Domestic Spying Issue Inflames Debate Over Patriot Act Renewal...

:toast:

...checks & balances are finally returning to D.C.?

and i hope the good senators keep hammering away at the "fearmongering" meme. after all, if we're so quick to give up our civil liberties, doesn't that mean the "terrorists" really have won?

call it what ya like, but it sure sounds to me like the reaction of a whining bratty kid who hasn't gotten his own way. only the kool-aid drinkers will buy this crap, the rest of the public likely finds his 'waaaaaaah' reaction simply childish.

Sen. Patrick J. Leahy (Vt.), the Judiciary Committee's top Democrat, said of Bush's speech: "Fear mongering and false choices do little to advance either the security or liberty of Americans."<snip>

......Reid and Leahy want a three-month extension of the existing Patriot Act, which would give the House and Senate more time to negotiate changes that could be locked in for four years. Bush and Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist (R-Tenn.) repeatedly have said they will not accept a short-term extension.

But some Republican aides said privately that with lawmakers eager to adjourn for the holidays, few viable options exist. If GOP leaders are pushed to the brink, they said, a temporary extension of the current law might be preferable to its expiration.

Sen. Russell Feingold (D-Wis.), a leader of the filibuster, said yesterday: "Nobody wants these parts of the Patriot Act to expire. We want to fix them before making them permanent, by including important protections for the rights and freedoms of innocent American citizens."

The Senate fell eight votes short Friday of the 60 needed to end the filibuster and allow a vote on the proposed renewal of the Patriot Act, which the House approved Wednesday. Four Republican senators joined all but two Democrats in voting to sustain the filibuster.........

On Friday, Frist likened the bill's opponents to those who "have called for a retreat and defeat strategy in Iraq." He sounded more conciliatory yesterday, as he sought a way out of the impasse. "Democrats want to fight this war on terror," Frist told reporters at the Capitol. "They want to give our law enforcement appropriate tools as well."

"I really feel that if we work hard, we can pass the Patriot Act as written today," Frist said. "If I could just get people to study it and examine it."

That's unlikely, Reid said. A temporary extension of the law, allowing renewed House-Senate negotiations next year, "is the only way to go," he told reporters. If the law "is not extended," he said, "the full blame is with the president and the Republicans. We have bent over backward to try to accommodate them."