What is the stand?

Guaranteed healthcare for all Americans, mandated by the federal government, but allowing the states to have some flexibility in how they implement it.

Secondly, we should be a party that is not afraid to stand up to unfair trade agreements. Senators on both sides of the party have trouble with CAFTA and the results of NAFTA. We should break with the party's recent past and say we're not going to vote anymore for trade agreements that ship our jobs overseas and are not fair to the workers and the environment of those other countries. Third, there is an overwhelming desire for a real energy-independence approach in this country. People are ready to hear specifics, all the way from wind turbines, to fuel cells, to ethanol, that will make people believe we don't have to have these foreign countries who essentially have us, as I like to say, over the barrel.

A number of people on the left were unhappy with how you voted on John Roberts. After the vote, Ralph Neas of People for the American Way was in the hallway saying you had voted against the interest of the Constitution.

Yes, I read his quotes. The two most important votes about the Constitution were [for the confirmation of] John Roberts and John Ashcroft, according to Ralph Neas. I wonder where he was the day the USA Patriot Act was voted on and I was the only senator to vote no. I think he is a little confused about what are votes on the Constitution, which that was directly, and what are votes on individuals.

But you have Roberts on the bench. Harriet Miers is heading toward the bench.

Don't count on that.

Well, whoever the president's next nominee is, it's very possible that the person could eat away at a number of legal principles that are Democratic foundations.

It's very possible.

But you voted, still, for Roberts.

I have this odd sense that George Bush is going to pick whoever the justice is. So those who are yelling and screaming, apparently, have forgotten who gets to make the nomination. So the question is, what's the best we can get from George Bush? It was my judgment that John Roberts, based on everything I saw and heard, directly and indirectly, was the best possibility we could have to pick somebody who would be non-ideological in his nature, who would try to do the right thing on the court, even though he is certainly more conservative than I am, and who I think in the end will probably be less partisan than his predecessor, Chief Justice Rehnquist.

So I thought it was the best possible scenario for the future of progressive concerns. I may be wrong. But that was my judgment and I think people who wanted a different choice than Roberts would have found out they got something worse.

What is your take on Miers?

I am puzzled. I don't really understand. I will need to be convinced that this is a person who is of the highest standing, who is qualified, in the first place, for the Supreme Court. Secondly, I am really troubled by the notion that her qualification is that she has a close personal relationship with the president. That strikes me as the opposite of the independence and objectivity that I actually admired with Roberts.

You spoke out against the 527 groups in 2004. Democrats historically have depended much more on these large checks, whether it is through 527s or soft money. If the 527 loophole is closed before 2008, do you think it really handicaps the Democratic nominee?

Yeah, everybody says that to ban soft money would be devastating to Democrats. Even Terry McAuliffe has admitted it did just the opposite. We broadened our base of supporters. It basically returned us to being something of the party of the people. The 527s, I think, were a negative for Democrats. I don't think they helped us. I think, on balance, the whole Swift Boat thing was devastating to John Kerry. These groups are just cheating. It's current law, under the 1974 law, not the McCain-Feingold bill, that they should not be able to do this. So I think we would be much better off having a clean message driven by the party and the candidates, rather than these groups. You know, frankly, they run ads sometimes that are obnoxious in terms of not showing Democrats to be respectful and I think that hurts us.

The Swift Boat group was obviously the most effective for the money. But a lot of the big money was going into get-out-the-vote groups on the left and the advertising groups on the left. Do you think those hurt John Kerry's candidacy?

My sense was that that kind of activity was not what was effective. It was the party. It was the organized work that was done in coordination between the state parties and the federal parties and the candidates.

There is a theory in Washington that the Democratic Party is divided between insiders and outsiders, the conventional leadership of the party and the outside activists like bloggers. Do you buy into that?

I think there is a problem with it. I don't know if there is a severe divide, but it is something we need to overcome. I think there are a lot of efforts being made by Democratic senators who have awakened to the reality.

What is the problem that you see?

Well, I think what Democratic senators are beginning to realize is that there is a tremendous potential base of support out there that is represented by the blogs and some elements of the Green Party and especially among young people, who the party has not done a very good job of appealing to. Certain votes that I have taken have caused me to have a lot of exposure to these individuals and groups. I just saw what it meant to people that a Democrat stood up on the USA Patriot Act, that Democrats voted against the Iraq war. This is the key to bringing in people who are looking for strong, alternative leadership to the Bush administration.

We have an opening. We have an opportunity here. Republicans brilliantly figured out before we did direct mail and a number of other things that led to the Reagan revolution and the Contract With America. We have an opportunity here to, I think, be the ones who do a better job with the Internet, with the blogosphere, with the unbelievably democratic, with a little d, opportunities that this all presents. This is a sea change in American politics, giving the average person an opportunity to participate in this exciting, real-time way with the political process. I think we are better positioned to take advantage of that.

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