Dems Jab at Republicans for voting down Patriot Act

Dems are the biggest bunch of hypocrites ever! They whine and complain about the Patriot act for a decade. Then when the first group of politicians in Washington with the guts to vote it down turns out to be Republicans, they point fingers at the Republican Party and claim it is a failure of leadership.  That if the Republicans didn't have the votes to pass it that it should never have been brought up for a vote.  Extending 3 portions of the Patriot Act failed to pass by 2/3rd on Tuesday by 13 votes.

Some of the commenters at Politico had a more balanced approach:

Kinnison said:
When you write "the Republicans" what you really mean is the Republican leadership, which consists of old-line professional politicians and party elites. The people who caused the failure to renew of the Patriot Act provisions are the "Young Turks", the new guys elected primarily by the Tea Party, who know who sent them and what they expect from their Representatives: constitutional adherence, smaller government, reduced spending and protection of our liberties. They voted against renewing the Patriot Act, as they should have.

Michael Maloney said:
This is going to be a very interesting session of congress vis a vis watching the infighting between the Tea Party (libertarian) wing of the party and the establishment (authoritarian) wing.

Good for the new kids for remembering their pledge to keep Government out of our hair.

mtrillium said:
Republican embarassment? Not really. Sounds like a lively caucus of independent thinkers -- and I like them even more!

As far as merits: all in all, Patriot Act should probably be renewed, but I get a chill giving it to the Libs to use. Don't know if I trust with powerful tools Democrat operatives staffing some key positions in FBI. For some lefties, their politics is like Islam: any abuse is justified in order to "right" a "wrong".

Patriot Act is a controversial expansion of power, there's a good reason why it has a sunset provision, you better trust who you give it to. When the Press is in opposition, you can be sure they'll hunt down any appearance of abuse, which makes it safer with Repubs at the helm. With Press and Dems at power, there's less of a balance.