Does this mean that she's found an angle of investigation that won't implicate her? That'd be impressive.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:01 PM by ethan

Please please please

Posted July 10, 2008 3:13 PM by Stefan Jones

I wonder if this is about timing? They finally feel that the impeachment wouldn't actually go through until he's officially out of office. That way we don't get Cheney, we don't get Pelosi herself accused of power-grabbing, and we still get something that vaguely resembles justice.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:16 PM by Leah Miller

She could have done it a whole lot earlier. Like a year ago. The investigations would have been worth it, if only for the entertainment value of watching two-legged cucarachas running for cover.

Why do I have the feeling this is going to go nowhere, and all those cucarachas will make it safely into the shadows again?

Posted July 10, 2008 3:17 PM by P J Evans

Can has, pls.

Also, if Obama wins, I want Dennis Kucinich in a senior cabinet post. Director of DHS would be nice. Or Sec. Of State. I don't think he's a lawyer, but if he is, AG would be perfect.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:21 PM by Josh Jasper

I have to say that it feels to me like a smokescreen to cover the shameful Democratic behavior on FISA.

"Hey, we're not so bad! Look, we're willing to impeach!"

Posted July 10, 2008 3:25 PM by Debbie

PJ Evans @4:

I'm getting a different vibe -- could this be the biggest bait-n-switch operation ever pulled?

That is, they give Bush the FISAfiasco bill and then turn around and start impeachment hearings.

I find it very interesting that Kucinich has narrowed it down to ONE charge.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:27 PM by Lori Coulson

an impeachment during a presidential election while we're in the middle of two wars ?

nah guh hapn

Posted July 10, 2008 3:37 PM by cleek

I can't help feeling this must be a cynical ploy. If not, and she finally grew a pair,* hooray!

*Of ovaries, of course

Posted July 10, 2008 3:38 PM by Xopher

I was wondering what kind of signing statement Shrub issued on that bill when he signed it this morning.
It was perhaps too much to ask for, that the rose bushes would do a sudden growth spurt and hedge him in permanently, or maybe just wrap around him and pin his arms to his sides.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:39 PM by P J Evans

In related news:

Rove ignores subpoena, refuses to testify

I hope they send the Master at Arms out to arrest Karl Rove.

I hope there's a rule on the books that he can be confined in the stocks and pelted with rotten fruits and vegetables by the good folk of the town until his hearing.

I hope the good folk of the town have plenty of durian.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:39 PM by Stefan Jones

Impeachment is only the first step. It strips them of executive privilege and immunity, and makes them eligible for charging with war crimes.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:41 PM by j h woodyatt

Gotta impeach Cheney first. If only because I don't think you could get much out of Bush. There's likely nothing in that noggin of his but fond memories of clearing brush. As was planned.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:51 PM by Stefan Jones

It also opens the door to impeachment of any Federal officers (Cheney, Rove, AGAG, Addington, Yoo, Libby, et alia) who aided and abetted Bush.

Why is this important? If these people ARE impeached it prevents them from ever holding another Federal office* and strips them of the bennies (no pension, no health insurance...) And, yes, it means they can be charged with war crimes.

*This is what should have happened to the Iran Contra bunch.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:52 PM by Lori Coulson

I've always thought that any road to effective impeachment started with signs that read "We will follow this investigation wherever it leads." Jumping straight to impeachment never seemed like a way to build the consensus that would be necessary to force a president or vice president from office.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:52 PM by Doug

Bushes Third Term: 25 to Life...

Let's reopen Alcatraz, and leave him there alone. His only allowed human contact will be when supplies are brought in by members of the SF Rainbow community...

Posted July 10, 2008 3:54 PM by Edward Oleander

Stefan Jones @13 -- Not necessarily, we're talking about holding a hearing. Said hearing may produce evidence that would compel the Judiciary committee to recommend that the House file articles of impeachment...

And those could be for ANY number of individuals, not just Bush.

Posted July 10, 2008 3:57 PM by Lori Coulson

#16: No. He and Cheney should be sentenced to pick up litter along busy highways. Ones with lots of poison oak along the margins.

Posted July 10, 2008 4:05 PM by Stefan Jones

Edward 16: His only allowed human contact will be when if supplies are brought in by members of the SF Rainbow community...

FTFY. Also I think it should be LWOP, not 25-to-Life.

Posted July 10, 2008 4:06 PM by Xopher

Stefan @18: I think Bush and Cheney are so poisonous that the poison oak/ivy would die on first contact.

Posted July 10, 2008 4:07 PM by Lori Coulson

This should have happened 2-3 years ago. Now it's revenge, not justice.

I also think this is more a way of making again the election "about Bush", rather than about Obama (who is now much weaker since the end of the primary).

Posted July 10, 2008 4:16 PM by Giacomo

Giacomo, Obama shot himself in the foot with his vote on FISA. His campaign called me last night, asking if I wanted to volunteer -- and I told them that there was no way I'd help him now, that the FISA vote was the dealbreaker for me.

Obama was not and never has been the candidate I wanted in the Oval Office. I have not decided if I will vote for him in November or write in John Edwards.

Posted July 10, 2008 4:21 PM by Lori Coulson

Lori:

Every vote is a compromise. You don't get points in heaven for holding true to a principle while allowing things to get worse on earth.

Posted July 10, 2008 4:29 PM by Kevin J. Maroney

Thanks, Kevin -- maybe I'll have cooled down enough by November to vote for him. Right now I'm very angry.

I suspect that the words "Supreme Court" will have the chilling effect needed to counter my current ill-will.

I wish there was a Presidential candidate in the current race that I could feel good about voting for... I guess that's asking too much of the Kindly Ones.

Posted July 10, 2008 4:37 PM by Lori Coulson

I'm voting for Obama but sending my big campaign contribution to the ACLU instead.

I'm still contributing to the local Democratic party, the general congressional reelection fund, and maybe the legislative fund.

Posted July 10, 2008 4:44 PM by Stefan Jones

Kevin, what has us ticked off, even the lukewarm people like me, is that he didn't even do that. He told us he'd vote against it, he gave support for opposition to it by words ... and he voted with and for the bad guys.
He wants to be a leader, he can f*cking well try leading. (I do wonder how much of this was brought in by the people he took on from Clinton's campaign. Before that, he was pretty good; after, meh.)

I'll vote for him, but the only money he's getting from me after July 1 will be that from the 'Get Disappointed by Someone New' bumperstickers I ordered last weekend.

Posted July 10, 2008 4:46 PM by P J Evans

Personally, I wouldn't contribute to the DCCC directly either; money flows to the likes of Steny Hoyer and Rahm Emanuel that way, either for them to use or to direct to candidates they like. In the past, that's meant more Blue Dogs. I'd pick individual candidates through BlueAmerica or ActBlue or their equivalents.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:00 PM by Linkmeister

I can't help thinking that there is a relationship to the FISA amendment. Did Bush sign it yet?

