Senate Republicans will be playing a lot of defence in 2016

By Richard K. Barry

Of the 34 U.S. Senators up for reelection in 2016, 10 are Democrats and 24 are Republicans, which will provide a great opportunity for Democrats to take back the Senate.

One race worth considering in the early stages is Republican Ron Johnson's Wisconsin Senate seat, which Public Policy Polling finds to be very competitive should Russ Feingold jump in for the Democrats. PPP has Feingold at 50% to Johnson's 41% at this point in a hypothetical rematch of their 2010 contest.

Johnson hasn't proven to be very popular during his first term in the Senate. Only 32% of voters approve of the job he's doing to 40% who disapprove. 28% of voters with no opinion about him also suggests he hasn't made a terribly strong impression on people over the last 4 years. Meanwhile Feingold is still relatively popular despite his 2010 loss. 46% of voters see him favorably to 35% with an unfavorable opinion. That makes him more popular than any other politician in the state who we looked at on this poll.

After the disaster in 2014, it will be great fun to watch a bunch of Republican sweat it out. 

Early days, but I'm looking forward to it.

Craziest Republican of the Day: Ron Johnson

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Yes, it goes to the junior senator from Wisconsin, the Tea Party Republican who beat incumbent Russ Feingold in 2010 (largely because he got caught up in the Republican wave and because no one knew what he was really about politically, having never run for office before -- and because Wisconsin was crazy, as is frequently the case). From The Raw Story:

Tea party-backed Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) says that the right to own high-capacity ammunitions magazines like the 100-round drum that was used to kill at least a dozen people in Colorado last week is a "basic freedom" that is protected by the U.S. Constitution.

Fox News host Chris Wallace on Sunday asked Johnson why people needed military-grade weapons like the AR-15 semi-automatic rifle and large ammunition clips used by the shooter in Aurora, Colorado where at least 12 were killed and 58 were wounded.

"The left always uses the term 'assault rifle,' and they're really talking about semi-automatic weapons that are used in hunting," Johnson explained. "That's what happens in Wisconsin. These are rifles that are used in hunting. Just the fact of the matter is this is really not an issue of guns. This is about sick people doing things you simply can't prevent. It's really an issue of freedom."

Really? Hunters use these weapons? If that's really the case, how insanely fucking ridiculous.

And, really? It's a "basic freedom"? Because the Founders were worried about the defence of a new and vulnerable nation in the late 1700s, that means they approved the private ownership of weapons beyond anything they could have imagined at the time?

"Does something that would limit magazines that can carry 100 rounds, would that infringe on the constitutional right?" Wallace wondered.

"I believe so," Johnson insisted. "There are magazines — 30-round magazines — that are just common all over the place. You simply can't keep these weapons out of the hands of sick, demented individuals that want to do harm."

First, you can't entirely prevent these weapons from getting in the hands of dangerous individuals, but you can certainly make it extremly difficult. But crazy (and crazed) pro-gun absolutists like Johnson are against even that -- against even trying.

Second, it's too easy to write off what happened as the actions of a "sick, demented" individual. That's not to say that James Holmes isn't sick and demented or was acting as part of some concerted effort, or that he was motivated by specific ideological attachments. No, it's just to say that he didn't act in a vacuum, which is to say, that he acted within a certain culture -- in this case a culture of violence that while not exclusively American is certainly more prevalent in the U.S. than in other Western countries. It's the culture of the Second Amendment, the culture of the NRA, the culture of extremists like Ron Johnson.

There won't be nearly enough examination of that culture and its political underpinnings in response to the shooting in Colorado, largely because the right screams bloody murder whenever it comes under scrutiny, and whenver it looks like there might be momentum towards meaningful gun control, but we won't achieve any meaningful understanding of what happened, and specifically why it happened, until there is.

All eyes will be on the newly open Wisconsin senate seat in 2012

By Richard K. Barry 

It's getter harder and harder to contemplate how the Democrats hold onto the Senate in 2012. As we have been saying over and over again, 33 seats are up for grabs. 21 of these are Democratic seats (two additional independents caucus with the Dems) and, of course, only 10 are GOP seats.

On Friday, Herbert Kohl, Democratic senator from Wisconsin, announced that he would not be seeking reelection in 2012, which probably pushes this one into the "toss-up" category. That at least is where the Cook Political Report now has it.

No sure thing in politics, but Kohl got 67% of the vote when he last ran in 2006, which was his fourth win in a row so his reelection wouldn't have been a bad place to put your money.

