Obama Misses Vote On MoveOn -- Right After Voting On Boxer Measure

Comments (52)

gonzone wrote on September 20, 2007 2:23 PM:

Is this all they have to do in the Senate?

How much are we paying them?

No important issues, let's name a bridge!!

RonK, Seattle wrote on September 20, 2007 2:26 PM:

Though Clinton and Dodd (and Obama) supported the Boxer measure -- which also condemns MoveOn.

mopper wrote on September 20, 2007 2:26 PM:

I certainly have no idea about the specifics of Obama's schedule, and this certainly does sound like a politically cowardly move...on the other hand, he's supposed to be in Atlanta today for an afternoon rally, so it is also possible that he simply had to leave.

Keith wrote on September 20, 2007 2:29 PM:

According to TPM Election Central's handy calendar, he has a townhall meeting in Rock Hill, SC at noon. This vote happened at 12:36 (according to roll call). So he probably voted for the first and left for a private jet to SC. Assuming TPM EC has their information correct.

mopper wrote on September 20, 2007 2:31 PM:

Heh--Greg Sargent, may I direct your attention to your own website's political schedule, which says:

Sep 20
Freedom Center, Rock Hill, SC // 12:00 PM ET
Barack Obama Town Hall - Rock Hill, SC

Barack Obama holds a town hall meeting in Rock Hill, South Carolina at noon.

According to your link above, the vote for MoveOn ad was at

Vote Date: September 20, 2007, 12:36 PM

Indeed, the other vote, the Boxer Amendment, was at noon-ish, so it seems like Obama actually stayed in the Senate late to vote on one bill before rushing off to his campaign event (for which he was undoubtedly late).

MarcNYC wrote on September 20, 2007 2:33 PM:

A real Profile in Courage

js wrote on September 20, 2007 2:36 PM:

excuses, excuses, scheduling conflict ? right.

annefrank wrote on September 20, 2007 2:45 PM:

Hillary was the only senator "absent" for the 2005 bankruptcy bill. Profile in courage...
But it doesn't even compare with Dems refusal to hold impeachment hearings because it would be harmful to Hillary's presidential ambitions.

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 2:47 PM:

Some of the Democratic senators may have felt this was a difficult vote, since it does not mention MoveOn.org by name.

Here's the resolution:

- - -
"To express the sense of the Senate that General David H. Petraeus, Commanding General, Multi-National Force-Iraq, deserves the full support of the Senate and strongly condemn personal attacks on the honor and integrity of General Petraeus and all members of the United States Armed Forces."
- - -

And senators always have Very Bush Schedules and Very Important Dates.

But it makes me wonder -- if Obama HAD been in the senate when the very difficult vote came up about giving Bush authorization to go to war in Iraq if diplomacy failed -- would Barack Obama have had A Very Important Engagement that day also?

Nice to be able to have it both ways.

NCSteve wrote on September 20, 2007 2:47 PM:

I was about to say he had some splainin to do until some Alert Readers did it for him. Given that it was a town hall, I'd cut the guy some slack. (But then, I'm admittedly a strong supporter of his.)

As a general rule, my sense is that he's a guy who'd thinks its strategically better to take heat for how he votes than for ducking a vote, but, damn, running late for a town hall? A whole room full of people waiting to ask him questions getting more pissed off by the minute because of the wait? To vote on this thing?

That's a no-brainer.

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 2:50 PM:

Oh, and Obama is never late for any of his campaign events?

Dave White wrote on September 20, 2007 2:56 PM:

But it makes me wonder -- if Obama HAD been in the senate when the very difficult vote came up about giving Bush authorization to go to war in Iraq if diplomacy failed -- would Barack Obama have had A Very Important Engagement that day also?

Are you really comparing the Iraq War authorization with this waste-of-time, joke of a resolution?

I wish more Senators didn't bother showing up for this thing.

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 3:00 PM:

Does it occur to anyone that this was (is) a FREE SPEECH issue?

During the Civil War, President Lincoln constantly criticized General McClelland.

Would this bunch of senate cowards also have condemned President Lincoln?

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 3:03 PM:

"Dave White":

I am saying senators can CHOOSE when to be Too Busy To Vote.