Either enough people now have their asses covered that they feel they hang Bush out to dry with what is publicly known without risking getting themselves dirty, or some maneuver more brilliant than I can imagine just took place.

I would bet money on the former if I were inclined to bet, but I'll keep my fingers crossed.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:01 PM by Chris Quinones

Every vote is a compromise. You don't get points in heaven for holding true to a principle while allowing things to get worse on earth.

Yup, and the reason Obama had my vote was very simple. He didn't vote for the Patriot Act. With the FISA vote, he's successfully become part of the same establishment that is trying very hard to disenfranchise me... and anyone else who is foolish enough to not have a credit card and a passport.

Now, I don't know what I'll do. (beyond write a sternly worded letter explaining to the man exactly *what* FISA, the Patriot Act and Real ID do)

Posted July 10, 2008 5:01 PM by Emily

Addendum: you could think of the DCCC as a mutual fund. You might have better results picking individual stocks.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:01 PM by Linkmeister

If Bush is impeached for lies about the need for a war in Iraq....

It doesn't look very good for Tony Blair and Gordon Brown over on this side of the Atlantic.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:07 PM by Dave Bell

I can at least say that both of my Senators as well as my Representative opposed the immunity deal. (One of the senators didn't vote yesterday, but Kennedy had a good excuse and his vote wouldn't have swung it anyway.)

Obama began losing his chance at my money when he taped ads supporting John Barrow in Georgia's primary; the immunity wiggle-waffle made it clear that he wasn't interested in my money at all, and after his vote for the bill, well....

I live in Massachusetts, so it's not like losing my vote will cost him the state. That makes it awfully tempting to either vote for a third party candidate who's not a whackjob (if any are available on the MA ballot) or to write in a different Democrat.

It's probable that I'll be less angry by November, but I currently can't imagine anything Obama can do (and I mean do, not promise, since I can't trust his promises) to regain my trust before then.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:18 PM by Christopher Davis

#28
Earlier today. In the Rose Garden. With a wrench and Col Mustard ....

I don't know what kind of signing statement he attached to it, but I'd bet there is one.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:22 PM by P J Evans

I think I might be one of the few people who feels that Obama was very shrewd with his vote on FISA.

For some reason, he felt that he had to make that vote. I’m not going to try to read his mind. He had a reason. He didn’t do it without some calculation on what it would mean for his campaign. He knew that it would anger his netroots supporters, but (and this is the shrewd part) he knew that this is July and the election isn’t happening until November. I assume he realized that he would take a hit in his fundraising in the short-term, but he probably has money enough to last him a while still. He knew that the voters who would be most angered by his FISA vote were people of principle, and, therefore, people who would vote for the candidate that most represented their principles, which is Obama (certainly not McCain). All Obama needs is time for the FISA anger to die down and common sense to inform the netroots people that they need to vote for him. And, as I mentioned above, he has the time.

In the end, Obama gets to make an unpopular vote and win an election.

What a shrewd bastard he is. I almost respect him more after this for his political savvy.

Almost.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:22 PM by Joe J

Pelosi isn't opening the door, she's passing the buck. She's going to have the committee shoot it down so she doesn't have to take any more flak for it.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:26 PM by Matt Alan

::holds breath, closes eyes, wishes really really hard::

Posted July 10, 2008 5:32 PM by Nora

Well, at least Bush signing the new FISA bill is another impeachable offense.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:33 PM by Earl Cooley III

Hey, here's another brick for the wall:

Conyers Demands Special Counsel

Posted July 10, 2008 5:34 PM by Lori Coulson

#34
Optimist.
Obama hasn't been forthcoming on his reasons for shredding the Constitution.
He has to have known that was what the bill does; the only possible excuse is that he didn't read it (which is the only excuse a lot of them have, and it's like wet tissue paper in quality.)

Posted July 10, 2008 5:36 PM by P J Evans

Stefan #11:

And here's committee chairwoman Linda Sanchez on why Rove is full of the well-known article. Inspiring reading.

Posted July 10, 2008 5:53 PM by joann

whether President Bush should be removed from office for lying to Congress and the American public when he sought congressional approval back in 2002 for taking military action to invade Iraq

2002-10-01: FAULTY INTELLIGENCE: the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) is sent to Congress days before lawmakers voted to authorize use of military force against Saddam. The report states with “high confidence” that Iraq “has now established large-scale, redundant and concealed BW agent production capabilities.” It said “all key aspects” of Iraq’s offensive BW program “are active and that most elements are larger and more advanced than they were before the Gulf War.”

The presidential commission would state that this assessment was “the most important and most alarming” judgements in the document, and was based largely on information from Curveball. Even though in the last few months the CIA had flagged Curveball’s biggest corraborator as a liar and even though Germany had told the CIA that they thought Curveball was a fabricator, the NIE says it has “high confidence” on what amounts to Curveball’s fantasies.

The NIE report also states the aluminum tubes are for centrifuges even though every expert who looked at them said they wouldn't work as a centrifuge and were likely rocket fuselages.

2002-05-xx: The CIA had said that three sources corroborated Curveball’s stories of mobile bioweapons factories. All would turn out to be frauds. The most important corroborator, a former Major in the Iraqi intelligence service, was deemed a liar by the CIA and DIA in May 2002 and a fabricator warning was posted in U.S. intelligence databases.

2002-01-01: Captured terrorist Ibn al-Shaykh al-Libi is tortured by US agents. During this time, al-Libi claims that al Quaeda sent operatives to Iraq to acquire chemcial and biological weapons and training. In Feb 2002, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) states al-Libi “has been undergoing debriefs for several weeks and may be describing scenarios to the debriefers that he knows will retain their interest”. (Apparently, “debriefing” is code for “torture”.) Even though the DIA doubts al-Libi’s claims, CIA Director, George Tenet, authorized the use of al-Libi’s claims in Secretary Powell’s Feb 2003 speech to the UN.

By the time the NIE report was sent to congress in October of 2002, every piece of intelligence had multiple red flags against it to flag them as highly suspect. Yet the report told congress that intelligence agencies had "high confidence" in the accuracy of the report.

2002-09-xx: Cheney and Scooter Libby make about 10 trips to CIA headquarters, where they personally questioned analysts. To some in the CIA, it looked like the vice president himself was determined to control the content of the National Intelligence Estimate (NIE). One former CIA officer tells PBS, “I was at the CIA for 24 years. The only time a Vice President came to the CIA building was for a ceremony, to cut a ribbon, to stand on the stage. But not to harangue analysts about finished intelligence.”

http://www.warhw.com/us-handwavium-in-iraq/

The lying with the intelligence given to congress is so absolutely blatant that I can't imagine anyone being able to defend it. I would think that all it would take to get an impeachment would be to simply pull the trigger and get all the intel out in the open in one place.

But I'm biased, so....

Posted July 10, 2008 5:59 PM by Greg London

#39

Don't get me wrong. I want to see the telecom companies in court for what they did, and I really like the fourth amendment as it is. If I had a vote, I would not have voted for that bill. I don’t think Obama should have voted for it either. He should have filibustered it as he had threatened before.

