Proxmire was a codger, to be sure. I certainly didn't agree with everything he said and did. CarolC mentions his draconian push to repeal Glass-Steagall. He was also staunchly anti-abortion, and was once married to a Rockefeller (not my favorite American dynasty).

But he was a complicated guy. He, like Russ Feingold, was also an early opponent of an unpopular war (Vietnam). He replaced Joe McCarthy (thank goodness). And every morning the Senate was in session, he gave a speech demanding the US Senate ratify the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, which they finally did in 1986, after he had made 3,211 speches.

Not a bad record, even if I hated the fact he saved NYC by sacrificing it's citizens to corporate marauders.