MarcNYC wrote on September 20, 2007 3:05 PM:

So he canceled the event so he can vote, and then skipped out on the one that was a little bit tough . . . ? Like I said before, a real Profile in Courage. This is really sad.

Dave White wrote on September 20, 2007 3:06 PM:

And I'm saying I wish more Senators had CHOSEN not to waste their time with this.

Hoppy wrote on September 20, 2007 3:08 PM:

This is more than a free speech issue. It is an extremely unconstitutional interference with a protected form of speech. The First Amendment says "Congress shall not...." But, Congress just did. All of the spineless, judgment challenged, Democrats who voted for that measure need to be forced to attend a high school level civics class to learn something about how to do their jobs. I already emailed Feinstein to let her know I am ashamed that she is my senator. We should all do that.

Anonymous wrote on September 20, 2007 3:11 PM:

It's time to start working on replacing Feinstein. We've got five years to find a challenger.

Dave White wrote on September 20, 2007 3:13 PM:

The First Amendment says "Congress shall not...." But, Congress just did.

Not really. This was a Sense of the Senate resolution, not a law. A worthless exercise, yes, but one that is still constitutional.

tarheel74 wrote on September 20, 2007 3:13 PM:

No wonder Hillary is thrashing Obama in all the polls. It is called courage of conviction. Time and again when it came to difficult votes Obama either skipped or voted the wrong way and tried to explain it all away with professorial semantics. This is guy is fast turning out to be a big bore (yawn!).

Greg wrote on September 20, 2007 3:20 PM:

guys, in relation to his travel schedule today, check out the update I just added. Obama canceled that south carolina event late last night because of the importance of today's Senate votes.

DaveW wrote on September 20, 2007 3:25 PM:

They all voted for the Boxer version, which may have been good partisanship but still braindead for condemning their best allies.

I'm still sort of in shock, but I really don't see how the Democratic Party will recover from this naked contempt for their most effective allies, the ones who won them the Senate. It won't just be MoveOn that learns their lesson from this. Nobody wants to sleep with rattlesnakes. As far as I'm concerned, it's past time to forget the Democratic Party. Nader was absolutely right, and I was absolutely wrong -- both for ranting against him, and for working so hard with MoveOn to elect the likes of McCaskill, Tester, and Webb. Never again.

NCSteve wrote on September 20, 2007 3:28 PM:

Okay, I'm now officially back to "somebody got some splainin to do."

But, tarheel 74, exactly what other missed votes are you talking about? And as to Hillary's "courage" and "convictions?" Yeah, I'd love to see a few examples of that, too. Unless you're talking about her conviction that she must be president.

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 3:35 PM:

This was NO "little" issue.

This was about FREE SPEECH.

In America, last I looked, we were and are free to call the president or any of his sycophantic Generals a horse's ass if we want to.

Isn't that what our soldiers are DYING to protect -- our freedom to speak out (as long as such speech is not slanderous)?

~ ~

It was just yesterday that these same Republican punks could not muster up the guts to defy Bush and give our soldiers proper rest time at home after being in combat.

The Republicans do not give a rat's ____ for our troops; they are just interested in caving to Bush.

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 3:38 PM:

Hillary stood up for the First Amendment today, in case you missed it.

EricD wrote on September 20, 2007 3:44 PM:

It's not like Obama did not know the second vote would occur.

He could have voted "present" like he used to do in Illinois.

demwinger wrote on September 20, 2007 3:46 PM:

hillary just won the dem nomination (not like she could lose anyway)

time for dems to jump on board and support a progressive female for president.

NCSteve wrote on September 20, 2007 3:47 PM:

"Hillary stood up for the First Amendment today, in case you missed it."

Hillary voted the right way and my guy apparently dodged, so laurals to her and darts to Obama. But please, let's not pretend she did anything other than calculate which of three unappealing choices she'd catch the least heat for and doing it.

