I'll have full updates as soon as possible -- keep checking back in.

Yes, we'll do that or not.

Tim, are you or Dr. Dean ever going to post an article to counter the negative propoganda from Roll Call yesterday about Dem infighting and Dr. Dean's fund raising? Most of us Deaniacs love the man unconditionally, but as critical thinkers, some facts forthcoming to counter that negative publicity might be a 'good thing.' I confess to harboring some lingering doubts about what happened to the $ warchest around they time of that fateful Iowa caucus and the scream.

Posted by Annilow on January 31, 2006 at 01:58 PM

warchest s/b war chest, they time s/b the time.

Tim,

Annilow brings up some important issues. So from the blogsphere we would like to know why a thread title was given "Enjoy" after thousands worked to get the Senators to vote no on cloture?

The vote came in and the Alito 18 once again voted with the radically right side.

Enjoy...that was rather harsh.

More appropriate title...simply could have been
"Post Filibuster Thread"

Bill Millers talking points for State of the Union

First, let me say it is time our party starts fighting fire with fire. It is time for strong leadership and we need to put a tougher face on our party. While I truly respect Sen. Harry Reid and Sen. John Kerry, we really need a tougher representative, someone like Jack Murtha.
The following opinions come from a group of people that meet for breakfast on a regular basis in Morgantown, Pa. a small town with a diverse population. The group consist of several small business owners, one of whom is gay, a Wal-Mart employee, a Mennonite farmer, a waitress, an event planner, and varied other people who join in from time to time. So as you can see this is Main St. America. Literally our meeting places are two restaurants on Main St. in Morgantown and Elverson Pa. Most are Democrats and some identify as independent. Our democrat members are becoming very disappointed with what seems to be weakness in our party. Therefore, I hope you will take these suggestions seriously.

Alito confirmation – It is somewhat symbolic that on the same day our nation has lost a great civil rights leader our Republican led congress confirmed Judge Alito who seems to have little respect for civil liberties

Economy- New figures show that the average salary increases is at the lowest in nine years and that the average savings for Americans is at the lowest since the great depression. Any positives in the economy are mostly based on the record earnings of the big energy companies

War on terror - Are we really any safer than we were before 9/11? This administration seems to ignore the facts that we are not achieving our goals in Iraq.
Our borders are porous, they always say, “We are fighting them there so that we will not have to fight them here”, yet we ignore the fact that they can cross our borders anytime they want. We have not caught Osama Bin Laden, in fact Al-Queada seems more emboldened now than ever before. (Releasing tapes on a weekly basis). In addition, the unnecessary war in Iraq has seemed to help their recruitment.
Likewise, the republicans seem to want to continue to use terrorism as a political campaign Slogan when the term is so vague that it could encompass many countries and organizations. Therefore it is a war against a word not a specific person or group that they could go on using forever to put fear into the minds of the American public.

Healthcare- More people are without health insurance than at any other time in history and all this administration seems to come up with is tax incentives. This does not do any good if you cannot afford it in the first place. A tax break at the end of the year does not help pay for it on a monthly basis. It is time to consider a universal health plan that is affordable and does not just benefit the insurance companies. The Medicare prescription plan is a debacle at best.

White House Scandals- Corruption has prevailed in this administration. Starting with their relationship with Ken Lay and continuing to their relationship with Jack Abramoff. The old saying goes “Show me your friends and I will tell you who you are”. With friends like Ken Lay, Jeff Skilling, Jack Abramoff, Mike Scanlon, Raul Garza, David Safavian, Scooter Libby, Tom DeLay , and Jeff Gannon we are getting a clear picture of who this administration really is.

We know what kind of s*** Bush is going to push and call it sugar tonight... What I'm looking forward to is the response from Tim Kaine.

Does Sloppy Joe Lieberman have a primary opponent yet?

How can we expect to take back this country if we allow DINOs like Sloppy Joe to go unchallenged? Corporate Democrats will only do what their constituents want done if they feel their job is on the line. Those 19 senators were more afraid of the regressives than they were of their Democratic constituents.

42 Democrats voted against Alito, a sufficient number to sustain a filibuster or to force the Republicans to follow through on their threat to blow up the cloture rule (even if Chaffee had flipped his vote on a cloture vote).

So there it is - evidence of EXACTLY what is wrong with this party. No will, no courage, no principles. Plenty of posturing ("Hey - I voted against Alito, right?" and "Hey - I actually CALLED for a filibuster - remember, Hillary?"), but not enough gonad among the lot of them to make a fight on principle - even at the cost of...HORRORS!!!!...losing.

You think I'm "cynical," boys and girls? There's nothing more cynical than a cowardly, capitulating elected Democrat. All nuance, no guts. No principle worth fighting for except the principle of triangulating themselves into reelection.

What a pathetic bunch. All they have to offer is that they are the "alternative" to Republicans, but when it comes time to put up and prove that they really do offer an alternative, they hide under tables.

Fuck the Democratic Party. Every time these useless, spineless turds do something like this, another three hundred thousand voters - the poor, the unemployed, the defenseless - shrug their shoulders and say "What the fuck - if they're not going to do anything for me then I might as well vote for Republicans - crumbs are better than nothing."

