The hits just keep coming for New York Gov. David Paterson: the New York Times reported Wednesday that the state's Commission on Public Integrity found that the Democratic executive violated a ban on gifts for public officials by accepting free World Series tickets for himself and his son. The ethics body also found that Paterson falsely testified that he had intended to pay for the tickets. The charges carry a maximum penalty of $40,000 each.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/04/2010 00:00 ||
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Omitted: The governor was later ejected for arguing balls and strikes.
Can we make it apply to cabinet posts and Obama-czars, too? Wouldn't have anyone left to 'run' the country ...
Congressman Jason Chaffetz wants federal employees who don't pay their taxes to be fired. The Republican from Utah introduced a bill Wednesday and will offer it as amendment during a markup by the House oversight and Government Reform Committee.
"We have about 100,000 federal employees how are seriously delinquent and have tax debt that is just unaccepted," Chaffetz says during a video on his Web site. "If you have that kind of tax debt and you do not pay your federal taxes you should be dismissed by the federal government."
Chaffetz says the IRS fails to collect about $1 billion from federal employees each year.
Posted by: Bobby ||
03/04/2010 06:31 ||
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#1
Is that fired or beaten with a cane?
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
03/04/2010 7:28 Comments ||
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Now that you ask DB, I'd like to see both and a little jail time for the worst abusers.
#3
This should wipe out both Obama's cabinet and czars.
Posted by: ed ||
03/04/2010 8:38 Comments ||
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#4
Just wonderful, especially the part about the IRS being unable to collect. Seriously, WTF? How the hell could that be possible? They never had a problem attaching the wages of city or state government employees, but federal ones are untouchable?
Posted by: Old Patriot ||
03/04/2010 17:33 Comments ||
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#10
Would this extend to Congresscritters too?
You know the IRS will not fill out your tax return for you unless...you're mentally incapable, blind, or a Congresscritter. Consider that the real unification theory of the universe if there ever is one.
Republican Gov. Rick Perry and Democratic former Houston Mayor Bill White clinched their parties' nominations for governor Tuesday, setting up a fight over whether the problems in Washington or Austin are more relevant to Texans' everyday lives.
White told supporters in Houston he expects Perry to try to "perpetuate" himself with politics of division and distraction to avoid talking about Texas issues, such as high unemployment, state government growth and unfunded mandates for local governments.
"Texans deserve a new governor," a leader who is "more interested in the jobs of Texans than in preserving his own job," White said.
White said he believes Perry will continue trying to put voters' attention on political debates in Washington.
"They'll point fingers at Washington and talk about the alarming growth in government in Washington so you won't notice the alarming growth in government in Austin," the Democratic nominee said.
Perry, speaking to supporters at the Salt Lick barbecue restaurant in Driftwood, signaled that he fully intends to continue the anti-Washington rhetoric.
"From Driftwood, Texas, to Washington, D.C., we are sending you a message tonight: Stop messing with Texas!" Perry said.
Perry said his challenges are to tell the story of a successful Texas, "defend the conservative values that made them possible" and "remain attuned to the threat of a federal government that continues to overreach," as well as increasing its spending.
"It is clear the Obama administration and their allies already have Texas in their cross hairs," Perry said, referring to his expectations that national Democrats will support White.
Perry won the GOP nomination over U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison and activist Debra Medina. Perry hammered on Hutchison's Washington ties in his anti-federal government campaign.
Hutchison conceded the race to Perry and urged her supporters to unite behind Perry.
With voters angry at both Republicans and Democrats in Washington, Hutchison had trouble getting traction in her race. Medina used the anti- government sentiment and solid debate performances to propel her into better-than-expected third-place results.
Medina declined to concede. Her campaign claimed that if Perry fell below 50 percent in the final vote count that she would be in a runoff with him because Hutchison had conceded.
