YAY!

Montana, Georgia, North Carolina, Missouri, and part of Nebraska could still go either way.

As things stand now, there will be at least 57 caucusing with the Dems in the Senate. Republican Senator Smith is leading by just 3,000 votes in Oregon, with 30% of the (Democratic-leaning) precincts yet to report If Merkley takes the lead, that puts the Senate at 58D. Democrat Al Franken is winning by about 1,200 in Minnesota with 98% of the precincts in; if he holds the lead, that puts the Senate at 59D. Something screwy has happened in Georgia; possibly uncounted early votes in GA may possibly mean a runoff Senate election in December. If there is indeed a runoff, a win in GA could mean 60D/40R in the Senate.

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After Karl Rove ignored another Congressional subpoena to testify, Chairman Conyers decided to put inherent contempt on the table:

"A refusal to appear in violation of the subpoena could subject Mr. Rove to contempt proceedings, including statutory contempt under federal law and proceedings under the inherent contempt authority of the House of Representatives," Conyers and Sanchez wrote.

"We are unaware of any proper legal basis for Mr. Rove's refusal to even appear today as required by the subpoena," Sanchez said Thursday morning when Rove failed to show up. "The courts have made clear that no one -- not even the president -- is immune from compulsory process. That is what the Supreme Court rules in U.S. v. Nixon and Clinton v. Jones."

There is no executive privilege or pardon that can override Congress' inherent contempt proceedings. If Rove is held in Inherent Contempt of Congress, he can be arrested by the House Sergeant-At-Arms, tried in the House, and imprisoned for as long as the remainder of the current Congress' term.

Fuck yeah!

The Daily Awesome just joined the Atheist Blogroll. Check it out!

Welcome news, for sure - though about a year late:

If Rove refuses to testify voluntarily and ignores the subpoenas that will certainly be issued, he should be held in Inherent Contempt of the House of Representatives.

No American is above the law. None of us should be able to ignore Congress without consequence. If Mr. Rove ignores a subpoena from the Judiciary Committee, then the House of Representatives should pass an Inherent Contempt citation and exercise our right to send the House Sergeant-of-Arms to gather Mr. Rove and bring him before Congress to testify.

That is all.

ACLU blog:

Yesterday, Americans who believe that no one, not even the President of the United States, is above the rule of law, triumphed. Their triumph? By not voting on the FISA bill, the House has listened to its constituents' pleas and defied Bush's fear-mongering. Tens of thousands of Americans called their House Members and let them know that it's not okay for the President to choose protecting the telecoms over protecting the American public. They're the true patriots, not the telephone companies that spied on you.

Crooks and liars has the transcript and a downloadable version here

Dear Senate Democrats,

There will be no extension of the Police America Act (a.k.a. Protect America Act or P.A.A.). Despite your best efforts to the contrary, you somehow managed to hold together a filibuster and block the horrid intelligence bill, and the Republicans were dumb enough to filibuster every alternative including extensions.

There isn't enough time for an extension now. It will expire.

Republicans have all they need to try and portray the you as anti-spying on terrorists. Nothing the Democrats do will prevent the attack ads this fall. Nothing. In the end, it won't matter that it was actually you who tried to work the bill through, when you're pictured with Osama Bin Laden for 30 seconds while a guy with a mean voice utters Republican talking points over creepy music. So let it go.

Given that you have no possibility for obtaining legislative cover, why even bother with any changes to F.I.S.A.? After all, letting the P.A.A. expire won't stop any surveillance; we will merely default to the slightly less secretive authoritarian system we had from 1978-2007, when government had virtually unlimited surveillance authority. Under the F.I.S.A. court system, all government has to do is obtain a secret warrant from a secret court that says yes 99.99% of the time; they even have a full week after they do the surveillance to go and get a retroactive warrant.

Requiring a F.I.S.A. warrant for foreign-to-foreign calls that get routed through the U.S. isn't even a bad thing, really. As I said, getting a warrant is easy as pie and can be done after the spying. We can change the warrant requirement for foreign-to-foreign over U.S. lines next year if we really want to, when there is a Democrat in the White House. But it is obvious now that Republicans will hijack (again) any attempt you make to change foreign-to-foreign requirements without demolishing the FISA court. It simply isn't worth it. Obviously it wasn't very important to the G.O.P.'ers in the executive branch, since they decided scoring political points was more important than renewing P.A.A.

Let it die. Democrats have nothing to lose and everything to gain. How about making some scary ads attacking Republicans, for once? Instead of worrying to death about ads attacking you for being best friends with Osama Bin Laden (or whatever nonsense they cough up this year) you could cook up some ads attacking Republicans for trying to take away vital American freedoms. Who knows, maybe they will be so good that Republicans will start capitulating for once.

It is "Live free or die!", not "Live free, or don't," Democrats. You have the stronger electoral ground here. If you would just stop running from your own shadows you would do well.

Be bold for once, you goddamn Senatorial pussies.

The internet has declared war on Scientology. Xenu be praised!

Transcript: