US Congress Watch // Current

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14 days ago

Stop Blackwater for Good

There's finally a bill to stop private, for-profit companies like Blackwater from waging war in our name with little regard... more

JonRaymond
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AMERICA’S POLITICAL MESS, TIME TO START OVER : Veterans Today

TERM LIMITS, A THIRD PARTY OR EVEN REAL CAMPAIGN FINANCE RULES AREN’T ENOUGH By Gordon Duff / STAFF WRITER / Senior... more

WeAreChangeKy
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Leaked documents reveal GOP plan to use scare tactics to raise money

"National GOP leaders are doing damage control today after a Politico scoop lifted the curtain on the party's plan to tap voters' "fear" in the coming campaign season. The PR problem started when an absent-minded attendee at the Republican National Committee (RNC) confab on February 18 in Boca Grande, Florida, left a 72-page document from its 2010 strategizing session in a hotel room. Today, Politico reporter Ben Smith's expose is making headlines.

The memo tracks the fundraising presentation that RNC Finance Director Rob Bickhart delivered to the RNC's $2,500-a-head annual retreat. The best path to victory in 2010, the document advises, is for Republican candidates to depict themselves as the best hope for resisting the "trending toward socialism" taking shape in a Democrat-dominated Washington.

And the document doesn't shy from making its points graphically. MSNBC showed the images this morning on Morning Joe [See page image above]:

The presentation portrays the Obama administration as "The Evil Empire," includingthe now-infamous image of President Obama made over in the makeup Heath Ledger used in his performance as the Joker in the 2008 Batman movie "The Dark Knight." House Speaker Nancy Pelosi appears as Cruella De Vil from "101 Dalmatians," and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is the witless cartoon dog Scooby-Doo. The memo candidly confirms that the aim of such caricature is to amp up "fear" among the GOP's conservative base. The memo also makes fun of major RNC donors, categorizing some as "ego-driven" and easily pacified with "tchochkes" (a Slavic word for toys).

The embrace of harsh rhetoric and the swipes at the large donor set seem to signal the GOP establishment's growing comfort with employing tactics associated with the activist Tea Party movement-and with plying Tea Party sympathizers for cash. Of course, it isn't unusual for parties out of power to court controversy and play with fire to rile up donors and grass-roots activists. The RNC has caught heat for fundraising tactics in the past, most recently when it was caught sending out fake census forms to raise money. And Democrats have shown a demagogic streak in the past, depicting George W. Bush and Dick Cheney as Bond-like supervillains and playing up alleged GOP plans to kill Social Security to rally voters behind a popular entitlement program."

Full article at link below:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ynews/ynews_ts1217"National GOP leaders are doing damage control today after a Politico scoop lifted the curtain on the party's plan to... more

Trauzer
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17 days ago

Obama's Budget Revealed: Money for Wars and Weapons, While More Americans Face Joblessness and Hunger | | AlterNet

The latest federal budget opens the American public to yet more pain, while shielding the military and the rest of the national security establishment from the same.
March 2, 2010 |

Send up a flare! The 2011 federal budget has sprung some leaks in the midst of a storm. Not sure there's enough money for life rafts! Forget women and children first!

Buffeted by economic hard times, the 2,585-page, $3.8 trillion document is already taking on water, though this won’t be obvious to you if you’re reading the mainstream media. Let’s start with the absolute basics: 59% of the budget’s spending is dedicated to mandatory programs like Medicaid, Medicare, Unemployment Insurance, Social Security, and now Pell Grants; 34% is to be spent on “discretionary programs,” including education, transportation, housing, and the military; 7% will be used to service the national debt.

A serious look at this budget document reveals some “leaks” -- two in actual spending practices and two in the basic assumptions that undergird the budget itself. Ship-shape as it may look on the surface, this is a budget perilously close to an iceberg, and it’s not clear whether the captain of the ship will heed the obvious warning signs.

Whose Security Is This Anyway?

In his State of the Union Address, given several days before the 2011 budget was released, President Obama announced a three-year freeze on “non-security discretionary spending.” This was meant as a gesture toward paying down the looming national debt, but it should also be considered an early warning sign for leak number one. After all, the president exempted all national-security-related spending from the cutting process. Practically speaking, according to the National Priorities Project (NPP), national security spending makes up about 67% of that discretionary 34% slice of the budget. In 2011, that will include an as-yet-untouchable $737 billion for the Pentagon alone.

Within the context of the total budget, then, so-called non-security discretionary spending represents a mere 11% of proposed 2011 spending. In other words, Obama’s present plans to chip away at the debt involve leaving 89% of the budget untouched. Only the $370 billion going to myriad domestic social programs will be on the chopping block.

What's in that $370 billion? Well, for starters, programs that focus on the environment, energy, and science. In the 2011 budget, these categories combined are projected to receive $79 billion or 6% of total domestic discretionary spending. Though each of these areas could actually use a significant boost in funds, that’s obviously not in the cards -- and this will translate into less money at the state level. New York, for example, is projected to receive $247 million in home energy assistance for low-income folks, down more than $230 million from 2010. These funds mean an energy safety net for our communities, and also warmth and jobs in a cold winter, which looks like “security” to most of us, no matter what our captain says.

Asking for disproportionate cuts and efficiencies in programs in only 11% percent of the overall budget might perhaps be slightly easier to stomach if military spending wasn’t allowed relatively free rein in 2011 (and thereafter). The NPP estimates, in fact, that aggregated increases in military spending over the next decade will exceed $500 billion, drowning twice-over the projected $250 billion in non-security discretionary savings from the president’s cuts over the same time period. Consider this visible unwillingness to control military-related spending leak two in our budgetary Titanic.

By now, danger flags should be going up in profusion because the second leak is so familiar, so George W. Bush. With each new bit of information, in fact, it sounds more and more like the same old song, the last guy's tune. It’s clear that, as soon as the stimulus bump wears off later this year, we're in danger of falling back into exactly the same more-money-for-the-military, less-federal-aid-to-the-states rut we’ve been in for years, despite strong statements from both President Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates decrying Pentagon waste.

And speaking of waste, the Department of Defense is currently carrying weapons-program cost overruns for 96 of its major weapons programs totaling $295 billion, which alone are guaranteed to wipe out any proposed savings from President Obama's non-security discretionary freeze, with $45 billion to spare. That's only to be expected, since neither the Pentagon nor any of the armed services have ever been able to pass a proper audit. Ever.

Even more at the link:The latest federal budget opens the American public to yet more pain, while shielding the military and the rest of the national... more

WeAreChangeKy
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2 comments

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18 days ago

Sen. Jim Bunning Says “Tough s__t!” to Unemployed and Uninsured : Veterans Today

“Tough s__t!” That’s a precise quote. Is Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) all there? Maybe not. Does this guy have any clue, any compassion for the American people. We’re talking uninsured families and people’s lives.

Families matter, pal. From Ed Kilgore:

If you are unemployed, or if you are one of the millions of people hanging on to cancelled employer-sponsored health insurance via COBRA, your life will take a turn for the more insecure on Sunday, thanks to Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY), who wants to make a symbolic gesture about federal spending. Bunning is refusing to let the Senate vote on totally noncontroversial extenders for these provisions, which will probably force a cloture vote and at least a week’s delay in restoring unemployment insurance and COBRA.

What makes this weird is that Bunning is taking this action not to secure any concessions on present or future legislation, but to express his grumpiness about something that’s already happened: Senate passage of the first chunk of jobs legislation by a 70-28 vote.

Now you have to appreciate that Bunning is a very angry old man. Never a very genial soul, he was pushed into retirement by his own party because it looked like he would be defeated even in a good Republican year, in part because he’s exhibited some signs of being a few bricks shy of a load. So he’s mad at his colleagues, and maybe even mad at his constituents, for their failure to let him serve in the Senate into his ninth decade of walking the earth.

