BONIOR / MCDERMOTT UPDATE: Chris Suellentrop writes in Slate that Bonior and McDermott have their pluses and minuses. Minuses:

When it comes to foreign policy, Democrats have a reputation as credulous stooges whose reflexive anti-war leanings make them willing dupes for murderous dictators. That didn’t happen in this case (at least not yet),[It didn’t? — Ed.] but the charge is so effective that it doesn’t matter whether it’s true. Bonior and McDermott may not have played into Saddam’s hands, but they did play into the GOP’s.

Also customary is anti-war Democrats’ tendency to cry “Vietnam” and “quagmire.” . . . Of this, McDermott is particularly guilty. He criticized the early airstrikes in Afghanistan last October, raising the specter of the war in which he served as a Navy psychiatrist at Long Beach Naval Station: “There are some eerie parallels that trouble me.” McDermott has repeated similar fears during the buildup to war with Iraq. At times, the opposition to war from the Party That Cries Vietnam appears to stem more from ’60s and ’70s nostalgia than from moral or political beliefs.

On the upside, Suellentrop says:

If Maureen Dowd is to be believed, Hillary Clinton is keeping her private doubts about an Iraq war to herself in order to preserve her “political viability” in the 2008 presidential race. She’s not the only Democrat with similar motives. Say what you will about Bonior and McDermott—they’re naive, they’re too trusting of an evil tyrant, their decision to condemn Bush from a foreign land was ill-timed and foolish. All that is true. But at least they’re sincere. And at least they’re not silent.

So they’re useful idiots, but in their defense, they’re idiots — unlike the other Democrats, who are political opportunists. With this being what defenders of Democratic positions on the war are saying, I think the Democratic Party is in real trouble here. Which explains why Bush is facing so little opposition on this question, I guess.

Meanwhile, back on Bonior and McDermott in specific, rather than the Democrats in general, Bill Herbert has looked at the transcript of yesterday’s press conference and points out a howler that other commentators missed.

UPDATE: Here’s a story on how Daschle got rolled on the war resolution. Does this have anything to do with Dick Gephardt’s presidential aspirations? The story of the intra-Democratic infighting on this subject isn’t getting the attention it deserves — though it sounds as if Bonior and McDermott’s action, and the bad publicity it created, played a role here too.

Hmm — puts the old “if you want peace, prepare for war” saying in a new light, doesn’t it?