Thoughts about yesterday's FISA vote

A few more comments on the disgraceful anti-American FISA vote in the Senate yesterday.

At a time when the Cheney/Bush administration commands support from about 20% of the population, the vast majority of which believes that the country is headed in the wrong direction, the only place Bush could win any kind of vote is in the obsequious Congress. These people who have been elected to represent us, clearly don't.

I am aware that when the corporate media talk about a "Democratic" congress, that is by no means a reflection of reality. First of all, a Democratic Party that required Conn. Sen. Joe Lieberman's vote to take control can't possibly reflect Democratic values. Although it's not at all clear to me what values the Democratic party represents on international issues. More to the point, how they differ from the belligerent war-mongering of the Bush/McCain policies. The 2006 election provided the Democrats with barely enough votes to organize the congress, clearly not to control it.

But there is a far more important point to be made. Why should only Democrats be committed to preserving the Constitution and the rule of law? After all, every senator takes the following oath of office:

I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter: So help me God.

Clearly the part about "support[ing] and defend[ing] the Constitution against all enemies, foreign and domestic" slipped the mind of most of these toadies yesterday. There is absolutely no question that Bush and Cheney are "domestic enemies" of our democratic system and our Constitution. The ACLU describes what happened yesterday in these words:

Congress has not only legalized the Bush administration's secret NSA spying program, it has given the government even more power to listen to our phone calls and read our emails than even the Bush administration illegally claimed for itself under its secret program. And, by granting telecoms immunity, it has made it highly unlikely that we will ever learn the extent of the administration’s lawless actions.

Clearly we need to take back control of our society from the military-industrial complex, which Pres. Eisenhower so eloquently warned us against in his Farewell Address.