Daily Kos

Republicans Continue Fight on Process

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 19:16:05 GMT

In the House, Republicans are going to do their damnedest to derail the health insurance reform bill by trying to force a vote on whether Pelosi can use a self-executing rule.

“If passed by the House, the resolution would prohibit Speaker Pelosi from implementing the ‘Slaughter Solution,’ the scheme by which Democratic leaders are seeking to ‘deem’ the Senate bill as passed without an actual vote in the House,” said Michael Steel, a spokesman for the Republican leader, Representative John A. Boehner of Ohio.

That's the "scheme" that Republicans used dozens of times when they had control of the House, of course. Over on the other side of the Hill, Senate Republicans are still whining about reconciliation, and even have enlisted Bobo to the cause. I'll let Ezra do the debunking since he did it so well.

But none of Brooks's evidence is true. Literally none of it. The budget reconciliation process was used six times between 1980 and 1989. It was used four times between 1990 and 1999. It was used five times between 2000 and 2009. And it has been used zero times since 2010. Peak reconciliation use, in other words, was in the '80s, not the Aughts. The data aren't hard to find. They were published on Brooks's own op-ed page.

Nor has reconciliation been limited to bills with "significant bipartisan support." To use Brooks's example of the tax cuts, the 2003 tax cuts passed the Senate 50-50, with Dick Cheney casting the tie-breaking vote. Two Democrats joined with the Republicans in that effort. Georgia's Zell Miller, who would endorse George W. Bush in 2004 and effectively leave the Democratic Party, and Nebraska's Ben Nelson. So I'd say that's one Democrat. One Democrat alongside 49 Republicans. That's not significant bipartisan support....

To recap, Brooks argued that reconciliation is being used more frequently, and that past reconciliation bills, like Bush's tax cuts and prescription drug benefit, were significantly bipartisan. Reconciliation is, in fact, being used less frequently, past reconciliation bills like the tax cuts were not significantly bipartisan by any stretch of the imagination, and the prescription drug benefit did not go through reconciliation. Brooks isn't wrong in the sense that "I disagree with him." He's wrong in the sense that the column requires a correction.

David Brooks? Correction? Yeah, that'll happen. Since the GOP's case against the use of reconciliation is so weak that they have to rely on Bobo to lie about it for them, they need an ace in the hole to derail this, and to that end they only hope to bury it in amendments [sub req.]:

Senior Republican leadership aides were reluctant to divulge the number of amendments Senators are prepared to file. But given that reconciliation rules prevent Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) from limiting amendments to such a bill, the GOP is looking to upend the Democrats’ health care agenda by proposing an unspecified number of changes.

“There is a healthy batch of amendments that were excluded from the health care debate that will serve as a down payment,” a senior Republican Senate aide said Monday. “But it is safe to say our Conference has plenty of other ideas that are being put to paper.”

Ideas that they hope will make Dems have to take a whole lot of politically difficult votes. Which is precisely why the House doesn't trust the Senate, and has to go to the lengths of things like self-executing rules. If nothing else, this prolonged debate has shown just how deeply broken our system is, that it can be hijacked by a bunch of nihilists who want nothing to do with governing.

Of course, if Obama and every other Democrat with a microphone pointed out that this is what the modern Republican party has become--a bunch of bomb-throwers who think government is the problem--instead of persisting in the delusion that they the loyal opposition who need to be reached out to and who have ideas worthy of consideration, it might be easier to govern around them.

Stupid headline tricks

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 18:30:04 GMT

WaPo:

House may try to pass Senate health-care bill without voting on it

The Hill:

Dems move closer to passing Senate bill without actual vote

These two headlines are going to be difficult to explain when the House holds its vote. How do they plan on reconciling the fact that they're reporting on an actual vote, expected to take place later this week, when they've already reported that there won't be one?

The answer, of course, is that there will be a vote, and the headlines are misleading and inflammatory.

Meanwhile, confusion (willful and otherwise) fans the flames of panic on both the left and the right, the right insisting that self-executing rules (not counting the 200+ Republicans used) are, "the greatest constitutional crisis since the Civil War. It would be 100 times worse than Watergate," and the left worrying that the procedure creates constitutional problems.

