Fitz and Feingold!

hwew– that was scary– got the CPU screen as soon as I hit submit. I’ll be checking in on DiFi and thanks for the information.

O/T James Webb - likely challenging Allen in the VA Senate race this fall will be on hardball tonight.

Don’t these people talk to each other?

I called the senator’s office and asked the lady I spoke with what the senator’s position was on the censure resolution. I got a long-winded answer about how the senator was looking at all the issues and will make her position known in the future.

I told the lady that I supported Feingold’s resolution and hoped that my senator would as well. The lady thanked me and asked for my zip code.

Oh, the hypocrisy!

There is nothing better than this to indicate to the grass roots - the party leadership does not have our interests at heart!

It is time to take over the party!

Why not? The fundamentalists did it to the Republicans, and look where it got them.

Let me let you in on a little secret.

The big decisions are made by small groups. While we are tending to our personal lives, a mere handful of party loyalists attend party meetings. They set the agenda, spend the money, decide which candidates to support.

Working people should begin attending these meetings, volunteering to work, accepting responsibility, and steering the agenda.

I truly truly hate DiFi I mean truly but I will hold my nose once again and contact her regarding this issue. you can’t get much more vested in the status quo in america than DiFi. and a homophobe too.

by the way Working for Change has this censure issue as their top action. good going.

http://www.workingforchange.co.....emId=20475

I am so gullible.
OT, thanks Susan, comment 90, previous thread. I signed the petition and emailed Allard.

Now wait, wait, wait…I just hung up from Feinstein’s office here in San Francisco seconds ago . . wherein the gentleman who answered the phone (PISSED) said that Ms. F has not issued a statement and that her web site has information regarding the “investigation regarding the wire taps”…

…and I shot over to our beloved Firedoglake to BITCH about how Mr. Pissed on the phone indicated “she’s has not made a statement as to censure of Commander Codpiece . . and poof . . here is Ms Feinstein’s pic and whoo hoo . . she’s supporting censure!

Hmmmmmmmm……………? Ms. F has freaked a lot of us local San Franciscans with her actions/votes over the years . . is she finally admitting to being a Democrat rather than a Repub. in Dem drag?

Move on just sent this for us to sign:

http://political.moveon.org/ce.....zw&t=1

I hate to say it but she might not have the guts for it. Basically she is a doormat. Poor woman. Still we got to work with her. Hold yer nose and call. Geebus, where in God’s name will we find a Dem who has a pair? We’re bein raped here and the Hill is sayin gee there may be some fine debate points but nothin actionable? I don’t think so.

Do they think no one will notice?

We must constantly remind ourselves that electing Democrats is, at best, a means and not an end in itself. So, we tear the levers of power out of the cold dead hands of the GOP while pushing the Democrats toward becoming a real alternative - not just less corrupt, but truly progressive. As Rummy would say, “It’s going to be a long, long war.”

Kerry said he would “absolutely” support the censure resolution. Did he? Where is he? According to the Globe, he is waffling:

link

He oughta be ashamed for not jumping right in with Russ.

EPU’d.

*just wondering: when is Feingold up for reelection? Has he been reelected since opposing the patriot act in 2001 and opposing the war?

*I called brownback’s office yesterday and the person answering the phone, who was clueless, said she would have a staff person who was familiar with the issue call me back. They didn’t. Better(?)than roberts’ office, which claimed not to know his position but did not offer to have someone call me back.

Pach - I don’t think you are a defeatist. But from your #29 last thread, I for one don’t want to throw the party away or not call them democrats. That is what I took as “not seeing the forest for the trees” more than “giving up” or perhaps better put, being exasperated with your party.

I think if we have any job, it is to guide the vichy (or pussy gnome) Dems along, kicking and screaming if we have, to a political world view where they actually represent something and do their jobs.

If I read too much into your post, my apoligies.

In support of my point, as this thread points out, give it time.

Okay…suck teaser headline giving our MIZZ F credit for doing something right … for once … only to find out . . she hasn’t.

now I can stop calling Mister Pissed at her San Francisco offices an asshole for not knowing what his boss was up to.

I guess I should read the entire post and not the headline.

So just pretend I never wrote the last sentence in 14 above.

If Feinstein is not supporting Feingold’s Resolution, then she deserves everything she gets from us, but remember, the censure of Clinton was an attempt to head of his impeachment by offering a less damaging alternative.

