March 12th 2009

Ms. Transparency Saves Stealth Pay Raises

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anPo, handmaiden to Gaea and Hades, has her surgically enhanced butt firmly planted on a bill that would put an end to automatic Congressional pay raises.

Pelosi refused to commit to allowing a House bill putting an end to the practice – which would then force the oh-so-public roll call votes on pay raises.

Given that the Senate had earlier rejected a similar notion on a 52-45 vote, the Dems have struck another bold blow for transparency opaqueness.

Pinkie Reid, facing a tough re-election campaign, says he’s committed to the idea of ending automatic congressional pay raises.  So is there any money where your mouth is, Pinkie?

“I will bring it up some other time.”

That’s a terrif promise, Pinkie. (source)

Up until 1989, Congress stuck with the Constitution, which requires Congress to set its own pay, then go home and face the voters when they run for re-election.  The 1989 fix established automatic cost of living increases unless Congress voted not to take one.  They get a big, fat public vote when they decline a raise, and total stealth when they’re feathering their nest.

Current Congressional paycheck:  $174,000.  I’m surprised it’s not $249,999, so they can milk us for the max, while staying south of PrezO’s Transfer of Wealth Tax.

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January 7th 2009

Burris Fiasco Doesn’t Deter Pinky

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arry Reid is undeterred. He told Politico he expects to serve as Senate Majority Leader until at least 2015 (he’s up for reelection in 2010, but that’s not fazing him). And he expects to be controversial the whole time, telling Politico his Senate won’t be a rubber stamp for Barack Obama because he doesn’t believe in an over-powerful executive branch.

How about an over-powerful senate? The constitution makes it clear that Roland Burris should be seated as Illinois’ junior senator, but Reid, Orval Faubus-like, is standing in the Senate door, denying him access.

What a dumb move. Without Reid, the Republicans would have had to fight Burris in order to keep the Democratic corruption ball in the air and push for a special election, but now they can sit back and talk about what a shame it is that Reid won’t let a qualified man who would be the Senate’s only black member serve.

It follows a string of dumb Dem moves: They allowed Blagojevich to become governor, not being able to smell a rat because of the overwhelming rat odors that permeates the back rooms of Illinois. They feared a special election. They refused to work with Blagojevich on the Senatorial nomination (a no brainer strategy – how could they have missed that?). And now the leader of the Senate is utterly mishandling Burris by standing on the wrong side of the constitution, and the wrong side of the Congressional Black Caucus.

No matter. Harry is confident all his multitude of leadership failures won’t keep him from leading the Senate for another seven years. I hope he’s right. The Senate is the only game in town now, and we need every advantage we can get.

Another Politico report shows Reid sinking deeper into the Burris swamp. He and Illinois’ senior senator, Turban Durbin, are meeting with Burris today to try to work something out, and all indications are they’re manipulating like crazy. They’ll seat him if he promises not to run in 2010. They’ll seat him if Illinois Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn (an old white guy) endorses him. They’ll seat him if Quinn violates the constitution and appoints him.

None of these options is legal, none treat Burris as anything but a second-class railroad car porter, and all of them show Reid’s political insensitivity, as does this:

“What should happen, Blagojevich — if he really cared about his state and cared about Mr. Burris — should just step down and let Quinn do what Quinn would do,” said Reid, who has spoken to Quinn in recent days. “Whoever Quinn appointed, unless there were something I don’t understand, I just think anybody that he suggested … they’d all be fine.”

Blogojevich isn’t going to just step down, and Reid calling for it just makes the senate leader look desperate. And excuse me for just assuming that Pat Quinn, who after all was able to elevate himself to the second highest seat in Illinois, isn’t exactly squeaky clean himself.

Worse, Reid crossed swords with a strong potential opponent for Senate leadership, Dianne Feinstein.  Feinstein suggested that Democratic leaders – i.e., Reid – would be undercutting gubernatorial appointments everywhere if they barred Roland Burris.  That’s legit, but here’s Reid’s response:

That’s not valid, her statement.  I told her that. OK?

Not OK.  But you just keep playing the fool and splitting your party, Harry … but not too much, OK?  We need you in as leader.

