RE: Did you see what happened?

I wanted to pass along to you some of the reaction to my friend Harry Reid's bold move yesterday, when he forced the Senate into an extraordinary meeting about the manipulation of intelligence leading up to the Iraq war.

Today the Republican National Committee reacted with a hit piece on our Democratic Senate Leader. The attack document leads off bashing Reid for his action yesterday, claiming that the Washington Post called Reid's action a "cheap trick". But that's just not true --

The increasingly desperate Republicans picked the only two words they liked -- here's the full quote from the Post article that shows that the truth still doesn't matter:

It was a cheap trick -- and it worked brilliantly. Reporters dropped their stories about Alito and covered the melee in the Senate. CNN titled the episode "Congress in Crisis." MSNBC displayed a live shot of a mostly empty hallway outside the Senate chamber and a clock showing elapsed time since the Senate went into closed session.

Republicans knew they were licked. They agreed to set a schedule for the long-delayed intelligence committee investigation Democrats demanded. "Today, the American people had a victory," Reid declared. [Washington Post, 11/2/2005]

Enough is enough, and Harry Reid knows it. We must demand accountability for manipulated intelligence on Iraq and the White House cover-up. I support his action completely, and so do more than 10,000 others who have written notes of thanks to him in less than 24 hours.

There's still time to make a special contribution and send a note of thanks to Harry Reid:

http://www.democrats.org/fightback

It is worth noting that a year ago today we lost an election. Tens of millions of us were disappointed because we put so much of ourselves into that cause. We donated money, we talked to friends, we knocked on doors. We invested ourselves in the political process.

That process did not end a year ago. It continues right now -- as we fight on the life and death issues that matter today, and as we build a permanent Democratic Party in all 50 states that will win elections in decades to come.

These are not one-time, short-term investments. We will only create lasting change if that sense of obligation and responsibility becomes a permanent part of our lives.

Martin Luther King, Jr. said, "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."

We will not be silent.

I will personally deliver your note of thanks to Harry Reid, along with my own, because our elected leaders must know that when they show courage they speak for all of us.

Thank you.

Governor Howard Dean, M.D.