Still, ALL Senators, Democrat and Republican should support Feingold. They swore to uphold the Constitution, and all their other responsibilities should be in the service of this oath they took.

From the Raw Story article mentioned below:

One aide said that some senators felt the move went “too far.”

“I just think you know there’s was a concern among a number members of the caucus that this was going a little too far,” the staffer remarked. “The majority of the American people agree with what the president’s doing. A lot of people outside the beltway see this as a tool that’s keeping Americans safe.”

Can somebody please get these Democratic staffers a cable plan that includes at least one channel besides Fox News??? Or an ISP that doesn’t follow the military’s site-banning policies???

It’s enough to drive a guy to shoot someone in the face.

(Note to NSA readers: that last bit was a joke)

Jane

I love a good game of pool.

I think you just cleaned the table with that post.

Smoking hot shot!

Steven Leon says:
March 14th, 2006 at 10:35 pm

I’m more loyal to the progressive movement than to the democratic party, but if the party is going to be someone’s bitch, then I’m all for making it our bitch.

And yes, it’s a long war. I write about this on the front page this week here:

http://firedoglake.com/2006/03.....-tide-yet/

Hopefully the comments will transfer over at some point.

I just emailed DiFi
Senator Feinstein:
Senator Feingold said: “No one questions whether the government should wiretap suspected terrorists. Of course we should, and we can under current law.â€
Senator Feinstein, you voted for censure against President Clinton for sexual indiscretions between consulting adults. We need you, Senator Feinstein, to explain to the corporate media the difference between what Clinton did to Monica and what Bush is doing to the Consitution.

Hi,

I think the world of all of you (Jane, Redd, Glenn, etc.) and that the current gang on Pennsylvania Ave. is by far worse than any other in my 43 years on the planet.

That said, Bill Clinton didn’t have an impeachment trial because he got a blowjob, he got that honor for lying about the blowjob under oath.

While there is no comparison in the threat posed to our bill of rights posed by Bush’s lying and Bill’s lying, they are both examples of contempt for the rule of law.

His indiscretion with Monica notwithstanding, Clinton will go down (no pun intended) in history as a very successful president. However, the stain (pun intended) from his fling with Monica was probably instrumental in helping put the current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in office.

My political empathy is with you, but don’t think that your comparison of Huge Lie:Blow Job is appropriate. It’s more like Huge Lie:Lie.

Good luck with the web site.

She needs to be told that Feingold is an mensch.

Evil Parallel Universe says:
March 14th, 2006 at 10:38 pm

What I meant to convey in that post was that when these people fight, they are being democrats. Tomorrow they may qualify, or may qualify on another issue, but not this one.

In other words, the label is ephemeral, based on behavior.

That way we can reclaim the word, and the party, and define it in terms of action in support of democratic values.

OK, I e-mailed feinstein, told her to support the legislative branch of government and to support the democratic party. Asked her to represent me because my 2 repug senators do not. Don’t have a lot of faith in her. Maybe we should start a campaign to demand that she either endorse censure, or resign from the judiciary committee so that some democrat with a spine (if we can find one besides feingold) can serve on the committee.

OT: A comment of mine has been quoted on the front page of MyDD:

http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/3/14/173822/900

In the last thread, rwcole said: The guys I played with would have cut him a new one- if that’s the situation

And rightfully so. But they would have hustled for Russ’s rebound, and taken him to the woodshed after the game.

For our hostesses: the PREVIEW function is much missed. As if you don’t have a long enough list already :)

A lot of the comments assume that the best outcome is to have all the Dems commit to support quickly, and then we all go down to glorious defeat. I don’t see it that way.

I thought the point was not to make the vote an end in itself, but rather to provide a vehicle to continue discussion/debate about the fact that President is not following the law. Having lots of Senators say, “I want to here the evidence first,” or “we need an investigation,” is not per se bad, and when it’s said, it’s another chance to say, “but there’s not real investigation going on.”

The problem we had before Feingold’s action was that the matter was being swept under the rug, buried: the Intelligence Committeed was not going to hold hearings, and a new subcommittee of only seven senators would get more secret briefings — voila: problem solved, out of sight, out of mind.

So I think the point is to keep some movement alive towards genuine public debate and investigation. Keep the issue in the news. The Censure Motion is the vehicle. The moment it’s voted on, the discussion could end.

So what’s the feminine form of dinosaur? Dinosauress, dinosuarine, dinosaurette? Or is it just Difinosaur?

