9
Jun
“Having the respect of your constituents is fundamental for a Member of Congress,” Schwartz said in a statement. “In light of Anthony Weiner’s offensive behavior online, he should resign.”
That’s the sentiment of some Democrats. Particularly with Reps Allyson Schwartz, D-PA, Joe Donnelly (D-IN), Niki Tsongas (D-MA), Mike Ross (D-AR), Larry Kissell (D-NC) and Michael Michaud (D-ME). Nancy Pelosi has one-upped them and called for an ethics investigation.
But, I got a real issue with all this. As of this date, Anthony Weiner has committed no crime.
That’s right, you heard it here first. No matter how disgusting some people, by their own defined standards, might have found his behavior, it’s really none of their business who the people of Weiner’s district choose to be their Representative.
The internet has prompted a return to the old days of posse law enforcement. Personally I find everything about Nancy Pelosi more bothersome than anything Weiner has done to this point. Although being a loathesome annoying character, being bitten by a goat really has been his only claim to fame. Bankrupting the United States of America is Nancy’s. I just think that’s a bigger deal and therefore Nancy should be forced to resign if Weiner can be for such a lesser ethical lapse.
Bottom line, it’s totally up to the people of his district to decide since no federal law has been broken. No matter how lewd and disgusting his behavior is, Barney Frank has him trumped and I certainly don’t hear anyone bitching about him.
As usual, your opinion is always appreciated.
Among them. the Human Rights Campaign, which was founded in 1980 and boasts more than 1 million grassroots supporters, has some of the deepest pockets. During the first quarter of the year, the Human Rights Campaign spent $480,000 on federal lobbying and employed more than 20 lobbyists. During 2010, the Human Rights Campaign invested $1.98 million on federal lobbying. The Human Rights Campaign also operates a political action committee of its own. During the 2010 election cycle, the group’s PAC raised more than $1 million and doled out about $804,000 to federal candidates.
| REPUBLICANS | |
| Biggert, Judy (R-IL) | $5,000 |
| Keating, William R (D-MA) | $4,500 |
| Ros-Lehtinen, Ileana (R-FL) | $7,000 |
| Scozzafava, Dierdre K (R-NY) | $4,863 |
| Shays, Christopher (R-CT) | ($25) |
| Kirk, Mark (R-IL) | $2,000 |
Not a whole lot going on there huh? Now check out this list:
| NON-REPUBLICANS | |
| Ackerman, Gary (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Adler, John H (D-NJ) | $9,500 |
| Andrews, Robert E (D-NJ) | $2,000 |
| Arcuri, Michael (D-NY) | $10,000 |
| Baca, Joe (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Baldwin, Tammy (D-WI) | $3,550 |
| Bass, Karen (D-CA) | $2,500 |
| Bean, Melissa (D-IL) | $4,500 |
| Becerra, Xavier (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Bennet, Michael F (D-CO) | $4,462 |
| Bera, Ami (D-CA) | $3,500 |
| Berkley, Shelley (D-NV) | $1,025 |
| Berman, Howard L (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Bishop, Timothy H (D-NY) | $10,500 |
| Blumenauer, Earl (D-OR) | $2,000 |
| Blumenthal, Richard (D-CT) | $9,500 |
| Boccieri, John A (D-OH) | $9,000 |
| Boswell, Leonard L (D-IA) | $9,500 |
| Boxer, Barbara (D-CA) | $8,975 |
| Braley, Bruce (D-IA) | $6,000 |
| Capps, Lois (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Capuano, Michael E (D-MA) | $1,000 |
| Carnahan, Robin (D-MO) | $8,984 |
| Carnahan, Russ (D-MO) | $3,000 |
| Carney, John (D-DE) | $8,305 |
| Carson, Andre (D-IN) | $1,000 |
| Castor, Kathy (D-FL) | $1,000 |
| Chu, Judy (D-CA) | $3,500 |
| Cicilline, David N (D-RI) | $9,118 |
| Clark, Tarryl (D-MN) | $7,948 |
