One is reminded of the Roman general Fabius, who used caution and delay before he attacked an enemy. Likewise, it seems, Feingold was in wait of those low numbers before he unfurled his banner of principles for his censure motion.

As for voting against the Patriot Act, that was an outcome of egregious political naivety and blindness not to be able to perceive the great danger that America faced, and faces, from a lethal internal enemy.

Both his stand against the Patriot Act and his censure motion ( I agree with Mark’s third reason) are the offspring of political innocence and have nothing to do with principles.

http://congeorgekotzabasis.blogspot.com

Yes, exactly right. That’s is why so many Dem lawmakers tripped over themselves to support Feingold!

Torturing prisoners is a scandal. Prima facie. The responsibility lies up the entire chain of command to Rumsfeld and Bush.

We do not know what happens at GITMO. The administration will not let the UN or anyone else interview the prisoners alone. It is a scandal when the President decides that he has the power to detain anyone, anywhere, and hold them indefinitely without charging them with anything. Also prima facie.

It is not a scandal when the VP shoots his friend in a hunting accident. The President and VP supposedly set the moral example for the country (as we were endlessly told during the Clinton impeachment). It is a scandal when the example which is set is that a) you don’t inform the authorities until twelve hours after the event, when any traces of alcohol can leave your system, b) you don’t accompany your friend to the hospital after you shot him in the face, and c) you dispatch surrogates to suggest that it was really Whittington’s fault that he was shot.

Abu Ghraib is another example of this. The Democrats tried to connect the abuse committed by a couple of low-ranking soldiers directly to the White House through the authorization of harsh interrogation tactics at GITMO.

They also blew GITMO out of proportion. The interrogation tactics are in no way terror; the harshest treatment the detainees has been done by the detainees themselves, who are intentionally trying to starve themselves to death. This “scandal” didn’t really work out either as most Americans aren’t bothered by the thought of scantily-clad women flirting with terrorists.

Vice-president Cheney’s hunting accident is another example. The Democrats blew it out of proportion because most people didn’t really mind their previous scandal, the wire-tapping of Al Qaeda suspects.

At least we agree about Bruce Springsteen…

All of this will (hopefully) come in due time, when the party coalesces around a candidate. Commentators were shocked when the Democrats more or less sang from the same song book in 2004. In 2008, the Dems should carry Ohio and a whole lot more.

A majority of Americans feel that the Bush administration is a “failure.” Bush’s approval rating is 33 points less than Clinton’s at the time of his impeachment. If you average the approval ratings of Bush and Cheney, you have a lower rating than any President at any time since these polls started. If you think that this is the result of scandals manufactured by Democrats, think again.

And if they don’t impeach or censure him after all this constant caterwauling, then it just looks like they lack the courage of their convictions here, of which they obviously have none.