The Democrats don't think they'll have enough votes to impeach Cheney or better still Bush and Cheney so they aren't willing to try. But there are plenty of articles of impeachment that will hold up in the process which would leave the Republicans in the position of either supporting the indisputable articles of impeachment or "revealing" that they prefer politics to the defense of the Constitution of the United States.

I'd plea to Pelosi and Read, "Work with us," the American citizens horrified by what the Bush administration has done to our country!

If anybody reads "This Modern World," the 'toon from a few weeks ago portraying Bush as the bully at the beach and Harry Reid as the weakling who get's sand constantly kicked in his face was spot-on. Bush is a chickensh*t bully, as long as he knows Pelosi and Reid are even bigger chickensh*ts, he's going to keep kicking sand in their faces and then daring them to do something about it.

At this point the Democrats, particularly their leadership, resemble dogs that have been beaten and kicked a long time, cowering as though they're going to be beaten again. Who can respect that? Their failure to even get the toothless "No Confidence" vote on Gonzalez was yet another brand of cowardice and collusion.

"We set the bar too high."
What kind of spineless horse flop is this? Hey, Reid, you lilly-livered sack, you ever heard of a fillibuster? Coward.

Oh, I'm sure the cry of..."we don't have the votes to overide, blah-blah, blah..." is the foundation of their complicity, and will be recited on this thread ad infidim. It has become apparent to most of the unlettered in politics, that the representatives of the people are unfaithful whores to other interests, and are not our whores. They did promise with an oath...didn't they? Whether they be "D" or "R", it matters little.

The system is broken. Two party; one idealogy isn't going to bode well for the future of politics, civilation, or peace and happiness. Better start over, and good riddance.

Investigate WTC-7

"I understand their disappointment," said Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada. "We raised the bar too high."

You dick. What a lame response for what was effectively bait and switch. Dems have no guts to walk the walk.

The Dems have screwed us, and will continue to screw us. Time for a change.

Why would one expect a party funded by arms dealers to end a war?

If you read this article you may want to do it near a garbage can or toilet, so you can avoid getting any vomit on the floor. One after another, the author quotes leading democrats apologizing for failing to end the war in Iraq and blaming it on not having enough support from Republicans. Harry Reid apologized for "setting the bar too high." I call bullshit on that.

Harry Reid and the Democrats didn't set the bar. The US people set it. Last November they spoke loud and clear to Congress: end this war NOW! All it would have taken was for the Congress to pass NO funding bill. They definitely had the votes to do that—after all, they have a majority in both houses. Instead they passed a bill that gave Bush exactly what he wanted and then blamed it on the minority when it passed.

What a bunch of useless liars.

I liked this statistic and quote from the article: "A Quinnipiac University poll this month found Congress with an approval rating of just 23 percent. "People voted for change. But they don't think they got it," said Peter Brown, an assistant director of the poll."

Yep. That's because the democrats are defenders of the status quo. They materially benefit from how the system is organized and can't reasonably be expected to lead a fight against it. You can't convince someone to believe something they are paid not to believe.

The one possible silver lining mentioned in the article? "But among Democrats' top legislative promises, just one, the first increase in the federal minimum wage in a decade, has been passed by Congress and signed into law by Bush." Of course, this supposed victory was a rider tacked on to the war funding bill, and the minimum wage is still far lower than what is needed for a genuine living wage.

Worse, wages are still under attack from Congress as they are busy attempting to revive a Bracero-style "guest worker" program that will lower wages for millions. The real way to raise wages is to give amnesty to undocumented workers and for all workers to form unions and fight for higher wages. We can't rely on the Democrats to give us progress. We must struggle collectively for it.

Sucks to be a Democrat these days. They are not going to do anything and if the party moves to the left to do something, they won't get elected so they can't do anything. Hard dilems. The entire political scene has shifted to the right in America these last 30 years.

Cry me a freak'n river! Let's rewind this pathetic train of excuses already. These Dem leaders ran on a platform of ending the war. While they were doing that, they also were only expecting to win the House. The fact that they took so many seats in the Senate as well only adds to their potential for change.

What Pelosi and Reid are proving is that they really are no different from the reds, because they obviously are more concerned about their personal reputations and agendas rather than using every possible means to do what they told us they would do.

Excuses, nothing more, nothing less. This two party system is broken, neither party truly represents the people any longer. America is the heart of democracy, please, this is just a puppet show.