But both sides make a single fundamental error, which I'll illustrate with Jack Balkin's example, that leads to all the rest:

Ezra Klein reports that Speaker Nancy Pelosi hopes to avoid asking House Democrats to vote directly on the Senate health care reform bill; instead, she will incorporate the bill by reference in the House reconciliation bill, which will then be sent to the Senate [....]

Whether or not it provides plausible deniability, is it consistent with the Constitution? Stanford Law Professor (and former judge) Michael McConnell doesn't think so. The argument is simple: To satisfy Article I, section 7's requirement of bicameralism and presentment, both houses must pass the same bill for the President to sign. If they pass different bills, no law is created, even if the President signs both.

The first flawed premise in Balkin's opening is that he believes the Senate health care reform bill will be incorporated by reference in the House reconciliation bill. It will not. Instead, the rule governing consideration of the reconciliation bill will incorporate a motion to agree to the Senate bill (actually a Senate-amended House bill). Agreeing to such a motion is perfectly routine and perfectly legitimate. The House will be presented with the opportunity to vote up or down on a measure incorporating that motion, and by adopting it will in turn adopt a procedure for agreeing to exactly the same text as the Senate passed, which will be triggered by the House's recording of a vote in favor of passage of the reconciliation bill. At no point does the House amend or otherwise alter the text of H.R. 3590 as amended by the Senate. The requirements of the Constitution are satisfied.

Mark Levin, complaining from the right, asks incredulously:

They're going to present a rule issued by [Rep. Louise Slaughter's] committee, with her as chairman, that says that the House already adopted the Senate bill, when we know it didn't?

He'd be right to be incredulous if his premise were correct. It isn't. The rule will not say that the House already adopted the Senate bill. It will say that the House, by adoption of the rule, agrees that it will manifest its assent to the Senate bill with its vote on reconciliation bill.

Can it do that? Yes it can. The House, under its constitutional prerogative stemming from Art. I, Sec. 5, determines its own rules of proceeding. All the Constitution requires of it is that approval of bills be signaled by a recording of the yeas and nays in its Journal, and that the same text be agreed to by both houses of Congress. By agreement under the rule, the House will indeed signal its agreement by the yeas and nays to the language of the Senate bill, but it will do so with its vote on the reconciliation bill.

But isn't that odd? A bit. Could the House signal its agreement to the Senate bill with its vote on a bill establishing National Unicorn Day? Yes it could, so long as the procedure is agreed to by a majority of the House beforehand, the yeas and nays are recorded on the Journal, and the text of the Senate bill itself remains unchanged in the action.

And that's exactly what happens here.

It's no different in that sense than when the Senate agrees by unanimous consent to a House-passed bill. Or when the House takes up a motion to agree to the Senate version of a bill, as opposed to bringing the bill itself to the floor and voting on that. The House determines for itself, through its own rules, whether it will accept a Senate bill by calling it to the floor and voting on it directly, or instead by agreeing to a motion to agree to the Senate version. In one case, the vote is on a pending bill. In the other, the vote is on a procedural motion. But either will do, thanks to Art. I, Sec. 5, and the idea that that would suddenly be constitutionally suspect endangers probably 50% or more of the entire body of federal law.

To Balkin's credit, he proposes later in the piece a method by which "deeming" the Senate bill passed would be acceptable:

Despite Judge McConnell's concerns, which are textually well founded, there is a way that "deem and pass" could be done constitutionally. There have to be two separate bills signed by the President: the first one is the original Senate bill, and the second one is the reconciliation bill. The House must pass the Senate bill and it must also pass the reconciliation bill. The House may do this on a single vote if the special rule that accompanies the reconciliation bill says that by passing the reconciliation bill the House agrees to pass the same text of the same bill that the Senate has passed. That is to say, the language of the special rule that accompanies the reconciliation bill must make the House take political responsibility for passing the same language as the Senate bill. The House must say that the House has consented to accept the text of the Senate bill as its own political act. At that point the President can sign the two bills, and it does not matter that the House has passed both through a special rule.

The luckiest part of this whole thing? That's exactly what the plan actually is:

Option 3: Place self-executing language in the rule for the reconciliation bill that deems the Senate amendments agreed to upon passage of the actual reconciliation bill in the House.

[...]

The Speaker took care to say that nothing's been finalized in terms of this decision, but her preference is clearly for #3.

