There are a lot of bad bills that the Republicans may try to ram through, but here's the worst of the worst - a bill to legalize the President's warrantless wiretapping program. The White House is desperate to enact this bill, which allows the government to spy on American citizens, on American soil, without a warrant.
Other measures on the White House wish list that are likely to surface during the lame duck session include a number of unfunded tax cuts and questionable trade measures. Democrats have nothing to gain by allowing these measures to pass in the next few weeks, and everything to lose. Everything should wait until the new Congress, when Democrats will have a lot more say about how bills are put together and what gets passed.
I do wish he'd run in 2008, but you have to admit, it's a hell of a trade-off. There aren't so many working Senators that you can shrug off the loss as insignificant.
One thing I'd like to point out is that the wiretapping bill is retroactive; a pardon for the president on one of the most prosecutable impeachable offenses, and the only one that's completely indisputable.
So, aside from the fact that the law is itself impermissible - a fifth-amendment violation - it is also an attempt to forestall resolution of the Constitutional Crisis created by this Republican Congress and George Bush.
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