Those sonsabitches

[pecunium]

If this is the sort of crap we can expect from the senate, we ought to have accepted Miers. She'd have been a fawning patsy for Bush, and the right, but it might be better to have a well-meaning idiot than someone who is smart, as well as wrong (and looking at his history I might go so far as to say evil).

I was happy-ish, about the cloture vote.

Then I saw the roll call.

Compare and contrast

Cloture 72 Yes 25 No

Not great numbers, but more spine than the (all too) loyal opposition has been willing to show lately.

This morning however, expletives left my mouth when I saw

Confirmation 58 Yes 42 No.

The four dems who said they were going to vote for him, they did. No foul. I think they were wrong, but they told us up front they were going to vote for him and I can't fault them for voting for cloture either, if they sincerely thought he was fit for the bench.

But 40 dems voted against him, as well as Jefforrds. (and Chafee, I know he got a lot of heat. I can't really fault him, much, for not voting a loser; and I don't know in what order he was called, it may have been a known defeat, though I think symbolically standing up to the White House on something like this has merit too).

That means there were enough dems to have sustained a filibuster, if they'd been willing to stand up. Spinless excuses for public servants.

Here are the weak sisters. The one's who are trying to have their cake, and eat it too (becuase they knew that for cloture to pass was to confirm Alito, a yes on cloture was a yes on Alito, it's that simple).


AKAKA (D-HI)
BAUCUS (D-MT)
BINGAMAN (D-NM)
CANTWELL (D-WA)
CARPER (D-DE)
CHAFEE (R RI)
DORGAN (D-ND)
INOYE (D-HI)
KOHL (D-WI)
LANDRIEAU (D LA)
LIEBERMAN (D CN)
LINCOLN (D-AR)
NELSON (D-FL)
PRYOR (D-AR)
ROCKEFELLER (D WV)
SALAZAR (D CO)


If they are your Senators they need to be told what you think of them.

The Senate switchboard numbers are 888-355-3588 or 888-818-6641, call up (toll free, it's on your dime, but as a taxpayer) and ask for your senator.

If your senator voted the way you wanted them too, it might be nice to drop them a line, or a call, and let them know you appreciate that, esp. if they lost, because the press is going to be beating them up about it. It's already started with today's WaPO which said a filibuster was pointless from the get go because, ...Republican control of the Senate meant that more than a few GOP senators plus Democratic opponents would have had to go against Alito or at least agree not to block a filibuster. That's a mistatement. What I'd have lost 50 (out of 100) points for on anything I turned in while I was in college. Not counting Chafee there were 41 votes against. If Jeffords (Ind VT) had voted against, then we'd have lost. But without a single Republican vote a filibister can be maintained. (you know, that "liberally biased" press which ran tens of thousands of words a day about Whitewater [before Monica] and devoted almost an entire evening new broadcast [not Nightline, but the evening news] to trying to exlplain the arcana of a land deal where the Clintons lost money, so we'd appreciate the magnitude of the scandal, but, in comparative coverage, ignores the NSA wiretapping case. Referring to to it, as, "eavesdropping" instead of, "warrantless wiretaps," but I digress).

Hold their feet to the fire (the WaPo too, send them a note pointing out the math of the Senate belies their claim that Republicans had to sign on to a filibuster). Tell your reps that it's ok to be, "obstructionist." If the Republicans could block dozens of judges, for years, and refuse to allow an "up or down vote," on an ambassador, we can do the same. We can do it better, because we can afford to be public about it (we'll have to be, because the White House and the Republicans will try to beat us up with it).

It's time to make the people you elected to represent you, start doing it.