democratic caucus

Yesterday I posted about our weak kneed leaders in Congress. Today they seem set on proving my point:

With a potentially bruising election less than six weeks away, Democrats on Capitol Hill came to an impasse Thursday over what to do about the Bush tax cuts. The result was a decision to do nothing, at least until after the elections, when Congress comes back to Washington for a lame duck session.

For weeks, Republicans have happily watched from the sidelines as liberal and moderate Democrats have struggled to agree on the best course of action, both politically and on policy grounds, with the Bush-era tax policy that Democrats describe as a "time bomb." All of the tax cuts -- including those on income, estates and dividends, as well as the child tax credit, the marriage penalty and the Alternative Minimum Tax -- will return to 2001 levels (as the legislation originally called for) unless Congress acts this year.

Greg Sergeant points out that the Democratic leadership is afraid that if the tax cuts expire on the top 2%, the Republicans will accuse them of “raising taxes”.

Following up on yesterday’s post, the number of senators singing the letter to urge Harry Reid to put the public option back in play is now growing. Here’s where the list stands:

• Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.)
• Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio)
• Michael Bennet (D-Col.)
• Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.)
• Bernie Sanders (I-VT)
• Al Franken (D-Minn.)
• Pat Leahy (D-VT)
• Roland Burris (D-Ill.)
• John Kerry (D-Mass.)
• Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI).

These senators have not yet signed on but signaled strong support for the public option:

• Tom Harkin (D-Iowa)
• Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.)
• Ben Cardin (D-Md.)
• Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.)

This is an awesome momentum, with 14 senators now showing strong support for the public option. That’s almost 1/4 of the Democratic caucus, and the number seems to out shadow the number of blue dogs now. You better start listening Harry.

Vendettas and ‘gotcha’ is the politics of old. It’s synonymous with the old attack ads, and something the American people have started rejected, rather strongly. Barack Obama campaigned on change. In two weeks since becoming our President elect, Obama has:

Embraced his one time rival Hillary Clinton, offering her a top position in his administration

Welcomed his recent rival, John McCain, to sit down and discuss how to move forward and put country first.

Dismissed any calls of Joe Lieberman being punished for campaigning against him.

The last issue is the biggie, causing so much outrage throughout the blogosphere right now. Obama said he was going to give us change, and he has. I wish some in the blogosphere would learn to accept that, instead of acting like the person who just murdered a family member was acquitted.

And if they have trouble listening to me, then listen to what Bob Cesca has to say on it – hitting on another point:

With Begich's victory, the Democratic caucus has grown to 58. With Franken and Martin, we could hit 60. Filibuster proof -- at least on paper. But imagine if the Democrats had voted to ejector-seat Lieberman from his chairmanship, and he had stormed off to the Republicans, as he had threatened.

The Begich win would've been nullified in terms of the caucus head-count. One step back to 57. Even if Martin and Franken both win, we would've been stuck at 59.

At 9:00 PM:

Senator Barack Obama : 33.29%
Senator John Edwards : 32.11%
Senator Hillary Clinton : 31.71%
Governor Bill Richardson : 1.74%
Senator Joe Biden : 1.03%
Senator Chris Dodd : 0.07%
Uncommitted : 0.05%
Precincts Reporting: 659 of 1781

Via the Iowa Democratic Party Caucus

Can't get much closer than that!

REPUBLICANS

All news networks have called it for Huckaboner. This guy will be fun to beat hehe.

From

Raw Story

Landmark hate crimes legislation passes
House

09/14/2005 @ 5:36 pm

 In an unexpected 223-199 vote, the House of Representatives passed
sweeping hate crimes legislation Wednesday, including protections for
minorities and gays who are the subject of hate crimes.

The bill, authored by Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), was a rider on another
bill -- the Child Safety Act. Thirty moderate Republicans joined the
Democratic caucus in supporting the amendment; the bill now goes to the
Senate, where its fate is uncertain.

Conyers was elated about the measure's passage.

"The passage of this legislation is an historic event that has its basis
in the anti-lynching efforts of the 1930's," the Michigan Democrat told RAW
STORY. "This has truly been a bipartisan effort that was year in the
making."

Conyers said it was the first criminal law-based civil rights legislation
to pass in decades.

In 2003, the most recent data available, law enforcement agencies
identified 9,100 victims arising from 8,715 separate criminal bias-based
offenses. Reporting by law enforcement is voluntary and it is widely
believed that hate crimes are seriously under-reported.

Current law limits federal jurisdiction over hate crimes to incidents
against protected classes that occur only during the exercise of federally
protected activities, such as voting. Such statutes do not permit federal
involvement in a range of cases where crimes are motivated by bias against
the victim's perceived sexual orientation, gender, disability or gender
identity.