MR. RUSSERT: You seem to suggest that John Kerry and John Edwards lacked courage.

SEN. BYRD: No, I'm not saying that. I'm saying they lacked the facts. I didn't have the facts any more than anybody else, but I had studied this administration; I had listened to what Karl Rove had said in Austin, Texas, when he addressed the Republican National Committee in January of 2001 when he indicated that this war, this homeland security subject, all of this, was a horse on which they could ride right through the upcoming election. He indicated that the people trusted the Republicans more to defend this country, and it was his suggestion that the Republican strategy should be to use this in order to win the election. I read about that. And then, as a result of my reading that, every time I saw the president on camera with the backdrop of the military, of the National Guard, I remembered what Karl Rove said. And I think the administration was carrying it right through on his advice.

"Bush's power has been wielded with arrogance, calculation, and disdain for dissenting views. The Constitution's careful separation of powers has been breached, and its checks and balances circumvented. Behind closed doors, schemes have been hatched, with information denied to the legislative branch and policy makers shielded from informing the people or Congress. In fact, there appears to be little respect for the role of Congress. There is virtually no attempt to build consensus through the hard work of reaching across the aisle to find common ground. Real consultation does not exist."

Congress was weak, and I was ashamed of the Senate for the first time in my 45 years, that it would shift this power and remove itself and take away its voice. It turned over to this one man the decision to use our military forces as he would, when he would, where he would, and there's no sunset provision in that. There was at least a sunset provision in Tonkin Gulf resolution. There's no sunset provision in this power.

I said to myself and to my colleagues, "Look, if we're going to be silly enough and unsensible enough to shift this power to this president, let's at least put a sunset provision in it." I offered an amendment, got 31 votes, including my own. I could hardly believe it. I was ashamed. But not only has the Congress failed, the American people have been unthinking and they've not asked questions. And finally, the press, the media itself, bought into this once the president's drums of war started.

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