Today on the historic motion on Cloture to proceed (Motion to Invoke Cloture on the Motion to Proceed to H.R. 6304 ) with the Measure Number H.R. 6304 (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 ). H.R. 6304 is a Senate bill to amend the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 to establish a procedure for authorizing certain acquisitions of foreign intelligence, and for other purposes. Amongst the list of 5 Senator "not voting" are Obama and Clinton who are not sick or are not Republican. Amongst the rest 3 are Kennedy and Bryd who are really sick and are absent from the Senate. The last one is McCain who is the Republican Senator to have missed most votes this year. Amongst those who opposed the bill included Senators like Boxer, Feingold, Biden and Dodd.

NAYs ---15
Biden (D-DE)
Boxer (D-CA)
Brown (D-OH)
Cantwell (D-WA)
Dodd (D-CT)
Durbin (D-IL)
Feingold (D-WI)
Harkin (D-IA)
Kerry (D-MA)
Lautenberg (D-NJ)
Leahy (D-VT)
Menendez (D-NJ)
Sanders (I-VT)
Schumer (D-NY)
Wyden (D-OR)

Not Voting - 5
Byrd (D-WV)
Clinton (D-NY)
Kennedy (D-MA)
McCain (R-AZ)
Obama (D-IL)

Grouped By Vote Position YEAs ---80
Akaka (D-HI)
Alexander (R-TN)
Allard (R-CO)
Barrasso (R-WY)
Baucus (D-MT)
Bayh (D-IN)
Bennett (R-UT)
Bingaman (D-NM)
Bond (R-MO)
Brownback (R-KS)
Bunning (R-KY)
Burr (R-NC)
Cardin (D-MD)
Carper (D-DE)
Casey (D-PA)
Chambliss (R-GA)
Coburn (R-OK)
Cochran (R-MS)
Coleman (R-MN)
Collins (R-ME)
Conrad (D-ND)
Corker (R-TN)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Craig (R-ID)
Crapo (R-ID)
DeMint (R-SC)
Dole (R-NC)
 Domenici (R-NM)
Dorgan (D-ND)
Ensign (R-NV)
Enzi (R-WY)
Feinstein (D-CA)
Graham (R-SC)
Grassley (R-IA)
Gregg (R-NH)
Hagel (R-NE)
Hatch (R-UT)
Hutchison (R-TX)
Inhofe (R-OK)
Inouye (D-HI)
Isakson (R-GA)
Johnson (D-SD)
Klobuchar (D-MN)
Kohl (D-WI)
Kyl (R-AZ)
Landrieu (D-LA)
Levin (D-MI)
Lieberman (ID-CT)
Lincoln (D-AR)
Lugar (R-IN)
Martinez (R-FL)
McCaskill (D-MO)
McConnell (R-KY)
Mikulski (D-MD)
 Murkowski (R-AK)
Murray (D-WA)
Nelson (D-FL)
Nelson (D-NE)
Pryor (D-AR)
Reed (D-RI)
Reid (D-NV)
Roberts (R-KS)
Rockefeller (D-WV)
Salazar (D-CO)
Sessions (R-AL)
Shelby (R-AL)
Smith (R-OR)
Snowe (R-ME)
Specter (R-PA)
Stabenow (D-MI)
Stevens (R-AK)
Sununu (R-NH)
Tester (D-MT)
Thune (R-SD)
Vitter (R-LA)
Voinovich (R-OH)
Warner (R-VA)
Webb (D-VA)
Whitehouse (D-RI)
Wicker (R-MS)

http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/ro ll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?con gress=110&session=2&vote=00158#p osition

Ian Welsh at Firedoglake writes:

I do want to give a nod to Feingold and Dodd for being consistently on the right side of this issue. The 15 who voted against deserve to be remembered for doing so. 80 voting for means that the leadership was pushing hard, we lost significant numbers of votes from last time.

As for Obama, well, here's what he had to say:

"The bill has changed. So I don't think the security threats have changed, I think the security threats are similar. My view on FISA has always been that the issue of the phone companies per se is not one that overrides the security interests of the American people."

Regular readers of FDL and EmptyWheel will know that this is security theater and that there is no reason to believe that gutting the 4th amendment will make Americans safer, even if Obama is willing to ignore his oath to uphold the Constitution. This is a sad day, especially for those of us who believed Obama when he said he would support a filibuster against retroactive immunity.

http://firedoglake.com/2008/06/25/the-re al-fisa-vote-passes-80-to-15-with-the-pr esidential-nominees-passing/

The question is "are you disappointed with Obama and Clinton's not voting on this important Cloture Bill?" What does it say about them and about us??