And yet, I can’t help thinking that he had some very compelling reason to vote for it. I can’t imagine that he was ignorant of the flack he would take for his vote. He must have known that voting this way would hurt his popularity with a large block of his supporters. And yet, he still did it. Maybe it’s just me, but I find that fascinating. I really wish I knew what he was thinking.

On top of that, I’m really impressed by how gutsy a move this is. Most politicians are too frightened of alienating voters to even try voting against their supporters wishes. Obama may be wrong, but he has guts enough to do unpopular things.

Of course, this doesn’t change my vote in November. So long as Obama is the Democratic nominee for president, I’ll vote for him. (I’ll never vote for a 3rd party or Republican. And staying home is not an option.) But, at least now, I have no illusions about his saintliness. He is (and always was) a shrewd politician above all else.

To put it simply, one does not go form near total obscurity to presidential frontrunner in less than a decade without being a master politician. As much as I dislike what he's done, I have to respect his skills.

Posted July 10, 2008 6:00 PM by Joe J

That should read "supporters' wishes" above.

Posted July 10, 2008 6:09 PM by Joe J

Joe, try this one:
www.salon.com/politics/war_room/2008/07/10/obama_fisa/

Posted July 10, 2008 6:14 PM by P J Evans

#42: And yet, I can’t help thinking that he had some very compelling reason to vote for it.

Sure. He wanted the president to have those powers -- because he thinks (with some good reason) that he'll be president in six months or so.

Obama's a very good politician, and supports a lot of good things. I will vote for him, and perhaps even work for him. But if he couldn't have gotten this far without being a master politician, he wouldn't have gotten this far without being very ambitious.

Politicians don't run for office to diminish the power of those offices -- even the good ones who basically want good things. (And in case anyone wonders, yea, I think that if Obama & Clinton's positions were reversed, their votes would have been too.)

This is, of course, the whole point of the "checks and balances" idea.

The disappointment here, really, isn't Obama (or for that matter McCain) -- the two votes here that, in some sense, I'm least disappointed in. (I mean, sure, I wish they'd done the right things. I'd like a pony, too.) The disappointment is in all the other members of Congress -- who didn't stand up for the powers of their branch.

I don't think we can count on politicians, even the best, to check themselves. The problem is when we can't count on politicians to check others -- even members of the other party. (Yeah, dems may think they'll win in November -- but for now, it's about Bush. And if not them, then it should've been the Republicans.)

Obama had a reason -- a good one, in a pragmatic but not moral sense. It's the rest of them that we ought to worry about.

SF

Posted July 10, 2008 6:30 PM by Stephen Frug

Huh. Maybe it's time once again to pull out this bumper sticker I designed a few years ago:

image
cafepress link

Posted July 10, 2008 6:45 PM by Evan

Well, shoot, the links didn't work. Retry:

image
cafepress link

Posted July 10, 2008 6:46 PM by Evan

No Impeachment will ever happen, as much as we'd like it and DK fights for it. Conyers has lost his courage....this is just a cynical move by Pelosi.
Joe J., I am amazed that you can call Obama shrewd...unless he plans to use those powers to be a really BAD Prez and if that's so, he's just another power-hungry megalomaniac. I have lost ALL respect and WILL NOT vote for the man. This tears it after the "big Military" crap, support for Israel...blah, blah...He might just blow the election at this rate. He just got worse than Hillary!

Posted July 10, 2008 7:05 PM by Papawhale

P J Evans #39: Obama hasn't been forthcoming on his reasons for shredding the Constitution.

Although it's not customary until after the two major party's national conventions, maybe he received a national security briefing (as one of the two leading presidential candidates) that scared the hell out of him. That, at least, would be plausible.

Posted July 10, 2008 7:11 PM by Earl Cooley III

#42 Joe J:
And yet, I can’t help thinking that he had some very compelling reason to vote for it. I can’t imagine that he was ignorant of the flack he would take for his vote. He must have known that voting this way would hurt his popularity with a large block of his supporters. And yet, he still did it. Maybe it’s just me, but I find that fascinating. I really wish I knew what he was thinking.

Joe J, the only speculative reason I've heard that even comes close to being acceptable is that there was simply no way that FISA was going to be voted down. No way, no how, not even if Obama voted against it and led the filibuster against it. And Obama voting for it, looking like a flip-flopper and pissing off his base, is less embarrassing than being unable to lead the Democratic Party in voting it down.

That argument assumes that there are a couple dozen Democratic Senators who are cowardly enough to vote for it, no matter what. I can't decide if I dislike the argument because it's an unreasonable assumption, or because it's sadly a reasonable assumption.

#45 Stephen Frug: The disappointment is in all the other members of Congress -- who didn't stand up for the powers of their branch.

Exactly. I could sort of understand it through 2006, with the Republicans being too gleeful about power and war to bother with checks and balances, but we have a Democratic Congress now. Most of those seats are likely to be safe, based on the projections of voter turnout this fall. And Bush has maybe a 20% approval rating right now. So what on earth are they afraid of?

Posted July 10, 2008 7:13 PM by Becky

#42: And yet, I can’t help thinking that he had some very compelling reason to vote for it.

#45: Sure. He wanted the president to have those powers

Were there any public polls showing how the American public as a whole stood on the FISA bill?

I get the impression that Obama partly thought the the bill wasn't that bad, and partly thought that if he votes against it, it might kill his chances of getting elected.

I mean seriously, Bush still has a 25% approval rating for christ's sake. that's 75 million people who support the worst president in history and some of them can vote.

While people here understand the issue with this new law, I think it might be safe to say that a lot, hell a majority, of americans don't know enough about it to NOT be swiftboated into thinking that voting against this bill is hating america or something.

I'd like to think it came down to lobbyist money, but the fact that half this country is scared witless and will believe just about anything Fox News tells them is sort of hard to ignore.

I keep trying to get to the root cause of this vote, and nothing is really convincing me that it was anything other than representative of what American voters think. And it depresses the hell out of me.

I'm not a huge fan of the V for Vendetta movie, but one scene I thought really spoke the truth was V's broadcast where he lists all the problems with the government, and then goes through a list of people that could be blamed, and then says in the end, "I blame you" or something.

Bush had the highest approval rating of any president right after 9/11, and the guy is an idiot. so what can you expect.

A Democracy is no better than the sum total of the people in it.

Posted July 10, 2008 7:21 PM by Greg London

"...He must have known that voting this way would hurt his popularity with a large block of his supporters entities with a proven track record of mobilizing votes....."

Fixed it for you.

Posted July 10, 2008 7:22 PM by j h woodyatt

Earl Cooley III wrote:

maybe he received a national security briefing (as one of the two leading presidential candidates) that scared the hell out of him. That, at least, would be plausible.

Plausable?

Given that Bush has a well-established track record of lying in security briefings when it suits his agenda, what sane person is going to believe a security briefing at this point?

