Bruce Fein:

Iraq will inexorably disintegrate under a White House successor in the White House who will have disowned the Bush madness and removed American troops as concessions to reality. Enjoying retirement in Texas, Mr. Bush will argue for the history books that Iraq was not lost on his watch; and, that more of his madness would have been crowned with victory. These observations will seem unjustifiably harsh to Mr. Bush's cheerleaders. But the president has consistently shown himself a small man driven by petty ambitions. And tall and high-minded American soldiers in Iraq pay a steep price.

John Danforth:

BY a series of recent initiatives, Republicans have transformed our party into the political arm of conservative Christians. The elements of this transformation have included advocacy of a constitutional amendment to ban gay marriage, opposition to stem cell research involving both frozen embryos and human cells in petri dishes, and the extraordinary effort to keep Terri Schiavo hooked up to a feeding tube.

BARR: Here again, this is absolutely a bizarre conversation where you have a member of Congress saying that it's okay for the president of the United States to ignore U.S. law, to ignore the Constitution, simply because we are in an undeclared war. The fact of the matter is the law prohibits -- specifically prohibits -- what apparently was done in this case, and for a member of Congress to say, oh, that doesn't matter, I'm proud that the president violated the law is absolutely astounding.