Month: March 2006

One man with courage is a majority.

—Thomas Jefferson

I’m pretty certain that when Jefferson came up with those words, he was hoping for some sort of righteousness in the majority-of-one’s endeavors. And then, sometimes, there’s the likes of Sen. Feingold and his one-man political assault on President Bush.

A U.S. senator has put forward a resolution to censure President George W. Bush for ordering the wiretapping of some American phone conversations without a court warrant.

Senator Russell Feingold, a Democrat from Wisconsin, accused Bush on Monday of breaking the law and misleading the American public.

The resolution calls on the Senate to condemn Bush’s “unlawful authorization of wiretaps of Americans within the United States without obtaining the court orders required.”

[…]

The five-page resolution accuses the president of violating the U.S. Constitution and the country’s Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.

The only U.S. president ever censured by the Senate was Andrew Jackson in 1834.

[…]

Last December, Americans learned of a secret domestic surveillance program conducted by the U.S. National Security Agency.

The revelation caused an uproar and triggered questions about limiting Bush’s broad scope to govern.

Bush defended the program as a “vital tool” and said the spying was only on known operatives of al-Qaeda and its affiliates and only on communications going in and out of the U.S., not within the country.

“I re-authorized this program 30 times since 9/11 and I intend to do so as long as the nation faces the continuing threat of an enemy that wants to kill American citizens, Bush said.

Feingold is considered a possible for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2008.

Can this one man become the bedrock of a majority? Well, it seems highly unlikely as his fellow Democratic senators are rushing to not stand by his side.

• The Feingold Resolution and the Sound of Silence
• Democratic leaders shy away from censure plan
• Democrats Beat Quick Retreat on Call to Censure President
• Democrats Tepid on Censure, Say the Debt Is the Threat

Feingold has responded by expressing dismay at the response, accusing his fellow Dems of reacting out of fear.

Sen. Russell Feingold on Tuesday blamed fellow Democrats for inaction on his stalled resolution to censure President Bush for his authorizing the National Security Agency’s electronic terrorist surveillance program.

“I’m amazed at Democrats … cowering with this president’s numbers so low,” said Feingold, D-Wis. “The administration … just has to raise the specter of the War on Terror, and Democrats run and hide.”

Well, that should rally the troops.

It is my view that, rather than acting with righteousness, Feingold’s maneuver is one of erroneous self-righteous grandstanding. His own words make it clear — attack the president now, not for the sake of the nation or our security but rather because his numbers are low and it’s an opportunistic time.

That doth not a majority make, nor should it.

While seemingly slipping in under the scope of most American media, work on the memorial honoring the Twin Towers is beginning, despite the reservations of the families of several victims of the 9/11 terrorist devastation.

Without political ceremony, construction began [today] on the memorial to the thousands of people who died in the 9/11 World Trade Centre attacks – even as relatives of some of the victims headed to court to fight plans to build at the site.

Lorries [Edit: lorries? Hey, it’s the Scotsman, a damn fine paper that can call trucks lorries if it chooses] laden with timber and other equipment rolled down a ramp as construction workers began cleaning the memorial area of debris and installing protective wooden coverings over parts of the original foundations of the twin towers.

After six to eight weeks of preliminary work, concrete will be poured to create supports for the “Reflecting Absence” design.

George Pataki, the New York state governor, last week called the event “a very important milestone,” but no ground-breaking ceremony is planned for several weeks.

Officials said they wanted to meet a schedule to build the memorial by 2009.

Some families of 11 September victims who oppose the underground memorial design are trying to stop the construction before the memorial is set in concrete.

The Coalition of 9/11 Families last week filed a lawsuit charging that the memorial would damage the historic “footprints” – the foundations of the two towers. Preservation groups have made similar arguments in letters to rebuilding officials. An initial court hearing was scheduled for yesterday.

The Reflecting Absence design, by the architect Michael Arad, was chosen two years ago out of more than 5,200 competition entries.

It marks the fallen towers with two stone reflecting pools at street level, surrounded by trees.

The pools drop 70ft below ground, where visitors find surrounding each pool the names of the nearly 3,000 people killed in the 2001 attacks and the 1993 World Trade Centre bombing.

Families have said the memorial would dishonour the dead by placing their names below street level and might be difficult to evacuate quickly.

And what about those concerns of the families, both in terms of dignity and public safety?

Stefan Pryor, the president of the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, the agency in charge of rebuilding at Ground Zero, said the design would “fulfill the highest standards of both safety and beauty”.

He said the agency would continue to listen to family members’ concerns.

Apparently, Mr. Pryor’s definition of listening equals my definition of ignoring. At least that damned freedom center idea still appears to be dead.