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The vote to kill Kucinch’s privileged resolution began as a largely party-line affair, but halfway through the vote, Rep. John Shadegg (R-Ariz.) persuaded Republican leaders to get rank-and-file GOP lawmakers to change their votes to force the debate.Knowing full well the political disaster of impeaching the Vice President on evidence Kucinich brought down from his stay on that UFO he was talking about last week, Democrats tried to rid themselves of the resolution only to have the Republicans gleefully deny them that opportunity. Instead of tabling the resolution (which would have defeated it), the GOP forced the Democrats into another vote to refer it to committee by switching dozens of their votes, defeating the motion to set the resolution aside.
At one point, the vote to table the motion stood at 246-165. Once Republicans began switching their votes, momentum swung the other way. When the vote stood at 205-206, some Democrats began switching their votes.
The vote to kill Kucinich’s resolution finally failed 162-251, giving Republicans the opportunity to watch Democrats debate whether to impeach Cheney — a debate in which many liberal Democrats were more than willing to engage.