I just wrote to her and told her that I expected her to uphold her oath and hold the president to account or to resign.

neurophius– Feingold won re- election in 2004.

This is a very nice article about Feingold from myDD for your reading pleasure.
http://www.mydd.com/story/2006/3/8/43934/04010

Sort of OT: Salon has published ALL of the Abu Ghraib photos–with a detailed contestualization.

The timing is amazing.

The only thing “instrumental” in putting this boob in office is:

1. A 5-4 majority on the Supremes;

2. A stolen election in 04 (and 00 for that matter).

See:

20 Amazing Facts about US Elections

http://www.yuricareport.com/20.....tions.html

and:

The “controversy” over the exit polls/so-called “actual” results.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2.....exit_polls

I want my CA Senators on TV behind Russ. And right NOW! They owe it to us and the country. Time for pay back.

scarecrow says:
March 14th, 2006 at 10:52 pm

I agree with all of that.

You are spot on.

The goal also is to smoke out the members of the Dem caucus and push them ti act like democrats.

And that is precisely what we are doing.

James Webb on Tweety– replay @ 7pm– missed most of it.

Pachacutec — yes -smoke them out. Who are those guys? Because I know a few [hundred? thousand?] members of the Firedoglake Brigade who would like to have their phone numbers!

On my way home, where I can avoid work just as well as here.

So, when it fails I want My Senators BOTH to resubmit immediately. Every day if necessary. Ask for full Bill readings as well. Shut down the Hill until it gets passed then move on. Who has the nads? Let’s see.

Love the site upgrade. No preview for comments? Oh boy, look out for typos and bad grammar from Dover Bitch!

I am in such a bad today. The Dems are pathetic. The Feingold article on Raw Story absolutely boils my blood.

In my capacity as a constituent, I called Feinstein’s SF office. The guy who answered said he would pass on my concerns, and said “we’re getting a ton of calls on this. thanks for the call.”

Lou Dobbs on now–says not one of Feingold’s collegues has said they would support censure.

“Out of State” response from DiFi
“Thank you for sending me your electronic mail message. I appreciate your
taking the time to share your thoughts with me.
Because of the volume of e-mail that is received by my office, we can only
respond to email that includes a California postal address. Please resend
the text of your e-mail message, including your postal address, and I will
respond to you as soon as possible.
Should you need additional information about the Congress, or my offices
in Washington and California, please visit my homepage on the World Wide
Web. The address is http://feinstein.senate.gov.
Thank you again for contacting me, and I hope you will continue to do so
in the future.
Sincerely,
Dianne Feinstein
United States Senator”

currenlty both of Sen. Feinsteins numbers are busy.

lets keep calling her and tell her to stop complaining and go on the offensive.

CNN says censure a “long, long, long shot” and that it will suffer a quiet death.

You know the drill, of course. FDL’rs need to tell DiFi to get with it, AND copy Reid, AND thank Feingold.

Heading to another Democrat Meetup event tonight, hope nothing big happens here while I’m gone. Better yet, hope you’re all going to step out to a Meetup tonight, or at least locate one in your area and mark the next meeting on your calendar.

BTW, did anybody else notice that the speech by John Howard about Iraq is now DOA?
http://www.johnhowardpm.org/speech1817.html

Too much traffic, or hacked? Hmm.

Wow new template!

R2K

In re: John Casper #42 — any FDL’r got a California PO Box address we can use for replies from Ms. Feinstein? Or an underused phone number with a California area code to use in a fax header?

OMG - this site is soooo much better! God I hated the incessant scrolling required at the old site! Don’t like the kos-style comments tho - preferred the popup-haloscan…

Where’s Hillary? What about the presumptive nominee? What’s her stand, or she busy triangulating on the issue?

Russ Feingold’s courage is a mirror for all of the other scared demo bunnies. I have no hope that Sarbannes and Milkulski will do anything to support him. I did contact their offices and Reid too.

Specter and Frist’s faces yesterday was worth every bit of it. I thought Harry could have waited 5 minutes to make the announcement about Mrs. Inoya. It looked messy to me.

Well, some context is required:
1) DiFi proposed censuring Clinton to derail the impeachment — before it began, but was inevitable.
2) Her action lead to the birth of MoveOn.org.

I’m NOT saying she was right, or her continued Republican-light leadership role is right, but it is not as simple as she was trigger happy before and cowardly now.