Do people still believe that we have an opposition party to the NeoCon Republicans.. please please wake up and smell the corruption. The Democrats are lining their pockets with the profits from this war just as much as any of their "colleagues across the aisle".

If we investigated; both parties would guilty of War Crimes. They are just playing their puppet media and us.

I'd like to think that Congress - and the American people in general - would quit dicking around with who's a Dem and who's a Repub and just get on with being Americans. Doing what's right for We the People instead of what they think is right for their party and/or lobbyist.

Naive, I know, but I can wish...

(Granted there are notable exceptions in Congress - just not enough to make a difference.)

Reid is full of shit...the bar isn't too high, the Dems just dont want to jump that high, for fear of not getting elected again.

Ending the war does not require ANY action, just one measure of INACTION...do not fund the war any more, do not introduce any war funding bills. prevent the Refucklicans from putting forward any funding bills.

Unfortunately, that means no more earmarks & pork, so it will NEVER HAPPEN

The current democrats will not do anything as they are as bought and sold as republicans (with the exception of kucinich, and maybe a few others). This Is fact people. Look at what they have done and voted for. I voted for obama and remember his campaign of liberalism. then i watched how he voted and it was pathetic. Hillary "the Queen of Mean" will bomb iran, she has mean eyes and they don't lie.
This makes me want to vote for Ron Paul he seems to ring with an honesty.

Ultimately does anyone know who has the most royal blood in the next presidental farce??????? If the websites that state that ALL or most american presidents were descendents of royalty then wouldn't this hold true. the next prez will be a royalty decendent

Some of these Democrats are cynical and immoral enough to want the war to drag on until '08 so it can be used as an election year issue. Besides, what defense contractor wants the war to end? And both parties take 'contributions' from defense contractors.

Goose, that is garbage. People might not like voting for the "left" just like they wouldn't like voting for a "socialist" (even though they probably don't know what that word is), because the political and media elites have tirelessly worked to demonize the idea that regular people should try to empower themselves. However, if you look at polls, the public is to the "left" of the Democratic Party by a wide and growing margin. They are more strongly against the war than either party. The public supports universal healthcare by a wide margin (even if taxes need to be raised), is that more "centrist" than the Democrats? No. According to polls they are overwhelmingly against "free trade", which only a small portion of the Democrats are right now. They want to cut down drastically on corporate control, while the Democrats swim in corporate money. They are for much stronger environmental laws than the Democrats are willing to propose at this time. They are more open to socially liberal positions like gay marriage than a few years back. I don't think people want some empty headed centrist nonsense. It's pretty clear that what DC considers "centrist" isn't what the public now views as centrist. I'm a lefitst and the public has moved in my direction on most issues, the Democrats would be wise to notice.

Bullseye Grant!

Grant, I see those polls, but I wonder how the questions were asked because the answers just don't fit with the way people vote or talk. I live in the CA Bay Area and while there are a lot of folks that talk like you and certainly fall into your view of the world, those folks don't amount to more than 30% of the people I talk to. I think the public is against the war but if you ask the question, "Are you against the war?" or "Are you against the war and should the troops be withdrawn now?" you are going to get a different answer.

I have seen people grab onto poll results and waive them around before and they end up not being what people actually do when the rubber hits the road.

Who was the guy that said something about making stretched press releases and then believing what you read in the paper? I am not telling you you are wrong per se, but I think you are more optimistic than you really ought to be. I know that my Midwest family is not for public health care or tax increases or more environmental laws. There are a lot of them and they vote.

I just bet that what you will see is the left, and to me that means the goals you are talking about, is going to push for these goals and at the final election, when presented two centerist choices, half or more of the "left" is going to vote for one centerist and the other half of the people will vote for the other and the true left will be out in the cold again.

I do NOT think there is going to be a withdrawal from Iraq by 2010. I do not think we will see public health care in the next 20 years. I don't think you are going to see any party vote to adopt a follow-on to Kyoto. I don't think there is going to be any less free trade in the next 30 years. I do see some compromise on illegal immigrants which will further depress low income wages in the US for non immigrants.

I very much agree with you about the probability of Gay Marriage. (Which I support. I am bi FWIW) However rather than being a liberal position, I think it is going to be cast as a civil rights issue like women voting or inter-racial marriage. In the end, how does any couple that you don't know or would even associate with effect the sanctity of your marriage?