So here we go. Kohl is the fifth Democrat to announce that he was not running again. The others are Daniel Akaka of Hawaii, Jeff Bingaman of New Mexico, Kent Conrad of North Dakota and Jim Webb of Virgina. Joe Lieberman is one of the aforementioned independents, who caucuses with the Democrats, who is not running.

One of the possible Democratic candidates that has to come to mind is Russ Feingold, who had been a senator from Wisconsin from 1993 to 2011 before being defeated by Republican Ron Johnson in the 2010 election by a margin of 52% to 47%.

For the moment, Feingold is taking things slow, but pressure will no doubt build as Democrats try to figure out how they hold the seat. In any case, there will be no shortage of interested candidates.

On the other side of the aisle, Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan is already considering making a run for the vacant seat. In some classic "political speak" he said he is going to:

take some time over the next few days to discuss the news with my family and supporters before making a decision about how I'm best able to serve my employers in the First Congressional District, our state and our nation.

Translation is that he will be burning up the phone lines to make sure he can raise the money needed to win, maybe do some polling to see how he's doing statewide, and otherwise get a read on how good his chances of victory might be.

This will be interesting, though, if Ryan runs and gets the nomination. Gov. Scott Walker's assault on public-sector unions has already guaranteed that there will be a national focus on Wisconsin come 2012. Ryan's budget with its radical plan to end Medicare as we know it will surely put more focus on him regardless. His entry into the senate race would only add fuel to the fire that Democrats are likely to stoke from now until election day. I think that might work for the Democrats, actually. I can't imagine that a lot of Republicans are going to want to see a high profile senate race in Wisconsin with a debate about Medicare constantly on the front pages of national newspapers and in other media.

Herbert Kohl is 76 years old and I doubt that his decision to step aside reflects any concerns on his part that the seat can't be held. My guess is that if the Democrats are in any shape at all in 2012 and Obama is running the kind of campaign we know he can run, they should be okay. That's a lot of "ifs" but that's where my money is today.

(Cross-posted at Lippmann's Ghost.)

Quote of the Day: Russ Feingold on health-care reform

By Michael J.W. Stickings

From Politico:

We're headed in the direction of doing absolutely nothing, and I think that's unfortunate.

More: "Nobody is going to bring a bill before Christmas, and maybe not even then, if this ever happens. The divisions are so deep. I never seen anything like that."

There is good reason to be so pessimistic. Reality sucks.

Especially Congressional "reality" dominated by cowardly Democrats and obstructionist Republicans.

(I still think Obama might just know what he's doing, waiting for Republican opposition to run its course before stepping in, allowing Republicans to take the blame, and pushing a Democratic bill that includes a robust public option. But maybe I'm being delusionally optimistic.)

Craziest Conservative of the Day: George F. Will (or, in support of Russ Feingold's effort to amend the 17th Amendment)

By Michael J.W. Stickings

I understand that George Will is, despite his global warming lies and distortions, one of the smarter conservatives out there -- I'll leave that up to you to decide just how much of a compliment that is (remember: it's all relative). I understand also that Will was against the McCain-Feingold restrictions on political finance and that he remains opposed to any such restrictions on political "speech." But is it really the case, as Will remarks again today, in his WaPo column, that McCain-Feingold was an "evisceration of the First Amendment." Is evisceration not a bit too strong a word? Last time I checked, the First Amendment is fine, all things considered, what with what Bush and Cheney did to it.

But Will's column today isn't about McCain-Feingold, it's about Feingold's proposed constitutional amendment, an amendment to the 17th Amendment that would require Senate vacancies to be filled by special election only, and not by temporary appointment of the governor. Given the situations in Illinois, where disgraced and soon-to-be outgoing Gov. Rod Blagojevich appointed the corrupt and egomaniacal Roland Burris to fill Obama's seat, and New York, where, in this case, incompetent Gov. David Paterson flirted with Caroline Kennedy, appointed the quasi-Republican Kirsten Gillibrand to fill Hillary's seat, and then unleased a character assassination campaign against Kennedy, amending the 17th Amendment would seem to be a very good idea.

Not to Will, though, who calls Feingold's proposal "more vandalism against the Constitution." Really? Vandalism? Is that not also a bit too strong a word?