Obama being scared into voting for FISA by a security briefing is only one more reason to distrust Obama's judgement. Anything Shrub says needs to be treated with great caution.

Posted July 10, 2008 7:32 PM by Ursula L

With Congressional approval at about 9%, I'd have thought "willing to take on Congressional leadership" likely to be a very popular quality.

Posted July 10, 2008 7:45 PM by Bruce Baugh

I think it's possible that Obama voted for it, knowing it was Constitutionally flawed but figuring it would give him some political ground in the center--and also assuming that the ACLU and other civil rights groups would file suit almost immediately and have it struck down in the courts. Which is a win-win for him: he gets to look tough on terror, and the law can't be implemented anyway.

I don't of course know this is his reasoning, but it's possible. And of course he can't admit to it, because you're really not supposed to vote for laws you think can't pass Constitutional muster.

Posted July 10, 2008 8:13 PM by cofax

I have long suspected that the warrantless wiretapping (which started well before 9/11, let us not forget, a time when terrorism was self-evidently the lowest of Bush administration priorities) was initially targeted not at terrorists or criminals but at Democrats.

And this leads to a faint, perhaps-paranoid suspicion that the FISA law--among others--passed due to fear of a blackmail apocalypse. (The only thing that keeps me sane and skeptical on this point is the conviction that if Bush's people really had dirt on Democrats, there's no way they'd keep it quiet just because the Democrats had capitulated. They'd blackmail and extort and then publish it anyway.)

Teresa said it best: “I deeply resent the way this Administration makes me feel like a nutbar conspiracy theorist.”

Posted July 10, 2008 8:35 PM by Evan

#39: Obama hasn't been forthcoming on his reasons for shredding the Constitution.

He hasn't exactly been silent on the issue. There was this blog entry about it. I don't know that it really makes me feel any better about his vote ...

Posted July 10, 2008 8:39 PM by aguane

hmm that link didn't work - here it is sans html: http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/rospars/gGxsZF

Posted July 10, 2008 8:40 PM by aguane

Becky @50

He could have done several things, including simply saying publicly, in the week or so before the vote, that he'd vote against it and for removing immunity. (This is what he was saying, before June, that he'd do.)
He could have armtwisted - as the presumptive nominee, he has a bit more power than a junior senator.
He could have said to Reid, I'm going to put a hold on this bill, and if you ignore the hold, I'll speak against you. (Reid has a history, in this session, of honoring holds from Republicans but not from Democrats - that's something else that needs to be stopped.)
In other words - he could have led.
That's what has me angry at him.

Posted July 10, 2008 8:52 PM by P J Evans

P J Evans @59 -- Right on. Playing it safe doesn't make any sense right now. What are they going to do that they haven't already done to American citizens?

Posted July 10, 2008 9:27 PM by TomB

P J @ 59: I completely agree. The question is whether the other Democrats would have followed Obama's leadership there. I'd like to think they would have, but maybe Obama was too afraid to test it. (For the record, I think they would be stupid not to. If anything, the Democratic party is slowly but surely shifting back to the left, and the centrist Democrats need to worry about liberal primary challengers more than general election Republican challengers. I think. I hope.)

And I can't stand Reid. Last week or so he was quoted as saying that since he was the majority leader, he had to go along with the majority. Funny; I thought that meant that maybe he set the tone and actually led the majority!

Posted July 10, 2008 9:43 PM by Becky

Somewhere among all my other deep dark suspicions, the fact that impeachment didn't pop back out from under the bushel until the FISA bill got signed actually has given me an inkling of hope: is it possible that the monitoring laws Bush pushed for, and got, are about to be turned around on him and his supporters and the whole widespread criminal conspiracy that is the GOP? If lack of evidence was the sticking point, well, Congress can damn well subpoena all the same Super-Hoovering of data that Bush could order by mere fiat. Now watch the positions change....

Posted July 10, 2008 9:46 PM by Pyre

When your approval rating is 9 f*cking percent, why do something that can only make it worse? They stand up to Bush and Cheney, and their approval rating goes up. (That got demonstrated last year.)

I told the nice (but anonymous) staffer at Boxer's LA office that if the approval ratings for Bush and Cheney were any lower, they'd be in the Marianas Trench. I don't know that he would have thought it so funny if I'd said that of Congress's rating.

Posted July 10, 2008 9:49 PM by P J Evans

Lawrence Lessig, who knows Obama from his University of Chicago days, has posted a comment on this matter.

Posted July 10, 2008 10:34 PM by John A Arkansawyer

I must say: I am really damn sick and tired of being lectured about how it's wrong to have strong feelings when Democrats sell out the Constitution yet again. Lessig has many good points to make, and I continue to respect him greatly, but I do not want other people trying to manage my emotions so much. Grr.

I would concede others' right to tell me to stop caring so much if I saw their tactic of mellowness producing results. But the one real accomplishment of recent years, the 2006 election, produced good results precisely because worked-up people got together and roused each other and bystanders to vote. Since then it's been steadily downhill again. I refuse to be cool if it just means losing more.

Posted July 10, 2008 10:57 PM by Bruce Baugh

Insert a reference here to the work of Jane Hamsher and Glenn Greenwald, prominent accomplishers of things who aren't mellow or cool at all.

Posted July 10, 2008 10:59 PM by Bruce Baugh

Bruce #65:

Yep. I'm just so irrational, feeling all betrayed just because of a little betrayal. And I'm so unreasonably vengeful, to feel no particular excitement about sending money to a guy who has just helped along one of the worst things this administration has been doing.

Posted July 10, 2008 11:14 PM by albatross

Michael noticed the pattern over on another thread and I responded by listing each vote here. Basically nearly every senator voted in line with the color of their state's voting population, based on how that state voted in teh 2004 election. If the state voted Kerry, most dem senators for that state voted against the bill. If the state voted for Bush, most of the dem senators for that state voted for the bill.

Which goes to something that Lessig is saying. We don't have a majority yet.

If the choice is (1) Obama votes for the bill and has a chance to get elected president or (2) Obama votes against the bill, the bill passes anyway because all the other senators are voting for their reelections, and Obama loses any chance of winning the presidency, strategic voting requires he vote for the bill.

Strategic voting isn't pretty. But when people voted on absolutist and perfectionist principles and vote for Nader in the 2000 election, and not only does nader not win, but Bush gets elected, I think the choice is clear that we must vote strategically.

Posted July 10, 2008 11:16 PM by Greg London

And those stories claiming Rove is citing executive privilege? That's a lawyer running a snow job. No executive privilege has been claimed yet. The post before that one discusses the letters a bit more.

Posted July 10, 2008 11:18 PM by P J Evans

Greg, the thing is that I don't see that Obama made a decision that will win him votes. It has certainly cost him enthusiasm in the netroots. It's portrayed in the press as capitulation. His donations are down. And Congress is even more staggeringly unpopular. Where's the win in any of this? What the heck have any of us gained?