Anyway, we get to watch the clowns go at it for another few months before the candidates are selected. I think we are going to go straight down the middle again and that means more war, fewer social programs and pretty much no movement on anything of consequence other than that.

"Work with us", as in "can't we all just be friends"?

I have news for you Nancy, we are way past that! Stop worrying about antagonizing the guy, and start the impeachment proceedings!

What a lame excuse! "We don't have the votes." So instead of taking a stand, the Democrats vote with the Republicans and then have even fewer votes. It would make no sense at all except that as time goes on it becomes more and more evident that the Democrats are as much, or nearly as much, in the pockets of the war mongers and corporations as the Republicans.

Either the Denocrats are corrupt liars and cheats or they are weak, spineless cowards. Either way, it's not good. I've read that the difference between all modern administrations and the current one is that all modern administrations were controlled by big business, but the current one IS big business. At one time, it seemed like a big enough difference to matter. I no longer think so.

We need a third party, but I don't see that happening in the near future, if ever. Democrats, except for people like Kucinich, are not the answer to what ails our country. In the past, the spirit of America somehow overcame most problems and it seemed that the whole was greater than the sum of its parts. Now there are too many bad parts, and the future seems pretty bleak.

Goose, free trade has decimated our industrial base (we export mainly weapons now, while fighting a "war on terror", not cars), lowered our wages, made private insurance virtually impossible in the long run in this country, lead to an explosion in the differences in wealth and given corporations absolute control over peoples' lives. People are feeling the effects and they don't even have a fraction of the facts to make sense of it, they just know it isn't working (the rest of the world has known this for decades). The public is against the Iraq war and they only have a sliver of information. Do they know what is in the Oil bill that will privatize Iraqi Oil (connect this with the CIA concept of "blowback" and you'll get what I'm hinting at), do they know what the CPA did to the Iraqi people and economy when the war started? Do they know how many billions of their, and their children's, tax dollars have disappeared into off shore tax shelters? I could go on forever in regards to these issues. I don't know where you live or who you talk to but if they don't have a problem with the current set up they either don't have the facts on the issue, they're relatively well off, are a blind partisan or…frankly dumb.

The wording doesn't matter. Let's think about healthcare as an example. What if we gave people the FACTS about healthcare worldwide. X country (every industrialized country but us) has some form of socialized healthcare, with little to no input from private insurers, and as a result of the lowered costs (no profit motive, no marketing, no executive salary, administrative costs a fraction than the private insurance market, etc) they pay less than half of what you pay and have everyone covered. Under these systems you wouldn't go into debt or lose your home if you get really sick and have preventive healthcare so small problems stay small, which also cuts down on costs. Over here you have the American system, give them the facts. Which would you prefer? Who in their right mind would want our system? Same goes with economics, "free trade" vs. countries trying different policies, etc. What has happened is that reality is catching up with the fantasy underpinnings of "centrist" and right wing policies, just as many on the left predicted. It's just taken longer than most thought.

Tell me know which polls are misleading and give me some facts as to why people would chose otherwise. On what issues and why?

Congress recently approved another priority — a bill to expand federally funded embryonic stem cell research. But Democrats are not expected to be able to override a Bush veto.

WTF - Where's the filibuster?

Any social change that has been achieved in this country has come about by people taking direct action to demand it from the government. All that the president or congress does is surrender to the peoples' will. The civil rights bill and voting rights act came about because of the civil rights movement, the eight-hour day and banning of child labor because of the labor movement, and end to the war in Vietnam because of the peace movement, etc., etc. Politicians don't change things, effective protest changes things. Yet groups like Move-On.Org are distracting potential activists into thinking that the election of more Democrats is the solution to rampant facsism and kleptocracy. As the saying goes: if voting could actually change anything, it would be illegal. The time has come for massive civil disobedience, since the system has failed. I believe it was Rousseau who said: "When a person no longer enjoys those rights which he or she would possess even in the natural state, the social contract is dissolved."

"What y'all say? BULLshit.

"Stepped in what? BULLshit.

"Smells like what?? BULLshit.

"Hell you say..." --"Cotton Eyed Joe", old Texas dance tune.

These Democratic LIARS are doing what they're scripted to do: Beat around the Bush and then surrender when the going gets tough. That's what the korporatist-fascists are paying the Dem leadership to do, and said leadership is delivering value (to the pigs) for the money.