Howard - quit your day job and go third party. This truly is the end of the Road to Nowhere.

baronscarpia has a legitimate point....without some of the harsh language, the dems seem to have lost some "balls" to stand up to the repubs.
i'm mad has hell at this admin. and i'm losing some of my love for "our" party. no one is blasting the repubs. for their stand on the issues. scream from the rooftops. this admin. is the crookedest bunch i've ever seen.....get mad. raise hell. enough is enough.
if the dems can't change things, maybe we need a new party that will look after the poor and working people.

baronscarpia has a legitimate point....without some of the harsh language, the dems seem to have lost some "balls" to stand up to the repubs.
i'm mad has hell at this admin. and i'm losing some of my love for "our" party. no one is blasting the repubs. for their stand on the issues. scream from the rooftops. this admin. is the crookedest bunch i've ever seen.....get mad. raise hell. enough is enough.
if the dems can't change things, maybe we need a new party that will look after the poor and working people.

if the dems can't change things, maybe we need a new party that will look after the poor and working people.

Andhow, to start from the ground up with the republican machine spinning the media would be suicide.

What needs to be done and is actually being done...you do understand what happened yesterday during the filibuster vote. But also remember that even when we were in the majority we appointed both Scalia and Thomas.

So something very amazing happened this week. The base spoke! We spoke in such force that the Centrists of the 80's listened. That is a great accomplishment.

Remember it was Howard Dean who started the base. He brought the people together. He is still out there every day bringing the base together.

And the base brought 25 democrats to vote for a filibuster during a time when we are a minority.

This is extraordinary.

We did speak to the leadership and we have broken that centrists stand.

Kos and Digby spoke about this and now is the time for the base to continue!!

This is a Pyrrhic victory for Republicans and "moderate" Democrats. The hell they will pay is yet to come.

f the dems can't change things, maybe we need a new party that will look after the poor and working people.

Posted by andhow on January 31, 2006 at 05:22 PM

Somehow I think they have had plenty of chances to prove that they really deserve our loyalty, this was an eye opener for me. All of us know they didn't stand a snowball's chance in hell of winning the straight up and down vote, but for the sake of principle, show us you care about the things we care about. Stop the BS lip service. A major disappointment for me and many people I know.

Who is running against them in primaries? Mark Wilson (D) against Maria Cantwell in Washington. I've already talked to him on the phone and invited him to our local Dem meeting.

http://www.votemark.org

I signed up as a phone volunteer in faraway CT for the Ned Lamont campaign against Lieberman. I can make cell calls on weekends - not that hard.

http://www.nedlamont.com/?errors=email&errors=source&errors=zip&errors=target&errors=name

Vichy Dems web site is keeping track - clicky

I'll never forget the betrayal of those on this list who could have stopped the cloture vote because the R's only had 58, not enough. They could have stopped Alito for at least one day. Instead they voted against him the next day just in time to be meaningless.I especially blame my senator Maria Cantwell who advertises herself as pro-choice.

Akaka (D-HI)
Baucus (D-MT)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Byrd (D-WV)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Carper (D-DE)
Conrad (D-ND)
Dorgan(D-ND)
Inouye (D-HI)
Johnson (D-SD)
Kohl (D-WI)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Lieberman (D-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Nelson (D-FL)
Nelson (D-NE)
Pryor (D-AR)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Salazar (D-CO)

PeppermintLizzy -

Your standards of "exraordinary achievement" are piteously and laughably low.

Baron,

I beg to differ with you! Perhaps your's are too HIGH. It took the Republicans 40 years to get to this state of majority in all areas of government ! We will not take it back overnight! Steps like happened this week, are a Positive, not a negative as you see it!

I have a new version of a well known song. My title is: THE BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLICANS, here are the words I hope you enjoy.

Mine Eyes have seen the bungling of that stumbling moron Bush;
he has blathered all the drivel that the neo-cons can push;
he has lost sight of all reason 'cause his head is up his tush;
the Doofus marches on.

I have heard him butcher syntax like a kindergarten fool;
There is warranted suspicion that he never went to school;
Should we fault him for the policies - or is he just their tool?
The lies keep piling on.

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
His wreckage will live on.

I have seen him cut the taxes of the billionaires' lone heir;
As he spends another zillion on an aircraft carrier;
Let the smokestacks keep polluting - do we really need clean
air?
The surplus is now gone.

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Your safety net is gone!

Now he's got a mighty hankerin' to bomb a prostrate state;
Though the whole world knows its crazy - and the U.N. says to
wait;
When he doesn't have the evidence, "We must prevaricate."
Diplomacy is done!

Oh, a trumped-up war is excellent; we have no moral bounds;
Should the reasons be disputed, we'll just make up other
grounds;
Enraging several billions - to his brainlessness redounds;
The Doofus marches on!

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Glory! G !

I have a new version of a well known song. My title is: THE BATTLE HYMN OF THE REPUBLICANS, here are the words I hope you enjoy.

Mine Eyes have seen the bungling of that stumbling moron Bush;
he has blathered all the drivel that the neo-cons can push;
he has lost sight of all reason 'cause his head is up his tush;
the Doofus marches on.

I have heard him butcher syntax like a kindergarten fool;
There is warranted suspicion that he never went to school;
Should we fault him for the policies - or is he just their tool?
The lies keep piling on.

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
His wreckage will live on.

I have seen him cut the taxes of the billionaires' lone heir;
As he spends another zillion on an aircraft carrier;
Let the smokestacks keep polluting - do we really need clean
air?
The surplus is now gone.

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Your safety net is gone!

Now he's got a mighty hankerin' to bomb a prostrate state;
Though the whole world knows its crazy - and the U.N. says to
wait;
When he doesn't have the evidence, "We must prevaricate."
Diplomacy is done!

Oh, a trumped-up war is excellent; we have no moral bounds;
Should the reasons be disputed, we'll just make up other
grounds;
Enraging several billions - to his brainlessness redounds;
The Doofus marches on!

Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Glory! Glory! How he'll Screw Ya'!
Glory! G !