(And frankly, as someone who has always voted for her in the past, I recognize the error of my ways and will not vote for her again. I’m really sad and disappointed by her, constantly.)

neurophius says:
March 14th, 2006 at 11:10 pm

Republicans started talking about impeachment and planting seeds for it in November, 1992. They got impeachment proceedings up and running six years later.

CNN does not know shit, except what anonymous establishment insiders say to them.

New comments are frustrating. My comment #13 got zapped, as if comment #14 is a reply to my comment. And no one has yet explained what the acronym EPU means when I’ve asked.

Does anyone have any explanation?

Tengrain - Hold on there pardner. She may be weak but she is still one of ours. Well, kind of. Hold yer nose and use whatcha got. Fer now. Let’s not shoot ourselves in the foot. k?

EPU is an advanced CPU — sorta like the 486 was an improvement on the 386 …

watou - Okay, I’l take a crack at it (EPU) this time. Hold on.

wilson - I think the guy is serious. I’ll do it.

Thanks for the reminder, Jane. I just emailed Sen. Feinstein.

Hopefully, her aides are starting to enjoy my emails, as I’m certain she never reads them personally.

Rich @ March 14th, 2006 10:47 pm

Clinton lied while being deposed for another matter altogether. He lied, I suspect, because at that moment he didn’t want his wife to find out he’d had an affair. What he did was illegal, and it’s certainly likely that in those same circumstances any of us would have been prosecuted.

But it’s nowhere near the same thing. Having contempt for a political process hiding behind the law is quite different from having contempt for a law that protects us as citizens and could have probably been changed to accomodate just about any reasonable surveillance procedure.

Ken Starr was a reprehensible little man who did more to foster disrespect for our government institutions than all of Clinton’s misdeeds put together. I’m not too fond of Clinton, but his guilt was in not facing up to something he did that really should have been a matter for him and his family. Starr and his enablers boned the country, and unlike Clinton, they’ve never apologized or shown the slightest remorse.

I got one of those e-mails from Feinstein saying she doesn’t respond to non-Californians. I had hoped that she would view her service on the important Judiciary Committee as representing all of us. I guess not.

watou, EPU refers back to Evil Parallel Universe. Often EPU would comment just before a new thread appeared.

EPU: Named after FDL comenter Evil Parallell Universe.

Describes the state of having one’s comments lost in the shuffle as the herd moves to another new comment thread.

Having constituents must be a real pain for the dems.

wilson, LMAO

My update, I did get through to Sen. Feinstein.
She does not yet have a position, but it sounded like the guy answering the phone was getting hammered by callers all day!

The ONLY poll that anyone should be citing (IMO) on surveillance is the ABA poll.

http://www.abanet.org/media/re.....21006.html

Above is a link to the ABA release on their position and it includes a link to the poll they had performed.

18%
18 per cent
eighteen per cent

of Americans said they thought it was ok for the President to suspend civil rights and liberties on his own whenever he felt it was prudent for national security.

A little over 50 (52)said he can’t and another 25% said he could with the support of either Congress or the courts. So that is 77% that said he can’t do and they would not support him doing, what he has done.

The ABA is the only poll that addressed the legal issues correctly and all the pundits, RNC, etc. polls have to be discounted as against a poll specifically formulated on the legal issues of what the President is doing and formulated by “The” national organization for lawyers in this country. The organization that Hatch and others were so quick to laud when it gave Alito a bye.

The ABA is the national voice - not grabbing their findings and poll and trumpeting them over and over again is, IMO, a mistake.

fwiw

more EPU info : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPU
it’s a disambiguation page …

Professor Foland says:

March 14th, 2006 at 10:51

Excellent point Prof- that’s exactly what we would have done- and as you are implying- the game isn’t over yet.

Russ is several steps ahead of the pack again. Poor guy. Still, we love him in Wisconsin, even if they don’t in Washington.

I knew Boxer would come through!

Feinstein, on the other hand, is a reluctant democrat.

Help her find her way!

Fax numbers for DiFi:

DC 2022283954
LA 2138945042
SF 4159566701
SD 6192395719
SAC 9164482563

watou - There once was this blog called Firedoglake. We just call it FDL now. So, way back a long time ago there was this feller Evil Parallel Universe (EPU). He had the unfortunate nack of posting at the very tail end of a thread the most well thought out comments. However, bc everyone was now lookin at the new thread the comments were never truly appreciated or even read. So, he started by reposting them as an OT to the new thread. This became a quite common event for this person that the phoenominon was later characterized as being EPU’ed or EPU’d. It happens everywhere. Not just FDL. So, EPU’s ghost is EVERYWHERE.

