Democratic Backbone? Not In This Congress

This is depressing. House leaders stalled the FISA bill giving retroactive immunity to telecoms passed by the Senate under the guise of civil liberties and the rule of law, giving a glimpse of hope for the few remaining Democratic eternal optimists that finally the party would make good on promises made after the 2006 election.

But like a sadistic master dangling a treat in front a his loyal but stupid dog, it looks like they'll pull the treat of the defense of the Constitution once again, giving the White House everything they wanted in the first place, and as Glenn Greenwald notes, putting themselves in the worst possible position by picking a fight on a highly volitile issue that has gotten a lot of media attention, only to capitulate and give the Republicans more fodder.

...No rational person who has watched Congressional Democrats since they took over Congress could possibly have expected them to do anything but what they always do: namely, whatever they're told to do by the White House.

...what is somewhat baffling in all of this is just how politically stupid and self-destructive their behavior is. If the plan all along was to give Bush everything he wanted, as it obviously was, why not just do it at the beginning? Instead, they picked a very dramatic fight that received substantial media attention. They exposed their freshmen and other swing-district members to attack ads. They caused their base and their allies to spend substantial energy and resources defending them from these attacks.

And now, after picking this fight and letting it rage for weeks, they are going to do what they always do -- just meekly give in to the President, yet again generating a tidal wave of headlines trumpeting how they bowed, surrendered, caved in, and lost to the President. They're going to cast the appearance that they engaged this battle and once again got crushed, that they ran away in fear because of the fear-mongering ads that were run and the attacks from the President. They further demoralize their own base and increase the contempt in which their base justifiably holds them (if that's possible). It's almost as though they purposely picked the path that imposed on themselves all of the political costs with no benefits.

...Even with their ultimate, total compliance with the President's orders, they're still going to be attacked as having Made Us Less Safe -- by waiting weeks to capitulate, rather than doing so immediately ...It was a loss for them on every level.

And so here we find the American people (at least the Democratic ones) laying on the ground, dejected, demoralized and feeling like fools for allowing Lucy to pull the football away as we tried to kick it yet again.

What do we do now? Better Democrats. The gang of losers in the Congress are so used to giving in time and time again that they don't know how to win. How many times does the GOP minority leadership have to fuck them in the ass until they get the picture that the have to fight fire with fire? There is no negotiating with these cretinous bastards. You don't bring a knife to a gun fight. What was that line that Malone (Sean Connery) says in The Untouchables? "They pull a knife, you pull a gun. He sends one of yours to the hospital, you send one of his to the morgue."

This is the only way the Republicans know, and if you give an inch they'll take a mile. But the weak, flawed Democrats in Congress have just gotten so used to atomic wedgie after atomic wedgie, so used to being stuffed in a locker after having their milk money stolen time and again, that they know no other way to act even when they are in the majority.

The worst part is that if they really and truly cared about the rule of law, about defending the Constitution as they say they do, the separate votes they plan to cast on the FISA and immunity to cover their own asses would never take place. But please pay attention to those Democrats that will vote "yea" on immunity and put them on your sHit List of the Democrats we must replace in Congress. That list is getting longer and longer all the time.