Posted July 10, 2008 11:38 PM by Bruce Baugh

Ghu, if Lessig thinks everyone who liked Edwards was some kind of wild-eyed radical, what does he think about the Kucinich fans - they're sort of like Minneapolis in '73, still trying to win. (But without as much sense of fun, I suspect.)

Posted July 10, 2008 11:53 PM by P J Evans

Where's the win in any of this? What the heck have any of us gained?

How many americans think wiretapping terrorists is a good thing? How many americans could be convinced that not being able to wiretap will endanger american lives?

I haven't seen any poll numbers, so I honestly don't know. Do most americans support the new bill? Or oppose it?

If most americans support the idea of giving up privacy for security, it doesn't matter if that idea is completely wrong, because that's how they'll vote in the booths, anyway. And if that's what most american's think, then voting against the bill might turn a lot of those people away from Obama and towards McCain.

I get people are saying this vote has turned them away from Obama, but after going through that senate vote and listing the yay's and nays, and then lining them up with how those states voted in the 2004 presidential election, I've been getting the distinct feeling that a lot of people may disprove of Bush, but that doesn't mean they disprove of what he tried to do, merely his execution of it.

I'm getting the feeling (purely subjective, I don't have any numbers) that I'm part of a small minority of people who aren't afraid of terrorists in every shadow and who aren't willing to sacrifice civil liberties for security theater.

If that's the case, then voting against the bill might scare the already afraid voters into voting for the big, strong, military man who isn't afraid of doing what needs to be done and all that rot.

If it turns out that most Americans aren't afraid of terrorists in every shadow and most Americans don't want to sacrifice their civil liberties for security theater, then Obama's vote will hurt his campaign.

But I don't know any poll numbers. I don't know what most americans feel about terrorists and whether they feel wiretapping makes them safe or is a bunch of handwavey stuff.

Mostly, I just have been getting the feeling recently that hanging out on Making Light with a bunch of people who aren't afraid and who know security theater when they see it and who don't want their civil liberties given up for smoke and mirrors, may have gotten me to get a bit overconfident in how many people in the whole country feel that way.

Posted July 11, 2008 12:13 AM by Greg London

Greg, as nearly as I know from polls cited by folks like Greenwald, public opposition to widespread spying is widespread though not particularly intense. It would take some educational effort to tie it together with other offenses and make it an issue that people feel strongly about, but sense of "hey, no, these guys should have to make their case and not be able to do something things at all" is out there.

Posted July 11, 2008 12:28 AM by Bruce Baugh

Hoping that it doesn't bring the thread to a premature conclusion by implementing Monroe's corollary to Godwin's Law, the comments by Stefan @18 & Lori @20 immediately brought up a memory of this xkcd strip. Which might be a good cheerer-upper if the thread's topic is getting you down.

Posted July 11, 2008 12:32 AM by Epacris

Epacris, if need be, I'm certified to adjudicate Godwin's Law interpretation conflicts; however, the Fluorosphere has proven to be sufficiently self-aware to the extent that it needs very little guidance in that particular area.

Posted July 11, 2008 12:52 AM by Earl Cooley III

You know what? This is how McCain will win the election. Because of one issue in an incredibly complex system of government.
Obama voted for FISA. He didn't vote for war.
Which one matters more? If FISA is worth another term or two of Bushified foreign policy and fiscal nightmares, then please. Don't vote for Obama, and get ready for 100 years in Iraq.

Obama is not a savior, he is not even a saint, but he does represent the only hope for any kind of change in the United States right now.

Or maybe I'm wrong. I don't know.

Posted July 11, 2008 12:59 AM by JimR

JimR, it's not just this one issue, though this could have been a fine opportunity to educate the public on details and (let's remember) vote the way the majority of the public wants, rather than aligning himself with the stance of the only folks in town less popular than the president. It's the ongoing pattern of betraying his own explicit promises as well as shifting himself more and more into an ideological region we already know to be unpopular as well as (in my view, at least) unwise and often immoral.

I supported Obama (including with my donation) because of his record in Illinois and Washington and because of his well-articulated platform and supporting declarations. Now I've got...neither, actually. If he won't keep his promises, what can anyone do except guess?

Right now it's certainly the case that Obama is a much less dangerous candidate than McCain. It is, IMHO, no longer the case that he can be assumed to be a good one, and I think there's no basis at all on which to assert that he won't become more dangerous to life, liberty, property, peace, and justice in the months between now and election. He's on the path of rejecting both simple liberal virtues and the clear will of the majority of Americans in pursuit of the approval of a much smaller circle, one far removed from wisdom and (in many cases) basic competence.

This is a really stinky situation to be in, and I am very much angry at Obama for creating it, when vastly better alternatives remain at hand.

For the moment, the choice is clear enough: plan to vote for Obama, give active support to groups outside the Democratic Party capable of mounting challenges to the party establishment. I very sincerely hope that Obama won't drift into territory that makes voting for him seem not particularly different from voting for McCain. I don't think he will, actually. But I do think it very likely that I will end up regarding voting for him as a tragically messy necessity rather than as something likely to lead to much good.

Posted July 11, 2008 1:26 AM by Bruce Baugh

I liked what Lessig said here:
His vote for the FISA compromise is thus not a vote for immunity. It is a vote that reflects the judgment that securing the amendments to FISA was more important than denying immunity to telcos. Whether you agree with that judgment or not, we should at least recognize (hysteria notwithstanding) what kind of judgment it was. The amendments to FISA were good. Getting a regime that requires the executive to obey the law is important. Whether it is more important than telco immunity is a question upon which sensible people might well differ."

I also liked what Feingold said to Rachel Maddow the other day. That after Obama is elected we start correcting things. We have to cross one of two rivers. One is a toxic cesspool, we will die trying to cross it. The other has some turds floating but it won't kill us. Once we cross it we can start cleaning it up.

Posted July 11, 2008 2:22 AM by Brenda

#72 Greg

It's bullshit fearmongering.
The FISA court as constituted eight years ago, had full authority to authorize wiretapping against suspicious furriners not only on an expedited immediate turn around, but retroactively provide permission.

But what's been going on the past seven and a half years looks like the Stasi migrated in space and time from Soviet-satellite cold War East Germany, to the Executive Branch and for the past seven and a half years oxymoronically-labeled "Justice" Department of the US Government, and the vast majority apparently of federal judges appointed... recall that Clinton's nominees for judicial appointment got blocked by the dozens after his first couple years in office.

I genuinely fear the results of what I see as a horrendously corrupted government with lifetime appointments that I-have-nothing-polite-or-respectful-to-say-about for which Samuel Alito is merely a publically highly visible example of... I would guess that almost all of the federal judges appointed or promoted since 2001 have fascist and usually misogynistic also profiles to their values and opinions and compasses.

These past seven and a half years make Teapot Dome look like a minor noise level earmark and the spoils system of Andrew Jackson's Presidency look like appointment by merit and selection as best-qualified by service to minorities and public works projects providing the underprivileged and poverty struck and discriminated against whom Big Business wants relocated by eminent domain, with income and political clout and clear title and legal and polical power to instead of being gentrified out, instead becoing rich and powerful and staying put....*

* Andew Jackson effected the unconstitutional and lethal Trail of Tears and other forced eviction nd displacements.

