The numbers weren't there... do something about it.

The Editors at the Poorman have this to say about the Dems responsibility in this debacle and what voters can do in November.

It'’s true, “"the Democrats"” didn'’t send this awful, anti-Democratic bill to defeat. But, then, they didn'’t have the votes for it. Nor, indeed, did they fillibuster the bill. But, as Sen. Reid confessed, and as the final vote proved out, they didn'’t have the votes for that, either. But they should have made a futile gesture! you complain. Well, many Democrats did make futile gestures, futile speeches even, even crappy Hillary Clinton. But they should have made the futile gesture I wanted them to make! Well, perhaps they should have, but I fear we this discussion may now drifting from political commentary into interpretive dance criticism. The bottom line is the votes weren'’t there. The day was lost.

Basic mathematics explains why. Only 2-3% of the representatives of the majority party voted against it, as opposed to 75-85% of the minority. It would have been nice if, under circumstances carefully contrived by the majority party to be as politically difficult as possible, 100% of the minority went down to defeat. It would have been nice if any of the 15 trojan horse amendments introduced by the Democrats had suceeded. And a pony, if you please. But that didn'’t happen, and so we have to settle for defeat, and a Democratic rate of opposition only 30 times as high as the Republican.

From our history: the Fugitive Slave Act, the Alien and Sedition Acts, the internment of Japanese-Americans. Now the McCain Torture Bill - and this, too, shall pass. Now, whether it will pass into a shameful memory, or be overshadowed by still greater outrages on every alternate September, remains to be seen. What will most determine this is what party controls the aparatus of government - the party of 97-98% authoritarianism, or the party of 15-25%. Because if the Republicans are in control in 2008, and want to further degrade the country in order to hold on to the Congress and the White House, they will be proposing something which is as unthinkable today as the normalization of Abu Ghraib was two years ago - and the same merciless math assures us that this bill, too, shall pass. So, if this possibility concerns you, of fucking course it matters who wins in November. Look at the numbers. It matters more than anything.

But if you simply must blame Democrats for this, at least blame the ones who earned it. They have names.