I DO NOT WANT TO HEAR THAT THEY CANNOT STOP THIS DAMNED WAR. All they have to do is NOT APPROVE MORE MONEY. Period. No more money, no more war, and THAT'S IT.

Look, OUR CHILDREN ARE DYING. The fascists threatened to use the "nuclear option" (getting rid of the filibuster) in order to get their Constitution-destroying, ironically-named "Justices" on the Supreme Court. Why can't the Dem's do the same thing in order to save democracy? NUKE the pigs out of the Senate and GET THE PEOPLE'S WORK DONE.

It's enough to drive a feller to vote Green again...

I think you are referring to a Zogby poll with the questions you pose, but I certainly am not sure of that. I absolutely have not seen the questions and wonder how they were asked. I am musing rather than arguing at this point.

You may well be right, but it is not my experience. I live in the SF Bay Area and have contacts on the peninsula, the east bay, and the south bay if that helps you narrow it down. Liberal people mostly, but not all on the band wagon of universal health and pulling out of Iraq RIGHT NOW. FWIW, they are all lower middle to middle class.

As for health care, I spend a lot of time overseas, and in no country that I have been to is there a really successful public health care system. The all seem to treat the regular maintanance visits well to very well, but to a person, all my contacts when asked say that they would go to the US to do anything but the simplist surgery. Switzerland BTW has a mandated health care system but works thought private insurers. New Zealand has public health but most people pay to go to private doctors (who are NOT NEARLY as expensive as US doctors) to avoid the wait.

Don't worry. The Democrats don't care. They're too busy stuffing their pockets alongside their Republican friends. The problem we face is that though we vent our wrath in our blogs and other available media, we go unread, unheard, and forgotten. I used to think we could bring about change through the two-party system. Now I know I was a fool to think that. Other measures are in order, and the sooner, the better. Actions speak . . .

Also, forgot to mention, I have a degree in economics and am in graduate school, while learning Spanish (then French). None the less, I have to work two jobs (actually two and a half, I work in a real estate office and do extra work for the agents on the side) to pay bills. Four years ago, when I was 24, I was making more money than I make now with the two jobs, and I had cheaper healthcare. There aren't many people I know around my age who aren't in the same position. Most of them have two jobs and most of them have degrees, working no less than 60 hours a week. What worked in the past doesn't necessarily work in the future, what worked in the past might make the future actually worse. I don't have a problem with the citizens in the developed countries increasing their per capita resource consumption, they've been held down too long by the West. That means that our per capita resource consumption should decrease, we live in a world of finite resources and can't over consume or we'll leave less for future generations. What I'd like is for the lowering consumption to come from the people making MORE now than five years ago, not less. The negation should be paid by them, since their earnings are a result of the irrational and unjust financial markets anyway. I am relatively poorer in large part because some capitalist hired someone to increase their wealth by clicking a mouse on a screen a playing with some numbers, or some capitalist saw a business opportunity with members in the Communist Party in China to take advantage of the surplus labor army there (the Communist Party higher ups, I'm sure by coincidence, are predominately the new elite capitalists there). Again, if you and your friends are rich and are doing well with the current system, good for you. Just don't think your opinions can be generalized for the rest of the country. By the way, I live in Southern California. I thought about moving North, but the cost of living is even worse than down here. I'd really like to hear why a lower middle class person, living in an expensive place like San Fran, is against the policies I'm talking about here. I'm not trying to be rude, I just can't comprehend the rational, unless they don't once again have all the facts on these issues.

It seems that many Democrat candidates are trying to get Republican votes even if it means that they will lose Democrat votes. Bush snaps his fingers and the Democrats jump. All they need to do is not pass any bill that funds the war. Stop jumping when Bush snaps his fingers.

"We raised the bar too high."

VOTE DEMOCRAT - WE'LL SET THE BAR LOWER!

There we have it folks in black and white strait from the Democratic leader's mouth. For all you Dem supporters still sticking around and exorting the rest of us to give the Democrats a chance, just one more time...drop it!

Begging Bush? Poopycock! Talk is cheap, Lallapeloser and "Give 'em heck!" Harry. Instead put IMPEACHMENT back on the table; abandon the Bushists' hellbound hypocritically proffered "bipartisanship"; and begin using the same senatorial tools being used by the miserepublicans on DEMS: WTF(Where's The Filibuster?) and (double)secret (strangle) holds, henceforth on any further Bush war supplementals. Cut 'em off at the bills in both houses or you're out of there AND the White House in '08!