| Clarke, Hansen (D-MI) | $1,000 |
| Clarke, Yvette D (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Cleaver, Emanuel (D-MO) | $1,000 |
| Clyburn, James E (D-SC) | $5,000 |
| Coakley, Martha (D-MA) | $5,000 |
| Cohen, Stephen Ira (D-TN) | $4,975 |
| Connolly, Gerry (D-VA) | $8,135 |
| Conyers, John Jr (D-MI) | $2,500 |
| Coons, Chris (D-DE) | $4,195 |
| Courtney, Joe (D-CT) | $1,000 |
| Crowley, Joseph (D-NY) | $2,000 |
| Cummings, Elijah E (D-MD) | $1,000 |
| Dahlkemper, Kathleen (D-PA) | $1,000 |
| Davis, Danny K (D-IL) | $1,000 |
| Davis, Susan A (D-CA) | $2,000 |
| DeFazio, Peter (D-OR) | $1,000 |
| DeGette, Diana (D-CO) | $1,000 |
| DeLauro, Rosa L (D-CT) | $1,000 |
| DelBene, Suzan (D-WA) | $3,862 |
| Deutch, Ted (D-FL) | $5,900 |
| Dingell, John D (D-MI) | $2,000 |
| Dodd, Chris (D-CT) | $1,000 |
| Doggett, Lloyd (D-TX) | $1,000 |
| Doyle, Mike (D-PA) | $1,000 |
| Driehaus, Steve (D-OH) | $9,348 |
| Edwards, Donna (D-MD) | $3,500 |
| Elliott, Joyce (D-AR) | $4,500 |
| Ellison, Keith (D-MN) | $1,000 |
| Engel, Eliot L (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Eshoo, Anna (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Farr, Sam (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Fattah, Chaka (D-PA) | $1,000 |
| Feingold, Russ (D-WI) | $9,163 |
| Filner, Bob (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Fisher, Lee Irwin (D-OH) | $4,525 |
| Foster, Bill (D-IL) | $8,000 |
| Frank, Barney (D-MA) | $10,000 |
| Fudge, Marcia L (D-OH) | $1,000 |
| Galvin, Scott (D-FL) | $4,525 |
| Garamendi, John (D-CA) | $5,000 |
| Garcia, Joe (D-FL) | $5,500 |
| Giannoulias, Alexander (D-IL) | $3,135 |
| Giffords, Gabrielle (D-AZ) | $9,000 |
| Gillibrand, Kirsten (D-NY) | $7,000 |
| Gonzalez, Charlie A (D-TX) | $1,000 |
| Grayson, Alan (D-FL) | $6,500 |
| Green, Al (D-TX) | $2,000 |
| Grijalva, Raul M (D-AZ) | $4,000 |
| Gutierrez, Luis V (D-IL) | $2,000 |
| Hall, John (D-NY) | $9,500 |
| Halvorson, Deborah (D-IL) | $8,000 |
| Hare, Phil (D-IL) | $5,500 |
| Harman, Jane (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Hastings, Alcee L (D-FL) | $1,000 |
| Heinrich, Martin (D-NM) | $9,500 |
| Higgins, Brian M (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Himes, Jim (D-CT) | $7,000 |
| Hinchey, Maurice (D-NY) | $3,500 |
| Hinojosa, Ruben (D-TX) | $1,000 |
| Hirono, Mazie K (D-HI) | $1,000 |
| Hodes, Paul W (D-NH) | $3,664 |
| Holt, Rush (D-NJ) | $4,500 |
| Honda, Mike (D-CA) | $2,000 |
| Hoyer, Steny H (D-MD) | $4,500 |
| Inouye, Daniel K (D-HI) | $1,500 |
| Inslee, Jay R (D-WA) | $1,000 |
| Israel, Steve (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Jackson Lee, Sheila (D-TX) | $1,000 |
| Jackson, Jesse Jr (D-IL) | $1,000 |
| Johnson, Eddie Bernice (D-TX) | $1,000 |
| Johnson, Hank (D-GA) | $5,000 |
| Kennedy, Patrick J (D-RI) | $1,000 |
| Kildee, Dale E (D-MI) | $1,000 |
| Kilpatrick, Carolyn Cheeks (D-MI) | $1,000 |
| Kilroy, Mary Jo (D-OH) | $9,250 |
| Kind, Ron (D-WI) | $6,000 |
| Kirkpatrick, Ann (D-AZ) | $10,000 |
| Klein, Ron (D-FL) | $9,500 |
| Kucinich, Dennis J (D-OH) | $50 |
| Kuster, Ann Mclane (D-NH) | $5,000 |
| Langevin, Jim (D-RI) | $1,000 |
| Larsen, Rick (D-WA) | $4,500 |
| Larson, John B (D-CT) | $2,000 |
| Lassa, Julie (D-WI) | $9,500 |
| Leahy, Patrick (D-VT) | $3,000 |
| Lee, Barbara (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Lentz, Bryan (D-PA) | $3,000 |
| Levin, Sander (D-MI) | $4,000 |
| Lewis, John (D-GA) | $1,500 |
| Lieberman, Joe (I-CT) | $1,000 |
| Loebsack, David (D-IA) | $8,000 |
| Lofgren, Zoe (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Lowey, Nita M (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Lujan, Ben R (D-NM) | $1,000 |
| Lynch, Stephen F (D-MA) | $1,000 |
