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POPSRepublican Attorneys General in 13 States Threaten Lawsuit Over Health Care
The 60-39 vote marked the third time in as many days Democrats posted a supermajority needed to advance the legislation. The letter was signed by top prosecutors in Alabama, Colorado, Florida, Idaho, Michigan, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, South Dakota, Texas, Utah, Virginia and Washington state. All are Republicans, and McMaster and the attorneys general of Florida, Michigan and Pennsylvania are running for governor in their respective states. Last week, McMaster said he was leading several other attorneys general in an inquiry into the constitutionality of the estimated $100 million deal he has dubbed the "Cornhusker Kickback." Republican U.S. Sens. Lindsey Graham and Jim DeMint of South Carolina raised questions about the legislation, which they said was amended to win Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson's support. "Because this provision has serious implications for the country and the future of our nation's legislative process .....
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POPSReid Bill Says Future Congresses Cannot Repeal Parts of Reid Bill i'm not even sure that it's constitutional, but if it is, it most certainly is a senate rule. i don't see why the majority party wouldn't put this in every bill. if you like your law, you most certainly would want it to have force for future senates. i mean, we want to bind future congresses. this goes to the fundamental purpose of senate rules: to prevent a tyrannical majority from trampling the rights of the minority or of future congresses. According to page 1001 of the Reid bill, the purpose of the Independent Medical Advisory Board is to "reduce the per capita rate of growth in Medicare spending." For any fearmongers out there tempted to call an unelected body that recommends Medicare cuts a "Death Panel," let me be clear. According to page 1004, IMAB proposals "shall not include any recommendation to ration health care"--you know, just like the bill says there's no funding for abortion. Paging Sarah Palin: the death panel is unkillable.
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POPS Code Red In Washington D.C. Today; “This bill must be stopped!” Also: The Dems now expect the CBO scoring of the Reid plan that no one has seen to look good once the Medicare expansion is thrown under the bus. And: After all the sound and fury, Joe Lieberman is now reportedly on board with Demcare. Update: Heeeeere come’s MoveOn! Steamed at the Democrat majority over negotiating with Joe Lieberman, the nutroots will hold their own “emergency rally” today at 1pm Eastern today to lobby for nationalized health care. Wonder if unhinged Jane Hamsher will show up to burn Sen. Lieberman’s wife in effigy. Update 11:49am Eastern: Lieberman talking to press right now. Says Demcare plan is now “heading in the right direction.” GOP Sen. Susan Collins is standing by him, smiling, through his remarks. Ok, Susan Collins speaks. She can’t see voting for the bill in its current form. “It’s still too deeply flawed for me to support it.” She says she won’t support it even with amendments intended to improve the bill (that no one has seen, of course).
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POPSHave you seen the ObamaCare bill? Mikulski blocks "Read the Bill" rule Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D-MD) used procedural tactics this week to block an amendment offered by Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) to require all bills to be posted on the Internet 72 hours before they are considered by the Senate. It is outrageous -- but perhaps not surprising -- that a U.S. Senator would oppose such a modest proposal for transparency. Watch the video. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XwZz7h6tmFY&feature=channel TAKE ACTION! Contact Sen. Mikulski and tell her you're not happy she opposed the 72-hour "Read the Bill" rule. And please don't let her office tell you the amendment was not germane. The Senate adopts amendments every day that aren't germane and this one was no different. Mikulski's number is (202) 224-4654 and you can email her here. http://mikulski.senate.gov/Contact/contact.cfm
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POPSMitch McConnell Pwn's John Kerry's Block on Honduran Trip McConnell gets around Kerry block of DeMint Honduras trip Washington Post: ... Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) denounced Kerry's move on the Senate floor and sought the intervention of the minority leader, Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.). The Republican leader appealed to the Defense Department to provide an aircraft for DeMint's trip and the Pentagon agreed to do so, according to the South Carolina senator's office. PrairiePundit >>>
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POPSMarch on Washington Regardless, the timing of last night’s hastily arranged speech before a joint session of Congress was weird. Such special sessions are themselves weird, exceedingly rare forums usually reserved for dramatic effect, like when Presidents declare war. The glaring exception, it seems, was Bill Clinton’s ill-fated, pen-wagging veto threat to Congress if they failed to pass his (Hillary’s) health care plan. So why did Obama do it? Why now? According to USA Today before his speech, “the ever more noisy opposition to his health care objectives has had one result: It prompted Obama’s decision to address a joint session of Congress on Wednesday in an effort to regain momentum on the issue.” So the President wants to have another argument with the voters. He already has ridiculed publicly citizens who have the audacity to disagree, like the lady who asked him to keep government out of her Medicare. (Maybe she was referring to his proposed $500 billion . . .
