As one of the few senators for whom I can honestly profess to have tremendous respect and admiration, it was great seeing Russ Feingold (D-WI) in top form yesterday on NBC's increasingly irrelevant Meet the Press show skillfully batting host Tim Russert's questions left and right. The real highlight, of course, was Feingold's announcement that he planned on introducing two censure resolutions against the president — one for misleading the country into an unnecessary and ill-conceived war and the other for his administration's continued flouting of the law, exemplified by the NSA warrantless wiretapping, the president's unprecedented use of signing statements and the politicized firing of several U.S. attorneys.

As he made clear, these resolutions would only amount to a formal rebuke of the president and his administration and wouldn't exercise any binding authority on his actions. For those of us pining to see motions of impeachment introduced against Cheney and Bush in the House and Senate, this is obviously less than we expected, but given the current political circumstances, the best we could hope for.

Feingold isn't naive about the prospects for his resolutions to succeed: a similar attempt in 2006 to censure the president over the NSA spying program got him only three co-sponsors, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has already said he won't go along with them. Given the American public's strong disenchantment with this administration and its policies, it seems preposterous that Feingold's Democratic colleagues in the Senate wouldn't even be willing to co-sponsor an essentially toothless resolution. As he made clear, this resolution is about one thing and one thing only: holding the president accountable for his misconduct and assault against the Constitution.

"Censure is about holding the administration accountable," Feingold said. "Congress needs to formally condemn the President and members of the administration for misconduct before and during the Iraq war, and for undermining the rule of law at home. Censure is not a cure for the devastating toll this administration's actions have taken on this country. But when future generations look back at the terrible misconduct of this administration, they need to see that a co-equal branch of government stood up and held to account those who violated the principles on which this nation was founded."

The Democrats' excuse for skirting similar resolutions in the past has always been to fret about the voter backlash such a "drastic" move would precipitate and the significant portion of working time it would swallow up. That is both patently ridiculous and untruthful. As Feingold put it:

"What I am proposing is a moderate course, not tying up the Senate and the House with an impeachment trial, but simply passing resolutions that make sure that the historical record shows the way they have weakened our country, weakened our country militarily and against al-Qaeda, and weakened our country’s fundamental document, the Constitution. I think that’s a reasonable course and does not get in the way of our normal work. But the American people are outraged at the way they’ve been treated. They are outraged at the dishonesty that they have been subjected to. The American people—we deserve better than the way we’ve been treated, and somehow this has to be reflected," Feingold said.

As much as I'd like to see the Democrats show some gumption and actually support such a modest resolution, I know from prior experience not to expect much (if anything). Well, now that the House is slowly gearing up to impeach Cheney (House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers apparently only needs 3 more votes), we may finally get some results soon...