Texas election law experts, however, said Medina could not make a runoff even if Perry drops below the 50 percent threshold. Because Hutchison's concession has no legal meaning, they said, she and Perry would be slated for a runoff. If Hutchison withdrew from such a runoff, Perry would be the winner.
Perry, who turns 60 on Thursday, already is the longest-serving governor in Texas history, and he is seeking an unprecedented third full term. He begins the general election campaign with strong name identification, incumbent advantage and the likelihood that he can raise whatever money he needs.
White is trying to become the first Democrat to win the governor's office since 1990.
White captured the Democratic nomination by bettering six other candidates. White's only serious challenge came from Houston businessman Farouk Shami, who spent at least $8.5 million of his own money on the race. White also has shown an ability to raise money and ended the primaries with more than $5.4 million in the bank.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/04/2010 00:00 ||
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Salt lick Barbecue Rocks!
Bring your own adult beverages. And try the cobbler.
President Barack Obama urged Congress Wednesday to vote "up or down" on sweeping health care legislation in the next few weeks, endorsing a plan that denies Senate Republicans the right to kill the bill by stalling with a filibuster.
"I don't see how another year of negotiations would help. Moreover, the insurance companies aren't starting over," Obama said, rejecting Republican calls to begin anew on an effort to remake the health care system.
The president made his appeal as Democratic leaders in Congress surveyed their rank and file for the votes needed to pass legislation by majority vote--invoking rules that deny Senate Republicans the right to block it through endless stalling debate. Obama specifically endorsed that approach
GOP leaders were unmoved, despite Obama's declaration that he had incorporated a few of their proposals into his revised legislation.
The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said a decision by Democrats to invoke rules that bar filibusters would be "met with outrage" by the public, and he said Obama was pushing a sweeping bill that voters don't want.
"They've had enough of this yearlong effort to get a win for the Democratic Party at any price to the American people," McConnell said on the Senate floor.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/04/2010 00:00 ||
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Zero is banking on a Myth, that this country wants socialized medicine top to bottom.
McConnell is correct in his evaluation: Democrats to invoke rules that bar filibusters would be "met with outrage" by the public, and he said Obama was pushing a sweeping bill that voters don't want.
#2
a Myth, that this country wants socialized medicine
I am not sure it IS just a myth - a big chunk of opposition to Obamacare is coming from those who already have socialized medicine (medicare) and don't want it weakened. Add them to the poor who want better socialized medicine and the near-poor who basically have no health care now, and a big chunk of the lazy who are too stupid to realized it is THEY who will be paying for their 'free' health care and I suspect you have a majority of Americans in favor of socialized medicine.
#7
Is this why I saw the "5 out of 6 props behind me wear lab coats" talkup on the morning news, then lost his place on the 'prompter and stammered through the hammer-it-home lines?
#10
--During Glenn Beck show yesterday, he had about half a dozen people standing around in lab coats while he was at the chalkboard presenting to his audience.
Sen. Tom Harkin told POLITICO that Senate Democratic leaders have decided to go the reconciliation route. The House, he said, will first pass the Senate bill after Senate leaders demonstrate to House leaders that they have the votes to pass reconciliation in the Senate.
Harkin made the comments after a meeting in Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's office including Harkin and Sens. Baucus, Dodd, Durbin, Schumer and Murray.
When asked whether the leaders had made the decision, Durbin said: "We are moving ahead with a version of the health care reform bill that we believe has a good chance of passing both the House and the Senate."
He then put the onus on House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to signal whether she can provide enough votes to pass the Senate bill, followed by a package of fixes through reconciliation.
"The first step is with Speaker Pelosi and so I will let her decide what it takes in the House," Durbin said.
Reconciliation "has always been an option. But she has to make her own decision on what it takes to enact this in the House," he added.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/04/2010 00:00 ||
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Dedicated to Democrats Anywhere; The Party is Over.
Rep. Eric Massa (D-N.Y.) will not seek reelection after only one term in office.
According to several House aides -- on both sides of the aisle -- the House ethics committee has been informed of allegations that Massa, who is married with two children, sexually harassed a male staffer.