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POPSSenator Asks Clinton to Explain Honduran Policy he said. (Sen. Lugar) Washington has cut $16.5 million in aid to Honduras and this week revoked diplomatic visas for four members of Micheletti's administration to pressure it to reverse the coup. Micheletti on Wednesday night released a statement calling for new efforts to resolve the country's political crisis. But Zelaya's representative in Washington, Eduardo Enrique Reina, told Reuters he thought Micheletti was simply trying to gain time with the statement, noting that Micheletti's aides in Honduras are still vowing not to let Zelaya return. "We will ask the U.S. government to step up the pressure on Micheletti," Zelaya's ambassador told Reuters.
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POPSBecause It's Always Been About Him . . . weight - at the hands of Democrats It's the Blue Dog Democrats in the House who wince at skyrocketing health-reform costs just weeks after having swallowed hemlock for 0bama on a ruinous cap-and-trade carbon tax. He seized on Republican Sen. Jim DeMint's comment that stopping 0bama on health care would break his presidency to protest, with perfect disingenuousness, that "this isn't about me. This isn't about politics. "It's all about him. Health care is his signature reform. He knows that if he produces nothing, he forfeits the mystique that both propelled him to the presidency and has sustained him through a difficult first six months. Which is why 0bama's red lines are constantly shifting. Universal coverage? Maybe not. No middle-class tax hit? Well, perhaps, but only if they don't "primarily" bear the burden. Because it's about him , 0bama is quite prepared to sign anything as long as it is titled "health care reform."
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POPSSenator Jim DeMint vs. Matt Lauer on Health Care Lauer obviously could care less about the facts about the problems with Obamacare; he really just wants to nail DeMint on the "Waterloo" comment. DeMint kept his composure, kept the interview on track, and made a very compelling case. Matt Lauer looks fairly disgruntled at the end. DeMint makes a great point, though... when Obama was a senator, DeMint made a number of health care reform proposals... Obama voted them all down.
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POPSObama Blasts GOP On Health Care: 'This Isn't About Me' If the GOP would stop focusing on creating a Waterloo, and simply remember to put the American people first, our Gov't united could do some amazing things. But it's obvious what at least some Republicans see as their priority - to bring Obama down, regardless of what the people want or need.
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POPSI Demand Respect, General, "Could you say 'senator'?" "Why do some liberals apparently despise our military?" DeVore asks in a statement on his campaign's Web site. He says the use of "ma'am" is "a perfectly acceptable sign of military respect to both a U.S. senator or a senior female officer." Republican critics in the blogosphere and elsewhere are excoriating Boxer. Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., called Boxer "a loose cannon" and an embarrassment to her party. "I just can't put up with that kind of thing when people think too much of themselves, and we see a lot of that in Washington," DeMint told Fox News Channel. Boxer is scum. California's beleaguered taxpayers would do well to throw her out on her kiester at the next available opportunity.
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POPSFundamentalists Run The Gop Not much has changed here except the language is much more strident and spooky. This kind of ignorance is as insurmountable as that of extreme Islamists. I'm sure I want to fund those schools!
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POPSThou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before Him The bill includes $20 billion for school “modernization, renovation or repair of facilities” – with $14 billion for elementary and secondary schools and $6 billion for higher education, which includes the secular string attached. What exactly is “a substantial portion”? If an organization lets the scouts meet in their facility, will they no longer be able to use government money to fix their building? It’s simple, really. You grow the public sector, shrink the private sector, and fund only what you deem ideologically sanitary.
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POPSGOP stimulus plan costs 3.5 times Obama's Mostly in - guess what - permanent tax breaks for corporations and lowered income tax rates for the wealthy. New. Fresh. And with all the success of the Bush tax cuts, an obvious choice.
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POPSGOP Stimulus 3.5 Times More Expensive than Obama's A follow up to my morning post . What a surprise, huh? Republicans slinging horseshit. The GOP's plan calls for making Bush's tax cuts permanent and piling more tax cuts on top of them. All the while, they're complaining about the deficit (which is more their fault than anyone else's). This is especially hypocritical, since their plan increases the deficit more than Obama's. They don't care about the economy, all they care about is 2010.
