WILL CALIFORNIA DEMOCRATS CENSURE DIANNE FEINSTEIN?

There is no way to recall a senator. They're in for 6 years unless they start get caught committing criminal acts. Feinstein has successfully dodged accountability for her pattern of criminality-- mostly involving enriching herself through her husband's shady businesses and war profiteering. (She still is.) As Glenn Greenwald pointed out so eloquently in Salon on Saturday, "Among California Democrats, a grand total of 9% approve of Feinstein's beloved President; 90% disapprove. Obviously, nothing could be less relevant to Feinstein than the views of her constituents, but still, the disparity between what they believe and what she is doing is just striking, even for the Beltway." Even with Republicans in the mix, Bush's job approval rating in California is only 28%. And yet Feinstein has been the lynch pin of one policy success after another in his venal, toxic agenda.

Isn't it time someone start the process of holding Feinstein accountable to voters for her egregious misbehavior? A subtext of the dinner I went to Saturday night was an airing of grievances among progressives about Feinstein's pronounced reactionary bent. Our gentle host, Rick Jacobs, also happens to be the head of the Courage Campaign. And the Courage Campaign is launching a grassroots move today to censure California's senior senator.

The first shot was fired this morning by Max Follmer over at the Huffington Post, breaking the news that a coalition of progressive Democrats will ask the California Democratic Party to censure Feinstein at its executive board meeting this weekend.

The move comes as Feinstein again finds herself under fire for saying Thursday that she now supports granting legal immunity to telecom companies that shared customer email and phone messages with the federal government as part of the warrantless surveillance program.

"Dianne Feinstein does not listen to the people of California," said Rick Jacobs, president of the Courage Campaign, a progressive organization in California. "She supports George Bush's agenda time after time."

...East Bay For Democracy, a chartered Democratic Club outside San Francisco, will introduce the censure motion on Saturday at the state party's executive board meeting in Anaheim. The Governing Board of the Progressive Caucus of the California Democratic Party and the Progressive Democrats of America are also backing the measure.

In addition to her move to back Mukasey, critics have lashed out at her decision last month to vote to confirm Judge Leslie Southwick to the Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals in New Orleans. Southwick's
opponents charged that his record on the bench in Mississippi demonstrated that he was both racist and homophobic. The Congressional Black Caucus, Human Rights Campaign and People for the American Way opposed his nomination.

The censure resolution faces an uphill battle. In order to be considered by the full executive board, it must first make it through the party's resolutions committee, which must approve the text unanimously.

The text of the resolution is below:

Whereas Senator Dianne Feinstein voted to support the nomination of Judge Michael Mukasey as United States Attorney General, thereby elevating to the highest position in law enforcement a man who refused to renounce the right of the President to resort to torture and who refused to recognize waterboarding as a form of torture, and by this action Senator Feinstein failed to oppose President Bush and failed to stand for the ideals of the Democratic Party, which abhors torture and stands firmly against its use by the United States at all times and places; and

Whereas Senator Feinstein voted to confirm Judge Leslie Southwick for a seat on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit despite his clear record of racism and gender discrimination, thus failing to stand firmly with the Democratic Party, which supports gender equality and opposes racism in any of its manifestations; and

Whereas these examples are far from the only instances where Senator Feinstein, after seeking and securing the support and endorsement of the California Democratic Party, has failed to support the policies and principles of our party

Therefore be it resolved that the California Democratic Party expresses its disappointment at, and censure of, Senator Feinstein for ignoring Democratic principles and falling so far below the standard of what we expect of our elected officials.

Please go sign the Courage Campaign censure petition and read more about the case Californian's have against the West Coast version of Joe Lieberman.