| Maffei, Dan (D-NY) | $8,000 |
| Maloney, Carolyn B (D-NY) | $2,000 |
| Markey, Betsy (D-CO) | $9,142 |
| Markey, Edward J (D-MA) | $1,000 |
| Marshall, Elaine (D-NC) | $2,500 |
| Massa, Eric (D-NY) | $3,000 |
| Matsui, Doris O (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| McCarthy, Carolyn (D-NY) | $3,500 |
| McCollum, Betty (D-MN) | $1,000 |
| McGovern, James P (D-MA) | $1,000 |
| McMahon, Michael E (D-NY) | $9,500 |
| McNerney, Jerry (D-CA) | $10,000 |
| Meek, Kendrick B (D-FL) | $4,500 |
| Meeks, Gregory W (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Merkley, Jeff (D-OR) | $5,000 |
| Mikulski, Barbara A (D-MD) | $2,000 |
| Miller, Brad (D-NC) | $2,000 |
| Miller, George (D-CA) | $3,000 |
| Mitchell, Harry E (D-AZ) | $8,571 |
| Moore, Dennis (D-KS) | $2,000 |
| Moore, Stephene Ann (D-KS) | $3,500 |
| Murphy, Christopher S (D-CT) | $6,000 |
| Murphy, Patrick J (D-PA) | $8,832 |
| Murphy, Scott (D-NY) | $15,000 |
| Murray, Patty (D-WA) | $8,073 |
| Nadler, Jerrold (D-NY) | $2,500 |
| Napolitano, Grace (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Neal, Richard E (D-MA) | $1,000 |
| Norton, Eleanor Holmes (D-DC) | $1,000 |
| Nye, Glenn (D-VA) | $4,500 |
| Olver, John W (D-MA) | $1,000 |
| Pallone, Frank Jr (D-NJ) | $1,000 |
| Pascrell, Bill Jr (D-NJ) | $1,000 |
| Pastor, Ed (D-AZ) | $1,025 |
| Payne, Donald M (D-NJ) | $1,000 |
| Pelosi, Nancy (D-CA) | $5,000 |
| Perlmutter, Edwin G (D-CO) | $5,500 |
| Peters, Gary (D-MI) | $10,000 |
| Pingree, Chellie (D-ME) | $4,500 |
| Pougnet, Stephen P (D-CA) | $9,400 |
| Price, David (D-NC) | $1,000 |
| Quigley, Mike (D-IL) | $4,500 |
| Rangel, Charles B (D-NY) | $2,500 |
| Reid, Harry (D-NV) | $5,846 |
| Reyes, Silvestre (D-TX) | $1,000 |
| Richardson, Laura (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Rothman, Steven R (D-NJ) | $1,000 |
| Roybal-Allard, Lucille (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Rush, Bobby L (D-IL) | $1,000 |
| Ryan, Tim (D-OH) | $1,000 |
| Salazar, John (D-CO) | $5,500 |
| Sanchez, Linda (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Sanchez, Loretta (D-CA) | $7,500 |
| Schakowsky, Jan (D-IL) | $1,000 |
| Schauer, Mark (D-MI) | $8,316 |
| Schiff, Adam (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Schrader, Kurt (D-OR) | $8,758 |
| Schultz, Debbie Wasserman (D-FL) | $2,000 |
| Schumer, Charles E (D-NY) | $2,500 |
| Schwartz, Allyson (D-PA) | $1,000 |
| Scott, Robert C (D-VA) | $1,000 |
| Seals, Dan (D-IL) | $4,593 |
| Serrano, Jose E (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Sestak, Joseph A Jr (D-PA) | $4,455 |
| Sewell, Terri (D-AL) | $1,000 |
| Shea-Porter, Carol (D-NH) | $7,500 |
| Sherman, Brad (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Sires, Albio (D-NJ) | $1,000 |
| Slaughter, Louise M (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Smith, Adam (D-WA) | $3,500 |
| Speier, Jackie (D-CA) | ($500) |
| Sutton, Betty Sue (D-OH) | $7,500 |
| Thompson, Mike (D-CA) | $1,000 |
| Titus, Dina (D-NV) | $9,542 |
| Tonko, Paul (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Towns, Edolphus (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Tsongas, Niki (D-MA) | $3,500 |
| Van Hollen, Chris (D-MD) | $2,000 |
| Velazquez, Nydia M (D-NY) | $1,000 |
| Walz, Timothy J (D-MN) | $8,000 |
| Watt, Melvin L (D-NC) | $1,000 |
| Weiner, Anthony D (D-NY) | $2,000 |
| Welch, Peter (D-VT) | $1,000 |
| Woods, Anthony (D-CA) | $4,891 |
| Woolsey, Lynn (D-CA) | $2,000 |
| Wu, David (D-OR) | $3,758 |
| Wyden, Ron (D-OR) | $2,000 |
| Yarmuth, John A (D-KY) | $6,000 |
Now, we can assume one of two things is going on here. Either 200 individual Republicans are so prejudiced they will not accept cash from a PAC.