Freak out over. You may resume your normal level of confusion. But there will be a vote, and the dopes who have run headlines saying there won't be would have some explaining to do when the vote is held and they report it. Except that no one will demand that of them, because ... uh...

Teabaggers Want To Recall Bob Menendez

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 18:00:04 GMT

From the you-can't-make-this-stuff-up files:

A New Jersey appeals court is allowing a conservative tea party group to proceed with an effort to throw a Democratic U.S. senator out of office.

The three-judge panel Tuesday ordered the secretary of state to accept the group's petition seeking to recall Sen. Robert Menendez. That allows the tea party activists to begin collecting the 1.3 million voter signatures they need to get a recall on the ballot.

The court said they'll cross any Constitutional bridges if the petition drive is successful.

About that homework assignment ....

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 17:30:04 GMT

Oh, this is rich. Karl Rove on the current U.S.-Israel kerfuffle:

“I think this is part of a broader problem with the Obama administration, and that is there doesn’t seem to be enough groundwork done before these international meetings that they don’t get caught by surprises like this,” Rove said on ABC’s “Top Line.”

Yes, this from the "brain" of the administration that brought you the oh-so-well-planned Iraq war.

In the same interview, he criticizes the Honduran leader for--hang on to your hat--being a "cowboy president" who violates the Constitution. And somehow this is Obama's fault.

ROVE: We saw it in Honduras. Where rather than monitoring the situation, they [the Obama administration] let a cowboy president try to act in an extra-constitutional way to violate a fundamental principle in the Constitution, all without having done their homework in advance.

Senate Republicans Warn That Reconciliation Will Endanger Bipartisanship ... No, Really

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 17:00:06 GMT

Comedy:

Republicans are threatening to make life difficult for Democrats if they try to push health care reform through the Senate using the budget reconciliation process.

That's probably the funniest thing you'll read all day. Until, that is, you read Joe Lieberman's deep thought on the subject:

It will make it a partisan and less productive place than it’s been, I’m afraid.

Rasmussen vs. Everybody Else

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 16:20:04 GMT

The polls say health care reform is wildly unpopular, right?

Well...not exactly. It's true that according to Rasmussen health care reform is wildly unpopular:

But every other poll tells a different story -- that health care reform is steadily gaining support as the end game approaches:

You can track the numbers for yourself at pollster.com.

GOP backbiting

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 15:46:03 GMT

Writing in The Hill, Jordan Fabian catches an interesting reaction to Jim DeMint's admission that he's "less confident" than he once was about the GOP's ability to stop health care reform.

Even though DeMint said he was "less confident" a Republican aide appeared unfazed.

"Yet another helpful attempt to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory," was how he described the quote.

Once health care reform passes, we're going to see a lot more of this kind of bitter sniping.

Special Election In New York Today

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 15:00:04 GMT

In today's special election in New York's SD-13, José Peralta is set to replace disgraced and ousted abuser Hiram Monserrate ... and Peralta's opponent in the race is none other than Hiram Monserrate.

Yes, barely a month after he was expelled from the New York State Senate after his conviction for assaulting his girlfriend, the domestic abusing, homophopic, party traitor is trying to regain his old seat by touting his opposition to same-sex marriage. Because who better to uphold the sanctity of marriage than the man who slashed his live-in girlfriend's face with broken glass?

The special election is today, so if you live in New York's SD-13, get out and vote for José Peralta.

And whether you live in SD-13, in New York state, or if you just don't want to see a man like Hiram Monserrate holding power over other people's lives, volunteer today to help get out the vote.

Today in Congress

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 14:16:02 GMT

In the House, courtesy of the Office of the Majority Leader:

FLOOR SCHEDULE FOR TUESDAY, MARCH 16, 2010

House Meets At... 10:30 a.m.: Morning Hour
12:00 p.m.: Legislative Business
First Vote Predicted... 2:00 – 3:00 p.m.
Last Vote Predicted... 5:30 – 6:30 p.m.