Posted July 11, 2008 2:23 AM by Paula Lieberman

I am willing to stake a small wager that this move helps Obama not at all. I think it likely that it will cost him some support; I find it overwhelmingly difficult to believe that it will be a net help, and I'm willing to put a little Powell's credit behind my skepticism, given suitable terms.

Posted July 11, 2008 2:31 AM by Bruce Baugh

I have rights.
I had rights.
Screw this, I'm moving to Canada.

Posted July 11, 2008 2:40 AM by J.K.Richard

Thanks for your reassurance @75, Earl.

Posted July 11, 2008 4:11 AM by Epacris

J.K.Richard @ 81:

Might be a bad idea. Americans are self-reporting being very unpopular in Canada right now.

Posted July 11, 2008 5:10 AM by Lindra

lindra,

Americans are self-reporting being very unpopular in Canada right now.

that's not my experience. everyone does want to talk election-politics with me, though.

Posted July 11, 2008 5:15 AM by miriam beetle

I have a fairly technical legal question about FISA: does the amended law also immunize Bush and his governmental co-conspirators from Articles of Impeachment XXIV and XXV?

Posted July 11, 2008 6:53 AM by Earl Cooley III

Lindra @83, my family is of French and French Canadian decent--- I'm couple of vowel shifts and a Visa away from crossing the border.

Posted July 11, 2008 7:09 AM by J.K.Richard

#51:

#42: And yet, I can’t help thinking that he had some very compelling reason to vote for it.

#50:

And Obama voting for it, looking like a flip-flopper and pissing off his base, is less embarrassing than being unable to lead the Democratic Party in voting it down.

P.S. Maybe we should all start lobbying our senators for a new majority leader. Which do you like better for the position, Dodd or Feingold?

Posted July 11, 2008 7:18 AM by Chris

Earl, to the best of my knowledge, the recent bill only covers civil suits. In the event that a bunch of Democrats found a clue and/or a spine, impeachment could (I believe) proceed on those charges.

Posted July 11, 2008 7:20 AM by Bruce Baugh

Nathan Newman comes at the FISA controversy from a whole different angle, and I think he makes a lot of sense.

Posted July 11, 2008 7:49 AM by John A Arkansawyer

P J Evans @ 33: "I don't know what kind of signing statement he attached to it, but I'd bet there is one."

Probably "HA HA HA HA you suckers!"

Greg London @ 72: "I haven't seen any poll numbers, so I honestly don't know. Do most americans support the new bill? Or oppose it?"

A little googling turned up a lot of results from 2006 showing that people were really ambivalent about it--roughly fifty-fifty, with fairly dramatic swings both ways depending on how slanted the question was. However, I found this poll from 2007 showing significant margins opposing it. There isn't anything more recent that I can find. The trendline seems to be away from approval, though.

Posted July 11, 2008 8:52 AM by heresiarch

Arkansawyer at 89
"Nathan Newman comes at the FISA controversy from a whole different angle,"

Baby boomers are over represented on the blogs. They are near or at retirement age, have a lot of free time and so are not that interested in labor issues. Why would elites worry about the proles? Worrying about Labor also smacks of socialism, at least in America. We don't have much of a working class left anyway, our working class is in China.

Posted July 11, 2008 9:51 AM by Brenda

Joe J@42

Here's my guess about what's going on. The political dynamics of this election looks a lot like 1980 but with the parties reversed. Which means that one of the main things Obama is going to be doing is reassuring voters that he isn't an ultra-radical who would be "too dangerous" to risk electing. It's a good general strategy in the current political climate. Although one can quarrel with certain details of the implementation.

My favorite take on this issue right now is John Scalzi's July 2 webessay: Reminder: There’s No Actual Office for “President of the Left” at http://scalzi.com/whatever/?p=966

(Couldn't quite figure out how to get the link to work.)

Posted July 11, 2008 9:55 AM by Michael I

Brenda @ 91

1. Thank you for that dismissive generalization. Good luck getting any respect when you grow up.

2. -- We don't have much of a working class left anyway, our working class is in China. -- No, they're right here, either out out of work, working lower-paying jobs in a more expensive world, or broken on the wheel of health care. What, you thought 200,000,000 people just disappeared?

Just out of curiousity, are you working class?

Posted July 11, 2008 10:13 AM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

Brenda @ 91
We don't have much of a working class left anyway, our working class is in China.
So why am I at work in Los Angeles?

Please define 'retirement age'. I don't think it's when you think it is.
(Most of us boomers won't be retiring soon, because someone else threw all our savings into a black hole.)

Posted July 11, 2008 10:38 AM by P J Evans

Yesterday I finally made my first political donation of the 2008 election season. I made it here, to a PAC that will hold Congresscritters accountable for their votes on retroactive telecom immunity and warrantless wiretapping.

I understand that Obama is not running for President of the Left and that he may have had in his own mind good reasons for voting the way he did and that whatever faults I see in him pale in comparison to the unmitigated disaster that a McCain presidency would create. And therefore, Obama's campaign also deserves my financial support.

But not this week.

Posted July 11, 2008 11:04 AM by Seth Gordon

Brenda, 2008 is the first year Baby Boomers have become eligible for Social Security.

In case you didn't know, the Boom covered the years 1946 to 1964. So all you're seeing this year is the tip of the iceberg. The people who are eligible to file, are receiving reduced benefits.

Due to modifications in Social Security, I will not be eligible to collect full benefits until I am age 67 (born 1955). If I'm lucky, and my savings hold out, I will not file for Social Security until I'm 70.

Right now, I know of ONE person my age in my circle of friends who is retired. The rest of us are still working, and trying to balance care of our retired parents with care of our children.

Time on our hands? Hah!

Posted July 11, 2008 11:06 AM by Lori Coulson

re impeachment: One interesting point I've seen--and now I can't remember where--is that if Congress subpoenas White House officials as part of an impeachment investigation, those officials will have a much harder time playing the "executive privilege" card.

Posted July 11, 2008 11:17 AM by Seth Gordon

Nathan Newman usually makes excellent sense, and this is no exception, yeah.

Posted July 11, 2008 11:18 AM by Bruce Baugh

Stefan Jones #13
When I started wearing my (big iron-on letters, red&white on blue) IMPEACH CHENEY FIRST T-shirt about two years ago, I figured I was putting myself in for some flack. Well, not once. Ever. The pause while some people figure it out before grinning is a bonus, too.

Earl Cooley #37
Well, at least Bush signing the new FISA bill is another impeachable offense.
His perjuring himself when he took the oath of office is already two impeachable offences.