Massa, whose departure endangers Democrats' hold on a competitive seat, told POLITICO Wednesday afternoon that no one has brought allegations of misconduct to him.
Asked about the sexual harassment allegations, Massa said: "When someone makes a decision to leave Congress, everybody says everything. I have health issues. I'll talk about it [later]."
Massa recently suffered from non-Hodgkin's lymphoma, and he has said that his experience with cancer drove his interest in running for office so he could help reform the health care system.
A 20-year Navy veteran, Massa was elected to office last November. He serves on the Agriculture, Armed Services and Homeland Security committees.
Massa is scheduled to hold a conference call at 3:30 this afternoon to announce his decision, which came as a complete surprise to several of his freshman Democratic colleagues in the New York delegation.
Massa has played a gadfly-like role in the House, calling for a single-payer health care system at a conference of liberal activists last year despite representing a Republican-leaning district. He was one of 39 House Democrats to vote against health care legislation; he said it didn't do enough to control costs.
As a freshman representing New York's most Republican House district, Massa was one of the most endangered Democrats in the delegation. Republicans had been aggressively targeting his seat and landed top recruit Tom Reed, the Republican mayor of Corning, to challenge him.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/04/2010 00:00 ||
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I guess he did not want to be the "butt" of all the jokes.
Democrats could have a shot at picking up the open governor's seat in Georgia this year, according to a Public Policy Polling survey that shows former Democratic Gov. Roy Barnes narrowly leading all his prospective Republican opponents in a general election fight.
The PPP poll places Barnes ahead state Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine by one point, 40 percent to 39 percent; ahead of former Secretary of State Karen Handel by five points, 41 percent to 36 percent; and ahead of Rep. Nathan Deal by five points, 43 percent to 38 percent.
Barnes's campaign may be helped by voters' rising dissatisfaction with outgoing Republican Gov. Sonny Perdue, whose approval numbers have suffered amid a weak economy and tough budget debates in his state. Only 29 percent of Georgians -- including just 44 percent of Georgia Republicans -- approve of Perdue's job performance, compared with 52 percent of voters who disapprove.
Barnes, whom Perdue defeated for reelection in 2002, also benefits from strong name recognition. A 36-percent plurality of Georgia voters view him favorably, compared with 33 percent who view him unfavorably. The former governor still faces a contested Democratic primary against Georgia's top African-American elected official, Attorney General Thurbert Baker, who trails all the Republican candidates in PPP's poll.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/04/2010 00:00 ||
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Former North Dakota Attorney General Heidi Heitkamp is passing on a bid for the U.S. Senate, leaving Democrats without a strong candidate to oppose Republican Gov. John Hoeven in this fall's open-seat race.
Speaking on her brother's radio program in Fargo Wednesday, Heitkamp said her decision to skip the race was a personal one, that came down to concerns about family and where she wanted to live.
"I've decided I'm not going to be a candidate for the United States Senate. If this were an easy decision for me, it would've been made a long time ago," she said on the station KFGO. "The toughest thing I had was calling a lot of those supporters and sending e-mails this morning and disappointing them."
Though she met with the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Heitkamp said she repeatedly signaled to party leaders that she was not likely to launch a campaign for the seat of retiring Democrat Byron Dorgan.
"I really impressed upon them that this is something I had never sought out, and my heart and my life is in North Dakota," Heitkamp said, explaining that her husband practices medicine in North Dakota and would not have wanted to leave the state. "My first impulse was this is a job I never sought out, but I owe it to my party and all the people who've supported me to at least consider it."
A mid-January poll commissioned by Daily Kos and conducted by Research 2000 showed Heitkamp would have started a campaign trailing Hoeven by 21 points, 34 percent to 55 percent.
Posted by: Fred ||
03/04/2010 00:00 ||
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California Rep. Pete Stark -- a controversial lawmaker who has a history of volatile comments about Republicans -- is now chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, automatically moving up from the second slot after New York Democrat Charles Rangel relinquished his gavel Wednesday morning.
