This round goes to Dodd!

Christopher Dodd won a significant battle today when Majority "Leader" Reid withdrew the FISA overhaul that would have given retroactive immunity to telecoms that spied on American citizens.

Dodd left the campaign trail yesterday and flew back to Washington from Iowa to personally lead the charge. Of the four Democratic Senators running for the presidency, he was the only one to do so. "I respect immensely the people who spend a lot of time on these issues. But this is a critical moment," Dodd said on the Senate floor. "This is one of these moments you need to be here for this, to engage in this debate and discussion. They don't happen everyday, but this is an important one. This goes right to the heart of who we are. This isn't about selling your soul, it's about giving it away, in my view, if you don't stand up for these rights."

While he did not technically filibuster the bill, he did debate pretty much non-stop for eight hours, and when he ceded the floor to his Democratic colleagues, he remained engaged in the debate from start to finish. "Everyone who spoke on the floor said they were grateful for Dodd taking a stand," said a staffer to the Senator who asked not to be named. "They said if it weren't for him they wouldn't be having this much-needed debate."

Congratulations, Senator. That one you won today? You won it for all of us, and I appreciate your efforts on behalf of civil liberties and the Constitution. Thank you for standing up. And I mean that from the bottom of my bleeding, liberal heart.

(Hat-tip to Huffington Post)

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Call Senator Reid Right Now!

He is on the verge of sticking a thumb in your eye on a Friday afternoon! Flood his office with phone calls and emails! Fill his voicemail! Run his staff ragged!

He is threatening to ask for a 'motion to Proceed" on FISA - the bill that Senator Dodd placed a hold on! Reid wants to let the Telecom's off the hook for breaking the law and spying on you!

The phone number to his office is 202-224-3542.

If you can't get through to his office, acll the Capitol switchboard. That number is 202-224-3121

Here is the link to his senate email forum:

reid.senate.gov/contact/email_form.cfm


Call right now and tell him just exactly how pissed off his fecklessness makes you!

(Can you say Majority Leader Feingold?)

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Questionable Democratic Fundraising E-mails?

So, I recently moved to Olympia, WA and I would just like to say that it took Comcast FOREVER to successfully hookup my internet access. I say successfully, because the first TWO times they came, it quit working. So, after about a month long hiatus from blogging, I'm happy to be back (not to mention how thrilled I am to have regular access to e-mail. I'd like to give props to The Evergreen State College for tacitly allowing me to use their library computers for personal internet use. Good people there.).

Anyway...

A good friend of mine who blogs under the moniker Tzepish drew my attention to a couple of questionable fund raising e-mails he's received from the Dodd campaign, and it looks like he isn't the only one.

From Tzepish:

The extremely informal "Hey," opener makes this email seem almost as though it
were written only to the recipient from Chris Dodd himself. The request for
"$23" (as opposed to $20 or $25) is meant to give the impression that he really
is only $23 short of the goal, whereas a request for $25 would have been more
readily recognized as a regular donations solicitation email.

and regarding a second e-mail from Dodd (image not available) which read:

"I noticed that you recently made an attempt to make a contribution to our
campaign on-line, and for some reason the attempt was not successful."No. I did
not recently make an attempt to contribute to the Dodd campaign, and this email
won't get me to do it. I did contribute to the campaign a couple months ago, and
guess what? The charge on that one went through. But imagine if I had recently
made a donation on the website (let's say $25), and then received this email?
Chances are a good portion of the people receiving this would go ahead and
attempt the donation again, and whoops, there goes another $25! Right into the
pockets of the Dodd Squad.

A Dodd staffer actually responded to Tzepish's concerns in the comments of the blog, writing that the second e-mail was a response to an earlier donation from a previous accounting period (although, I'm not sure I buy it, but whatever, I'll give them the benefit of the doubt).

These e-mails rubbed me the wrong way. It's not that they were necessarily out right dishonest (well, the second message would be if my suspicions are accurate), but they do seem kind of sleazy. It's like the candidate (in this case Dodd, but Atrios has also received a similar one from Obama) is trying to trick us into donating. I know marketing is essentially professional trickery, but for whatever reason (perhaps my naivete), I would expect more from politicians. This all smacks more of e-mail spam than it does legitimate electioneering. How strong are a candidate's convictions about his or her campaign if they have to resort to tricking the party loyal into contributing to their primary coffers? I'm probably just being to sensitive, but I still don't like it. Not at all.

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Dodd Questions Legality of Fox Recess Appointment

Senator Christopher Dodd (D, CT) has indicated he will seek a legal opinion on the recess appointment of Sam “Swift Boat Liar” Fox to be Ambassador to Belgium.

Fox would serve in a voluntary capacity, without pay, but there are legal questions about the interpretation of the law the way the Bush White House reads it.

In the White House interpretation of the law, Fox could serve as ambassador voluntarily, so long as he agreed not to sue the government later for not being compensated for his services.

But there is a catch…

Under federal law, “voluntary service” is prohibited when the position in question has a fixed rate of pay – and ambassadorships have a fixed pay rate. The salary is a “statutory entitlement” and therefore unwaivable. That is how the Government Accountability Office, an arm of Congress, interprets the law.

Look for this to be a major issue when an angry congress returns to session next week.

This appears to be far from over.

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