Russ Feingold was interviewed by Mike Gousha, a local (and very cool) newscaster in Milwaukee, on
Sunday Night with Mike Gousha. The interview was broadcast tonight, on 1/22.
I haven't seen any transcripts of the interview on the Internet, but there were a few things that are worth passing on --- some good, some not so good. The highlights are on the flip.
- Feingold all but dismissed the idea of a filibuster on Alito, claiming they don't have the votes. I thought this was an odd thing to do, especially for Feingold, who tends to be overly cautious in his statements. So I was disappointed to hear him come out and pretty much single-handedly take the filibuster off the table, considering how he was the clean-up hitter for the Dems in the Alito confirmation hearings.
- When asked about his future plans, of course, he demurred, saying he won't make a decision on running in 2008 unles he knows he can do the job, do it well, is right for him and his family, etc. When Mike Gousha pointed out that he's viewed as a lefty a la Howard Dean, he pointed out that he is very hard to pigeonhole: he's known in DC as a "deficit hawk," supports the 2nd amendment and gunowners' rights, etc. He ended by saying that he thinks someone like himself or John McCain would be the kind of person who would do well as President --- someone who calls 'em as he sees 'em, etc.
- When asked if the President deserves credit for there not being another 9/11, he didn't bat an eye in saying how "we all deserve credit," including policemen, firefighters, etc. It was very well done.
- He also went after Bush pretty hard on wiretapping, and encouraged the blunt statements by Gore recently that there needs to be an investigation into the legal justification, or lack thereof, on Bush's part. He noted that although he's going to keep an open mind, he's going to have a hard time finding a believable justification for Bush's wiretapping.
- Again, "with an open mind," he's at least leaning very heavily toward shooting down Alito. I think it's safe to put him in the NO side, if not the Leaning Toward NO side.
- The rest were the usual topics/explanations you'd expect. Gousha did a nice job of setting up the right-wing talking point for Feingold to take down, like a Dad putting a baseball on a batting tee for his 6-year-old son. The most memorable was the timeline for withdrawal in Iraq. Gousha asks if that would give our enemy in Iraq a date with which they could declare victory, and Feingold explained how that is essentially a nonsensical point-of-view.
If anyone can find the transcripts for the show (I'm off to bed), I think they'd make for an interesting read.