In Colorado Senator Ken Salazar and "want to be" Senator Mark Udall voted for another $100 billion to "get us out of Iraq" WHAT???

There is an active campaign to withhold votes from any candidate for any office that has done this. That may mean leaving blanks on the ballot if there is no suitable candidate and it may mean that Democrats start losing elections. Maybe the Democratic Party will begin to catch on than they can't win elections with spineless behavior, double talk and walking the fence.

"I'd really like to hear why a lower middle class person, living in an expensive place like San Fran, is against the policies I'm talking about here. I'm not trying to be rude, I just can't comprehend the rational, unless they don't once again have all the facts on these issues."

Well I think that everyone looks at the facts differently and they bring a lot to their decisionmaking that changes the perspective on facts.

First, you have to remove any argument about the good of others and have to make it about the good that one person will recieve. No one really makes personal decisions like votes based on what is going to happen to someone else, you make that decision based on what you think is going to happen to YOU.

If there is national health care will that make MY life better? In my case it will not. I have an HMO and it works great. My kid was born and the insurance paid a putative $20,000 for the private room at UCSF Children's Hospital where he was born. I paid $15 for the delivery and $40 for the Indian food that was delivered afterwards. Simple HMO, available to most companies that offer healthcare. Why would I want a government burocrat administering this? I don't want government doing more for me. I think the issue is that every employer should be forced to *offer* health care to all its employees. I know that here, all the bank tellers were reduced to less than 20 hours a week.

I just think the pain level is high enough yet for a change. Like I say everyone I know is doing OK, not great, but OK. Certainly not as well as 7 years ago, but OK.

We are going to see what happens. I still bet that there is going to be a split left with Nader or Gore and a crappy middle of the road Democrat like Clinton and a crappy middle of the road Republican like Guilianni and he'll win a split vote because no Republican is going to vote for Nader or Gore.

The "democrats" DO have the votes to do exactly what they were asked to do. They could have chosen, long ago, to do exactly what the right wing in this country has no compunctions about doing; that is to say, they could have chosen to go out and rally the mass base of voters who voted for them last November. They could rally that support, they could call it out into the streets, they could mobilize it. A this point, no other political organization in this country, with the exception of the so-called republicans, has the power to do what the "democrats" could do to get those votes. They could have screamed "mandate", just like the "republicans" do every election year, and beaten the "republicans" in the congress senseless with it. They could have initiated impeachment proceedings against the war criminals at the national level. And they won't, because they're a party of bought big brother bunnies. They had a mandate from the majority of voters in this country now twice, when they walked away from their presidential victory in the year 2000, and when they walked away from the gains they made in November of last year. Why anyone votes for such a bunch of ridiculous cowards is totally beyond me.

They ran, promising they were going to DO something - actually several things not just ending the war. Now they sit on their thumbs preferring to proclaim "...but we KNOW we can't pass it" without bothering to publicly try. I'd personally prefer to see them "wasting time" by attempting to pass what they promised while "knowing it won't pass" - at least this way we the people would KNOW it failed because of the Republicans whether due to lack of votes to pass or lack of votes to override a veto. I didn't vote to see more of the same. If the status quo had been acceptable, I would have joined the many who'd been electing and re-electing Republicans - but I continued fighting for and voting for Democrats. Now I'm wondering why I bothered.

And since when is the deciding factor of whether something is good whether it's "good for me"? Shouldn't the deciding factor be whether it's good for society as a whole and/or to whom the something would be beneficial? Quite a lot of people in this nation *would* benefit from healthcare reform - even if a particular individual doesn't personally want/need it because they still have "good insurance". It's this selfish outlook on what should happen or what needs to happen that helped the Republicans get into office and stay there for so long. It's also this selfish outlook that's left many people to become what's basically disposable because no individuals are helping or to make the changes necessary for the nation to help since individual aren't helping. It's very sad for society when people are left to be disposable on the grounds of "but I don't personally need it" - and people are quite commonly being left to bankruptcy and/or poverty because THEY ended up in one of the spots where, sticking with health care, reform is desperately needed...something that's even more twisted and unacceptable when you look at how much our society has and how much is spent on health care.

