All hope not yet lost.

True, i intentionally indicated in my post that maybe all hope is lost, more to stimulate people to care, I knew it had yet to hit the house, but then again, want to bet on a terror attack just about then?

as for Rove, Id like them to nail him to the wall, perhaps some law abiding right wingers may realize the administration is corrupt and think twice about blindly voting for them again..

I'm on a pessimistic kick in regards to this country right now. In short:

People are too fucking stupid to do the right thing.

We're screwed. Crap like USA PATRIOT Act extensions will get passed, or not, for all the wrong reasons, and not enough people are aware of what the "wrong reasons" are to actually try to do anything about it.

well, i did specifically mention it was the House that passed them. i just find it hard to believe there's anyone in the world who still supports this crap.

Move On strike me as a bunch of liberal jerkoffs. I'm with them on some things, but only those things that do not involve the freedom for them to mold a liberal dictatorship.

Freedom isn't liberal or conservative. It just is.

But the fight isn't over. By ballot, wallet, or rifle, the fight goes on.

Senators.

1. Senators vote much more carefully on these issues than to reps--they are far more likely to be around and their votes remembered when these things become unpopular (which the patriot act already is).


2. Exactly one senator--Russ Feingold--voted against the patriot act the first time around. Even if there are only 20-30 defections, and the extensions pass, you will lay the groundwork for a repeal if you persuade your senator to vote against it.


3. MoveOn.org is a Democrat/Liberal organization, founded to stop the Clinton impeachment. They piss me off occasionally as well, but -- since half of Democrats in congress supported the patriot act-- singling out MoveOn.org for not opposing the patriot act more strenuously is like singling out the RNC for not opposing GATT.
   
   The fact that they have been exceptionally successful as a force multiplier for small actions by liberal Democrats has led people to believe they are some kind of universal public advocacy organization. That is simply not what they do. They don't try to do it, or even seriously claim to do mainstream public advocacy (except to keep their tax-exempt status) : they are there to oppose George W. Around 60% of the time, that is all that's required for good government these days. In the case of civil liberties, there are lots of villains, and only most of them are Republicans.

A way-long-overdue retraction and apology.

By the way, O., my source reported erroneously that Ron Paul voted for the patriot act. Shame on me for not looking it up in Roll Call the first time.

Bob Ney of Ohio, Ron Paul, and Butch Otter of Idaho were the three Republicans who voted against the USA PATRIOT act.

Vote count-house

Senate
Note that the votes against the act have almost tripled. Defeat is better than repeal, but the road to repeal is slowly being paved.

Re: A way-long-overdue retraction and apology.

I don't even remember the original post, but, apology most certainly accepted.

So, how you doing? I quit drinking too.

It's really hard... rather more irritatingly so than it should be.

-Ogre

IMHO, MoveOn.org is worse than useless.

Why worse than useless? Because their spamming pisses off people who might otherwise be sympathetic with the causes they're espousing. I have the fuckers blackholed, because they started spamming me with every issue that came across their desk and wouldn't stop.

Already called. I know that some debate is likely in the Senate, but I don't think it will change the outcome. The fact that the house is more likely to pass things without as much of a huff isn't really reassuring to me.