"Congress isn't driving the bus over a cliff - that's what the administration asked for, but thanks to the bold rebellion of Senators McCain, Warner and Graham, [Congress] refused. Instead they simply removed the guard rail, fired the traffic cops, gave the keys to a drunk driver, and closed their eyes," - Obsidian Wings' blog, on the torture and detention-without-charge bill.
Marty Lederman dissects the rightly blistering NYT editorial today here. They used my formulation:
"Americans of the future won't remember the pragmatic arguments for caving in to the administration. They'll know that in 2006, Congress passed a tyrannical law that will be ranked with the low points in American democracy, our generation's version of the Alien and Sedition Acts."
Neither party comes out of this looking anything but cowardly, unprincipled and morally bankrupt.