NE is an odd state. Puts up guys like Hagel who infuriates the right, and Nelson who infuriates the left.

Nelson will not switch parties because the GOP dosn't want him. The current Gov. wants to run for senate in 2012. My take is Nelson will retire. He should have retired in 2006 - after voting for both Bush Tax cuts and the Medicare Rx expansion - he had done enough damage. But I agree with Nathan - we're unlikely to ever get a progressive senator out of NE - and until we can Nelson will ahve to stay, warts and all. I do wish we could avoid him as the 60th vote however - and concentrate on Snowe or someone else.

I think I now disagree.  A Republican will attack the policy, but that is understood and expected.  When Nelson attacks policy, he undermines the policy, because then it can be looked at as, "Even the Democrats don't like it".

On top of that, the fact that he won't even vote for cloture on presidential appointees and Democratic Platform issues, means he is kind of a poison pill.  We can look like we almost made it, by getting 58 Democratic Senators, and try to get 2 Republicans to break the filibuster, but if we succeed he can just step up and stop it anyway.

If for some reason this posts twice, I apologize.  I was in the midst of typing and lost what I was doing, I think.

Anyway, I just don't agree with your point, Nathan.  Nelson has gone from being someone who often opposed Democratic positions to one who opposes Democratic positions all the time.  Nelson does nothing to increase the progressiveness of the Senate--he's not a progressive, for heaven's sake.  What's the difference between having a Republican who opposes us on everything, and a Democrat who opposes us on everything?  In fact, as others have noted, Nelson is worse than a Republican, because his opposition gives cover to the Republicans ("even the Democrats oppose this bill").

As for his vote for the stimulus, let's remember that he voted for it after arbitrarily saying that the President's original amount was too large, despite the opinion of many leading economists (including Krugman, who won the Nobel Prize, for crying out loud) that it was not large enough.  Nelson had no alternative, and no reason, for asking that the stimulus be cut, he just wanted it to be smaller.  In so doing, he undermined the effectiveness of it and killed the chances for a second stimulus, which we so badly need.

Replace him with a conservative Republican, and the vote on major Democratic proposals will change not at all.

Nelson watered down the bill, so how is he fighting for his constituents?  He is the cause of some of the watering down of a bill that would have helped his state disproportionately.  So, what you are saying is that he fought hard to please the corporations so that he could help his state by passing a weaker bill and lining his campaign coffers at the same time?  We could also state this as, "he fought hard to line his campaign coffers, while being forced to maybe accept some bill being passed, and doing what he can to sabotage that bill"?

You've made my exact point, and contridicted your own.

I fully agree that passing something is better than nothing.  I'm even for passing the Senate bill as-is if it's the only way we get something signed into law.  It's a crappy step forward, but a step forward none the less.  But that has NOTHING to do with your arguement that Sen. Nelson was "fighting for his constituents" in the HCR debate.

You concede that the original bill would have been better for Nebraskans than the watered down bill.  Yet, somehow you feel that Sen. Nelson watering down that bill is "fighting for his constituents".  That just doesn't jibe.  The original bill was better, and then Nelson made it worse.  Therefore, he was fighting AGAINST his constituents' interests.

Given the way Republicans are behaving in the Congress, I agree that I'd much rather have a Blue Dog than a Republican in that seat, even when BDs are as subversive as they are.  But to say that they are working on behalf of the people of their state when it's plainly and demonstratively clear that they are not, is a mistake.