If she truly gave a rat's ass about the First Amendment, she wouldn't have been triangulating on it by coming out in favor of the flag burning amendment. That's a hell of a lot more important than voting against the administration of a Senatorial finger wag.

annefrank wrote on September 20, 2007 3:47 PM:

Obama's absence for the 2nd vote has been explained by a previously scheduled SC rally today. But the rally was canceled LAST night.
What's the Truth?

gqmartinez wrote on September 20, 2007 3:48 PM:

The outcome of many votes are well known beforehand so I don't necessarily have too much of a problem with occasional missed votes. That said, I'm sure level of outrage would be much more intense if Hillary did this. I don't mind valid criticisms of Hillary, but the double standard is quite annoying.

jca wrote on September 20, 2007 3:49 PM:

WARNING: TPM has a bias, and it's not in favor of Barak Obama. This isn't the first negative spin on him, while oftentimes TPM witholds punches on, say, Edwards. See if you can guess, in the next few months, the Mainstream-Media-like bias by TPM in favor of Edwards and against Obama.
Too bad: otherwise, I think TPM has done some fine reporting.

Geek, Esq. wrote on September 20, 2007 3:51 PM:

Obama has a rally with thousands of supporters who paid $25/head today in Atlanta.

Was he supposed to skip that event for a waste of time crapola bill like the Cornyn Amendment?

js wrote on September 20, 2007 3:51 PM:

Q: Could Obama tell Harry Reid to cast the vote for him?

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 4:01 PM:

Oh, I think it was an act of courage for the 25 Democratic senators to vote "nay."

The rightwingers -- including, and especially, Rudy Giuliani -- will be eager to crucify every one of those brave Democrats.

The rightwingers will scream that those Democrats do not "support the troops."

Of course, the time to SUPPORT THE TROOPS was yesterday when the senate Republicans (most of them) voted to DENY our troops rest time at home equal to their time in combat.

Then, the Republicans were Missing In Action.

Michael Caine wrote on September 20, 2007 4:05 PM:

There are a few reasons why Obama didn't vote on the resolution. The first and most likely was because it didn't matter. He already voiced his opinion on the Boxer resolution. This one didn't deserve a vote and therefore did not receive one.

The second was not giving Republicans a chance to swift boat him on a meaningless resolution. Unlike Hillary, who thrives on the partisan mud slinging, Obama prefers to avoid such gamesmanship. By voting on the Boxer Resolution and not on this one, Obama can counter any Republican swift boating by saying he is against all such attacks, not just focusing on one.

The third is that he wasn't there. He did not vote present. He didn't vote at all. He may have decided that the it wasn't worth attention so left after the Boxer resolution failed to achieve the necessary votes.

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 4:10 PM:

"Geek, Esq. ":

The Cornyn amendment vote chastising anyone who would criticize a military person was NOT, as you say, a "waste of time crapola."

The Cornyn amendment is an assault on the First Amendment -- you know, the one that allows you and all the rest of us to express ourselves freely (as you and we do here at TPM).

bob wrote on September 20, 2007 4:11 PM:

So let me get this straight, we all agree that it was a dumb vote and a waste of time, but somehow it's important to some of you to waste time voting against a dumb bill whose passage is a foregone conclusion?

Right...go back to posting on Hillary's website.

kjoe wrote on September 20, 2007 4:12 PM:

jca wrote on September 20, 2007 3:49 PM:
WARNING: TPM has a bias, and it's not in favor of Barak Obama. This isn't the first negative spin on him, while oftentimes TPM witholds punches on, say, Edwards. See if you can guess, in the next few months, the Mainstream-Media-like bias by TPM in favor of Edwards and against Obama.
Too bad: otherwise, I think TPM has done some fine reporting.

I can't document it---but i do get a lot of that same feeling. What is worse in my case, is that it seems to have escalated since septemeber 1st---which leaves me wondering---are the numbers in the polls---which should be mostly irrelevant at this point----causing tpm to worry about losing future access if they do not get aboard the Hillary express soon enough?

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 4:13 PM:

"Michael Caine":

Defending the rights protected in the First Amendment is NEVER a waste of time.

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 4:19 PM:

"bob":

If it is such a waste of time, why are you here posting about it?

EricD wrote on September 20, 2007 4:24 PM:

Obama did vote on the Feingold Amendment that came AFTER Cornyn.

A true profile in courage from the junior senator from Illinois.

Dave White wrote on September 20, 2007 4:26 PM:

Defending the rights protected in the First Amendment is NEVER a waste of time.

This resolution did not infringe on those rights, it was a non-binding (ie non-law) worthless Sense of the Senate resolution that is nothing but a waste-of-time political theater.