The most appropriate response to Bunning’s grievances is probably the words the senator himself contemptuously uttered yesterday to Sens. Dick Durbin and Jeff Merkley when they cited the plight of the unemployed and soon-to-be-uninsured in asking him to let the extenders come to a vote: “Tough s__t!” The people he’s affecting with his little fit of pique have a lot more to complain about than Bunning, who’s largely wasted twelve years in the Senate being a grumpy old man. But he is a fitting symbol of the obstructionism of his party in Congress, which knows no bounds and feels no shame.“Tough s__t!” That’s a precise quote. Is Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) all there? Maybe not. Does this guy have any... more

WeAreChangeKy
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1 comment

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22 days ago

Obama gives health care another shot with summit

The President is sitting down with a bi-partisan group of lawmakers at the Blair House in Washington and they're talking... more

afitzgerald
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51 comments

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20 days ago

The Need for Filibuster Reform

Can we bring democracy back to our government? "Why should a Republican minority of 41 senators that represent only 37% of... more

tbowman131
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72 comments

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20 days ago

RE: Divorce Agreement

John Wall wants a divorce from liberals... Well I have something to say about that...

Clever, if not simplistic. I'd be tempted to take you up on the offer if not for the fact that it's based on certain false premises, and even after the divorce you would continue to infringe on the rights of others... that's just not acceptable to me.

There's a popular misconception that liberals are anti-military. I'm a liberal and a veteran of the United States Army. I'm against abuse of military power. I believe supporting our troops means not sending them off to die in an unjust war, (AKA Iraq).

I served in the military to defend such things as freedom of speech and freedom of religion. Judeo-Christian values are great. So are the values of Islam, Scientology, Humanism, as well as Buddhism and Hinduism. The practice of all are protected by the U.S. Constitution.

Now, you may call me a tree-hugger, but the fact is that your lack of concern for the environment will pollute my kid's lungs and poison their water. Even if we are divorced, your SUVs will pollute my air. Sorry, but you just can't contain it and I happen to like clean air.

And before you decide to file those divorce papers, think about the good that liberals have done for this country: Liberals ended slavery, (yes, Abraham Lincoln was a Republican, but read the history books, Republicans were the liberals of the 1800s,) and liberals gave us civil rights. Liberals championed Medicare and Medicaid and liberals fought so that women could have the right to vote.

What have Conservatives done? Well, they've fought us along the way... you know, just in case progress in these areas moved just a little too fast.

America is a pluralist society. We are who we are because of our ethnic, religious, cultural and political diversity. It is this diversity that makes us great. If you don't like it, then you can move out of the house. I'm staying and I'm keeping the kids and the dog.

So no, I don't agree to a divorce. Instead, I recommend counseling. I don't quit on America and I won't take the easy way out at the expense of others.

Sincerely,

Lucas Ives, Former Law Student, Current MBA Student, U.S. Veteran and a Proud AmericanJohn Wall wants a divorce from liberals... Well I have something to say about that... Clever, if not simplistic. I'd be... more

lucasives
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22 days ago

Without Debate, Senate Renews PATRIOT Act

The Senate today voted to extend the PATRIOT Act for another year, as requested by the Obama Administration. The vote came without... more

ProjectBat
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41 comments

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21 days ago

Senators' Friendship Strong On and Off Capitol Hill

'while many in Washington believe that bipartisanship is long gone, two seasoned Senators say it's not...at least not... more

ryan8566
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22 days ago

Bunning Blocks Jobless Aid in Senate

The Senate clash over the unemployment benefits ended just before midnight Thursday with Senator Jim Bunning, Republican of Kentucky, refusing to lift his objection, meaning the jobless aid – for however short a time – will run out Sunday night unless a deal is reached Friday.

As the fight drew to a close, Mr. Bunning complained he had been ambushed by the Democrats and was forced to miss the Kentucky-South Carolina basketball game. He said Democrats caused their own problems by dropping the program extensions from an earlier bipartisan jobs measure.

And while he said the Senate spent almost three hours “telling everybody in American that Senator Bunning doesn’t give a damn about people who are on unemployment,” he assured those still watching that he was indeed interested in renewing the programs as long as it can be done to his satisfaction.

Senator Richard Jr. Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat, said he intended to try to break the impasse again Friday morning but Mr. Bunning indicated he would again be on hand.

Senator Jim Bunning, the conservative Kentucky Republican, insisted that the jobless pay due to run out Sunday night should be paid for rather than added to the deficit as an emergency. During the debate, Mr. Bunning stood rigidly at his desk in the back row of the Senate and objected to repeated Democrat attempts for agreement to extend unemployment coverage through April 5.

