Gordon Smith - Still a wingnut!

Oregon's Senator Gordon Smith gets some strokes from the New York Times today. Undeserved. Now that Mr Smith's party has lost the Senate and it has become obvious to all but the most delusional neocon that the misadventure in Iraq is lost Mr Smith does what he does best, he jumps ship with an emotional speech.
G.O.P. Senator in Spotlight After a Critical Iraq Speech

WASHINGTON, Dec. 27 — At the close of the Senate’s lame-duck session, in between formulaic tributes to senators departing voluntarily or otherwise, a Republican backbencher suddenly rose to give one of the most passionate and surprising speeches about the war in Iraq yet delivered in Congress.

Skip to next paragraph For a solid Republican who had originally voted for the war, the words spoken by the senator, Gordon H. Smith of Oregon, on the evening of Dec. 7 were incendiary and marked a stunning break with the president.

A "stunning break", hardly - good politics, you bet. The talking dog says it well:

Oh yes... Gordon... you may be a decent man, but you're an enabler of very venal, awful people and their extremist policies, which, you have just called "criminal" and I frequently call a lot worse. I didn't see you lead a filibuster of the repeal of habeas corpus, now did I? You come from a state that has been the coolest (in the good way) on the subject of global warming, and yet you continue to vote and caucus with the party that would prefer that we not even talk about it so we can keep on jacking up oil and coal industry profits, even as we huddle up in hurricane shelters and fight for the world's last usable water (speaking of which... perhaps the Bush family will be kind enough to invite you in to their new spread in Paraguay... or not...)

After a while, Gordon, I just look at you, and Snowe and Collins of Maine, and the soon to be ex-Senator Chafee, and say... WTF? YOU ARE ENABLING PEOPLE WHO DO THINGS THAT YOU KNOW ARE WRONG. The overhwhelming majority of the time. And you frequently vote with them (though the vote for caucus leader is the only one that counts.)

Recognizing two years before an election that a lost cause is lost doesn't suddenly qualify you as a moderate. In addition to the war there are still all those other horrible votes. You either believed that we didn't need habeas corpus and that oil company profits are more important than the saving the planet or you are a hopeless political hack. Now the Oregonian will continue to push your faux moderate credentials but I for one will not be falling for it. Sorry Gordon, you may play a moderate on TV but you are still a wingnut in my book.