More than Alito on the Line

Today we will see which Democrats in the Senate are champions of the American people and which are enablers of a police state; which truly value privacy and the lives of women and which are too chicken to gun-sling for reproductive rights when the clock strikes high noon; which senators value individual rights, environmental protection, workplace rules, consumer protection, governmental checks and balances and separation of church and state and which fear a GOP-threatened “nuclear option” more than the rollback of all of these.

Never forget how your senator votes today on ending debate on Samuel Alito. Let their vote today be seared, like the vote on the Iraq War, on your memory and let it guide you in actively supporting or opposing them in 2006, 2008 -- whenever they run for re-election or higher office.

For Bush and his arrogant, incompetent cabal will have to slink away from power someday, but Alito stays on the court for a lifetime, to do his level best to return us to the Gilded Age in terms of legal protections and individual rights. The last line of defense must stop him: Democrats in the senate who haven’t been coopted or compromised by the corporate-military-industrial complex, or otherwise turned against the interests of average Americans.

There is a possible filibuster, which may be as little as three votes away, in the works. For organizing this, Americans owe Senators Kerry and Kennedy their gratitude and active support right now, today. Call 888-355-3588 and lean on your home state senator or on mine (Clinton is in the fight, Schumer isn’t yet so call him). Others to focus energy on include Barbara Mikulski.

If Democrats aren’t willing to stand up for these most basic American values now, when it counts, how can they be trusted to stand up for anything, anytime?