“I believe we should pay for it,” declared Mr. Bunning, who said he was determined to remain to thwart the Democrats. “I’ll be here as long as you are here.”

Democrats, in unusually personal terms, challenged Mr. Bunning, a member of the Baseball Hall of Fame, for denying aid to tens of thousands of Americans struggling in a bad economy, even reading letters from Kentucky residents about their own problems.

“I just don’t think one senator ought to be able to heap this kind of suffering and misfortune on people who are already struggling in this economy,” Senator Richard J. Durbin of Illinois, the No. 2 Democrat, said, chastising his Republican colleague. “This is a wild pitch you are throwing tonight because it is pitch that is hitting somebody in the stands.”

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/02/25/bunning-objects-over-and-over/The Senate clash over the unemployment benefits ended just before midnight Thursday with Senator Jim Bunning, Republican of... more

current89
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5 comments

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22 days ago

Obama Pushes Policy Over Politics At Health Care Forum

WASHINGTON — President Obama opened his much anticipated health care forum on Thursday by calling on Democrats and Republicans to “focus not just on where we differ but focus on where we agree,” as Republicans called for the president to scrap his bill and start over.

Mr. Obama, speaking to lawmakers from his seat at the table they shared, not from a podium or with a teleprompter, used his opening remarks to make the case that reforming the health care system is critical to the nation’s economy. He made no opening bids, but instead called on the two parties to abandon their talking points and engage in a real unscripted discussion, even as he conceded that it might not result in a bridging of the deep philosophical divide between them.

“I don’t know that those gaps can be bridged and it may be that at the end of the day we come out of here saying, ‘Well, we’ve had some honest disagreements,’” the president said, adding, “but I’d like to make sure that this discussion is actually a discussion and not just us trading talking points.”

But as the morning ran on, it was clear that Republican anger ran deep. One of the liveliest exchanges came when Mr. Obama clashed with his former Republican rival for the White House, Senator John McCain of Arizona, who unleashed a pointed attack on the president for the process that Democrats used to produce the bill — even as Mr. Obama tried to redirect him to talking about its substance.

Mr. McCain pointedly reminded Mr. Obama that both of them had campaigned “promising change in Washington” and that the president had promised to televise his negotiating sessions on C-Span. “I’m glad that more than a year later you are,” the senator said, going on to deride the 2,400 page bill as the being produced “behind closed doors” with “unsavory deals.”

Mr. Obama tried to cut Mr. McCain off. “John, we’re not campaigning anymore, the election is over,” he said.

Mr. McCain laughed. “I’m reminded of that every day.”

The forum, which the White House intended as a back-and-forth between Republicans and Democrats on health care policy, is an extraordinary last-ditch effort by Mr. Obama to revive his health care bill. The White House is betting that the public will tune in and conclude Democrats have better ideas for reforming health care; Republicans are betting the public will favor their ideas.

At the least, it will provide the viewers a glimpse of relatively unscripted conversation between the two parties on an issue that has divided them for decades.

In his own remarks, Mr. Obama got personal, recounting the story of his mother’s death from ovarian cancer, and the illnesses of his daughters: Malia, 11, who was rushed to the hospital after complaining she couldn’t breathe and, the president said, was diagnosed as having asthma, and Sasha, 8, who had a potentially dangerous case of meningitis as a baby.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/26/health/policy/26health.html?hpWASHINGTON — President Obama opened his much anticipated health care forum on Thursday by calling on Democrats and... more

current89
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2 comments

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22 days ago

Senator Reid: Apologize for sexist remarks!

Feb. 23 – Groups are calling for Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada to apologize for sexist remarks made yesterday. Reid’s... more

regjoeschmo
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26 comments

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23 days ago

Senate Votes 70-28 to Approve $15 Billion Jobs Bill

WASHINGTON — The Senate today easily approved a $15 billion Democratic plan to try to spur job creation, as lawmakers... more

current89
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0 comments

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23 days ago

Support Rep. Anh Cao (R-LA), who supported Democratic health care legislation!