OR
The heads in charge of Human Rights Campaign are more interested in raising donations for Democrats than they are advocating human rights. I mean think about it, giving blindly to the minority party just doesn’t get a whole lot accomplished in DC. There are 246 Non-Republicans in DC right now. There are 213 in that list right there. That’s an 88% hit ratio. There are 287 Republicans in DC right now, six are in that last up there. That’s about a 2% hit ratio.
Maybe.
Just maybe.
If the heads of Human Rights Campaign weren’t so prejudiced they’d get more accomplished?
Rep. Anthony Weiner had a rather notorious meltdown over the past week. Faced with accusations of sending lewd pics to women, he held a rather surreal, bizarre, and most definitely deceptive series of “interviews”.
First question that needs to be asked before I go any further:
I know hindsight’s 20/20. I know a lot of people will answer that they never did believe him now, when they probably did before. But, the bottom line was his “interviews” were so amazingly evasize and contrived that no one really believed him.
So, imagine everyone’s surprise last night when, faced with evidence from multiple, sometimes antagonistic sources, Weiner caved and confessed to doing it with at least six women.
There is one woman on Earth who still defends him tho.
I really have to quote her to make sure people realize the profoundness of Walters’ statement:
First of all, I have my own theory about why he took that picture, if indeed he did take that picture,” Walters said. “This is my theory – this doesn’t mean that it is right. He is married to this beautiful woman, whom I know, who a lot of us know, who the chief of staff to Hillary Clinton and she travels a lot. And it may be that he took that picture and sent it to his wife to say this is how much I miss you. That’s possible.”
Man, does she really believe that? Do you think she actually does?
According to Breitbart, there’s a lot more, much worse, to this story. I don’t doubt for one second Breitbart will hold back on him. Maybe Barbara Walters does for some bizarro reason. Most likely, due to her friendship with the Weiners, she’s in classic full-blown denial. I mean think about it Babs, even Nancy Pelosi is now demanding an ethics probe. For Nancy to diss on a Democrat, they had to be toast already.
My take, the guy’s your typical internet stalker getting his jollies on the side via digital gratifcation. The six women so far are just the tip of the iceberg. This is gonna get real ugly before it goes away. Rather than doing the honorable thing like Chris Lee did and resign, Weiner has already announced he’s not resigning and intends to fight this, and embarrass his district mercilessly until he’s gone.
Where it will get real ugly, real fast, IMO, is IF he hangs around, it’s gonna make that Obama “CHANGE you can believe in” campaign slogan seem like a really embarrassing farce. And if Obama’s peeps do what they truly need to do, I really do see another Blago moment occurring. This guy just doesn’t strike me as being discreet in any shape or fashion.
But, through it all, the one thing he can count on is Barbara Walters propping him up I suppose.
( Surreal moment #2 of this whole thing, Joy Behar defending Sarah Palin. Gag me with a flipping spoon! )
Larry Elder over at RealClearPolitics writes a very nice little article retrospective of when gas prices rose under Bush, and how they are now under Obama. In his article, he mentions some comments made by Nancy Pelosi. I had tackled that one before. Just for the record, when she made the comments criticizing Bush and promising her “commonsense plan to help bring down skyrocketing gas prices by cracking down on price gouging, rolling back the billions of dollars in taxpayer subsidies, tax breaks and royalty relief given to big oil and gas companies, and increasing production of alternative fuels”, gas is STILL 20% more than when she made her promise. And you know what, it’s on a path to get much, much, worse:
| Commodity | April-06 | January-11 | |
| Corn | $250 | $624 | 150% |
| Soybean | $590 | $1,374 | 133% |
| Wheat | $400 | $794 | 99% |
| Gas | $58 | $93 | 60% |
Normally I discuss gas prices and supply in my science blog. However, this issue is 100% political. There is now more supply than there was in 2006, but the price is higher purely because of liberal political philosophies limiting our ability to get it. If it were actually accomplishing something good, I would grin and bear it. As it is, with the deforestation in South America and the declining US economy, which does more good for the planet than anything else does, this is not something good.