You can read Will's argument in its entirety, if you like, but it essentially boils down to this: "Feingold proposes to traduce federalism and nudge the Senate still further away from the nature and function the Framers favored." And what the Framers wanted was for the Senate, unlike the more populist House, to be "more deliberative than responsive." Fair enough, but this is 2009, not 1789. Times have changed. And while I understand that Will and his federalist brethren would prefer for times not to change -- and for the Constitution to remain forever as it was at the very beginning, the reality is that they have. And, last time I checked, the Constitution has been amended a number of times -- 27 times, to be precise; or 17, if you prefer not to include the Bill of Rights. I can only presume that Will is against all of these amendments -- including, say, the 13th, which abolished slavery, and the 17th itself, which provided for direction election to the Senate -- so evisceratingly vandalistic were they.

Like it or not, the Senate is already somewhat other than what the Framers envisioned and designed. It is still more about deliberation than is the House, but senators are now elected directly by the people -- in other words, it is more democratic than it once was, just like the country as a whole is, and, without taking anything away from the Framers, who understood that a healthy democracy needs to include certain non-democratic elements, if only for the sake of stability and depth (thankfully, for example, Supreme Court justices aren't elected), there's nothing wrong with enhancing the democratic quality of the Senate by replacing temporary appointments, which leave so much to self-interested governors and their partisan preferences, with special elections that would allow the people to determine who represents them even in so august a body as the U.S. Senate.

Will may not like it, and he will no doubt continue to fume, but we have reached a point in time -- the times having changed -- that a representative of the people (or even of a state) who has not been elected to serve simply lacks legitimacy. And that's what Feingold's amendment is all about: legitimacy. And at a time when democratic institutions around the world are undergoing a crisis of legitimacy, that is, when they are losing, or have already lost, the public trust, there's nothing wrong with adding legitimacy where far too much of it is lacking.

Overturning Dubya: Obama to reverse Bush national security policies

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Following up on my Bush-Obama-Gitmo post from last night, it looks like Obama will indeed reverse many of Bush's more egregious moves:

President-elect Barack Obama is expected to move swiftly to reverse executive orders regarding torture of terror suspects, the military prison at Guantanamo Bay and other controversial security policies, sources close to his transition said, in dramatic gestures aimed at reversing President Bush’s accumulation of executive power.

Senator Russ Feingold (D-WI) said he's been informed that President Obama will support his proposed legislation to make public some opinions from the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel, which issued some of the Bush Administration's most sweeping claims of executive power. Obama also has promised to limit President Bush's practice of using "signing statements" to amend legislation.

"Every day we get indications that they're serious about reversing the abuses of the Constitution," Feingold, a harsh Bush critic, told Politico. Feingold said he thinks Obama is likely to issue executive orders rapidly reversing Bush policies, and others have indicated that those will likely cover the interrogation and detention of terror suspects, and keeping the records of past presidents secret.

For America, then, the start of a long road back to respectability and a renewed moral standing in the world, a start coming in just a matter of days, and not a moment too soon.

FISA bill signing: post mortem

By Carol Gee

7/18/08 -- Because I have been travelling, my posting here at The Reaction has been lacking. Today I am posting something I did on the 12th at South by Southwest that never made it over here. I do this because I am "still smarting" about this disaster, and wanted to share my "take" on it as I wrote it at the time -- for whatever it's worth. The post follows:

How did the courage of Congressional Democrats die, when it comes to protecting our citizens' civil liberties? What happened to their oaths of office in the face of OCP's (our current president's) massive assault on Fourth Amendment privacy protection. First, please look at WaPo transcript of what OCP said as he signed the new FISA bill: Bush remarks on signing of FISA bill. Here is an excellent article headlined, "Bush Signs Spy Bill, ACLU Sues" by Ryan Singel at Wired: Threat Level. To quote:

The American Civil Liberties Union filed suit Thursday over a controversial wiretapping law, challenging the constitutionality of the expanded spy powers Congress granted to the president on Wednesday.

The federal lawsuit was filed with the court just hours after Bush signed the bill into law.

Civil liberties advocates have not laid down and died, however. Read this excellent piece regarding what one of the key longtime advocate organizations thinks about the current moribund situation, etc.: "Interview with ACLU re: constitutional challenge to new FISA law," by Glenn Greenwald at Salon.com. To quote:

. . . the extraordinary fact that the surveillance program implemented by Congress yesterday does not merely authorize most of the President's so-called "Terrorist Surveillance Program" that gave rise to this scandal in the first place, but is actually much broader in scope even than that lawless program, because there is not even any requirement in the new FISA law that the "target" of the surveillance have any connection whatsoever to Terrorism, nor is there any requirement that the Government believe the "target" is an agent of a foreign power or terrorist organization, or even guilty of any wrongdoing at all.