The lone Republican lawmaker to support Democratic health care legislation has seen his fundraising drop by nearly 40 percent... more

HowdyDo
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1 comment

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25 days ago

The Knives Come Out: Far Right Attacks Brown as 'Too Liberal' a Month After Win

It was perhaps inevitable that Senator-elect Scott Brown (R-Massachusetts), who scored a stunning upset victory over Democrat... more

SkeeterVT
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4 comments

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24 days ago

7 million a day to israel in 2009 but no healthcare? WHY?

7 million dollars a day to israel in the form of aid and no healthcare. Ask your congress and your senate to stop funding the terrorist state of israel and pay for your healthcare instead.

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FROM THE LINK

Since the October War in 1973, Washington has provided Israel with a level of support dwarfing the amounts provided to any other state. It has been the largest annual recipient of direct U.S. economic and military assistance since 1976 and the largest total recipient since World War ll. Total direct U.S. aid to Israel amounts to well over $140 billion in 2003 dollars. Israel receives about $3 billion in direct foreign assistance each year, which is roughly one-fifth of America's entire foreign aid budget. In per capita terms, the United States gives each Israeli a direct subsidy worth about $500 per year. This largesse is especially striking when one realizes that Israel is now a wealthy industrial state with a per capita income roughly equal to South Korea or Spain.”

- John J. Mearsheimer and Stephen M. Walt
"The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy"

* The source for US military aid to Israel during Fiscal Year 2009 is the Congressional Research Service’s “U.S. Foreign Aid to Israel,” written by Jeremy M. Sharp, Specialist in Middle Eastern Affairs, updated February 3, 2009. According to this report, by early February 2009, the US had already given Israel at least $2.55 billion ($2,500,000,000) in military aid for Fiscal Year 2009.

Over the last 20 years, the U.S. has been slowly phasing out economic aid to Israel and gradually replacing it with increased military aid. Beginning in 2007, the U.S. has been increasing military aid by $150 million each year. By FY2013, we will be sending Israel $3.15 billion a year (or an average of $8.6 million a day) and will continue to provide military aid at that level through 2018. U.S. tax dollars are subsidizing one of the most powerful foreign militaries. According to the CRS report, “[current U.S. military aid] grants to Israel represent 18.5% of the overall Israeli defense budget.”

Contrary to ordinary U.S. policy, Israel has been and continues to be allowed to use over 26% of this military aid to purchase equipment from Israeli manufacturers. According to CRS, “no other recipient of U.S. military assistance has been granted this benefit.” Thanks in part to this indirect U.S. subsidy, Israel’s arms industry has become one of the strongest in the world. “In 2007, it was the 8th largest arms supplier to the developing world.”

In addition to military aid, the United States continues to provide Israel with additional aid and benefits. The numbers are not yet available for FY2009, but are likely to be significant.

By all accounts the United States has given more money to Israel than to any other country. The Congressional Research Service’s conservative estimate of total cumulative US aid to Israel (not adjusted for inflation) from 1949 through 2009 is $106.1647 billion.

A November 2008 Washington Report article “A Conservative Estimate of Total Direct U.S. Aid to Israel: $114 Billion,” by Shirl McArthur, puts the cumulative total even higher.

According to McArthur, “[T]he indirect or consequential costs to the American taxpayer as a result of Washington’s blind support for Israel exceed by many times the amount of direct U.S. aid to Israel. Some of these ‘indirect or consequential’ costs would include the costs to U.S. manufacturers of the Arab boycott, the costs to U.S. companies and consumers of the Arab oil embargo and consequent soaring oil prices as a result of U.S. support for Israel in the 1973 war, and the costs of U.S. unilateral economic sanctions on Iran, Iraq, Libya and Syria. (For a discussion of these larger costs, see ‘The Costs to American Taxpayers of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: $3 Trillion,’ by the late Thomas R. Stauffer, June 2003 Washington Report, p. 20.)”

** The source for US aid to the Palestinians during Fiscal Year 2009 is the Congressional Research Service's Report “U.S. Foreign Aid to the Palestinians”, written by Jim Zanotti, Analyst in Middle Eastern Affairs, updated February 20, 2009. According to the report the U.S. has never provided Palestinians with military aid (although we have provided Palestinians with aid for policing their own people as well as with humanitarian and development assistance).7 million dollars a day to israel in the form of aid and no healthcare. Ask your congress and your senate to stop funding the... more