This did not infringe on anyone's rights and this wasn't a question of the "First Amendment" the first amendment doesn't protect people from being criticized for their speech.

NCSteve wrote on September 20, 2007 4:32 PM:

Poetry,

"Defending the First Amendment is never a waste of time."

I agree wholeheartedly. So when's Hillary going to recant her support of that Flag Burning Amendment?

I'm serious about this. The Senate resolution today was a symbolic fart on First Amendment values. It is not a law, and thus not unconstitutional. The First Amendment says, in relevant part, "Congress shall make no law . . . abridiging the freedom of speech." It does not say, "A single house of Congress shall not pass legally meaningless nonbinding resoutions tut-tutting over sophomoric exercises of the freedom of speech."

The flag burning amendment is a direct assault on the First Amendment, a proposal to actually empower Congress from to pass laws abridging freedom of speech. For Hillary to try to burnish her image among people who would never vote for her in a million years by claiming (whether insincerely or otherwise, it's equally bad) she's in favor of opening this Pandora's Box is simply abominable.

So, please, spare me your plaudits for Hillary's Rightous Defense of the First Amendment today. They ring hollow for me.

Anonymous wrote on September 20, 2007 4:39 PM:

I used to require my 6th grade students to write a copy of the first amendment, simply as a handwriting assignment--and some years--usually when some issue caused the school board to require us to recite the pledge of allegiance, I would ask permission to have my class also recite the first amendment. (The answer was usually "yeah, whatever.")

I am having a hard time figuring out why a senator sould vote for either resolution. Whether it is a law, or not, senators have power to decide things (generally for big shots), so it is inherently warning people not to say stuff.

I don't want the government warning us not to say stuff.

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 4:39 PM:

"Dave White ":

You should get chills up your spine when the senate passes a resolution condemning anyone's exercise of his FREE SPEECH rights.

Any American HAS the right to say anything about any General he wishes to as long as it is not slanderous. It should be a cold day in hell when the senate thinks that the exercise of one's right to FREE SPEECH needs to be criticized.

kjoe wrote on September 20, 2007 4:40 PM:

I used to require my 6th grade students to write a copy of the first amendment, simply as a handwriting assignment--and some years--usually when some issue caused the school board to require us to recite the pledge of allegiance, I would ask permission to have my class also recite the first amendment. (The answer was usually "yeah, whatever.")

I am having a hard time figuring out why a senator sould vote for either resolution. Whether it is a law, or not, senators have power to decide things (generally for big shots), so it is inherently warning people not to say stuff.

I don't want the government warning us not to say stuff.

Shii wrote on September 20, 2007 4:46 PM:

"Some of the Democratic senators may have felt this was a difficult vote, since it does not mention MoveOn.org by name."

That's the summary, not the full text. The full text basically reads "MoveOn.org is undermining America" and it is infuriating that any Democrats approved of it.

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 6:09 PM:

"Shii":

The text at:
http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=110&session=1&vote=00344

is:

"To express the sense of the Senate that General David H. Petraeus, Commanding General, Multi-National Force-Iraq, deserves the full support of the Senate and strongly condemn personal attacks on the honor and integrity of General Petraeus and all members of the United States Armed Forces."

Do you have a link for some other text?

poetry wrote on September 20, 2007 6:19 PM:

"Dave White":

The senate voting to CONDEMN anyone's right to FREE SPEECH should be the "canary in the mine" for us.

If the Republicans get away with this -- and it looks like the media whores are lapping it up -- how long will it be until the Republican senators pass a resolution that CONDEMNS us for saying negative things about Our Dear Leader who is, after all, the "Commander in Chief" of the Army and Navy"?

SanityClause wrote on September 21, 2007 5:02 AM:

Good for Obama to skip this idiotic vote. It shows he has the sense to refuse to be pigeonholed into such nonsense.

myspace wrote on September 22, 2007 12:17 AM:

myspace [url=http://groups.google.com/group/whitepage/web/myspace.html#1362811535]myspace[/url] http://groups.google.com/group/whitepage/web/myspace.html 1444383463

Nate wrote on December 14, 2007 8:12 AM:

Check out Ron Paul. Don't let his Republican tag make you not.

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