Ask yourself this question: if Nancy Pelosi were trying to lose control of the House, what would she do differently? Elevating her extreme liberal California pal Pete Stark to temporary leadership of the Ways and Means Committee is a great way to further alienate independents and divide Democrats. Stark is next in line for the post in seniority, but his maverick personality had led some | Read More »
When Republicans ran Washington, Democrats regularly complained that they were terrible managers. They argued that because of Republican incompetence, deficits were high, deadlines were missed, money was wasted, and rules were ignored. It called to mind PJ O’Rourke’s famous quote about Republicans: The Republicans are the party that says government doesn’t work and then they get elected and prove it. But if Republicans were inefficient | Read More »
It’s no surprise when a Southern Democrat in a GOP-leaning seat – someone like Parker Griffith – runs like a scalded dog from Nancy Pelosi. Indeed, if Democrats hold a narrow edge in the House after the 2010 elections – a genuine possibility – they will nervously count the Blue Dogs to see how many will withhold votes from Pelosi. But it should be surprising | Read More »
Congressman Henry Waxman is in charge of developing health care overhaul legislation that can pass the House Energy and Commerce Committee. He’s not having much success, as a few moderate Democrats have insisted on cost-cutting measures. Today Waxman made clear that he’s willing to make en end-run around the moderates, and bring his radical legislation straight to the House floor. In doing so, he made | Read More »
Wow. I wonder if Chairman Murtha – the one who delivered all the earmarks – knew that his brother was apparently somehow implicated in this fraud. I also wonder who else on the House Appropriations Committee knew. After all, the entire committee is responsible for vetting earmark requests and at least making a minimal attempt to determine that they are spent in compliance with the | Read More »
There mainstream media and the Left are all over themselves in recent weeks, trying to pin Republicans down on who leads our party. Is Rush Limbaugh our leader? Is it Mitch McConnell? Or is it Sarah Palin, or John Boehner, or Michael Steele, or someone else? You can rest assured of two things: The only reason they want to know is so that they can | Read More »
Roll Call reports that House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer is effectively siding with Republicans who want more aggressive scrutiny of ethical charges against leading Democrats. He plans to offer a motion to reveal whether the Ethics Committee is investigating corruption charges against senior Democrats (notably John Murtha and Pete Visclosky) with regard to their dealings with a defunct lobbying group: House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer | Read More »
I recently had the opportunity to have a lengthy discussion (on background) with a source at the National Republican Congressional Committee, regarding the state of their planning for 2010. My strongest impression is that this is a team of professionals that has learned the lessons of the last few cycles and who are doing a good job setting the table for a strong cycle. No | Read More »
What can you say about a video that speaks so clearly for itself? If you don’t believe Pelosi is lying through her teeth at this point, you never will. Her story has changed repeatedly, and the one she’s telling now makes no sense. You get the feeling that about halfway through her appearance, she suddenly realizes that the press isn’t going to simply reprint her | Read More »
It seems that good Lindsey Grahama has locked the bearded, alternate universe Lindsey Graham in a closet, and showed up at the first session of the Democrats’ terrorist interrogation show trial: “I don’t want to retry Nancy Pelosi, that’s not my goal but if you’re going to accuse these people in the Bush administration of being evil and committing a crime, then if she was | Read More »
Nancy Pelosi made a surprise trip to Baghdad yesterday. And according to Alsumaria, she tried to rewrite the history of the debate over the U.S. role in Iraq: “The SOFA agreement is one that agreed between our two countries and as many of you know, I’m very opposed to the initiation of hostilities in Iraq and to this war in general. But when … once | Read More »
The American people have good reason to question the leadership qualities of the sunshine patriots of the Democratic party – those whose views on national security are wholly dictated by the mood of the times. They clearly include people like Nancy Pelosi, who was repeatedly briefed on the methods for interrogating detainees, but never raised any concerns she may have had. She was content to | Read More »
When the Federal Bureau of Investigation conducted a court-authorized raid of the office of Congressman Bill Jefferson, Nancy Pelosi said: The Justice Department was wrong to seize records from Congressman Jefferson’s office in violation of the Constitutional principle of Separation of Powers, the Speech or Debate Clause of the Constitution, and the practice of the last 219 years. These constitutional principles were not designed by | Read More »
Barack Obama dismissed Rick Wagoner, and he is reportedly planning to dismiss a majority of GM’s Board of Directors. He also says he wants bold reform, so that General Motors offers the sort of cutting-edge products that the car buyers of today and tomorrow want. He also doesn’t like the Chevy Volt. So what does Barack Obama expect us to drive? Today’s news gives us | Read More »
Surely Democrats have not forgotten the debate over the stimulus, and the different experiences in the House and Senate. In the House, Democrats locked Republicans out and drafted a stimulus bill that got not a single vote from the other side – in fact, they lost some Democrats on the vote. In the Senate, Democrat leaders brought several Republicans into the room, bought off three | Read More »
Alan Mollohan has been under investigation by the Federal Bureau of Investigation for a few years. Today it’s reported that his charitable foundation received free rent from a high-tech consortium that he blessed with millions of dollars in earmarks: The West Virginia High Tech Consortium has provided more than $75,000 in free rent and administrative services to the Robert H. Mollohan Family Charitable Foundation, according | Read More »
I’ll let Rasmussen set it up: Democrats are still trusted more than Republicans to handle the economy by a 44% to 39% margin, but their advantage on the issue has been slipping steadily since November… In the first poll conducted after Barack Obama was elected president, the Democrats held a 15-point lead over the GOP on economic issues. In December, their lead dropped to 12 | Read More »
Karl Rove sees warning signs for Obama in his dealings with Congress: More significantly, Team Obama is stumbling on its biggest priority — an economic stimulus package. One stutter step came when Mr. Obama said he looked forward to signing a stimulus bill on Jan. 20 and then failed to lay out a proposal by mid-December so Congress could chew it over. That led House | Read More »
And so it begins: “It’s certainly true that we in Congress will have input,” Sen. Charles E. Schumer , D-N.Y., said in a Jan. 9 conference call. But, he added, “The urgency of this economic crisis . . . is going to limit any haggling over competing approaches.” Schumer predicted that Congress would complete its work by a self-imposed Feb. 13 deadline and would enact | Read More »
Nancy Pelosi is advising Barack Obama that he ought to immediately make good on his campaign promise to raise taxes on the wealthy: Pelosi told reporters today that she “couldn’t be more clear” in opposing some Obama advisers’ wish to wait for the tax cuts on the highest income earners to expire in two years, as they are set to do under current law. “Put | Read More »
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