California PO box

Here’s one:

989029

West Sacramento

95798

(It’s AT&T–but you aren’t interested in reading the reply anyway are you?)

Boy, this place is really looking slick. Lovely job of design.

My only remaining quibble is with the disproportionate, or inverted, spacing between a comment and its author, compared to the comment and the following comment’s author. In other words, each comment is CLOSER to the name of the author of the following comment, than to the name of its own author.

A fix would be to either remove the blank line at the beginning of each comment (which doesn’t seem necessary), or else to create a wider gap between each comment block. The shadings don’t overcome the spacing issue, to my eye.

But congratulations on a tremendous aesthetic upgrade and improvement over the old site.

Wilson I don’t think Wiki helps anymore.

EPU may mean:

European Payments Union
Emergency Power Unit
The European University Center for Peace Studies is known as the EPU
This page concerning a three-letter acronym or abbreviation is a disambiguation page—a list of articles associated with the same title. If an internal link referred you to this page, you may wish to change the link to point directly to the intended article.
Retrieved from “http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EPU”
Category: Ambiguous three-letter acronyms

testing 1-2-3

Mary says @ March 14th, 2006 11:26 pm

Looks like a good poll. I wasn’t aware of any other that tried to cover the bases this well, either. There are bound to be people who figure this would have been OK if they had gotten the law changed. In some ways, I agree with that position.

[My last post was seven minutes ago, and I just got that message about posting every 15 seconds again. If this is a repeat post, I’m sorry.]

Rumsfeld is on C-Span saying that we are celebrating the 3rd anniversity of bringing Democracy to Iraq.

Feingold is the Little Engine That Could– FDL and others of the democratic progressive mindset need to get the rest of dem on da train!

A little railroad engine was employed about a station yard for such work as it was built for, pulling a few cars on and off the switches. One morning it was waiting for the next call when a long train of freight-cars asked a large engine in the roundhouse to take it over the hill “I can’t; that is too much a pull for me,” said the the great engine built for hard work. Then the train asked another engine, and another, only to hear excuses and be refused. At last in desperation the train asked the little switch engine to draw it up the
grade and down on the other side. “I think I can,” puffed the little locomotive, and put itself in front of the great heavy train. As is went on the little engine kept bravely puffing faster and faster, “I think I can, I think I can, I think I can.” Then as it near the top of the grade, that had so discouraged the larger engines, it went more slowly, but still kept saying, “I–think–I–can, I–think–I–can.” It reached the top by dint of brave effort and then went on down the grade, congratulating itself, “I thought I could, I thought I could.”

To think of hard things and say, “I can’t” is sure to mean “Nothing done.” To refuse to be daunted and insist on saying, “I think I can,” is to make sure of of being able to say triumphantly by and by, “I thought I could, I thought I could.”
http://tigger.uic.edu/~plotnick/littleng.htm

Bionic is correct. Wikipedia sucks, at least when it comes to defining EPU.

“78 ccmask says:

March 14th, 2006 at 11:35 pm
Rumsfeld is on C-Span saying that we are celebrating the 3rd anniversity of bringing Democracy to Iraq.”

Dumsfeld can go suck on a Cruise missle.

“78 ccmask says:

March 14th, 2006 at 11:35 pm
Rumsfeld is on C-Span saying that we are celebrating the 3rd anniversity of bringing Democracy to Iraq.â€

What’s this WE shit???

That would be a good long hard slog.

As I said on an earlier thread, I contacted Cantwell and Murray whose phone answrers were also pissed. they were also pissy when I called about Alito. You know, I’m tired of the people I vote for being pissy with me when I contact them. Who the Hell do they think they are?:(

Ms. Feinstein and her Defense Contractor husband cannot upset their financial apple cart by displeasing the Repugs

Maybe he thinks Iraqi’s are shooting in the streets cause they are celebrating!