. . . Sen. Chris Dodd -- whose stalwart, relentless efforts to stop this law were nothing short of heroic, as those efforts often provoked substantial hostility among many of his colleagues -- sent around the following email today to his mailing list highlighting the positive aspects of the battle:

Yesterday was a sad day for the United States Senate.

It is my hope that the courts will undo the damage done to the Constitution.

But let us stand tall, knowing that by working together we were able to make wiretapping and retroactive immunity part of the national discourse these last number of months.

We came together – all of you, Senator Feingold, bloggers like Jane Hamsher and Glenn Greenwald, organizations like the EFF and ACLU, and untold hundreds of thousands of Americans who simply wanted to make sure that this one, last insult did not happen with ease.

I'm sorry we weren't successful.

I just hope I'm lucky enough to have you by my side in the next fight, whatever that may be.

Thanks for all you've done.

Chris Dodd

. . . the only people outside the Executive Branch who have any real knowledge at all of how these illegal spying powers were exercised are a small number of Senators on the Intelligence Committee who have been briefed by Bush officials, but they are barred by law from saying what they know. Nonetheless, here is what one of those members -- Sen. Russ Feingold -- said during his remarks on the Senate floor regarding the new FISA bill, as highlighted by Howie Klein. In a minimally rational world, these revelations from Sen. Feingold would be major, major news:

I sit on the Intelligence and Judiciary Committees, and I am one of the few members of this body who has been fully briefed on the warrantless wiretapping program. And, based on what I know, I can promise that if more information is declassified about the program in the future, as is likely to happen either due to the Inspector General report, the election of a new President, or simply the passage of time, members of this body will regret that we passed this legislation. I am also familiar with the collection activities that have been conducted under the Protect America Act and will continue under this bill. I invite any of my colleagues who wish to know more about those activities to come speak to me in a classified setting. Publicly, all I can say is that I have serious concerns about how those activities may have impacted the civil liberties of Americans. If we grant these new powers to the government and the effects become known to the American people, we will realize what a mistake it was, of that I am sure.

Important details about the ACLU lawsuits: Blogger emptywheel at Firedoglake discussed a number of and ideas about what might happen next to revive the question. To quote:

. . . one of the article's most intriguing elements: we have worked single mindedly under the assumption that, while many parts of the FAA might could be reversed or minimized through subsequent legislation with a new Congress, the retroactive immunity portion was irrevocable and final. That may, and I emphasize this is a tentative and weak may, not necessarily be the case.

If Congress could not do its job of checking an out of control executive, then there is only one branch left to do it, the judicial. I have not permanently given up hope, but it will be a long tough fight to revive it. The USA is a very sick patient now. We still need to work to save it.

(Cross-posted at South by Southwest.)

Russ Feingold: A friend of the Constitution

By Creature

I understand the strain of thought that says we should leave Obama some rhetorical wiggle room so he can actually win the election come November. Personally, however, I think there's room for dissent and support. If anything, a little dissent, a little separation from the left helps Obama quell the right's chant that he's a radical lefty (which he is anything but). With that, and with full respect and thanks to Senator Feingold, boy do I wish it was Obama in this video and not Feingold.



(Cross-posted at State of the Day.)

Congress' July 4 recess -- Implications for FISA

By Carol Gee

Congress will be away from Washington for a time to celebrate our nation's birthday. Given the manner this congress has been operating, it is often a good thing for our senators and representatives to be out of the city. Less mischief happens that way. As my regular readers know, much mischief has happened regarding the erosion of citizen privacy over the past few years. And Congress has aided and abetted that assault on the Fourth Amendment. The current fight is over the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, the "FISA" bill set for revision. The best post on the current and future situation regarding the FISA bill, as yet unresolved by Congress, was put up about a week ago by -- guess who -- my favorite, Glenn Greenwald, writing for Salon.com. Another of his excellent posts sets the stage for what is likely to happen to the FISA bill when Congress comes back from its July 4 recess. To quote (includes his links):

UPDATE: Two Democratic Senators actually fighting against the FISA bill -- Russ Feingold and Chris Dodd -- succeeded in blocking a vote in the Senate until after the July 4 recess (the vote is now scheduled for July 8). Jesselyn Radack -- the DOJ lawyer who became the whistleblower concerning the Bush administration's treatment of John Walker Lindh -- writes here about this success. It's only a temporary reprieve, but delays of this sort can enable further opposition to build and/or allow unanticipated events to intervene.