It would take an affirmative action of the House to remove Stark and replace him with another member of the Ways and Means Committee, according to aides familiar with House operations.
Stark -- one of the chamber's most liberal, partisan and pugnacious members -- has had his own recent run-in with the ethics committee, exhibiting bizarre behavior during an investigation that ultimately cleared him of wrongdoing.
POLITICO reported earlier this week that officials found Stark "extremely belligerent" toward investigators from the Office of Congressional Ethics and used a semi-hidden video camera to tape his interview during a probe of whether he improperly applied for a homestead tax exemption in Maryland even though his official residence is in California.
The incident is just one in a series of stranger-than-fiction episodes featuring the tart-tongued Stark.
He once accused a former Republican Ways and Means colleague, Nancy Johnson of Connecticut, of getting her information from "pillow talk," and called another, Scott McInnis of Colorado, a "fruitcake."
In 2007, he accused Republicans of sending soldiers to Iraq "to get their heads blown off for the president's amusement."
Posted by: Fred ||
03/04/2010 00:00 ||
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Lovely, just phuecking lovely. Replacing an unethical sleazeball with a complete gibbering lunatic. Keep it up, Quislingcrats, you're doing just great so far!
Posted by: Ricky bin Ricardo (Abu Babaloo) ||
03/04/2010 1:03 Comments ||
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Rep. Sander Levin (D-Mich.), a pro-union, anti-free-trade liberal who is a close ally of the auto industry, has been selected as interim chairman of the Ways and Means Committee.
Levin's ascension is a rebuke to the seniority system, as Rep. Pete Stark (D-Calif.) was in line to chair the powerful panel with authority over tax and trade issues, but rank-and-file
Democrats on the committee rebelled because Stark, 78, has a history of intemperate remarks and has an undisclosed illness that has made it difficult for him to be on hand in recent weeks.
A secret administration memo has surfaced revealing plans for the federal government to seize more than 10 million acres from Montana to New Mexico.
President Obama could enact the plans in this memo with just the stroke of a pen, without any input from the communities affected by it. The document lists 14 properties that, according to the document, "might be good candidates" for Mr. Obama to nab through presidential proclamation.
Administration officials claim the document is merely the product of a brainstorming session, but anyone who reads this memo can see that it is a wish list for the environmentalist left. It discusses, in detail, what kinds of animal populations would benefit from limiting human activity in those areas.
The 21-page document, marked "Internal Draft-NOT FOR RELEASE," names 14 different lands Mr. Obama could completely close for development by unilaterally designating them as "monuments" under the 1906 Antiquities Act.
It says all kinds of animals would be better off by doing so, like the coyotes, badgers, grouse, chickens and lizards.
Rep. Robert Bishop, Utah Republican, made the memo public because he didn't want another unilateral land grab by the White House, like what happened under former Presidents Bill Clinton and Jimmy Carter.
You notice how they consistently do this west of the Mississippi. By the time the government crossed that line, they retained the land while allowing states to form rather than giving up the land to the newly minted state upon ascension to the union*. Try doing this with eminent domain east of the Mississippi with property forfeitures from failed banks and financial institutions.
* of course there are exceptions. When the Army closed the Presidio of San Francisco which sat on very prime real estate in the city along the bay, the Californista delegation made sure the state got it to 'develop' rather than allow it to become a park in a more 'natural' environment. No need to be pristine here.
#8
Utah is talking about doing a eminent domain on federal lands in Utah with the recent Supreme Court ruling on it as evidence that Utah can "improve" it by making money and tax revenue.
I would pay good money to see Utah actually go through with it.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
President Barack Obama urged Congress Wednesday to vote "up or down" on sweeping health care legislation in the next few weeks, endorsing a plan that denies Senate Republicans the right to kill the bill by stalling with a filibuster.
