 WASHINGTON (AP) - Democrats distanced themselves Monday from Wisconsin Sen. Russell Feingold's effort to censure President Bush over domestic spying, preventing a floor vote that could alienate swing voters.
A day of tough, election-year talk between Feingold and Vice President Dick Cheney ended with Senate leaders sending the matter to the Judiciary Committee. ``I look forward to a full hearing, debate and vote in committee on this important matter,'' Feingold said in a statement late Monday. ``If the Committee fails to consider the resolution expeditiously, I will ask that there be a vote in the full Senate.''
| You could have had that today. |
Republicans dared Democrats to vote for the proposal. ``Some Democrats in Congress have decided the president is the enemy,'' Vice President Dick Cheney told a Republican audience in Feingold's home state.
Feingold, a potential presidential candidate, said on the Senate floor, ``The president has violated the law and Congress must respond.''
| I had no idea Karl Rove was this good. |
``A formal censure by Congress is an appropriate and responsible first step to assure the public that when the president thinks he can violate the law without consequences, Congress has the will to hold him accountable,'' Feingold said.
| Does that work on Senators? |
Even as he spoke, Democratic leaders fled held off the immediate vote that Majority Leader Bill Frist requested. Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., said he didn't know if there ever would be one. The referral averted a debate and a vote that Democrats privately worried would alienate voters who could decide close elections.
| Gee, can't imagine why the Dhimmicrats wouldn't want this to come to a vote. |
Throughout the day, Feingold's fellow Democrats said they understood his frustration but they held back overt support for the resolution. Several said they wanted first to see the Senate Intelligence Committee finish an investigation of the warrantless wiretapping program that Bush authorized as part of his war on terrorism.
| So that they don't look completely stupid. What they really want now is for this to go away since they saw that the public has no problem with reading al-Qaeda communications. |
Asked at a news conference whether he would vote for the censure resolution, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada declined to endorse it and said he hadn't read it. Sen. Joe Lieberman, D-Conn., said he had not read it either and wasn't inclined simply to scold the president. ``I'd prefer to see us solve the problem,'' Lieberman told reporters.
| You're about the only one, Joe. |
Across the Capitol, reaction was similar. Feingold's censure resolution drew empathy but no outright support from Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi. Pelosi ``understands Sen. Feingold's frustration that the facts about the NSA domestic surveillance program have not been disclosed appropriately to Congress,'' her office said in a statement. ``Both the House and the Senate must fully investigate the program and assign responsibility for any laws that may have been broken.''
| "And if we can't find any broken laws, we'll screech and scream and hold our breath." |
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