"One Minutes"

Suspensions (12 Bills):

H.Res. 311 - Expressing the support of the House of Representatives for the goals and ideals of Red Cross Month (Rep. Watson - Foreign Affairs)

H.Res. 605 - Recognizing the continued persecution of Falun Gong practitioners in China on the 10th anniversary of the Chinese Communist Party campaign to suppress the Falun Gong spiritual movement and calling for an immediate end to the campaign to persecute, intimidate, imprison, and torture Falun Gong practitioners (Rep. Ros-Lehtinen - Foreign Affairs)

H.Res. 1128 - Thanking Vancouver for hosting the world during the 2010 Winter Olympics and honoring the athletes from Team USA (Rep. Davis (CA) - Foreign Affairs)

H.R. 4252 - Inland Empire Perchlorate Ground Water Plume Assessment Act of 2009 (Rep. Baca - Natural Resources)

H.R. 2788 - Distinguished Flying Cross National Memorial Act (Rep. Calvert - Natural Resources)

H.R. 4003 - Hudson River Valley Special Resource Study Act (Rep. Hinchey - Natural Resources)

H.R. 3671 - Upper Mississippi River Basin Protection Act (Rep. Kind - Natural Resources)

H.R. 1769 - Alpine Lakes Wilderness Additions and Pratt and Middle Fork Snoqualmie Rivers Protection Act (Rep. Reichert - Natural Resources)

H.R. 4395 - To revise the boundaries of the Gettysburg National Military Park to include the Gettysburg Train Station (Rep. Platts - Natural Resources)

H.Res. 1089 - Recognizing the 150th anniversary of Augustana College (Rep. Hare - Education and Labor)

H.Res. 1167 - Expressing the support of the House of Representatives for the goals and ideals of Professional Social Work Month and World Social Work Day (Rep. Shea-Porter - Education and Labor)

H.Res. __ - Congratulating the 2009-2010 University of Maryland Men's Basketball Team on an outstanding season (Rep. Hoyer - Education and Labor)

Postponed Suspension Vote (1 Bill):

H.R. 4628 - To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 216 Westwood Avenue in Westwood, New Jersey, as the "Sergeant Christopher R. Hrbek Post Office Building" (Rep. Garrett - Oversight and Government Reform)

Conference Reports may be brought up at any time.

Motions to go to Conference should they become available.

Possible Motions to Instruct Conferees.

In the Senate, courtesy of the Office of the Majority Leader:

Convenes 10:15am

Morning business until 12:30pm with the time until 10:30am equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees. Further, the time from 10:30am until 12:30pm will be equally divided and controlled between the two leaders or their designees, with Senators permitted to speak for up to 10 minutes each, with the Majority controlling the first half and the Republicans controlling the final half.

The Senate will stand in recess from 12:30pm-2:15pm to allow for the weekly caucus meetings.

At 2:15pm, the Senate will resume consideration of H.R.1586, the vehicle for the FAA reauthorization bill. Roll call votes in relation to the FAA bill are possible Tuesday afternoon.

Once again, all the action is off the floor today. The House considers another raft of suspensions (today's crop comes courtesy of the Foreign Affairs, Natural Resources, and Education & Labor Committees), while the Senate kinda-sorta (in its way) considers FAA reauthorization.

Off the floor, it's vote counting on health insurance reform, which is headed for its next step toward passage: a stop in the House Rules Committee later this week, where the reconciliation measure will take its final shape before heading to the House floor. Expect Republicans to spend their day claiming the process is unconstitutional, but also curiously unstoppable.

Meanwhile, in the committee rooms, it's more budget mania. Today's full committee schedule appears below.

Cheers and Jeers: Tuesday

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 14:00:33 GMT

From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE...

Going once...Going twice...

The wild auctionbeast stalks his prey with stealth and cunning. Hiding between the sofa cushions to avoid detection, his nostrils suddenly flare as he picks up the scent of a fellow predator bidding on the same item in the Spring Netroots Nation Auction. He quietly deletes the "You've Been Outbid" email notice from his in-box and licks his chops.

Knowing that his competition is still lurking nearby, the auctionbeast fights the temptation to email the bastard and whine about how he really, really wants the item and please stop outbidding me him. Instead, he extends his hand ever so slowly from between the sofa cushions to his laptop and, his Taylor Lautner-like index-finger muscles now taut and tense, strikes his keypad with equal parts cool-headedness and bloodlust...

My Maximum Bid: $3

[Click]

Bid confirmed!

And now there's little else to do but watch as the auctionbeast's prey struggles, gasps for air, and eventually succumbs to the forces of free-market capitali...

[Ding!]

To: Bill in Portland
Fr: From Netroots Nation Auction Headquarters
Re: Auction status

You have been outbid again.

