There were a bunch of diaries on last night criticizing Voinovich for cowardice in
voting to send Bolton to the full Senate while witholding his recommendation. Sure, it'd be nice if he had a spine and voted his conscience. But I'm willing to give some credit to the guy for having the third of a spine that it took to speak up, unlike some of the other unhappy Republicans on the committee. He's helped us in the media battle surrounding the Bolton nomination. The way I see it, Voinovich is their Lieberman. (Should I say "our Lieberman?" Well, you know what I mean.)
Joe Lieberman has a fairly liberal voting record, but he often says nasty things about the Democratic party, making life hard for us. Lots of people in the media emphasize bipartisanship, which means that the person who disses his party gets regarded as brave, conscientious, and right on the issues. Furthermore, the media tends to say nice things about one side in a debate when voices from both parties are on that side. That side isn't being motivated by mere partisan ire -- they're really considering the issues and being conscientious!
Voinovich has Liebermanized the Bolton debate, and it's something we should be thankful for. Now our concerns can't be dismissed as just a bunch of Bush-hating Democrats complaining about Bolton. Bolton is so awful that even some Republicans think he's a bad choice! To some extent, it'll help us in the debate about judges as well. The media will be more likely to say that we're responding to serious problems with the nominees themselves, not just playing silly obstruction games.