John Nichols of The Nation reports that on Thursday the Senate voted 94–1 to raise the federal debt limit by $850 billion (now up to $9.815 trillion) and to grant the White House at least $9 billion in new war funding and more. (See Nichols’s article in full below.) Wisconsin’s Russ Feingold was the only senator to vote against the measure. Senators Clinton, Obama, Biden, McCain, and Brownback—all presidential candidates who, says Nichols, “are more involved in campaigning than governing”—did not vote. Feingold said:
