Update (by TL):

Via the John Kerry blog:

If you had any doubt about whether Democrats would come together to defend John Kerry against scurrilous Republican attacks, you should have seen New Jersey Senator Frank Lautenberg on the Senate floor today. Senator Lautenberg mounted a frontal assault on the latest Republican smears of John Kerry's record in Vietnam. Senator Lautenberg decried the "chickenhawks" in the Republican Party, which he defined as shrieking "like a hawk" but having "the backbone of a chicken."

Senator Lautenberg, who served in World War II, was particularly exercised about Vice President Cheney's role: "And now the chickenhawks are cackling about Senator John Kerry. And the lead chickenhawk against Senator Kerry is the Vice President, Vice President Cheney. He was claiming that Senator Kerry was not up to the job of protecting this nation. "What nerve. Where was Dick Cheney when that war was going on..."

The Kerry blog has the entire text of Senator Lautenberg's remarks here.