Feingold "Not Partisan." No, Really! He's Serious.

Senators Debate Move to Censure Bush
Democrats Bring In Nixon Nemesis, but GOP Defends Chief Executive's Powers

By Charles Babington
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, April 1, 2006; Page A02

The Senate Judiciary Committee's top Democrat said yesterday that President Bush probably deserves censure for his warrantless wiretapping practices, but Republicans hotly defended the president's claim of broad powers to fight terrorism.

With a key Watergate figure testifying before Congress for the first time in 33 years, Democrats invoked Richard M. Nixon's name as they attacked Bush's decision to let the National Security Agency bypass judges to eavesdrop on Americans' international phone calls and e-mails when a possible terrorism suspect is on one end of the line. They said the practice violates the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which requires warrants for U.S. wiretaps in most cases.

As a result, Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.), the panel's senior Democrat, said he was "inclined to believe" that censure by Congress is appropriate for Bush.

"We know the president broke the law," Leahy said. "Now we need to know why."

The committee's three-hour hearing focused on a censure resolution introduced by Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.). Leahy and Feingold were the only Democrats to speak, whereas five Republicans defended Bush to varying degrees, sometimes so vigorously that witnesses could not finish their sentences.

The Constitution authorizes a president to take necessary steps -- including warrantless wiretaps -- to protect the country from would-be attackers, said Sen. Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah). "I can only hope that this constitutionally suspect and, I believe, inflammatory attempt to punish the president for leading this war on terror will not weaken his ability to do so," he said.

There is no suspense about the fate of Feingold's resolution. Only two other Senate Democrats -- Barbara Boxer (Calif.) and Tom Harkin (Iowa) -- have fully endorsed it, and Republicans vowed to crush the measure if it reaches the floor. But they agreed to let Feingold invite two witnesses to the hearing, and he chose Republican lawyer Bruce Fein and John W. Dean III, whose last Senate testimony was before the Watergate committee in June 1973.

Dean's presence lent a whiff of star power, or walking history, to a session whose arguments tracked closely with those of previous hearings on the checks and balances between Congress and the chief executive.

At 67, Dean remains immediately identifiable as the young White House counsel who warned Nixon that the Watergate coverup was becoming "a cancer" on the presidency, and who eventually testified against his former boss at riveting televised hearings. He served time in a minimum-security facility for obstructing justice. Since then he has written books, feuded with G. Gordon Liddy, who helped plan the Watergate break-in, and drifted left politically.

Dean said he has "more expertise than anyone might wish" on how "presidents can get themselves on the wrong side of the law." He told Hatch that there is "lots of evidence" that Bush violated the FISA law. "I don't think you have any," Hatch retorted.

Committee Chairman Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) rejected the call for censure but said the surveillance program should come under the FISA court's auspices. He noted that Feingold's censure resolution did not accuse Bush of "bad faith," prompting Feingold to respond:

"If you want the words 'bad faith' in there, let's put them right in, because that's exactly what we have here. . . . The lawbreaking is shocking in itself, but the defiant way that the president has persisted in defending his actions with specious legal arguments and misleading statements is part of what led me to conclude that censure is a necessary step."

Oh Charles, he went way beyond that statement, he further accused the President of making an "attempt to dismantle our government." If this is truly what you believe, Mr. Feingold, then your motion for censure is far from appropriate. You should be seeking to impeach the President. Of course you don't have the guts to do that, you would rather let others bear the brunt of criticism for the impeachment effort. Gutless wonder!

The most hysterical statement Feingold made was his claim to be "one of the least partisan members of Congress." This guy is so delusional as to be comical. He doesn't just look like Soupy Sales, he really is the "Soupy Sales of the Senate."

The only problem is that unlike Mr. Sales, Feingold is not trying to be funny, he's just being deceitful and hateful. This is the most crassly political move by any Democrat Presidential Candidate so far.

Full Story: Feingold's Fantasy

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