LET'S ENJOY EXTENDED WALLOW IN USE-OF-FORCE VOTE ANALYSIS

My compliments and congratulations to the Coach Ed Arnzen and his Southeast Missouri State Otahkians for the remarkable tournament showing that has made us all so proud of them. We appreciate all your hard work and the rewards that you have earned.

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I have to confess considerable amusement at the eagerness with which so many CongressPersons and SenatorPersons now want to change the subject on their January "NO" votes on whether to go to war.

The only thing more comical than a politician lately spied scrambling for cover on a vote now seen as unpopular is the screening fire directed at critics of those politicians. I refer to fire that's laid down by those politicians' national media allies, terrified that this critical vote could be used to rid the halls of Congress of some of their darlings. But even some liberals don't buy this ludicrous stuff.

Liberal pundit David Broder of the Washington Post, ordinarily an unswerving voice of the congressional incumbency establishment, now writes of this vote, "The Democrats have lots of explaining to do ..." And liberal Michael Kinsley of The New Republic set CNN's entire "Capital Gang" panel to giggling Saturday evening, when he noted the absurdity of the now desperately advanced claim that because the January vote was a "matter of the deepest conscience", that it therefore could not fairly be analyzed, exposed and criticized for its larger meaning.

It's unfair to question our patriotism! say the liberal pundits and their media allies. But I've heard no one questioning their patriotism; rather it's their judgment that's being called into question, and for very, very good reason.

Recall that President Bush came to Congress in January for an authorizing vote on the use of force in the Gulf. He already had 12 count 'em, 12! supportive resolutions of the United Nations. The UN was previously distinguished principally as a moral sinkhole and a fount of left-wing, Third World, anti-American, anti-Western propaganda and lies. So on January 12, President Bush, the UN in his pocket, the American people in overhwelming support, came to the Congress and asked for support.

What the Congress was being asked was for the best judgment of its individual members, in perhaps the most important vote in 40 years. And at this critical, defining moment in history, what we got was this:

Every member of the Democratic leadership in both House and Senate, followed by overwhelming majorities of the rank and file of their party, voted to the left of the United Nations in denying the President his asked-for support. People forget: the vote in George Mitchell's Senate was a mere 52-47 for the President.

A partisan issue! goes the cry now becomingly drearily familiar. Well, excuse me, but it's the Democratic leadership who drew the party lines so sharply, with their votes back in January. And they'll not be heard whining today, when the undisputed facts are pointed out for all to consider. And there's more.