Well there it is then. It's nice that YOU, and people like yourself, have healthcare. You're making the mistake that your view is how everyone else sees the situation, and that isn't the case. The AGGRAGATE statistics of the US healthcare system show us why. I, and countless Americans, have had very bad experiences with healthcare here, as has my girlfriend, but I have healthcare, which is more than most people I know in their 20's. I worded my response to you carefully above, I said that there are different forms of socialized healthcare, some socializing the financing others the whole system. Both would be an improvement over our system. We involve the private insurers much more than other countries, even the ones who socialize the costs and use private insurers for service. I am in favor of single player myself, but my situation is different than yours and even though single player is the cheapest and most just, it's not a done deal because of people in your type of situation. Some group is going to be happy but, as a believer in democracy and as a leftist, I'd like the happy group to be the majority and I'd like those at the bottom to have some justice.

Regarding people voting about what they'll receive themselves: there is some truth to that, but that is a large part of the problem. YOU consuming as many resources as possible might make you happy. However, if you only think of yourself and don't think about others, you might over consume a resource yourself, helping to leave fewer resources for your kid's kids in the future, which will lower THEIR standard of living. You might not take the time to find out where your tax dollars are going, but they're going somewhere. One place is Venezuela, where your tax dollars fund the NED to undermine another country's democracy and helped set up, briefly in 2002, a military dictatorship that dissolved all branches of government. You might not know where your tax dollars go in regards to the Pentagon, but somewhere a billion dollar airplane is being built that will do nothing more than fly around the Nevada desert for a decade, to be replace by another, while people lack healthcare and poverty is going up. If you only vote for yourself, in today's world, you can do much more harm than you'd think.

Ralph Nader was correct

Their differences are minimal

The Republicans and Democrats should make the merge official and become the Corporate Party

It's time for a 2nd political party in America

I am glad to see the growing number of Americans who see through the political smoke and understand that with respect to any appropriations bill in the current Congress, a willing Democratic majority in the House clearly "has the votes" to cut off or limit any further funding of the Iraq war -- and a willing 41 Democratic Senators clearly "have the votes" to kill any appropriations bill that the House might pass. Of course the operative word is WILLING, since sufficient numbers of Democratic Senators and Congresspersons obviously are NOT WILLING to represent the Democratic voters who elected them.

I'll say one more thing, I gotta go home now. I am disappointed in people older than myself in the US. When they were my age, they had more of a social system, they protected domestic industry, there weren't as big of differences in wealth. As soon as they came of age, got a little older and "got theirs" they tore whatever worked for people like them down and monopolized the benefits. For the first time in a while, the older generations have no transferred down some of what THEIR parents gave them. It's amazing, when I talk to people in their 40's and older, how disconnected they are from what is happening to people my age and even younger. So, people like myself can't get ahead and are made to face circumstances that my parent's generation would never allow. If anything, I know what NOT to do when I get older. I'd like my kids and grand kids to grow up in a country that values them as people, and not means to some profit end or obstacles in the way of my luxuries.

The Democrats most likely knew in advance that their would be a deadlock in Congress concerning Iraq, but put on a great show to win votes in the last election promising to bring our troops home. Now the Democrats do appear weak, only handing Americans excuses.

As far as the Republicans being the party of change in 2008,change to what? They are the ones largely responsible for not constructing a plan to bring our troops home, obeying the President's wishes to keep them in Iraq indefinitely.

Maybe it's time for a change for the more radical left to be voted into Congress to end the deaths of our citizens in this Iraq civil war, which the vast majority of Americans do not believe in.

It don't make any difference which gutless party says what. Israel tells them both what, when and where, and the USA continues to do their genocidal killing for them. They are working overtime with their lies and deception to get America involved in Iran just like they did in Iraq. It's just a matter of time.........

http://www.wrmea.com/archives/July_Aug_2004/0407027.html

http://adlusa.us/index2.htm

I am angry and feel betrayed by the democratic Congress. Why did you give Bush what he wanted? You could have passed legislation you and the people of this country wanted and let him veto it.... again and again. So what if you don't have enough votes to over ride a veto. Just don't give him a bill until he comes to you with a reasonable compromise. He was on TV arrogantly demanding you give him what he wanted and you did. YOu have betrayed the people who voted you in office and if the Democrats loose the Congress in the next election you have no one to blame but yourselves. Maybe you don't deserve to lead our country.

You say if you didn't give Bush the money then you would be accused of not supporting the troops. You gave Bush money and our young men and women continue to stay and die.

