Are the Democrats going to turn tail and run?

I blogged earlier today about the White House putting the screws to the Senate Republicans to lay off on the investigation of the domestic spying program. Apparently, the Democrats are running from the story too. Here's some of what Glenn Greenwald has to say about it:

But undercutting all of that momentum is the increasingly obvious fact that a substantial number of Democrats are flirting heavily with -- if they have not already outright embraced -- the notion that they ought to back away from this scandal, focus on legislative "revisions" to FISA in order to render retroactively legal the Administration’s patently (and proudly) lawless behavior, plead with the Administration to accept some oversight going forward, and then forget about the whole sordid affair. Put another way, many Democrats are slowly slouching towards the path they almost always end up taking – that is, not challenge the Administration due to three things: fear, fear and fear. Specifically, they are afraid that standing firm will backfire politically, even though all available facts suggest that this fear is wholly unfounded.

Political considerations to the side for a moment, how can Democrats even consider allowing the Administration to break the law with impunity? As I’ve argued many times, the Administration did not violate the law here because they have a specific view uniquely about their power to eavesdrop. They violated the law here because they have adopted a general theory of Executive power which maintains that the President has the right to act contrary to any Congressional law -- and without any judicial "interference" -- with regard to any decisions that even vaguely pertain to national security, even including the use of war powers against American citizens on U.S. soil. To allow the Administration a free pass on this lawlessness is to further install and solidify that ideology of lawlessness. How can any Democrat possibly think it’s in the interests of their party or this country to acquiesce to that?

I couldn't agree more. Even if it were political suicide to stand up and fight this, I think it's imperative to do so, but I'm absolutely convinced it's not political suicide at all. Standing firm for principle will win, not lose, votes.