Evan #56
a faint, perhaps-paranoid suspicion that the FISA law--among others--passed due to fear of a blackmail apocalypse
Unfortunately, it's just too consistent that the national wiretap program (which was already in operation long before 9/11) has produced enough blackmail fodder against enough Congressional Democrats that Bushevik legislation just can't be defeated.
I state explicitly that I know of no hard evidence that this is the situation, but the idea has floated around for a while, and it's just too heartbreakingly plausible . . .
Teresa said it best: “I deeply resent the way this Administration makes me feel like a nutbar conspiracy theorist,” and I know some of the authorities on conspiracy theory.

JimR #76
You know what? This is how McCain will win the election.
Nope. One of the coldest parts of this is that it won't cost Obama a vote.
The people excited about this issue and this vote almost unanimously projectile vomit at the thought of "President McCain".

Posted July 11, 2008 11:50 AM by Neil in Chicago

Neil in Chicago @ 99... conspiracy theory

If I remember correctly, the movie ends with Mel Gibson shoving Patrick Stewart under water with a mop.

Posted July 11, 2008 11:58 AM by Serge

Lori Coulson @ 96

Pretty much my situation. I was originally planning on retiring this year or next (I'll be 62 in a few weeks), but now will wait until at least 65. Not sure I'll be physically able to hold a job after that; my back is deteriorating. But the medical bills are one of the main reasons to postpone retirement because I get a lot of use out of my medical insurance, and moving to an individual policy would more than quadruple my premiums and give me less coverage.

One of our old friends retired last month; he's 66, and was an ironworker for 40-some years, and he's pretty much a physical wreck because of doing the job of a 25-year old while in his 60s. His company still has a pension plan; that's the only reason he can afford to retire at all. Not many people his age are that lucky; most companies gutted the pension plan, then forced their employees to move to 401k's with no or little matching.

Posted July 11, 2008 12:27 PM by Bruce Cohen (SpeakerToManagers)

Brenda at 91:

WTF are you talking about?

I was born in 1946 -- that's the first year of the baby boom. I got my first job when I was 18 and have worked ever since. I have a little in retirement savings (and am watching the falling market with fury as it gobbles those up) still owe the bank on my mortgage, and expect to continue to work until I become physically unable to or until I drop dead, whichever comes first. I don't qualify to receive Social Security for another 4 years, and won't get very much when it comes. I pay over $6000 a year in medical insurance. The idle boomer rich do exist -- but boy howdy are they a small minority.

Posted July 11, 2008 12:32 PM by Lizzy L

Ok. This idea may be stupid and insane, but I can't for the life of me think of WHY it's dumb. If anyone can tell me why this doesn't make sense, I'd appreciate it.

Is it possible that Obama was afraid of/convinced to fear media retribution if he didn't vote for telecom immunity? It's become pretty bloody obvious that it doesn't matter how much money you have if the networks are against you, and I can actually SEE how a boycot/blacklist/whathaveyou by the networks could and would lose him the election.

Most of the telecoms are pretty closely tied to the TV/radio media companies, aren't they? I can see some lobbyist making that specific threat.

I know, nutbar conspiracy theorist. I also know that it doesn't neccesarily make Obama look all that great. But if the choices were "protest vote, get a negative media slant from now until the election" or "vote with the majority on an issue that isn't close, don't worry about the media..." I can't say I'd chose the former.

Posted July 11, 2008 12:37 PM by Leah Miller

Brenda 91: Are you being intentionally insulting, or do you just have the manners of a barn cat? What cave were you raised in? You owe everyone over the age of 40 in here (most of us, including me: born 1959) an apology.

Either that or you need to get lost.

You just accused us of not caring about anyone but ourselves, and of being elites (a stupid word). And talk about "smacking" of socialism, I was a socialist while you were in diapers at a time when admitting that would get you smacked—as in "smacked around by your fellow college students."

Just watch who you're lumping together. Right now you just look foolish. If you keep it up you will look like a troll, then a piñata, then like nothing at all: you'll be banned. (This is not a threat, which I have no power to make anyway: it's a prediction.)

Posted July 11, 2008 12:39 PM by Xopher

Brenda - There is a time to score points and a time to make points. Trying to do both simultaneously hardly ever works. I've seen people on a couple of threads now put significant effort into working with you to separate out some of the unwanted noise from the signals you are trying to send. Please take some time re-read their feedback and consider how some small changes in your posting style might go a long way toward gaining acceptance here.

Posted July 11, 2008 12:52 PM by Lance Weber

Bruce @101:

I'm one of the lucky ones. I'll have my pension plus my Thrift Plan (Federal 401k equivalent). That's why I'll be trying to delay applying for Social Security benefits until I'm 70.

I'm planning to retire at the beginning of 2012, I'll have worked for HHS for over 33 years...and I'm assuming I may need to work part time, too.

My fibro is getting worse all the time, and it's making it harder and harder to get up in the morning, even with the meds*. I'm praying it doesn't get to the point that I have to retire early on disability.

*Bog standard pain meds, ibuprofen mostly. I'm worried about taking anything stronger.

Posted July 11, 2008 1:04 PM by Lori Coulson

Bruce@73: as nearly as I know from polls cited by folks like Greenwald, public opposition to widespread spying is widespread though not particularly intense.

I don't know who Greenwald is. Would you have a link to a recent poll?

Paula@79: It's bullshit fearmongering

Yeah. I know. And bullshit fearmongering gets a lot of people to vote a certain way. Bush Co. use it for a reason: It works.

heresiarch@90: I found this poll from 2007

it's weird that there aren't lots of polls about this as the bill was coming up for vote, don't ya think? Or if there were, they didn't seem to hit the media. Trying to keep it under the radar maybe.

All, I'm in a seriously cynical mood the last few days. All I can think of is that huge flap made over Obama's comments about people being afraid clinging to God and Guns. Well, yeah, lots of people are afraid, and that's probably the most common response they exhibit.

So, the part of me that generally has a lot of faith in humanity went on vacation. I'm not sure when he's coming back. What's left is a cranky bastard who sees that most people are capable of lynch mobs and witch hunts and whatnot. I'm thinking that most people don't really care enough about it to do anything. But more importantly, I'm thinking most poeople don't know enough about it to be immune from ultra rightwing swiftboating propaganda campaigns that would have turned Obama's vote against the bill and tied it to "his middle name is hussein and some say he went to a madras when he was younger".

And I think anyone who thinks the Right wouldn't do that if Obama had voted against, I think greatly underestimates the evilness they are capable of.

But I'm in a cynical mood right now.

Posted July 11, 2008 1:10 PM by Greg London

Leah at 103: I don't think that's such a nutbar theory. I've got no evidence to support it, mind you.

Seth at 95, I've come to a couple of conclusions about Obama, and I hope I'm not proved wrong about either of them. The first one is that Obama is genuinely a liberal, or as close as one can get to being what I think a liberal is (as opposed to what Bill O'Reilly thinks a liberal is) and still be considered a reasonable candidate for President in these twisted times.

The second conclusion is that he really really really wants to win this thing, and to do that he's willing to make strategic political decisions that piss off folks like me or other folks to the left of me. His risk is that one of those decisions will piss off many folks, including the many to the right of me, or that the money will dry up, or that the media will turn against him, and so on. He appears willing to take those risks in order to win.