"Sonuvabitch!!!"

[sigh]

The wild auctionbeast re-stalks his prey with stealth and cunning. Hiding between the sofa cushions to avoid detection, his nostrils suddenly flare as he picks up the scent of a fellow predator.....

Auction ends at 10 tonight. Happy hunting.

Update: ~~The site seems to be temporarily down. I'll go whack it with a hammer and let you know if that works.~~ It worked! The site is back up.

Cheers and Jeers starts in There's Moreville... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]

Abbreviated Pundit Round-Up

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 10:30:02 GMT

Your one stop pundit shop.

Roger Cohen says that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s apology is not enough:

The announcement that another 1,600 apartments for Jews will be built in east Jerusalem, a pure provocation when restarting peace talks is the core U.S. aim. [...]

This is a watershed moment. Palestinian violence, Palestinian anti-Semitic incitement and jihadist infiltration of the Palestinian national movement all undermine peace efforts. They are unacceptable; Biden was right to “ironclad” the U.S. commitment to Israeli security. But it’s past time that Palestinian failings cease to serve as an excuse for Israel’s remorseless, cynical scattering of the Palestinian people into enclaves that make a farce of statehood. That is “an affront” to America.

In this sense, Biden’s foray has been salutary. It brought U.S. “vital interests” to the surface. It challenged Israel’s ostrich-like burrowing into polices that, over time, will make one divided, undemocratic state more likely than “two states for two peoples.” It asked again the question posed recently by David Shulman of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem: Are Israelis, cocooned, still able “to see, to imagine, and to acknowledge the suffering of other human beings, including those aspects of their suffering for which we are directly responsible?”

Bob Herbert believes that Toyota is treating California with "the foulest form of ingratitude."

David Brooks is an idiot:

Reconciliation has been used with increasing frequency. That was bad enough. But at least for the Bush tax cuts or the prescription drug bill, there was significant bipartisan support. Now we have pure reconciliation mixed with pure partisanship.

Once partisan reconciliation is used for this bill, it will be used for everything, now and forever. The Senate will be the House. The remnants of person-to-person relationships, with their sympathy and sentiment, will be snuffed out. We will live amid the relationships of group versus group, party versus party, inhumanity versus inhumanity.

First, there was not always "significant bipartisan support" when reconciliation was used in the past ... but why let 30 seconds on Google get in the way of an agenda? Second, what planet has Brooks been living on for the past 14 months? And finally, we don't send senators to Washington to make friends, we send them to do their job. Senate Republicans do not want to do their job. Or make friends, for that matter.

Marc Thiessen, fresh off of his disgraceful defense of Liz Cheney's attacks against Justice Department lawyers, today plays concern troll on health care reform. A troll who doesn't bother to follow the news on health care reform.

Eugene Robinson is appalled that the Obama administration will allow the resale of 100,000 contaminated, Katrina-era, FEMA trailers.

Lawrence Harmon points out that:

The traditional 18- to 22-year-old residing on campus is no longer the norm. Almost three-quarters of undergraduates fall into the “nontraditional’’ category, according to a 2002 National Center for Education Statistics report, meaning they work full time, are financially independent, attend college part time, or didn’t go directly from high school to higher education. For these nontraditional college students, a foreign adventure abroad is more likely to mean deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan than exploring the medieval Gothic quarter in Barcelona. College isn’t just for children anymore.

Derrick Z. Jackson wants to talk about more than brackets:

EARLY THIS basketball season, when the National Collegiate Athletic Association released its 2009 Division 1 Graduation Success Rate report, interim president Jim Isch boasted how the overall graduation rate for basketball was up nearly 10 percentage points over the last eight years. “Be assured, the NCAA’s commitment to academics is as strong as it has ever been,’’ Isch said.

Walter Harrison, president of the University of Hartford and chairman of the NCAA’s academic performance committee, added, “At the ground level of academic reform on our campuses, there has been monumental change.’’

There is no assurance of monumental change until the NCAA finally grounds its worst programs. However, there is no sign of that as top-power Kentucky made the Division 1 tournament with a Graduation Success Rate of only 18 percent for its black athletes and 31 percent overall. [...]

