Richard Shelby

Last week news broke that Sen. Richard Shelby had placed a hold on almost all of President Obama’s nominees in lieu of getting funding for some of his pork projects. Now he has retreated:

Republican Sen. Richard Shelby of Alabama will stop blocking Senate confirmation of about 70 government appointees nominated by President Barack Obama, his office said.

Shelby had placed "holds" on most of Obama's nominees, delaying the Senate from acting on them, in a dispute over federal spending involving his state.

"The purpose of placing numerous holds was to get the White House's attention on two issues that are critical to our national security – the Air Force's aerial refueling tanker acquisition and the FBI's Terrorist Device Analytical Center," Shelby spokesman Jonathan Graffeo said in a statement Monday night.

The problem for Shelby is that he has now been exposed as a major hypocrite. How can he continue to call himself a conservative after going to such extraordinary measures to secure pork? Any challenger to Shelby’s seat will have a field day with this.

Yesterday it was Kit Bond, today we have Richard Shelby:

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) has put an extraordinary "blanket hold" on at least 70 nominations President Obama has sent to the Senate, according to multiple reports this evening. The hold means no nominations can move forward unless Senate Democrats can secure a 60-member cloture vote to break it, or until Shelby lifts the hold.

So this is the Republican games being exposed? They will do what they can to really run up government spending, then blame it all on the Democrats. It’s time to stop trying to play nice with these assholes and go nuclear. President Obama should hold a prime time press conference and call these Republicans out by name for their games. The American people need to be made aware of what is going on and if the RNC and tea party want to support these assholes, then they also need called out. It’s time to fight back.

Sen. Richard Shelby was just on Morning Joe and he was, in an oh-so serious voice, expressing concern about ACORN and the possibility of “millions of tax payer dollars wasted”.

Where was Sen. Shelby when we were hearing about all the waste, fraud and abuse of Halliburton and KBR?

Where was his serious face when whistle blowers were talking about KBR feeding our troops spoiled food, so that the higher ups in the corporation could dine in better style?

Where was he when we started learning about our troops being electrocuted because of crappy work being done by U.S. contractors in Iraq?

And this doesn’t go for Shelby alone, but the entire Republican Party and right wing media. They all defended Halliburton and other contractors, and when in power refused to allow hearings.

But the most interesting thing is how the right is acting like President Obama is the CEO of ACORN or something. No he isn’t, but you know who WAS the CEO of Halliburton…Dick Cheney.

I guess for Republicans, playing politics is even more important than the well being of our troops fighting for this country.

Today’s contestant is Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama. On Fox News this morning, Shelby reaffirmed his belief that Obama was taking us “down the road of socialism”. The big thing he blamed?

WALLACE: Sen. Shelby, you say that the Obama administration is taking us down the road to socialism. Explain.

SHELBY: Well, obviously. So, they intervene last fall in the bank crisis. No one has ever done it on that scale before. Now the automobile crisis.

And because seeing is believing:

So now the whole TARP was the work of Obama? I almost forgot that it was Obama who took the unprecedented action of suspending a presidential campaign to work on this issue. Oh wait – that was John McCain. It was also Bush’s TARP program. With lying morons like Shelby out there making the case one can only assume the Republicans really love being in the minority.

That’s what it seems like the Republicans are heading for – a policy of saving white collar jobs, while letting blue collar workers hit the unemployment lines:

Top Republican senators said Sunday they will oppose a Democratic plan to bail out Detroit automakers, calling the U.S. industry a "dinosaur" whose "day of reckoning" is coming. Their opposition raises serious doubts about whether the plan will pass in this week's postelection session.

Democratic leaders want to use $25 billion of the $700 billion financial industry bailout to help General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and Chrysler LLC.

Sens. Richard Shelby of Alabama and Jon Kyl of Arizona said it would be a mistake to use any of the Wall Street rescue money to prop up the automakers. They said an auto bailout would only postpone the industry's demise.

So we should just let a million plus jobs go away? And it’s not just the actual jobs in the auto industry, it’s also all the businesses that thrive upon them. I’m talking about the restaurants and hotels that rely heavily upon the patronage of auto workers. The Cincinnati area has seen the effects of this first hand countless times in the past, and it isn’t a pretty picture.

Sen. Shelby, the ranking Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, just told Rachael Maddow that he has a letter signed by 200 of the top economists in the country and they are begging for Congress to not rush into this plan. I think that is a very interesting point that should not fall upon deaf ears.

So why the urgency of canceling a campaign and trying to delay debates then? A conservative Senator just said this shouldn't be rushed into, yet McCain is doing just that - rushing into it. Is McCain hoping that the campaigns would be suspended until 11/3? I wouldn't doubt it.