I guess that people figured that with gas past $4/bbl, this would not be a good thing to vote against.
Category: Legislation
House Passes Draconian IP Legislation
HR 4279 is a very bad piece of legislation. Among other things, it:
- Creates an IP “Czar” in the Department of Justice, who would be institutionally driven to make criminal matters out of what is has been a civil offense.
- Apply civil asset forfeiture, so you could lose your house if law enforcement agencies convince a judge that you might be infringing.
- Expanded criminal penalties.
Luckily, it’s unlikely to make it through the Senate in an election year, but this legislation is evil.
What too many people do not understand, including over 400 members of Congress, it passed 410 to 10, is that Patent and Copyright Law is at its Core Public Interest Law. It is not a property right, but rather a societal contract in which we all give up our rights in order to encourage artistic and scientific development through the granting of a temporary exclusive license.
House Votes Down Unemployment Extension…Sort Of
They had to vote, “under a procedure that required a two-thirds vote for approval”, but they fell 3 votes short, so they will reconsider it in the next few days.
Seeing as how they got about 50 Republicans to flip, and that constituents will doubtless be calling those who did not flip, I think that this will pass with a veto proof majority.
Bush Threatens Amtrak Veto
With mass transit and rail use skyrocketing, Bush is threatening a veto of the Amtrak budget, arguing that there needs to be less subsidies, despite the fact that rail passenger services world wide are subsidized, and that there should be private competition.
Private competition, huh? Who knew that Halliburton was getting into passenger rail?
Republicans Running Away From Bush on Unemployment Extension
I think that the fact that extending unemployment benefits is extremely popular with voters is why the Democrats split it out of the Iraq authorization.
They want as many Republicans as possible to have to choose between their political future and George W. Bush.
Voting against this will not look good in November.
Republicans Kill Global Warming Bill
This is not unexpected. Those guys will never admit that Al Gore was right.
Maybe next congress we will get 60 votes.
More Evidence of the Bush Terror Over Warrantless Wiretapping Revalations
We know that Bush and His Evil Minions™ are determined to create immunity for the telecommunications companies that spied on Americans, probably to cover up the fact that they used the program to spy on political enemies, particularly Kerry in 2004, but the fact that they are now cutting Kit Bond (R-MO), the ranking ‘Phant on the Senate Intelligence Committee in their negotiations with the House indicates that they are getting a bit desperate.
Normally, they don’t want their finger prints on something like this.
The Bush administration is talking directly with Democrats over rewriting the nation’s surveillance laws and leaving the top Republican on the Senate Intelligence Committee out of the debate, a senior Senate Democrat said Wednesday.
Senate Intelligence Committee Chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-W.Va.) said that negotiations were occurring without Sen. Kit Bond (Mo.), the ranking Republican on the panel.
………
“You know, Bond, he’s just complicating things,” Rockefeller said. “And I’ve never talked to him about [his one-on-one talks with Hoyer], so I don’t understand it.”
The only reason that the Bushies are so intent on this is because this program involves something so awful that they would all go to jail, and the only thing I can think of that would do that is their use of the program for partisan electoral advantage.
I could be wrong on this. When ever I think that I’ve mined the depths of the Bush administration, it turns out that I’m insufficiently imaginative.
Good Eminent Domain Initiative Passes in California
Prop. 99 passed and Prop. 98 was defeated. The former just prohibited eminent domain for private projects, the latter was an attempt to eliminate rent control.
Dems Set to Cave Again on Extension of Unemployment Benefits
Steny “Mr. Capitulation” Hoyer is saying that House Dems are, “likely to drop a 13-week extension of unemployment insurance benefits” from the Iraq supplemental.
This is both craven and stupid. Make the Republicans, and for that matter the Bush Blue Dogs, vote against the unemployment extension.
Not only is it good policy in an economy in a tailspin, it’s good politics, since the extension is popular.
It passed with 75 votes in the Senate. If Bush vetos it, come back again, and again, and again, and again.
Wimps.
Texas Observer Takes Down Phill Gramm
It’s a very good article, which places Gramm foursquare at the center of every major financial meltdown of the past decade.
My favorite quote:
Says Greenberger, “I am quite confident Phil Gramm didn’t understand what his legislation did. It was written by the banks and hedge funds.”
Note that Gramm was originally an economics professor.
It’s a good, and frightening, read on McCain’s economics guru.
This is Where His Habit of Missing Contentious Votes Will Bite Him In the Ass
Obama missed the vote on the Kyl-Lieberman amendment, which declared the Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist group, and McCain is hammering him on it.
If he had voted against it, I don’t think that it would be a big deal, but he missed the vote, and he has done so on a number of other contentious votes, the MoveOn resolution comes to mind.
If McCain hammers him on the substance, that he opposed the resolution, it shouldn’t be a difficulty, as Obama spokesperson Hari Sevugan response shows, “Instead of recognizing reality, John McCain continues to run on a platform of doubling down on George Bush’s failed policies.”