The NCAA says 56 percent of black basketball players now graduate from Division 1 teams, continuing a slow increase. White players have an 81 percent graduation rate. There is plenty of praise to go around among the 65 teams that made this year’s tournament. Top-tier seeds Kansas, Duke, Villanova, Pittsburgh, and Georgetown have black player graduation rates between 67 and 100 percent. Marquette, Wofford, Brigham Young, Wake Forest, Utah State, and Notre Dame had a 100 percent graduation rate across the board.

But until the NCAA bans the likes of Maryland, Texas, Nevada Las Vegas, and Kentucky, the concept of “student-athlete’’ is corrupted beyond repair. At these schools, the athletes are semipros who should be paid.

Open Thread for Night Owls: International Law

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 05:12:04 GMT

At Harper's magazine, Scott Horton writes:

Neoconservative legal scholars and their allies argue aggressively that international law isn’t really law because the nations who make it–through treaties and conventions and by practice–don’t really treat it as law. But Michael Scharf and Paul Williams, two alumni of the Legal Adviser’s office in the State Department–known inside the Beltway as "L"–decided to take a deep look inside the process of policy decision making to test this theory. They convened the ten living legal advisers in meetings in Washington and later also gathered some of their equals from Russia, China, and the United Kingdom, and asked them to address the question directly. Did their governments in fact treat international law as law in making decisions? Working through crises including Vietnam, Watergate, and Iran-Contra, they found that international law did in fact directly shape executive decisions. I put six questions to Case Western Reserve University Law Professor Michael Scharf about his new book, Shaping Foreign Policy in Times of Crisis. ...

Can you cite any specific cases in which a president has been advised not to take a contemplated action because of international law and he followed that advice?

The ten former State Department Legal Advisers provided a number of examples spanning thirty years. Examples detailed in the book include President Carter’s 1979 decision not to use force against the Iranian Embassy in Washington during the hostage crisis, President Reagan’s 1985 decision not to authorize the shooting down of an Egyptian airliner carrying the terrorists responsible for the Achile Lauro cruise-ship hijacking, President Clinton’s 1994 decision to halt the supply of counter-narcotics intelligence to the Peruvian air force after it shot down a civilian aircraft, and President Bush’s decision to direct the State of Texas not to execute a Mexican national convicted of rape and murder in order to comply with an International Court of Justice order. The legal advisers said there were only four times during the past thirty years in which they were intentionally cut out of the decision-making process on issues involving the interpretation or application of international law, and they described each as a "train wreck." The first was the mining of the Nicaragua harbor, the second was the Iran-Contra affair, the third was the kidnapping of Mexican doctor Humberto Álvarez Machaín, and the fourth was the drafting of the so-called "torture memos."

• • • • •

At Daily Kos on this date in 2006:

Viewers of MSNBC's Hardball were treated to a rare episode last night. The program was devoted to reviewing the deeply flawed assumptions and promises from the WH concerning every aspect of the Iraq War, President Bush's abysmal poll numbers, and the looming loss of GOP seats in the coming mid-terms as a result. But forty minutes in, host Chris Matthews suddenly made an abortive detour into fantasy-land, trying to portray the insurmountable problems the Republican cluster-fuck in Iraq poses for the Democrats. How ever will the Democrats survive this relentless plague of record popularity?

Open Thread and Diary Rescue

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 04:16:04 GMT

Tonight's Rescue is brought to you by Louisiana 1976, aloha_and_mahalo, HoosierDeb, grog, Alfonso Nevarez, and dadanation, with vcmvo2 editing.

The gorgeous pictures matching mole shares with us in his Biodiversity Adventures I: Southern Florida Photodiary are a glimpse of a paradise which is in peril from climate change. (Louisiana 1976)

Given the tone and tenor of the language used to deride President Obama, gjohnsit carefully explains just how deliberate and wrong this framing is when writing Words Mean Things: Fascism. (dadanation)

Mayfly delivers the eulogy for an Irish friend, and in such a way that you'd think you were down' the Pub with her, clinking glasses and enjoying A tribute on St. Patrick's Day. (aloha and mahalo)

If you haven't heard of Henrietta Lacks, jimstaro explains why you should in Making Billions{?} on Health, Yet Sources Of Not Compensated! (dadanation)