As I said, I hope I'm not proved wrong.

I want him to win.

Posted July 11, 2008 1:19 PM by Lizzy L

#91 Brenda
I was unemployed or underemployed, with no health coverage other than what I had been paying out of my own pocket until unable to afford it anymore, and no benefits, from October 1989-mid September of so 1998, and then again from April 2 3002 until October 2006.

During the 1990s one of my college classmates said, "Everyone I know [who is from our cohort] is out of work, about to become out of work, or had just come off being out of work."

The Boomers of the Chief Thief's age were leading edge and not crammed in stuck behind in the middle or end of the "pig in the poke." The -rest of the Boomers, lived with overcrowded classrooms (school construction lags by years the actual fecundity and immigration booms that inflate the numbers of kids in school... and then after when the numbers drop, the schools get closed down/sold off/deteriorate/laws get changed required new features and functionaility requiring new schools be more expensive etc.), enormous competition for jobs in situations where downsizing hit ferociously ("Will the last person leaving Seattle please turn out the lights?" --actual sign at the end of the 1970s/start of the 1980s. "Between me and the next youngest engineer [at Grumman] are fifteen years, because as part of the festivities following the landing of Apollo on the Moon, they fired all the engineers. The only people here my age are the secretaries." -- 23 or so year old George Varsillya Yenetchi to his old dorm floor, 3rd East East Campust at MIT, in the summer or fall of 1974. Newly graduating chemists and new chemistry Ph.Ds in the early to mid 1970s papered their living spaces with rejection letters from companies they sent their resumes to, some people collecting more than 200 rejection letters. And the aerospace crash was so bad, that at MIT, accounted one of the top five if not the top institution in the USA for aeronautical and astronautical studies, there were fewer than FORTY, out of a student undergraduate body of close to 4000, undergraduate students in the Aero and Astro department! Without the Air Force officers who were on activity duty working on graduate degrees in the department and "educational delay" grad students who were commissioned officers but getting masters' or doctorates before going on active duty, the grad school would have been even tinier for the number of students I think.

Posted July 11, 2008 2:07 PM by Paula Lieberman

Xopher #104: You just accused us of not caring about anyone but ourselves, and of being elites (a stupid word).

Ummm, a lot of people who participate on ML actually are elite; debate here can be like watching world-class ping pong. When the world of ideas is at stake, someone has to step up to the table and deal with it....

Posted July 11, 2008 2:11 PM by Earl Cooley III

Earl, of course we're elite in some ways. But her post implied that we're the ECONOMIC elite, which may be true for some of us, but damn few. Certainly it's insulting to those of us who are far from.

Posted July 11, 2008 2:26 PM by Xopher

Lizzy's assessment in #108 is pretty similar to mine.

I'd also remind people to ask themselves a question: when was the last time we had an actual liberal President? Not Clinton. Not Carter, certainly -- think back to the campaign of 1976, if you're old enough, when he very explicitly ran as part of the Democratic Party's centrist/conservative faction, or to the campaign of 1980, when he had a primary challenge from the left. So that'd be LBJ, if you count him as a liberal. (You can make a case either way.) If you don't, then you have to go back well over half a century.

Obama probably won't be the President of my dreams, but he'll probably be the most liberal President to be elected since I was born.

Posted July 11, 2008 3:32 PM by Matt Austern

Greg London @107: Greenwald is this guy. Detailed descriptions of precisely HOW the Bush administration breaks the law, and specific examples of how the press' complicity and the Democratic leadership's spinelessness enables that, all the way from 2004 on. Take your blood-pressure meds before reading.

Posted July 11, 2008 3:36 PM by mjfgates

joann@40: Inspiring reading indeed. And a beautiful job of hoisting them on their own petard; their claims that the President wasn't involved in any of this are turning out to be a liability.

What's more fun is that to invoke privilege, they're going to have to reverse themselves and say he *was* involved, so then he's party to an illegal act.

Beautifully reasoned.

cofax@55: I think Obama may be counting on the ACLU's suit; if portions of the law are ruled unconstitutional, they are effectively repealed without the legislative struggle.

Posted July 11, 2008 3:40 PM by Joe McMahon

Greg London: Whoops, sorry for lack of context. Glenn Greenwald is probably the single most informative writer on civil liberties and related issues right now. His posts are long, specific, and link-rich. Highly recommended. (I get him via RSS feed so that I don't have to bother with Salon's site directly.)

Like Heresiarch, I'm having trouble finding 2008 data. This 2006 poll showing public support for impeachment proceedings based on warrantless wiretapping is certainly indicative of something, though. The short form of a lot of looking at 2006-7 data is that the public seem okay with focused measures - surveillance cameras are a lot more popular than I'd like - but not for sweeping action without oversight or for a general policy of bugging anyone who seems interesting. The individual poll's phrasing and emphasis matter a lot whether the public tips for or against, which suggests (as is no surprise) that the public's conflicted, but the broader the power discussed, the more opposition there is to it.

This is the Google query I worked from, if anyone wants to double-check my work. The only caveat to keep in mind when looking at specific articles is that the Republican apparatus will lie about poll results when they think they can get away with it; check sources not committed to cheering on the president, where possible.

Posted July 11, 2008 3:44 PM by Bruce Baugh

Anyone hoping for Obama to be liberal really is wasting their hope, I'm afraid. Check out the Lawrence Lessig link earlier in the thread: the people who've actually known Obama best and longest agree that he isn't, and that he doesn't want to be.

Posted July 11, 2008 3:51 PM by Bruce Baugh

Bruce, I read the Lessig comment. I found it uncompelling.

And Lessig's suggestion that Obama should resign from the Senate strikes me as silly advice.

Posted July 11, 2008 4:13 PM by Lizzy L

Greg @107:

Yes, there was a big flap in the media about Obama's "bitter" statement. (A much bigger flap than will be made about McCain's chief economic advisor calling Americans who are worried about the economy "whiners", no doubt.) Yes, there was a big flap about Jeremiah Wright. And all Obama did after those two flaps was win the nomination and take a big lead in the polls over McCain.

At what point are Democrats going to stop being scared of what Republicans and media shills will say about them, and start making a positive case for their own values? I thought Obama would be a step in the right direction, and in some ways he has been. But on this bill, he chose the course of surrendering to the fearmongering, and chose not to make the case that the FISA bill represented an unconstitutional grab at Americans' civil liberties by people who want more and more unaccountable power and are simply using the threat of terrorism to get it.

People who say that his vote was necessary in order to get elected assume that he couldn't have made the case against it, and that the electorate can't be trusted to understand why it was a bad bill. Well no, they can't, if the only side they ever hear is the Republican side. For my entire adult life, the Republicans are the only ones who have been consistently, proudly, and unapologetically making their case (a case full of lies and fearmongering though it may be). I'll grant that the media have hurt our cause, but so has the willingness of Democrats to accept the conventional wisdom that D