“remember, the censure of Clinton was an attempt to head of his impeachment by offering a less damaging alternative.“

Incorrect, Ann. Check out this from BusyBusyBusy: “Update: A Timing Note. Commenter markbernstein suggests that Sen. Feinstein’s proposed censure resolution against President Clinton should not be held against her because it was offered as an alternative to impeachment. Alas, this was not the case. A completely different censure resolution proposed by House Judiciary Committee Democrats in early December 1998 was, in fact, intended to substitute for impeachment (it was voted down in committee). But the quotes above are from a resolution of impeachment censure Sen. Feinstein attempted to introduce on January 12, 1999, after President Clinton’s impeachment had already ended in acquittal. (link here

I am officially changing her name if she does not support Feingold, then she can’t share the same first syllable with him– she will be Di Lieberstein.

I wrote the following to my two senators (Lincoln and Pryor):

I strongly urge you to support Senator Feingold’s censure motion. Senator Feingold is factually correct that the President and his associates have committed a crime and that they have admitted they have committed a crime. Although President Bush has said there was no wire-tapping of US citizens except under FISA, this statement is not what he has since admitted. As a nation of laws, the President should set the BEST example, not the worst.

Furthermore, Senator Feingold’s motion is moderate in tone. I think this is the best approach to the problem — point out the problem and make the current administration realize that it is not above the law.

Given additional news reports and the modified testimony of AG Gonzalez, I think there are other, similar, illegal programs. The secrecy and illegal activities of the current administration should not be condoned.

Please stand behind a Senator who is simply doing the “right thing.â€

Virginia might be the state that helps us take back the Senate. Think I’m nuts?

Hold your nose and watch Hardball tonight well in 12 minutes actually. 7pm eastern

James Webb, Democrat, former Sec. Navy and well known author, is supposed to be on. He is a candidate that generates excitement. If he can win the primary, he could actually take Allen out.

That would also dampen the chances of President George Allen. Think about it.

angie–

“Di Lieberstein” ROFLMAO

Does she have “Dimentum”?

yep.

egregious says:
March 14th, 2006 at 11:49 pm

I’m going to watch it. He’s a blank slate to me at this point.

I want to be sure he’s no Zell Miller or Holy Joe before I offer support.

His home site has promised but offered no position statements. I want to be sure he’s not dodging, and not looking to the netroots to be his ATM.

Dimentum works for me if she flips.

I am beginning to see the outline of an FDL strategy. Yesterday, we mocked Joe Lieberman. Today, we mock Dianne Feinstein. Who will we mock tomorrow?

And for all you Feinstein staffers and supporters who don’t like what you are reading here, tell the senator to get behind her party’s new leader, Senator Russell Feingold.

Testing

The new layout is very appealing. It’s clean and easy to read. That’s very important when laying out information for people to read.

I commend Senator Feingold. So what if the execution of his brave and courageous act was not a choreographed, calculated, focus group-approved MTV moment. It the substance that matters and the focus should be on that.

Well, that seems to have worked.

Does anyone have a tally yet of the pro’s, con’s and undecideds?

neurophius - Right. New leader. New reality. Tell em to get behind the steamroller or we will put them in FRONT.

dannyboy - Whacho testin?

Tweety is bashing Bush on Iraq.

“A completely different censure resolution proposed by House Judiciary Committee Democrats in early December 1998 was, in fact, intended to substitute for impeachment (it was voted down in committee). But the quotes above are from a resolution of impeachment censure Sen. Feinstein attempted to introduce on January 12, 1999, after President Clinton’s impeachment had already ended in acquittal.”

shargash, I take back my statement giving Feinstein cover. How could she justify attacking Clinton is such a way?

What horror we Dems have to suffer at our elected officials hands! I still have to call people to organize canvassing for the Dems tonight. How can I go on when they do this stuff when they get elected?

egregious says:
March 14th, 2006 at 11:49 pm

Our ultimate goal is to build a progressive majority.

So, we fight and discredit Republicans and conservatism.

But to build a progressive majority, we also have two serious obstacles: 1) resistant establishment dems and 2) the establishment media.

We target them aggressivley as well. We try to play carrots and sticks with the later two, but we find aggressive smackdown generally gets the most results. Humor, mockery and snark are great weapons around here.

The Feingold censure push challenges us because we are crafting a positive campaign in support of a real dem who gets it.

So we have to artfully reward democrats who do well while shaming those who are unworthy of the party label.

That’s the FDL mission as I understand it. I think that covers everything we have done all these months, and I think Jane and Redd would agree.

If they’re not too busy with hosting transfer madness, they can comment, but I think they are busy right now.

So Bush and Dubai Ports World were lying:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/200.....s_security

They are not in the process of divesting the Dubai ownership of our ports.