I have come to believe that Dennis Kucinich is the only legislator of integrity who makes a stand and sticks to his word. And he is, as far as I know the only one who believes in peace and not war as a means to settle disputes.

This bill is a travesty as is the war it supports.

" I worded my response to you carefully above, I said that there are different forms of socialized healthcare, some socializing the financing others the whole system. "

I agree. You worded it carefully and I pointed out one part of what you covered. You are correct. There are several models and some work better than most. I just don't want government running anything that I have to deal with on a day to day basis. Ever. There has to be change though I agree. I would personally start with, as I said, all employers having to supply coverage and probably next would be tort reform to reduce the amount of damages in a suit or possibly even indemnify some entities fully or partially. That way doctors wouldn't need to pay four staff people to do the paperwork and have the insurance companies settle malpractice claims for hundreds of thousands of dollars. No need for malpractice, fewer forms equals lower overhead and cheaper medical treatment. Oh... and why CAN'T we buy drugs from Canada. I heard the drug company reps say it was for safety with a straight face...

"Regarding people voting about what they'll receive themselves: there is some truth to that, but that is a large part of the problem."

It isn't a problem, it is a tautology. Believing people are above this causes visionaries to become unibombers. Understanding that this is the way of man since our ancestors figured out that if they didn't eat that last sloth or whatever, their neighbors would. Make sure that everyone sees how they benefit from an action or you won't get them agreeing with you.

"you might over consume a resource yourself, helping to leave fewer resources for your kid's kids in the future, which will lower THEIR standard of living. "

I think this is more like CHANGE your standard of living not lower. We switched from whale oil before we ran out of whales. We ran out of old growth douglas fir and redwood, but there are new trees growing for buildings. Each individual resource, like oil, may be finite (technically all are including solar) but RESOURCES are infinite. There are always other ways of doing things and we get to them as we need to. Corn and alcohol for instance. Not a good idea in the long run, but it is a step. Maybe in 10 years we are converting plankton to alcohol or hemp or kudzu or whatever. Maybe in 10 years we have better solar panels. Maybe can harness wind better without killing the raptors. We are at the beginning of the age of man, not the end of it.

The future for the Democratic party is dead. And Pelosi is the number on assassin of the party. They were voted in to stop the war and impeach Bush. And they have done neither. It's taps for the Democrats for the next twenty years. Dead and buried by this insipid Congress.

You all make make good points, especially Eshu. It is up to the Democrats to educate people to support progressive policies throught grass roots support groups, liberal churches and media blitzing etc., just like the Republicans do with their base. Instead they make excuses. And even if they lost the vote on ending the war or it got vetoed by Bush, SO WHAT! They would have shown the people that they have principles and are doing everything possible. We have a new Democratic congressman in our district who is trying his best but with the weak leadership shown by Pelosi and Co. it makes his job really difficult. The underlying problem is the huge financial influence of the corporations on our congress critters. One way to cut back on that influence is to have public financing in all elections. This would cut back the power of lobbist and even give third party canidates a chance. Also, congress persons should be forbidden by law to go to work for any company who has benefitted from a bill that they have worked on for at least 10 years.

Someone correct me if I'm wrong here -- but isn't there a critical flaw with the mantra/smoke/deflection of "democrats not having enough votes to override a threatened presidential veto"??? Namely, it is Congress that writes the bills.

So, for instance, they could have funded Bush & Co's. Iraq misadventures to the tune of 1 cent. And, failing a veto override attempt, Bush would have his penny to continue the war.

Same for the rest. WTF is up in DC? Manchurian candidates, all of them?

The Democrats didn't 'set the bar too high'. They didn't set it high enough.

Face it, Democrats are liars. They say one thing in elections to their base, then they do something different when they have power.

If Reid thinks he didn't have the votes to end the war, then he knew it within hours of the last election. You can easily find all the interviews the media did with the new leaders of Congress in the day or so right after the last election. Reid and Pelosi were saying the same things as if reading from the same script. And the script was one that clearly promised that they were not going to cut the funding for the war. Go find those interviews and read them again.

So, did Reid spend the first few hours after the election working hard to find out just how many votes ending the war would have? I doubt it. No, he made that promise before he ever even tried to see if he could end the war. And my guess is that the promise was made to the power brokers who fund the Democratic party and seem to control its actions. Maybe its just a coincidence that donations from defense contractors to Democrats went up both before last election and since.