In a thought-provoking essay,hepshiba offers some Reflections on Right Wing Rhetoric #1: The Talismanic Word. (Louisiana 1976)

jellyyork looks at ongoing studies about the irrational voting behavior resulting from conservative moral framing in Democracy at Risk--What's Really Driving the Wingnuts. (grog)

Less than 5% Unemployment? RenaRF argues that, in the absence of irresponsible personal borrowing, such a high rate of employment will never again be possible, unless we get serious about revitalizing American manufacturing. (Alfonso Nevarez)

Muskegon Critic can barely contain his excitement over an impending step forward in creating new, green jobs - part of which includes a Major Wind Developer Giving Presentation to...our Facebook Group. (HoosierDeb)

jotter has High Impact Diaries: March 14, 2010.

virgomusic brings Top Comments - Choral Marathon Edition.

Enjoy and please join us by suggesting your own favorite diaries from the past twenty-four hours in this Open Thread!

Polling and Political Wrap-Up, 3/15/10

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 03:30:05 GMT

Beware the Ides of March! And, while you are doing that, take the time to read the Wrap, which actually (and mercifully, from where I sit and type) ducks back under the 10,000 word limit for the first time in weeks....

THE U.S. SENATE

CA-Sen: Right-Wing Groups Start Crusade to Crush GOP Frontrunner
From the moment he switched from a prospective gubernatorial race to a bid for the U.S. Senate, Tom Campbell has moved to the front of the polls. Clearly, this has the far-right a bit concerned (Campbell has a reputation as a moderate, particularly on social issues). One of their numbers, the folks at NOM (National Organization of Marriage), is taking to the air in order to paint Campbell as insufficiently conservative on the issue of gay marriage.

CO-Sen: PPP Finds Reasonably Open Primaries on Both Sides of Aisle
Both incumbent Democratic Senator Michael Bennet and presumed GOP frontrunner Jane Norton have to be at least a bit concerned about their primaries, if new numbers from PPP are to be believed. Bennet, on the Democratic side, leads former state House Speaker Andrew Romanoff by six points (40-34), according to the poll. Meanwhile, Jane Norton clocks in at a thoroughly unimpressive 34%. Her lead over Ken Buck is seventeen points, as he sits at 17%. Buck, however, is somewhat closer to Norton among conservatives, trailing 34-21. They also poll the GOP gubernatorial primary, but the result is so insignificant it does not merit its own spot in the Wrap: Scott McInnis leads 58-8.

NC-Sen: Marshall Poll Shows Big Primary Lead, But High Undecideds
There is something for everyone in a slightly dusty (mid-February) internal poll for Democratic Senate candidate Elaine Marshall, which was recently released by Team Marshall. Marshall's poll shows her with a twenty-six point lead, with 31% of the vote versus 5% for former state legislator Cal Cunningham and 4% for attorney Ken Lewis. Team Marshall will undoubtedly tell you that this means that they have a commanding lead, and neither of their rivals have managed to launch. Ask Team Cunningham and Team Lewis, and they will almost certainly tell you that even in Marshall's own internals, she is not close to sniffing 50% of the vote, despite being a statewide officeholder. Both of these hypothetical analyses are, of course, correct.

PA-Sen: Sometime-GOP Pollster Has Toomey Leading Specter
Here is kind of a peculiar counterweight to the spate of recent polls (by Research 2000 and Quinnipiac) showing Democratic Sen. Arlen Specter leading likely GOP nominee Patrick Toomey. A new poll from Susquehanna Research, a pollster that has worked both for media outlets and GOP candidates in the past, gives Toomey a six point edge (42-36) over Arlen Specter. Interestingly, they did not release a trial heat for a potential Sestak-Toomey showdown.

THE U.S. HOUSE

KY-03: Yarmuth Has 4-Point Edge Among Committed Voters, Says SUSA
Here is a rather strange poll, but one worth reporting, as it concerns a member of the Democratic class of 2006. SurveyUSA, who has been unusually quiet this election season, comes out of hiding to poll the Louisville Mayoral race, and tosses in a strangely-worded question about the electoral viability of John Yarmuth, who has represented KY-03 since 2007. 27% of voters will vote for Yarmuth no matter what, while 23% of voters will vote against him, no matter what. Most, perhaps not surprisingly, are waiting to see who the GOP candidate is. A quintet of Republicans, although arguably none of them are "first-tier" candidates, are vying for the nod.

