The Senate's passage of the USA Patriot Act hands Bush a much needed victory at a time when his popularity has dropped to a new low and in the wake of new revelations about Katrina lies and a backlash - deserved or not - to the Dubai ports deal the Democrats have handed the Republicans a chance to polish their tough-on-terror image for the midterm elections.
By a lopsided 89-10 vote Thursday, 14 of the act’s 16 provisions were made permanent and two others were renewed for four years. The 10 heroic votes against the act came from Jim Jeffords, I-Vt., and nine Senate Democrats: Russ Feingold of Wisconsin, Robert Byrd of W. Virginia, Daniel Akaka of Hawaii, Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico, Tom Harkin of Iowa, Patrick Leahy of Vermont, Carl Levin of Michigan, Patty Murray of Washington and Ron Wyden of Oregon.
Russ Feingold - a key opponent of the current [Un]Patriot Act - said before the vote:
"Without freedom, we are not America. If we don’t preserve our liberties, we cannot win this war, no matter how many terrorists we capture or kill.
"That is why the several Senators who have said at one time or another during this debate things like, “Civil liberties do not mean much when you are dead” are wrong about America at the most basic level. They do not understand what this country is all about. Theirs is a vision that the founders of this nation, who risked everything for freedom, would categorically reject. And so do the American people.
"Americans want to defeat terrorism, and they want the basic character of this country to survive and prosper."
The names of the Democrats who voted against "the basic character of this country" is much longer than the ones who voted for freedom and liberty, but several names are quite prominent and will influence our future votes: Sens. Clinton, Kerry, Kennedy, Feinstein.
Once upon a time a Democrat spoke of Profiles in Courage. This - except for the 10 exceptions - is not what he meant.
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