I get a sick feeling when I see the lack of fight by congressional Democrats.

[madfloridian]

It literally scares me. We are in serious trouble in this country right now, and the congressional leaders don't seem to have the will to go to battle for us.

Yet we will be told we must elect Democrats, or we will not survive as a country. We were told that before, and we got a majority in 2006.

Now that majority so many of us worked so hard for is letting us down.

Looks like they will go against the vast majority of the Democrats and let the FISA bill through with immunity for telecoms. Harry Reid had the power to choose which bill to bring up for a vote.

He did not choose the House version without retroactive immunity, he chose the one with immunity. He did not have to do that. He could have kept it off the floor if necessary. He is going against the hundreds of thousands who wrote and called.

FISA Debate Lookin' Good for The Telecoms?

The Senate will have two choices when debate begins this Thursday: the Senate intelligence committee's version, which would grant retroactive immunity for the telecoms that participated in the administration's warrantless wiretapping program, or the Senate Judiciary Committee's version, which would not. Although Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) himself opposes retroactive immunity, he struck a deal with the two committee chairmen to hold a vote first on the intelligence committee's version, and then have a vote on Leahy's version as an amendment. Civil liberty advocates say that move slants the debate in favor of a bill with immunity.

Why would Harry do that? It puzzles me.

Also we find that after great expectations of a big fight in the House to get the truth out....that we are let down again.

Who Has Time for Contempt?

Congress is busy with some pretty weighty issues these days: the faltering economy, Iraq and government surveillance just to name a few. And it seems that no one's got the time to respond when the administration tells Congress to stick their subpoenas where the sun don't shine.

Last summer, former White House counsel Harriet Miers didn't even show up in response to a House Judiciary Committee subpoena for testimony related to the U.S. attorney firings. They got an empty chair (see above). The same went for Karl Rove in the Senate Judiciary Committee. Both argued that executive privilege protected them from even appearing to invoke that privilege. The two committees also subpoenaed White House chief of staff Josh Bolten for documents and got nothing in return.

Rep. John Conyers (D-MI) promptly got a contempt citation passed in his committee for both Miers and Bolten in late July, shortly before the summer recess. But it's not official until passed by the full House. When Congress returned, though, nothing happened. Then a vote was supposedly imminent in November -- Conyers even issued a final warning to the White House. But then the vote didn't come (Iraq and FISA got in the way, top Dems said).

Yes things got in the way, you know.

Now they are saying:

“Right now, we’re focused on working in a bipartisan fashion on stimulus,” said House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.), indicating that the contempt vote is not expected for weeks, depending on how quickly the stimulus package moves....

When our Democratic congress is fearful in the face of a battle...then I get just plain scared. I want to yell at them to stop using the word unity...just stop it.

You do not compromise with extremists. They will chew you up and spit you out.