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January 5th 2009

The Second Most Annoying Liberal

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onservative News & Views certainly had a rich field of entries to consider for its 7th annual “20 Most Annoying Liberals” rankings- just look at the honorable mentions:

Bill Ayers, Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, Juan Cole, Kent Conrad, The Daily Kos, Bill Delahunt, Glenn Greenwald, Alcee Hastings, Christopher Hitchens, The Huffington Post, Jesse Jackson, Jesse Jackson Jr. Caroline Kennedy, John Kerry, Ezra Klein, The L.A. Times, Mike Malloy, Rachel Maddow, Michael Moore, MoveOn, Michael Newdow, The New York Times, Michelle Obama, Rosie O’Donnell, Keith Olbermann, Michael Pfleger, Ted Rall, Bill Richardson, Randi Rhodes, Al Sharpton, Cindy Sheehan, Ted Turner, Oprah Winfrey, Jeremiah Wright, Matthew Yglesias

Wow.  With at least 20 people more annoying than this crew, it’s easy to realize just how annoying liberals can be.

So here’s CN&V’s pick for the second most annoying liberal of the year:

Harry Reid: When the Senate Majority leader wasn’t bizarrely declaring that we had to grind our economy to a halt by refusing to continue to use fossil fuels…

” That is, coal makes us sick, oil makes us sick, its Global Warming, its ruining our Country, its ruining our World. We have got to stop using fossil fuel.” — Harry Reid

…or causing stocks to plunge by popping off at the mouth,

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is getting credit for sparking a blistering sell-off in insurance stocks. MetLife Inc., Hartford Financial Services Group and Prudential Financial Inc. all fell by double-digit percentage amounts [yesterday] after Reid on Wednesday said the financial-system bailout plan was crucial because a large insurer was at risk of failing.

…A statement from his office said that Reid was “not personally aware of any particular company being on the verge of bankruptcy” and that “he has no special knowledge about nor has he talked to any insurance company officials,” Dow Jones reported.

…Little Lord Harry was declaring that he was offended by the very stench of his constituents.

Defining quote: “My staff tells me not to say this, but I’m going to say it anyway. In the summer because of the heat and high humidity, you could literally smell the tourists coming into the Capitol. It may be descriptive but it’s true.” — Harry Reid

So who’s the most annoying liberal of 2008? Hint: He gave birth to one of the most outrageous anti-Palin stories of the year. Click here to see who it is.

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January 4th 2009

Sunday Scan – A New Year Edition

See Ya, Smuggler’s Gulch

I got a real kick out of seeing this picture in this morning’s LA Times. It shows the border fence on the U.S./Mexican border, apparently looking east-to-west as the fence snakes through Smuggler’s Gulch. Here’s the LAT:

Reporting from San Diego — Smuggler’s Gulch lived up to its infamous name.

For a century, the narrow canyon leading into California from Mexico provided cover for cattle thieves and opium dealers, bandits and booze runners. More recently, it has hidden thousands of illegal immigrants on their journey north, sealing its place in border lore.

Now, it’s a fading memory.

The canyon has been all but wiped off the landscape, its steep walls carved into gentle slopes, its depths filled with 35,000 truckloads of dirt as the federal government nears completion of an extensive border reinforcement project at the southwesternmost point of the United States.

Environmentalists, including California’s notorious Coastal Commission, fought the fence, citing all sorts of environmental chaos that surely would follow, saying it “will harm the Tijuana River estuary, threaten endangered species and destroy culturally sensitive Native American sites.”  As the photo shows, there’s an environmental point to be made here – but it’s a limited one.  The very dense cities of Tijuana and San Deigo create a much more impervious barrier to species migration than this puny wall.

In the end, the Bush admin. had to just override all this and push the fence forward. Now that Smuggler’s Gulch has been bulldozed into oblivion, I’m in accord with former Border Patrol agent Donald McDermott who told the LAT:

Good riddance.  Anything that makes it easier to control the border is a good thing. Continue Reading »

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September 29th 2008

Do The Dems Just Want The Economy To Fail?

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n the rush of everything that’s been going on since McCain suspended his campaign and Obama kept talking and talking and talking and talking, I managed to miss this, but Brian Goetti at The Conservative Edge didn’t:

Two weeks ago, when the financial crisis hit home, the Senate Majority Leader, Democrat Harry Reid said that “no one knew what to do”. Since that time, proposals have been made to solve the problem.

None of the proposals have come from Democrats. The Bush Administration proposed a bailout that Harry Reid, Nanci Pelosi and Barak Obama signed onto.

House Republicans put forth their own plan as well. So where is the Democratic leadership on this crisis? No where to be found as far as I can tell.

With the Dems now convinced they’ve got their election-winner, they won’t lift a finger to help. They might want to adapt McCain’s slogan and make it their own: Self-Interest First.

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With Obama winning the presidency by seven percent, we can't blame the media. Their laudatory coverage and refusal to extensively probe into Obama's background and [lack of] experience was at best responsible for five percent of his vote, the pundits tell us. Here is a compilation of over 100 significant instances of pro-Obama/anti-McCain bias during the 2008 campaign.

For all 'Media Bias 2008' – Click Here