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Captain Ed has some comments on Dingy's dilemma that I found interesting and thought you might too. "Harry Reid has a dilemma on his hands. His control over the Senate rests on a single vote; even if Senator Tim Johnson of South Dakota recovers enough to return to the Senate, the loss of one member of Reid's caucus will allow Dick Cheney to cast the deciding vote on control of the upper chamber. While this isn't news, an article posted yesterday by the New Yorker reveals that the debate on Iraq may push the Senate's only independent to rethink his loyalty: Lieberman’s Democratic colleagues know that if he switched parties they would lose their majority, and so they tend to indulge him, unless they are speaking to reporters off the record. This puts Harry Reid in a serious bind. His party came to power on an anti-war platform, a fact that several in his caucus have noted in the debate on the various resolutions that have been proposed. Their activist base has already made it clear that non-binding resolutions aren't what they had in mind when they pushed for the Democratic majority in the midterms, and a lack of progress on stopping the war in Iraq could lose them their majorities in either or both chambers in 2008. Unfortunately, unless Reid can get a Republican to switch caucuses, he has no choice but to limit their efforts to meaningless non-binding resolutions. Lieberman, smarting over the support given to Ned Lamont by Democrats he believed were his friends, now says that his loyalty to them has suffered serious damage. His "sentimental" attachment to the caucus extends only to the point of cutting off funding for the fight in Iraq. Not only would such an effort fail in the Senate -- it would require 60 votes to overcome the filibuster -- but it would effectively hand over control of the Senate to the GOP and Mitch McConnell. Republicans such as John McCain have dared the Senate Democrats to take an action with real meaning in opposition to the war, claiming correctly that "sense of the Senate" votes do nothing to end the war on any terms but instead embarrass the White House and demoralize the troops. Unfortunately, anything else more substantive in the next two years will require them to relinquish their slender majority -- and the Democrats do not appear willing to make that sacrifice." How ironic that the actions of the dems made Lieberman the most powerful man in the Senate on the most important issue facing us.

Schedule date: Tuesday, February 6, 2007

CSPAN 1

09:00 AM EST
0:30 (est.) LIVE
Meeting
Democratic National Committee Meeting
Democratic National Committee
James Zogby , Arab American Institute
Lottie H. Shackelford , Democratic National Committee

09:30 AM EST
0:30 (est.) LIVE
Call-In
U.S. Policy Toward Iraq
C-SPAN, Washington Journal
Susan Davis , D-CA

10:30 AM EST
1:00 (est.) LIVE
House Proceeding
Morning Hour
U.S. House of Representatives
The beginning and end of this live program may be earlier or later than the scheduled times.

12:00 PM EST
8:00 (est.) LIVE
House Proceeding
House Session
U.S. House of Representatives
The beginning and end of this live program may be earlier or later than the scheduled times.

CSPAN 2

09:21 AM EST
0:36 (est.)
News Conference
Fiscal Year 2008 Defense Budget
Department of Defense, Briefing Room
Tina Jonas , Department of Defense
Steve Stanley , U.S. Navy

10:00 AM EST
2:30 (est.) LIVE
Senate Proceeding
Senate Session
U.S. Senate
The beginning and end of this live program may be earlier or later than the scheduled times.

07:00 AM EST
0:30 (est.) LIVE
Foreign Legislature
Question Time
British House of Commons
Tony Blair , Labour, United Kingdom

CSPAN 3

09:30 AM EST
3:00 (est.) LIVE
Senate Committee
Fiscal Year 2008 Defense Budget
Armed Services
Carl Levin , D-MI
Peter Pace , Joint Chiefs of Staff
The beginning and end of this live program may be earlier or later than the scheduled times.

02:15 PM EST
5:45 (est.) LIVE
Senate Proceeding
Senate Session
U.S. Senate
The beginning and end of this live program may be earlier or later than the scheduled times.