Great suggestions, Ben Masel @ 9:58, for Operation Read The Bill as a strategy for constituents speaking to their Senators (if any can be found) this week...

One clarification: Because of the Unanimous Consent Agreement that Dodd and Feingold agreed to on Thursday, Feingold's six potential non-immunity amendments are moot, I believe. The Senate agreed to a total of three amendments to be debated and voted on 7/8 (all on immunity), prior to a final cloture vote: one amendment from Dodd/Feingold which needs a simple majority to pass (because the Republicans know that there aren't enough Democrats without Rockefeller - and Lieberman - to pass it, and two amendments which will need 60 votes to pass (because a few Republicans will favor those, including an amendment from Specter and a compromise proposal from Bingaman).

cboldt has good detail here (scroll down):

http://cboldt.blogspot.com/2008/06/groundhog-month-again-then-recess-again.html

I think my fall-back argument to the 11 Senators I highlighted would be to argue that if these legislators have any doubt at all about the Constitutionality of the (obscurely authorized and inscrutable) domestic spying program(s) - which even FISA experts can't decipher or describe by reading the new bill, they should make it a point not to vote for immunity - and thus vote against cloture to block it if immunity isn't amended out of the bill - in order to retain the checks and balances that would allow the courts to make that determination for them, as the Constitution provides. This, of course, assumes that these legislators value and honor the Constitution even where it rightly limits their power and the power of the Executive Branch to enforce "security measures" against our will and in violation of our inalienable rights, allegedly "for our own good."

[The Congressional Democrats] have failed in their oversight duties, and have failed to issue and/or enforce subpoenas (when asked about this, a Rockefeller aide told a group of us visiting his office that the Senator wished to keep relations with the Republicans "collegial") - ramoncreager

Yeah, because it's always important to remain "collegial" with a cutthroat mob of thugs and lawbreakers, isn't it, Jay The Autocrat Rockefeller? [Especially mobsters whose 'lively' personalities charm the patrician in you, like, say, that of your pal Kit Bond, who helpfully pointed out Thursday that H.R. 6304 contains "largely cosmetic" changes from the Pelosi-described "unacceptable" Senate bill that passed in February.]

Amendment to my preceding comment: I left the number "40" out when describing the number of votes needed to succeed in blocking cloture should Kennedy be absent. Remember that the proponents of invoking cloture are the ones who must reach 60 affirmative votes to do so. Anything that prevents that, including No votes and absent Senators, counts, whether it ends up totalling 39 Nos or 41 Nos.

Alter, in contrast, appears to be lying low; perhaps he realizes that, unlike what Olbermann said, his pronouncements were indefensibly ignorant.

Jonathan Alter emailed me on Friday with a pretty snide and insulting email, which I returned in kind. After a couple additional emails, the exchange became more substantive, constructive and civil. He originally demanded that I post the whole thing, but when I told him I didn't think it was particularly edifying for anyone - and that if he wanted to have the discussion in a more fruitful way, we should do so on Bloggingheads or somewhere - he rescinded his request.

He basically said that the Obama campaign believes that they only way they can lose is if McCain convinces the country he can't keep them safe. He also basically admitted that he was mistaken in saying -- on Olbermann -- that the new law is an improvement on the current state of things. He mistakenly assumed that the Protect America Act (which expired last February) was still the law, and hence, the current law was an improvement.

Both he and Olbermann heard the criticism loud and clear. That's one thing that has changed -- even the most insular media stars now not only hear criticisms of this sort, but feel compelled to answer. Alter was ultimately reasonable about it - I hope that Olbermann, on Monday, is as well. "Reasonable" doesn't mean agreeing with my point -- just acknowledging the clear weaknesses and poorly though-through claims in theirs.

Aloha!

Rex is in Berkely Springs, West Virginia.

I am afraid to look at her web site. @ www.surfdogsunsetbeach.com

My granddaughter won't allow me to get a haircut. I'll get a Amish bowl cut... (larry, moe, curly)

Pick two fingers? heh.

Surfdog says '"fun" is the middle name (no give a middle finger) of Surfdog. No say,`stupid leg.

Rex`ann really can speak about literacy of children. Adults should consider some truth maxims.

Farm Markets? The farm, Blueberry Hill Vegetables (CSA) Farm (small family) did a farmers market today. There not home yet. I have been too lame. I'm in a bona-fide, lame_profession, lately. "off-topic"

Aloha! Oahu. O, yea. hello.

Hawaiian Islands and Ohio.

Still no chance. Allen said "macaca", YOU'RE the one saying it's racist. There's a huge difference.

-- shooter242

"There's a huge difference". Yes, there is a "huge difference" between the one who is being racist and the one who calling out the one who is being racist. One is being racist, the other one isn't.

Macaca[1] is a pejorative epithet used by francophone colonialists in Central Africa's Belgian Congo for the native population.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macaca_(slur)

What in the hell is wrong with you, shooter?

i mean, all the much-heralded New Voters and Youth Support will vanish if this happens on a wide scale. young people are ideal and have powerful passions. it doesn't mean they are stupid.

This is a really important point. I think that Obama has less room to shift to some mythical "Center" because so much of the energy and electricity behind his campaign was built on the belief that he's different.

Most Obama supporters, I would guess, see him first and foremost as a politician and will give him the space to make cynical vote-getting calculations. But, as you say, much of th Youth/First-Time-Voter energy is built on a different premise -- it's about how the campaign makes them feel as much as it is about him as a candidate -- and if that evaporates, so, too, could much of what has made his campaign different.