They all want to be re-elected. With the exception of Feinstein (whose *yes* vote on this completely baffles me), these are all Dem Senators from conservative states. They’re just representing them what brung ‘em. You think any of these people would cast a vote that would NOT promote their own re-election?

They wouldn’t. This grandstanding is just that. But it does have a purpose. It’s to allow the GOP and certain at-risk Dems to show they’re not commies.

Me? I’m sending more money to MoveOn.

Remember, our system has ALWAYS been like this. This is nothing new. And, sadly, it was pretty much designed to be this way. Until more Dems are elected, so that the conservative Dems can get some cover, this is how it’s gonna be.

so any senator who voted for the boxer amendment voted to condemn moveon. roll call vote.

and only one D senator voted against this – Senator Russ Feingold.

quoting pach from above:

It’s important to understand, folks: this is not just an attack on MoveOn.

This is an attack on you. It’s an attack on all the netroots, the progressive base and the anti-war movement. There are Democrats who are secretly willing to align their interests with those of the White House to keep you from gaining power.

Please hit the phones. Don’t let them. This is not just about MoveOn. It’s about all of us. All of us are under direct attack.

we have one ally in the senate. one.

i just called my senators’ offices to ask why they voted to condemn moveon. no answer at senator kennedy’s office. at senator kerry’s office, i was read a statement that just makes me sick.

There IS a monolithic lobby. It is an essential asset of the Israeli state, whether its government is a hawkish one or a dovish one (when was the last dovish one, by the way).

FWIW, Mearsheimer and Walt are adamant that the Israel Lobby is NOT monolithic. They make this point in their book, and I’ve heard it from them in person. And they go into details about the differences among different groups and individuals involved. IIRC, they said a bit about that in their recent LA Times interview. See #335.

Ds voting “yes” (to condemn moveon)

Baucus (D-MT)
Bayh (D-IN)
Cardin (D-MD)
Carper (D-DE)
Casey (D-PA)
Conrad (D-ND)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Johnson (D-SD)
Klobuchar (D-MN)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Leahy (D-VT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
McCaskill (D-MO)
Mikulski (D-MD)
Nelson (D-FL)
Nelson (D-NE)
Pryor (D-AR)
Salazar (D-CO)
Tester (D-MT)
Webb (D-VA)

Ds not voting;

Biden (D-DE)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Obama (D-IL)

no Rs voted “no”
…..

leahy’s vote has me really depressed. (not that i feel good about webb, tester and the rest)

Christy Hardin Smith @ 107

Kathleen — You know, the “Israeli” lobby is not a monolithic one. You’d be more accurate to say the neocon lobby there. There are a lot of Israeli political groups working toward peace, reconciliation and such — just because they don’t get a lot of media play in this country doesn’t mean they don’t exist and that they don’t deserve our support. And denegrating all of Israel as a monolithic entity is insulting for the progressive caucuses there and here who support change in policies. I’m just saying…

I’ll stick up for both Christy and Kathleen here. We need better definitions in this arena. We can’t even use the specific term or abbreviation for the lobbying group Kathleen really means, without having our comments lost for ten to forty minutes in moderation.

On Monday, WaPo ran a hit piece, allegedly directed against Rep. Jim Moran (Dem. VA) for Moran’s comments at the end of an article by Michael Lerner about the new Walt and Mearsheimer book titled the same as the term to which Christy objects. But Marc Fisher’s hit piece, full of some outrageous distortions, is really an attack against the alternative, rational pro-Israeli groups to which Christy alludes.

To get this subject on topic, the lobby to which Kathleen refers is pushing hard behind the scenes to get a similar “sense of the House” resolution against Moran for his comments to which I refer in the lower link above. Again, this would also be an attack on the emerging lobby to which Christy refers and in which many of us hold our hopes.

The guy to ask here to explain all this is Philip Weiss, who has been forced out of jobs at the NY Observer and The Nation by the lobbying group to which Kathleen refers.

That makes sense

I don’t want to belong to either of them. They’re both full of cr*p.

Biodun @ 245

OMG!!!

Ditto. It’s a hitlist against free speech, and against those working for peace. I have read the article about the I*rael Lobby, but this is far worse than I thought.

By a twist of fate, I recently had dinner with the authors of that article, which they recently expanded into a best selling book that has 463 pages, 104 of which are footnotes. There have been two articles about them and their book in the LA Times in the past two weeks, this and this. Note the contrast. The first one accurately reflects what they actually said in person and in their book. The second, uses a caricature of their mesage as a strawman.

Kathleen @ 64

Good question David Gregory. Kept digging “no comment”

I missed David’s question. What was it?

he asked what Bush thought of the pre-emptive attack on Syria by Israel? No comment. Gregory asked again “no comment”

I think this is really great stuff.

The repukes are shooting themselves in the foot.

I’d like to see a real general strike to shut the country down to show how the people feel. Shut the whole country down for a day or protest.

PEOPLE PLEASE DIRECT ACTION

Um, no. They shot the Democrats, and the Dems said THANK YOU SIR MAY I HAVE ANOTHER! Then the Dems took the guns and shot themselves in the other foot.

On a general strike: hell yes. I am amazed, and I guess I shouldn’t be, how even this dumbed down lazy and out of touch general public is actually SMARTER and more tuned in than our representatives and media. Nothing will change if we wait for our reps to do it. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. Nothing. And not even in Jan 09 when Hilary is ordained to take power, either.