However, if McCain starts harping on the contentious votes where he did not show up, and makes his attendance an issue, it is a problem, because it strikes at the core message of any presidential candidate, that he will stand up for you.
So far, so good, but I expect this worm to turn shortly.
Foreclosure Phil
Mother Jones has a very good article on how Phil Gramm is at the center of every major financial scandal of the past decade.
Basically, if you see a financial collapse, Phil Gramm changed the law to make it possible.
And this guy is McCain’s economic guru.
It’s a good read.
Senate Considers Bill to Reign In Contractors
Should go further though….They are a problem throughout the government, not just in Iraq.
I Guess You Can’t Help Anyone Without Stomping on Civil Rights These Days
Case in point, the housing bailout bill that just passed the Senate creates national fingerprint registry:
Buried in the text of the revised legislation, approved by the Senate Banking Committee by a 19-2 vote this week, is a plan to create a new national fingerprint registry. It covers just about everyone involved in the mortgage business, including lenders, “loan originators,” and some real estate agents.
Lovely.
House Dems Looking to Short Circuit the Preemption Doctrine
Over the past few years, an obscure legal concept called the preemption doctrine, has gained increasing currency in the Federal courts.
Basically, the concept is that if a medical product gets FDA approval, that this strips the consumer of any right to sue should it prove defective, even if deliberate wrong doing or a cover-up can be shown (think Viiox).
There has been a big push for this by Bush and His Evil Minions™, because they believe that poor people should not be able to inconvenience large companies.
In fact, the FDA supported consumer lawsuits as a way to help keep medical companies on their toes until 2002.
It now appears that Henry Waxman, chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, is looking at eliminating this argument legislatively. He has started to hold hearings.
Point man for the Republicans is Connecticut’s 2nd most prominent prostitute*, Christopher Shays, who vehemently argued the administration’s position, “juries of laymen shouldn’t be usurping the rigorous decision-making process of federal scientists.”
Seeing as how politically appointed laymen are, “usurping the rigorous decision-making process of federal scientists”, throughout the Bush administration, this seems to me to be awfully weak tea.
In any case, I would expect legislation some time in 2009.
*Number 1 is Joe Lieberman….Come on, get with the program.
The Fall of the House of Bush
That’s the subtext to Congress making changes to Bush’s proposed Latin American drug enforcement plan.
In addition to cutting dollars, some of the money was also conditioned on meeting human rights goals.
I think we are seeing the collapse of political power at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.
It’s realized that Bush is a lame duck, and one so unpopular that you want to have him campaign for your opponent.
Lieberman Proposes Commodities Restrictions
Joe Lieberman is saying that he is, “considering legislation to place limits on large institutional investors in commodities markets“.
Even if he weren’t a complete asshat, nothing would come of this, because he is from Connecticut, and with New York City being the world’s capital for such activities, and with many of the people who make a living on the trade living in Southern Connecticut, there is no way that he would really press this.
While I believe that one of the problems with any market today is excessive speculative capital in and out flows, Lieberman’s proposal is rather limited, directed at limiting pension funds and closing a few loopholes, and won’t do much good, because there is already an industry full of people who find ways of ignoring such restrictions.
Instead, I suggest a transaction trading tax on financial instruments. It’s easily implemented, hard to avoid, and penalizes those who trade the most.
The Good Guys, and the Veterans Win
The new GI bill passed by a vote of 75-22 in the Senate, and so was attached to Bush’s Iraq war supplemental.
Republicans, including the sick old man running for president, John Sidney McCain III, argued against this, saying that it was “too generous”, and so might lure soldiers out of the military because they would want to go to school and better themselves now.
Note also that McCain couldn’t even be bothered to show up for the damn vote.
They included some other extras too:
The bill also includes money for housing and levees devastated by Hurricane Katrina, heating subsidies for low-income families, the space shuttle program, the Food and Drug Administration, biomedical research, roads and bridges, federal prisons, grants to local police departments, aid to rural schools, suppression of wildfires and preparations for the 2010 census.
The bill would extend unemployment benefits by 13 weeks nationwide, with an additional 13 weeks for workers in states with high unemployment.
The only thing that surprises me here is the fact that we aren’t already paying for preparations for the 2010 census.
The Bush Blue Dogs in the House are insisting that there be some sort of tax to offset these costs, but I think that they will fold, as this is ready made for the campaign slogan, “Congressman voted not to support our veterans”.
D’Oh!!!!!!!!!
Congress leaves 34 pages out of the farm bill that Bush Vetoed, so they will have to pass it again, have Bush veto it, and then do the override.
Someone should get fired because of this, but no one will be.
Sebelius Vetoes Republican Attempt to Criminalize N***ers Voting
In Kansas, thankfully there aren’t quite enough Republithugs in the legislature to override her veto of their so-called “voter-ID bill”.
Interesting point was that she had already vetoed a similar bill last year, and they came back with one that eliminated the fee for an ID for low income Kansans.
They didn’t do that in the first place because they don’t want low income Kansans to vote.