OK, I realize that a Russ Feingold candidacy probably would mean at least four more years of a Republican administration, since its unlikely that a majority of Americans would vote for him, but isn’t it nice to dream?

Let’s catalog some of his virtues:

• the only senator to vote against the Patriot Act in 2001
• campaign reform (McCain-Feingold)
• actually has kept his promise not to accept a pay raise while in office
• he’s for health care reform
• he’s against the death penalty
• the list actually goes on and on…

And, almost unbelievably, he’s not only come out against federal and state constitutional amendments banning recognition of same-sex marriages (including one pending in his own state of Wisconsin), aptly calling such attempts “mean-spirited” acts of discrimination against gay folk, but he’s actually gone a step further, standing up publicly in support of legalizing such marriages. These days only a truly principled politician could risk the political sucide such a statement could bring; its unusual to find a politician willing to stand up for what’s right when doing so could mean the end of a political career.

Feingold in 2008!