It was a straignt party line vote on the EPA’s rejection of California air quality standards on C02 emissions, which the record now shows was a political and not a scientifically driven ruling.
If it hits the floor, it will doubtless be filibustered.
If it passes, it will doubtlessly be vetoed.
DSCC: Ronnie Musgrove leads Roger Wicker, who was appointed to replace Lott, by 8%, 48% to 40%. Obviously, as this is a partisan poll, it can be taken with a grain of salt, but any time an incumbent, even one who has been in office for just a few weeks is at 40%, they are in trouble
Rasmussen Reports™ has Kay Hagan(D) leading Liddy Dole(R) by 1%, 48% to 47% in North Carolina, well with in the margin of error, but with Dole as a prominent incumbent being below 50%, she’s got a fight.
They also have Marc Udall with a 6% lead over Bob Shaffer in Colorado, 47% to 41% in the race to replace retiring Senator Wayne Allard with a margin of ±4%.
Not surprising, and given that it passed with veto proof majorities, it should be overridden.
The House Armed Services Committee just authorized $566 million to develop the F-136 engine.
I’m not sure how much of this is pork, and how much of this is a real belief that the savings and engine improvements derived from the F-100/F-110 competition in the 1980s can be repeated.
The Senate went with only $36 million, so the question is how it will resolve in conference.
With changes to lobbying rules at the beginning of this yearmaking revolving door payoffs more difficult, the unpleasantness of being the minority party, and the prospect of losing a seat in what was once a safe election, Republican incumbents are retiring in droves, and now it’s reported that this is crippling their fund raising apparatus:
Of the 32 Republicans who have resigned or announced plans to retire, 26 have political action committees known as leadership PACs — which members of Congress typically use to make donations to colleagues facing tough campaigns. Those 26 PACs raised $17 million in the last campaign cycle, but only $5.3 million for this election, a USA TODAY analysis of the latest campaign reports filed in March and April shows.
The bigger picture is that when your fund raising is based on bribery and extortion, which is what Tom Delay’s “K Street Project” was, you can no longer raise money if you lack the power to deliver.
Fee for service also means no fee for no service.
It appears that he will end his reelection bid.
If you recall, Fossella was busted for driving drunk. At the time he was driving from his home to his mistress’s, who had also born him a child.
I guess that we’ll be hearing a comment that he wants to spend more time with his families…..heh.
In the middle of a housing crash, with prices still falling, Fannie Mae has reduced down-payment requirements to as low as 3% on some loans.
The only thing that I can think of is that they hope that this sort of gesture will keep Congress from looking too closely at tighter restrictions.
Bad move, because it opens them up to even more risks.
Publius makes an an argument that the realities of votes and politics require that the Democrats keep Joe Lieberman in his chairmanship on the Homeland Security Committee.
While his arguments are logical, they are also wrong. They are predicated on the idea that he generally votes with the Dems, and this is really not true. He votes with the Dems when it does not matter, so he voted against Alito, and voted for Cloture.
If he is the 60th vote for cloture, he will not vote for cloture, because as he has already made clear, he is intent on extracting vengeance against a Democratic party that he feels has betrayed him.
As to whether you allow him to caucus with the Dems, that’s their business, but he should not be chairman of anything significant, particularly homeland security, which has been politicized, and needs to be de-Bushified.
Any authority that he is granted will merely serve his petty vendetta.
Malignant glioma. Damn.
On May 15, the Senate voted to vote to reverse the FCC’s 2007 decision to cross own a broadcast station and a newspaper in the same market.
On to the house.
He’s in hospital undergoing tests.
No word yet, but it appears not to be a stroke.
The House Armed Services Committee is sticking with the 5% cut in funding recommended by the Airland Subcommittee, and it’s likely that the house as a whole will stick with the cut.
Good idea. While some of the technologies are intriguing, the program as a whole is bloated, over ambitious, over budget, and over schedule.
Full disclosure, I worked on FCS from 2003-2006.*
*Yes, I have worked everywhere. Maybe I can’t hold down a job, but more likely this has been my role as “technical hit man”, where you are parachuted in to take care of a specific need.
In looking at the role of speculation on oil prices, a Senate committee is looking at increasing margin requirements:
“I think there’s an orgy of speculation that we ought to be deciding to do something about,” said Sen. Byron Dorgan, D-North Dakota.
He and others raised the idea of changing the margin or amount investors must pay up front in order to engage in oil speculation. It would be a hugely significant change in financial markets. Dorgan said stock speculation requires a 50% margin, but commodities like oil demand a much lower threshold, just 5% or 7%.
If you look at the credit crunch generally, the real problem is excessive leverage. Margins should be raised to the 75% range, where they were for stocks before the Fed cut them around 1980, and they should be applied to all investments.
Gene Taylor (D-MS), hairman of the House Armed Services Committee’s seapower subcommittee, is proposing scrap the Zumwalt class (DDG-1000), and replace it with an additional LPD and two resupply ships. The senior Republican on the subcommittee, Rosco “Neanderthal” Bartlett (R-MD), agrees.
I tend to agree. The Zumwalts are too large, too expensive, and too ambitious. They add nothing in overall capability, their weapons and sensor capability will not differ from their predecessors, so all their size gets is a larger store of weapons, at the cost of reduced coverage, since more smaller ships can cover different areas simultaneously.
They are also both pushing for more nuclear combatants, including a scheme to make the Arleigh Burke’s nuclear powered, which I’m rather dubious of.
In order to get through the Senate, Chris Dodd (D-CT) has to get Dick Shelby (R-AL) agree on the bill, otherwise it’s filibuster city.
Dodd is now saying that they are close to a compromise on the bill.
Not clear on what is on the table, though Shelby appears to be getting more rigorous regulation of the GSEs (Fannie Mae and Freddy Mac) as a part of the deal.
It appears that the Loss in the special election has shaken them up something fierce:
House Republicans turned on themselves yesterday after a third straight loss of a GOP-held House seat in special elections this year left both parties contemplating widespread Democratic gains in November.
The Republicans have a real problem. When the Dems lost power in 1994, it was because of a few bounced checks in the house bank, not delivering on healthcare, and supporting NAFTA.
When you consider the war, child molestation (Foley), corruption, incompetence, etc. of the Republicans, it’s going to be a lot longer than 12 years for them.
Happy dance!!!!
In testimony before Senator Charles Schumer’s (D-NY) Joint Economic Committee, Paul Volker called for more, and more effective regulation of the financial markets.
There is a back story to all of this. Volker was one of the Fed members who tried to keep depression era policies in place, with folks like Alan “Bubbles” Greenspan out maneuvering him on things like the emasculation of Glass Steagall by the Fed before the law was repealed.
It’s good policy, though I would go further and make the rich pay for the whole war, and good politics, because it forces Republicans to vote against veterans benefits or vote for a ½% increase on taxes for couples earning more than $1 million.
Heh.
Unfortunately, the article does not give much in the way of specifics, but my guess is that a lot of this is politics, as the Democrats benefit if the bill passes into law, or is vetoed by bush.
Absolutely crushed Tony Raimondo, and will face Mike Johanns to replace Hagel, who is not running for reelection.
Kleeb has an uphill battle, but it looks to be a good year for Dems.