Why don't Feinstein and the rest of the Democrats who fell into the GOP's spider web just close up shop (officially, that is) and go home? They've done all but make it official. The voters won't notice. The Republicans might, only when they realize they have no one to bait.

And Clinton: I see you've been practicing Twister a lot. You've turned political "flexibility" into an art form.

I always thought that Senator Dayton was the quiet "brother" of our beloved Paul Wellstone. What has happened to him? I believe he voted as a "weak" democrat on another issue and I was sooo disappointed.

"Countless men and women have died defending that flag," said Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., closing two days of debate. "It is but a small humble act for us to defend it."

Did all those men and women die to defend the flag? Really? Did they think, "Go ahead, screw our freedom, just don't touch that flag?" I hardly think so. It's so ironic that many on the right want to use their sacrifices to deny the very freedom they died to defend.

It is contemptable that any bastard who deliberately and methodically avoided military service in his youth would now have the gall to climb up on the dead bodies of generations of our soldiers and proclaim that he is the one to decide and define exactly what these men and women died for.

There is now a federal law against low-life scum who buy phony war medals on the Internet and claim that they earned them in the service of our country. Those people really should be ashamed of themselves, but they value the glory they were too cowardly to gain for themselves more than they value their self-respect.

I want a federal law against any low-life bastard, including Bill Frist, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove, for claiming to speak for our war dead, when in fact, they quivered in fear and connived like hell to get out of serving our country. They really should be ashamed of themselves.

Frist and others really should be ashamed of themselves, but they value the glory they were too cowardly to gain for themselves more than they value their self-respect.

They'll eventually stop saying stupid crackpot nonsense and acting like shitflinging primates. The Senate has become a den of useless twittering cronies who are better off ignored. It's not as if we have three fully functioning branches of government anyway. Or 2 or even one. The Senate has become for the most part a wing of the RNC's media engine, telling us who to be terrified of and which bed to hide under, unless there are same sex couples in the bed. I think in the end the Senate will become no more relevant than the House of Lords full of faux aristocrats with more money and inbreeding than brains and little to do.

What is the deal with him? He's not even running for re-election! He was willing to risk putting this amendment on state ballots as Republican red meat for years to come on what principle?

The flag does not belong only to the military. It is no coincidence that young people get all flag-wavy and want to 'serve their country' by joining the military when they don't have the opportunity or skills to do anything else.

Many people 'serve their country' without joinging the military. The flag belongs to everyone, including advocates for peace and justice, human rights workers, the Democratic Party and the ACLU. They have a better understanding of what the flag and the Constitution represents than do most of the flag-wavers in the military or Congress.

Burning the flag is not a positive political statement and demonstrates a lack of imagination, but burning it sends a powerful message. It surly shows the flag more respect than driving around with a tattered flag on your Hummer or wearing a flag lapel pin while you stomp all over the values it portrays.

I already knew that there was little chance of me voting for Fein-Repub again. She was a horrible mayor, she was pretty homophobic too, and she's just been about useless. I won't vote for her unless it looks like some freak real republican who is somehow worse might win. Finally, Finally, i really do think a 3rd party is an option.

Check out Webb's response to Allen's flag waving attack. I've had my reservations about Webb's credentials as a Democrat. But its nice to know that if he's now a Democrat, he intends to be one with "gumption". Hopefully the Democratic Party can find and field other candidates with the will to fight. Just rolling over and playing nice has not worked very well. We need folks with the guts and ability to stand up for true American values- like those stated in the Bill of Rights.

Several reports on the flag burning ammendment vote point out that it's a waste of time for the Senate to spend two days discussing this when there are more important things to do.

But is there really any reasonable expectation that the Senate is ever interested in important things? My impression is they're activities are generally irrelevant or harmful, and perhaps the best we can hope for is that they spend their days spinning their wheels on things which truly are without impact on anyone's daily life.

It's good to point out, over and over, how much this is crass political pandering.

But Tim, avoid straw men; did Orrin Hatch *really* say this "really is the No. 1 issue in America today"?

Or is that your exaggerating the inference you draw from it being discussed and voted on at all?

You know very well that there are thousands of bills discussed and voted on which are pretty trivial and could be attacked if the Senator behind them had to defend it as the "the No. 1 issue in America today". That's hyperbole and manages to be unfair, somehow, which in this case is not easy to do.

On the other hand, if he really said that, please put the deserved double quotes around it so he gets full shame.