The Daily Background

Earlier today, I was talking with a fellow congress-watcher, and we were musing about what would become of the PATRIOT act later today- after the House passed a 1 month extension. I said to my friend something along the lines of “Tonight the PATRIOT will go back to the Senate, but I dunno how many Senators will be present to make a decision….”

Well, the PATRIOT did indeed go back to the Senate, and apparently there was only one Senator available in town to make a decision on it. According to AP, John Warner (R-VA) quickly passed the bill and closed the Senate for vacation, after a four minute long last session of the year.

UPDATE: BBC is calling this a defeat for Bush. I guess we all know that Scotty’s refusal to outright say what he implied; that the President was going to Veto a 3 Month (or shorter) PATRIOT extension was for good reason- because he knew it probably wouldn’t happen.

Filed under: Patriot Act, Z-TDB Blog