Per comments above, Tweety and David Shuster are unloading on Bush on Iraq.

The blogspot site had a preliminary tally of the cunsure support roll, but that has not yet been transferred over, it seems.

I know Jane is looking for a new server host.

USA TODAY editor on Tweety says people no longer buy the line that the war in Iraq is part of the War on Terra.

Rich, Cujo
Clinton’s statement to the Grand Jury about “sexual relations†was made on a very narrow basis. The legal definition in use during the hearing was such that he believed that what he and Monica had done was outside that definition, and thus he could say that they had not ahead sexual relations as defined by the court. Sure, it’s weasely, but that’s what lawyers are paid to do, find cracks in the law to squeeze through. In A Man For All Seasons. Thomas More is being pressed to give his oath regarding the King’s second marriage, he tells his wife that if they [Henry VIII’s people] gave him the narrowest crack to squeeze through, he’s use it be out so quickly it would make their head spin. When Clinton was on camera and said to the world, “I did not have sexual relations with that womanâ€, that was a lie. It was an exceptionally stupid thing to say, but he wasn’t under oath; and it’s nothing at all like lying the country into war. Which should be considered a violation of his Oath of Office.

called Di’s offices and made the point that quite a few California’s are going to be extremely disappointed if Di won’t censure Bush when she was all too happy to censure Clinton.

That point seems to get phone answering person’s attention.

Coz, Pach, John, Wilson - ROTFL :)

I will be back tomorrow, or earlier if this BlueHost bandwidth thing works out. Unlike the office, where my connection flies and I had no probs this afternoon, for some reason the cable here at home is loading incredibly slowly if at all. So I am defenseless.

PS - I don’t mind the disambiguation gulag - anything to be a neologism.

Presnit to Iraqui peeps:
You have to ask yourself one question…
Am I better or worse off than I was 3 years ago?
The dead need not answer.

One wishes for spel check
Iraqi

EPU!

Today’s letter to Kerry: (too long,I know)

Dear Senator Kerry:

It is more than twenty-four hours since Sen, Russ Feingold spoke so honestly on the floor of the Senate with Sens. Frist and Specter looking on, among others. I watched the speech on CSpan2 and have read the text of this important action. As I read blogs last night, I became wrapped up in the excitement and relief expressed by every Democratic blogger and commenter that finally, after facing that elephant in the room for years, a Democratic Senator was fulfilling his oath of office and addressing the crimes of the Bush Administration.

I don’t know how Sen. Feingold handled this with the Democratic caucus. There is speculation he acted alone as well as thought that he discussed it and was encouraged not to do it at all. I am sure that Democratic Senators knew what he planned and that there were discussions about it among Dem Senators. What I, and the Dems in the blogosphere, cannot understand is how in the world we are seeing so little support for his brave leadership from the party in this. Speaking for myself only, I am rigid with anger that again our elected leaders are unwilling to assertively address these serious and illegal actions on the part of the Bush administration.

It is my understanding from calling Congressional offices across the country today and reading others’ reports of thier conversations with Senators such as Clinton, Schumer, Feinstein and Kennedy (Kennedy!!!) that they are waiting for the results of an investigation into the domestic spying program before they agree to support the proposed action. In the Senators words from his speech, “That is ridiculous!”.

If we have learned anything from this administration and from this Congressional Majority it is that there will be no investigation and they will circle the wagons and delay in every possible way the evidence gathering and Committee meetings required for “thier” version of an appropriate investigation. This President has no interest in allowing oversight of this or any other spying and he does not care what the American Public thinks of him or his friends. You know this as well as anyone.

Democrats are running out of time as this administration erases our civil liberties and Constitutional protections one by one. We cannot understand what you’re waiting for when an overwhelming majority of us support making this president take responsibility for his lies and crimes through legal Congressional measures. There are millions of us who support Impeachment on the lies leading us to Iraq alone, much less the litany of other crimes they have committed. Supporting Censure is a much different action that moving to Impeachment, and costs far less than appearing to be in disagreement about this very basic issue, the illegal NSA domestic spying program. What are Democrats so afraid of? This president has a 36% approval rating and yet the opportunity is missed to finally and vigorously support Censure.

Am I sorry to be a Democrat? Yes, if my elected leaders are unwilling to uphold thier oath to protect my constitutional rights.

Please support censure; please give us back our country, and yours. It is dying, slowly but surely.

Sincerely