12
Aug
It’s been a strange week. Not that any have been terribly normal since January 2009. First we had Howard Stern trashing Democrats:
To which Robert Gibbs suggested the “professional left” should be drug tested. Howard Stern on drugs? No way.
Also during this day of both Perseids AND a massive CME, Gibbs suggested those same “professional liberals” would only be happy with Dennis Kucinich. Am I supposed to think that’s merely a coincidence? I ain’t buying it.
And to top it all off, Charlie Rangel spent 37 minutes of Congress’s time belaboring everyone that he’s not a criminal, just stupid, and that some simple reprimand’s not a good enough charge, he wants expulsion. He then threw a party. This of course comes on the heels of Nancy Pelosi’s claiming that she had nothing to do with the ethics charges against Rangel or Waters. “Draining the swamp” only applies to conservatives obviously, duh.
Steven Slater then decided to pull the cord and use the chute.
H/T: K2
7/22/2010: “Now that the heavy lifting is over, we can go out and make our case,”, Joe Biden. The legislative season is over. The big stuff is all done. No more contentious votes for a fwe months. Nancy Pelosi even went so far as to completely skip the funding process because of the increbible issue that this is an election year. Congress is now expedient.
7/29/2010: Ethics charges stemming back to 2007 are filed against Charlie Rangel. Obama refers to him in the past tense.
8/2/2010: Maxine Waters faces ethics charges regarding her making sure her husband’s bank received special considerations by investigators. Obama hasn’t referred to her in the past tense yet.
Nancy Pelosi, vowing to keep on keeping on cleansing the Democrat culture of corruption, added these strong words:
Just call it a hunch.
It’s now come to light that apparently felons in Minnesota gave us Al Franken. Imagine that.
Nancy Pelosi has promised us that she will do everything in her power to diligently uphold the highest ethical standards in Congress that she possibly can and not allow HER Congress to return to the moral and ethical abyss that it was when she was in charge of it under a previous administration by dutifully doing nothing in regards to this information that a fellow member of her own party was possibly improperly elected.
When awoken with the news, Franken had no comment. MSNBC, CBS, and CNN have rushed to assure none of their peeps comment either.
Pete Stark did his best in his effort to win the honor of most unhinged Representative. It’s damn good too. Hank Johnson going into obsessive detail over his concern of Guam tipping over ranks right up there as well. Nancy Pelosi confidently assuring us that once we pass health care reform we’ll find out what’s in it is a personal favorite of mine, but didn’t seem to get much traction with the public. Harry Reid confidently assuring us that losing 36,000 jobs could have been much, much, worse was pretty good as well.
Now, Ciro Rodriguez has jumped into the fray with his latest town hall chat:
Clue, perhaps?
H/T: Big Governmant and Dave the Sage at ConstitutionClub.
Obama made transparency a big deal when he was running. The assumption was Bush was making all these backroom deals. I don’t think he was. Call it a hunch. So, Obama, pandering to the masses, promised to tell them everything. That has led to an odd result. First there was Nancy Pelosi’s well informed pitch to pass health care reform legislation:
Pelosi’s so proud of that statement she’s got it on her website.
Now, in attempting to pass financial reform legislation, Chris Dodd gave us these reassuring words:
”No one will know until this is actually in place how it works.”
In both cases, Democrats voted overwhelmingly to pass the legislations. In both cases, Obama was excited to sign the legislation as fast as possible.
I don’t pretend that legislators were ever a whole lot more informed on issues. But, they weren’t so quick to publicly assert how clueless they truly are under previous administrations.
Obama, put back that wall!
Find it odd that throughout the entire BP/Gulf Oil fiasco, not one single time that I’m aware of Obama has NOT blamed it on Bush? He’s blamed everything else on Bush, so why not this too? Everyone KNOWS Bush sold out to big oil. So why not state the obvious everyone is expecting to hear?
Because this is totally Obama’s baby.
I have told several people that I found it strange that it appears that several emergency devices that I would have expected to be in place on Deepwater Horizon were not and that’s the reason they can’t shut it off now. That’s probably due in large part because Liz Binbaum waived traditional requirements. I’m gonna guess she got her “guidance” from Ken Salazar, the Interior Secretary to the President.
No one seems to be delving too deep into this angle. But, unlike Katrina, this wasn’t a natural disaster. And unlike Katrina, there is definitely fault to be had.
Still don’t think Obama’s got something going on here? His reaction to the spill was to suspend all new permits for 30 days.
There are no new pending permits:
More change you can believe in huh?
I’m sure Nancy Pelosi will cite Ken Salazar and Liz Binbaum as even two more examples of the Democrat Culture of Corruption.