PA-07: Could Cleared GOP Field Actually Be Blessing in Disguise?
Most folks, myself included, figured that Patrick Meehan, the likely GOP nominee in the open-seat race in the Pennsylvania 7th, caught a break when former TV news anchor Dawn Stensland decided not to make a bid for the GOP nomination. As it turns out, Stensland might have only ruled out a Republican bid for Congress. According to the Philadelphia Daily News, Stensland has not ruled out an Independent bid for Congress. Stensland, who would bring name recognition into the contest, could cause a mountain of troubles for Meehan were she to run to his right (hat tip: DC's Political Report).

THE GUBERNATORIAL RACES

MI-Gov: Bernero Locks Down AFL-CIO Endorsement
It is hard not to consider Lansing Mayor Virg Bernero the Democratic frontrunner after the news that the AFL-CIO had decided to endorse his candidacy. He had already locked down the UAW. Bernero's leading Democratic challenger is state House Speaker Andy Dillon. The GOP has a multicandidate field, although it seems as if Congressman Peter Hoekstra has moved into the front of that field.

NM-Gov: Is Another Presumptive GOP Frontrunner In Deep Trouble?
Another day, another supposed top-tier Republican candidate looking at the painful prospect of political elimination within his own party. In something of a surprise, Pete Domenici Jr. finished way back in the pack at the state's GOP Convention this weekend. Not only did Domenici falter badly in finishing dead last among the five candidates, he logged a pathetic 4.6% of the vote. His team is dismissing it as a meaningless straw poll, but it has a practical impact--because Domenici scored less than 20% of the convention vote, he must gain twice as many signatures to qualify for the ballot than the two candidates who met that standard--Allan Weh and Susana Martinez.

PA-Gov: Susquehanna Poll--Corbett Leads By Double Digits
The same Susquehanna poll that had Specter trailing Toomey on the Senate side also, perhaps not surprisingly, has the presumed GOP nominee up big on the gubernatorial side. Most polls, to be fair, have Republican state AG Tom Corbett leading his Democratic challengers. Susquehanna, however, has the margins a touch wider, with Corbett up 37-26 over Democratic state Auditor Jack Wagner, and up fifteen (39-24) on Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato.

The Mother of All Self-Executing Rules

Tue, 16 Mar 2010 02:28:05 GMT

Via TWI, House Republicans say they can't block the House procedurally in their plan to pass the reconciliation bill with a self-executing provision considering the Senate bill "deemed" as passed.

House Republicans say they cannot block a Democratic maneuver that would allow Members to avoid a separate vote on the Senate health care bill.

“There is nothing that can prevent it,” said Rep. David Dreier (R-Calif.), the ranking member of the Rules Committee. “It’s something they can clearly do if they have the votes."

Of course, that's not preventing Dreier from attacking it.

Dreier ripped the plan as “trying to avoid the accountability of an up-or-down vote” and said it violated Pelosi’s pledge of an open and transparent Congress. “It pains me to see,” he said.

You know what's coming next, right?

When Republicans were in the minority, they railed against self-executing rules as being anti-deliberative because they undermined and perverted the work of committees and also prevented the House from having a separate debate and vote on the majority's preferred changes....

When Republicans took power in 1995, they soon lost their aversion to self-executing rules and proceeded to set new records under Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.). There were 38 and 52 self-executing rules in the 104th and 105th Congresses (1995-1998), making up 25 percent and 35 percent of all rules, respectively. Under Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) there were 40, 42 and 30 self-executing rules in the 106th, 107th and 108th Congresses (22 percent, 37 percent and 22 percent, respectively). Thus far in the 109th Congress, self-executing rules make up about 16 percent of all rules.

On April 26, [2006] the Rules Committee served up the mother of all self-executing rules for the lobby/ethics reform bill. The committee hit the trifecta with not one, not two, but three self-executing provisions in the same special rule. The first trigger was a double whammy: “In lieu of the amendments recommended by the Committees on the Judiciary, Rules, and Government Reform now printed in the bill, the amendment in the nature of a substitute consisting of the text of the Rules Committee Print dated April 21, 2006, modified by the amendment printed in part A of the report of the Committee on Rules accompanying this resolution, shall be considered as adopted in the House and the Committee of the Whole.”

And which Republican was chairing the Rules Committee in April, 2006? Why, David Dreier, of course.