And impeachment is the same story, except Reid and Pelosi made that promise even earlier. These two promised well before the last election that there would be no impeachment of the President. And, there is absolutely no way that they knew even the composition of the next congress when they made that promise. So there is no way that the promise not to impeach was in any way related to the votes in Congress.

Face it .... Reid and Pelosi made these decisions and these promises a long time ago. And they are completely fulfilling these promises. Their problem is that they've made promises that go against the wishes of a vast majority of the people in their party. So, all they've been doing since is trying to stage enough theater to try to convince their base that they really are against the war even while they've completely manipulated the process such as to ensure that they delivered on their promises.

The Democratic Party is based on bullshit. They lie to their base. They have no intention of following the desires of the base. They get their marching orders from elsewhere. The base is just a bunch of people to be manipulated, fooled and lied to in order to trick them into voting Democrat one more time.

What I don't get is why people keep voting Democrat? The Democratic Party abandoned its base no later than 1992. The whole Clinton Administration was an exercise in talking left and governing right. Reid and Pelosi and the Democrats and Obama and Hillary are all still playing that exact same game. The question is, how long can the people who vote Democrat keep falling for this.

Well, I believe we have all heard the term that politics is the practice of arranging for the possible.

Regarding the continuing war in Iraq, it is entirely possible for the Democratically controlled Congress to arrange for potential legislation that will eliminate the necessary funding for our military to continue its current campaigns in Iraq. There is absolutely no question about their ability to do so.

Doing so would obviously place them in jeopardy of being branded as domestic foreign agents, favoring the position of our enemies, even though it is difficult to understand exactly who those Iraqi battlefield enemies may be.

Realistically, such an action would be termed nothing less than political grandstanding. Certainly by anyone claiming the title of Republican and even many Democrats, some of which may actually have voted for such legislation.

With the above firmly in mind, therefore, how can any poster here possibly take the position that doing so would be anything other than a fruitless gesture?

Granted, it would probably satisfy a good number of voters who voted for Democrats to replace Republicans during the 2006 election cycle, but it certainly would not accomplish anything toward actually ending the war or bringing the troops back home.

If those who are now complaining about the lack of action by the Democratic Congress were to instead of condemning this lack of action encourage Congress to very seriously consider the impeachment of both the President and Vice President based on documented evidence of manipulation and falsehood leading to an unwarranted war, while still providing funding necessary to sustain and protect our troops, perhaps this Congress can then be expected to develop the stiff backbone required for that maneuver.

Would they stand accused of such action as being simply another political grandstand? Certainly! That's to be expected in the world of politics. But, it would serve as a very practical political move intended to win additional seats during the 2008 election based on the predictable actions of many of the existing Republican Legislators within the current Congress.

It's entirely possible that the political leaders of the existing congress have resisted such action in favor of what used to be called "jawboning" including the use of the tactics we have seen displayed thus far with the mistaken belief that the Republican majority in Congress facing reelection in 2008 would be more acceptant of public opinion and desire for a rapid end to the Iraqi conflict.

Since Plan A did not work, I believe it is now time for Plan B.

One other point ...

The Democrats clearly say that the only thing that is important is what helps them win the next election. Every issue is weighed and decided on this point. For instance, they've clearly decided that they feel that having Bush continue the war up to the next election helps their chances in that election.

I find that disgusting. The one thing I can't stand about the Republicans in the last 7 years is the way they've decided that they would support Bush even when it was not in the best interests of the country. The Republicans clearly did not do their job of oversight when they ran the Congress.

Now I see that the Democrats are exactly the same. Impeachment is decided on whether it hurts them in the next election or not. War funding is decided on what's best in their next election. I find that sick and disgusting.

And I absolutely refuse to vote for any party or candidate that does not put the interests of this nation and its people as its top priority. I absolutely refuse to vote Democrat. Not for a long, long time. And if I do vote Democrat again, it would have to be for a party that looks nothing at all like today's Democratic Party.

The other mantra that bothers me is that Democrats are afraid of political liabilities in being labeled "weak on" the "war on terror", etc.

But that also is clearly inaccurate -- the fact that they (like Bush) ignore and even flaunt low poll ratings really ought to raise the question whether they're working for people "above" rather than us sorry lot below. We don't really matter that much.

And if may be that the Democrat's very "job" in this good/bad crook scheme is to soothe us gently, and explain why such-and-such isn't possible. I've seen this many times before, it gets tiresome.