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POPSGOP Sen.: Electoral Rout McCain's Fault Am I the only one who sees that freedom and "religious-based values" are often contradictory? After all, the Taliban has "religious-based values." DeMint in his own words: McCain, who is proponent of campaign finance reform that weakened party organizations and basically put George Soros in the driver's seat. His proposal for amnesty for illegals. His support of global warming, cap-and-trade programs that will put another burden on our economy. And of course, his embrace of the bailout right before the election was probably the nail in our coffin this last election. And he has been an opponent of drilling in ANWR, at a time when energy is so important. It really didn't fit the label, but he was our package. I totally called this . DeMint -- and a lot of GOPers -- believe they lost because they weren't crazy enough. Good news for Democrats in future elections.
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POPS Drill Baby, Drill --- Chapter One "This is a major victory for Americans who are suffering at the pump,now that Democrats' ridiculous opposition has run out of gas," said Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.). "Now it's time to ensure drilling is expedited and prevent liberals from tying energy production up in endless litigation." UPDATE: On the day Democrats made their decision official, the Institute for Energy Research, an industry-funded research group, released polling that shows the majority made a popular decision; sixty-five percent of the respondents in the group's bipartisan poll favored repealing the drilling ban, as compared with the 30 percent who would like to keep it in place.
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POPSSenator Jim DeMint: Should We Drill? Palin’s Image as Anti-Earmark Champion September 12th, 2008 Republican Senator Jim DeMint rushing to her defense today in a “Wall Street Journal” op-ed. The senator joins me now. DeMint defends Palin fiscal stands September 12th, 2008 Before you could say, “Lindsey Graham,” Republican U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint zapped an op ed to The Wall Street Journal responding to criticism of the record of GOP vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin by Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama. Writing in today’s WSJ, the Greenville senator defended the Alaska governor fiscal record as “solid and inspiring.” “She will help (GOP presidential nominee John) McCain shut down the congressional favor factory, and she has a record to prove it. Actions mean something,” DeMint said.
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POPSSen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) Indicted For Being Sleazy And the “Congressional White Caucus” won’t jump to defend Sen. Stevens the way the Congressional Black Caucus did for William Jefferson. Why? Because Sen. Stevens’ actions — just like those of Sen. Jefferson — are indefensible. Oh, and the fact that there isn’t anything as absurdly segregationist and just plain absurd as a Congressional White Caucus. ________ With the possible exception of Rep. John Culberson (R-TX), Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK), Sen. Jim Demint (R-SC), and Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CN) — I think we should expel every other member of Congress and start over with people of honest and integrity…but more than that, people who don’t think my money is their money. Leaders committed to truly small and limited government. Sadly, our country is headed in exactly the opposite direction.
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POPSJoe Biden Defends Obama Against GOP Distortion Why hasn't Obama held any subcommittee hearings on Afghanistan asks GOP Senator Jim DeMint? Because we hold them here in the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Democratic Sen. Joe Biden fires back, and you know that. Biden catches DeMint trying to make a political cheap shot. That's my state Senator coming at you, Jim boy!
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POPSCould Earmark Moratorium Really Be On The Way? The GOP may be falling behind the Democrats, with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi moving toward a moratorium. In the Senate, courageous freshman Democrat Claire McCaskill of Missouri supports the DeMint amendment. She could be joined by her choice for president, Barack Obama. These developments encouraged Flake to say: "If Democrats actually move ahead with an earmark moratorium before Republicans, the Democrats will get the credit for eliminating earmarks, and, frankly, they'll deserve it."
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POPSSen Jim DeMint (R-SC) Introduces His Stop The Raid Amendment Every year, Congress votes to raid the Social Security Fund. Some in Congress have made a living redistributing tax dollars from working families to special interests. They believe that your money is best spent on a rain forest project in Iowa or the Charlie Rangel Center for Public Service in Harlem. Instead of allowing private donations or investments to pay for such projects, some members of Congress have decided that you, the taxpayer, should foot the bill. The Senate will have its chance to do just that when Senator Jim DeMint (R-SC) introduces his Stop the Raid amendment. Each Senator will have to take a stand on an important issue. By looking at how each Senator votes we will know who is serious about stopping the raid of the Social Security Trust Fund. Senator Barack Obama, for example, has floated the idea of increasing taxes to make up future shortfalls in the Social Security system. Meanwhile, he is only too happy to take earmarks that benefit him politically.
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