NY Congressional Race: Dem’s Block Military Ballots from Overseas
Democrats on the state elections board blocked GOP attempts to allow overseas military voting in the special election. Overseas ballots take weeks to reach voters and be returned unless special measures are taken to speed things up. But the elections officials refused to do anything to speed things up, or mail the ballots out early enough. The result is that perhaps 90 percent of the ballots will be tossed in the trash without ever being counted (Military ballots are cast mostly for Republican candidates).
The exclusion of these ballots violates a federal law known as UOCAVA, but the Justice Department filed only a “Potemkin Village” lawsuit in response, seeking a brief, cosmetic extension of time for returning the ballots — an extension that will result in only a handful of the wrongfully-excluded military ballots being counted. The Justice Department could easily have sought and obtained broader, more meaningful relief, as it did on several occasions during the Bush Administration. But it didn’t want to, for partisan political reasons.
So much for Obama’s campaign promise to defend the right of every American to vote (Obama’s Justice Department is also not interested in protecting the voting rights of white people denied the right to vote by black political bosses in predominantly-black counties).
This is just one facet of the continuing politicization of the Justice Department, which is now blessing unconstitutional bills that even liberal legal scholars admit violate the plain language of the Constitution.
So as usual, the “transparency” of the Democrats is as clear as Mississippi River water. The old motto win at any cost, even the at the expense of our Constitution. Where is the ACLU now? Oh yeah, that would benefit a conservative Republican candidate….
The Shut Up and Swallow Congress
Michelle Malkin
Deliberation in Washington is dead. We don’t have legislators. We have lemmings. We don’t have debates. We have high-speed hysteria sessions. After ramming through stimulus legislation that no one read and bailout bills that no one understood, Congress is now poised to stuff down taxpayers’ throats a deficit-exploding $3.5 trillion budget that enshrines the largest tax increase in American history.
Welcome to the cap-and-trade crap sandwich.The Democrats want to rig the game so you don’t have time to figure out this latest act of collective thievery before it’s perpetrated. They have been colluding on a plan to circumvent the Senate’s 60-vote threshold and amendment process by attaching their massive green tax scheme to a special budget legislative maneuver (“budget reconciliation” in the parlance of the Washington sausage-makers)
On the Senate floor Tuesday, Republicans valiantly tried to stop the cap-and-trade bullet train…
Boxer and Durbin indignantly accused GOP senators of “fear-mongering” over the costs of radical greenhouse gas emissions reductions.This global warming reduction proposal amounts to an unprecedented national energy tax on every man, woman and child. Every household. Every business.
Reid Leaves Open Option for Extreme Maneuver on Health Care, Energy Overhauls
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is holding the option of using a legislative maneuver to create not only a sweeping overhaul of the nation’s health care system but also a controversial cap and trade energy program, a move that could torpedo bipartisanship.
The maneuver, known as “reconciliation,” protects legislation to which it’s attached from a Senate filibuster. Republicans, in their deep minority status, are in an uproar over the possibility that they will be all but eliminated from the legislative process.
But Republicans are not alone in their opposition. A sizable number of Democrats have protested the move; first and foremost, Budget Committee Chairman Kent Conrad, D-N.D., who excluded it from his committee’s budget passed Thursday.
The House has reconciliation instructions in its budget for health care, and Reid left open the door Thursday to adding energy protections as well.
“We’re leaving nothing off the table,” Reid told reporters Thursday, a move that has touched off a firestorm of concern behind the scenes.
So concerned about the possibility of it being used, Sens. Robert Byrd, D-W.V., and Mike Johnanns, R-Neb., sent a letter of strong protest to the majority leader.
As opponents of proposed cap and trade measures, Byrd, the Senate’s most senior member and lead watchdog of Senate rules and decorum, and Johanns told Reid, “Enactment of a cap-and-trade regime is likely to influence nearly every feature of the U.S. economy.
“Legislation so far-reaching should be fully vetted and given appropriate time for debate, something the budget reconciliation process does not allow. Using this procedure would circumvent normal Senate practice and would be inconsistent with the Obama administration’s stated goals of bipartisanship, cooperation, and openness,” they wrote.
******As you all can see, Sen Majority Leader Reid will stop at nothing to Win. Win at any cost! To heck with soaring budget deficits, lost jobs, lost GDP, inflation. Lets tax and spend our way into oblivion for some crazy socialist agenda of Pelosi and Reid.*******
Milk Dodd’s Wife a Former Director of Bermuda-Based IPC Holdings, an AIG Controlled Company
Hmm… The Corruptocrats keep getting in trouble and the stories keep getting juicier. Who will Dodd try to throw under the bus for this little tidbit? I can’t wait to see how he tries to spin this one.
No wonder Senator Christopher Dodd (D-Conn) went wobbly last week when asked about his February amendment ratifying hundreds of millions of dollars in bonuses to executives at insurance giant AIG. Dodd has been one of the company’s favorite recipients of campaign contributions. But it turns out that Senator Dodd’s wife has also benefited from past connections to AIG as well.
From 2001-2004, Jackie Clegg Dodd served as an “outside” director of IPC Holdings, Ltd., a Bermuda-based company controlled by AIG. IPC, which provides property casualty catastrophe insurance coverage, was formed in 1993 and currently has a market cap of $1.4 billion and trades on the NASDAQ under the ticker symbol IPCR. In 2001, in addition to a public offering of 15 million shares of stock that raised $380 million, IPC raised more than $109 million through a simultaneous private placement sale of 5.6 million shares of stock to AIG – giving AIG a 20% stake in IPC. (AIG sold its 13.397 million shares in IPC in August, 2006.)
Clegg was compensated for her duties to the company, which was managed by a subsidiary of AIG. In 2003, according to a proxy statement, Clegg received $12,000 per year and an additional $1,000 for each Directors’ and committee meeting she attended. Clegg served on the Audit and Investment committees during her final year on the board.
IPC paid millions each year to other AIG-related companies for administrative and other services. Clegg was a diligent director. In 2003, the proxy statement report, she attended more than 75% of board and committee meetings. This while she served as the managing partner of Clegg International Consultants, LLC, which she created in 2001, the year she joined the board of IPC. (See Dodd’s public financial disclosure reports with the Senate from 2001-2004 here.)
Dodd is likely more familiar with the complicated workings of AIG than he was letting on last week. This week may provide him with another opportunity to refresh his recollections.
Move over and make some room on that couch! Time to grab me a handful of popcorn – you can’t make this stuff up!
Daschle Withdraws
02/03/09
About dayum time! Tom Daschle withdraws his nomination as HHS secretary.
Fox News:
Tom Daschle has withdrawn his nomination for health and human services secretary, after fielding mounting criticism over his failure to pay more than $130,000 in taxes.
President Obama stood by Daschle Monday, telling reporters that he “absolutely” supports the former South Dakota senator. But the president accepted Daschle’s withdrawal Tuesday morning.
It was unclear whether Read more
