September 28, 2006
Hard question
Forty-four out of forty-five Democrats in the Senate voted against aribitrary detention.
Fifty out of fifty-five Republicans in the Senate voted for arbitrary detention, and one hid in the corner instead of voting.
So here's the hard question:
Which party should opponents of arbitrary detention support this November?
Footnote Rollcall here.
Atrios has some of the Democratic speeches.
And in the end, 65-34, with 12 crossover Dems. I know this just highlights the need for achieving Democratic control of the chamber -- with Democrats in charge, a million amendments would have passed if it ever even came up for a vote. But this plain sucks. As far as I can tell 12 Democrats, including both who represent my native New Jersey, just voted to give President Bush the legal right to imprison me at his whim then waterboard me and beat me without leaving marks. The vote was embarrassing and the bill is terrifying.
At least now we'll get a chance to see just how moderate Justice Roberts really is.
Posted by: Alex F at September 28, 2006 06:51 PMI feel like I'm going to vomit. What the hell have we become?
That you have a category labeled "Torture" speaks volumes.
Posted by: Barry Freed at September 28, 2006 07:06 PMI feel like I'm going to vomit. What the hell have we become?
That you have a category labeled "Torture" speaks volumes.
Posted by: Barry Freed at September 28, 2006 07:07 PMSnowe wasn't hiding in the corner -- she wasn't there that day.
Posted by: Zzedar at September 28, 2006 09:53 PMSnowe wasn't hiding in the corner -- she wasn't there that day.
I'm sure I am overly romantic, but I can't help but remember the incident in Profiles in Courage where Senator Grimes of Iowa was literally carried into the Senate to vote (against his party) on the impeachment of President Johnson. What more important thing was Snowe doing when the vote on the Habeas Corpus ammendment was cast?
Posted by: Larry Lennhoff at September 29, 2006 05:20 AMMark, you need to revise your numbers in light of the vote on the actual bill. Only 33 D's were actually against arbitrary detentions; 11 were against detentions before they were for them; and one was consistently for them.
The D party has hardly covered itself in glory here, though in comparison to the R's they do look great.
Posted by: Joel at September 29, 2006 07:20 AMLieberman isn't a Democrat. He's with the Connecticut for Lieberman party these days.
So 44/44 Democrats voted nay.
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