There is a surprisingly vigorous feud among three of my favorites over the future of FISA. Glenn Greenwald and Keith Olbermann are going at it over Senator Barack Obama's unwelcome support for a bad FISA bill. Former White House Counsel John Dean is also in the middle of it. In my opinion, the disagreements are not so much over the back and forth criticisms between Greenwald and Olbermann over Obama's FISA stance, as they are about a general frustration due to the country's inability to stop the FISA bill's apparent momentum to passage. Empty Wheel weighs in with some helpful insight into this whole bizarre controversy. We all want the same things out of Congress on this matter; we just disagree on how to get there. Congress needs to exercise vigorous oversight over a law-breaking Executive. It needs to defend the Constitution. And it needs to stop caving in to the nasty tactics of Republicans.

(Cross-posted at South by Southwest.)

Dodd and Feingold to filibuster FISA capitulation

By Michael J.W. Stickings

Senators Chris Doss and Russ Feingold announced yesterday that they will filibuster the FISA bill (and Harry Reid will support them). This is from their statement:

This is a deeply flawed bill, which does nothing more than offer retroactive immunity by another name. We strongly urge our colleagues to reject this so-called 'compromise' legislation and oppose any efforts to consider this bill in its current form. We will oppose efforts to end debate on this bill as long as it provides retroactive immunity for the telecommunications companies that may have participated in the President's warrantless wiretapping program, and as long as it fails to protect the privacy of law-abiding Americans.

Here are two Democrats who are not willing to capitulate -- unlike some Democrats and almost all Republicans (who of course don't see it as capitulation) -- and who are prepared to stand up for the basic constitutional right of Americans to be free of unwarranted government surveillance and against the corporate enablers of Bush's culture-of-fear-based police state.

Dodd and Feingold are absolutely right -- and they deserve our appreciation, admiration, and support.

(For more from us on the disgusting FISA capitulation, see the very fine posts of Carol, Creature, Fogg, and Libby.)

Not all politicians suck

By Creature

Just to follow-up on my Disappointed post below. If there is a politician that has not disappointed me on FISA (or anything else, for that matter), it would be Russ Feingold. That's it, just giving kudos.

(Cross-posted at State of the Day.)

Obama got the hint

By Creature

With Wisconsin up next on the primary calender, Hillary is playing catch-up (suddenly not leaving delegates on the table matters), going negative, and grasping at slogans. Obama, on the other hand, pivots and builds. John Nichols from The Nation [via True Blue Liberal]:

When I talked with Russ Feingold last week about what the Democratic candidates for president should do to win Tuesday's Wisconsin primary, he suggested that both Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton should go to the senator's hometown of Janesville and talk about trade.

Obama got the hint.

He blew into Wisconsin. He talked trade. He talked NAFTA. He sounded Feingoldian. Could an endorsement from Feingold be far behind?

Obama's message at the GM plant was a good one -- not just for the workers of Janesville and the other factory towns that will be voting in Wisconsin on Tuesday and Ohio two weeks later, but also for Feingold. The Wisconsin senator says he has not made up his mind regarding the Obama-Clinton contest, but he holds open the prospect of a pre-primary nod to one of the contenders.

Stay tuned.

(Cross-posted at State of the Day.)

To censure or not to censure

By Edward Copeland

Sen. Russ Feingold has resurrected his censure idea against Dubya and various co-conspirators within his administration and once again I'm torn. Do they deserve censure? Yes. Do the deserve impeachment? Absolutely. Should it be pursued? I'm not so sure. I actually found myself agreeing with David Brooks on Meet the Press yesterday when he said that there are as many as 30 Republicans in the Senate on the verge of breaking on Iraq for good and to turn the debate into one on censure or impeachment would only serve to have them running back toward party unity instead of away from it.

Feingold proposes two measures:

The first would seek to reprimand Bush for, as Feingold described it, getting the nation into war without adequate military preparation and for issuing misleading public statements. The resolution also would cite Vice President Dick Cheney and perhaps other administration officials.

The second measure would seek to censure Bush for what the Democrat called a continuous assault against the rule of law through such efforts as the warrantless surveillance program against suspected terrorists, Feingold said. It would also ask for a reprimand of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales and maybe others.

While Dubya, Darth Cheney and the gang certainly deserve punishment, I think our priority must be ending this war and not allowing distractions to further delay this more than it will already be delayed just because of the massive logistics involved in such a redeployment. Certainly, I question whether the wavering Republicans will ever put their votes where their mouths are, but I have to believe it's more likely if it's seen as both parties and the country uniting against an intransigent presidency than if it becomes a blatantly partisan fight over punishing his misdeeds.