And today we have the Speaker of the House, John Boehner, calling on Anthony Weiner to step down. This would be the same John Boehner, who had prior knowledge of Mark Foley's activities and ignored it. This is the man, who decided to ignore someone trying to prey on children because of politics.
How can he call himself a man, much less a Christian or a leader?
If you ask Republicans around the country, they'll probably tell you that Tuesday's election results were all about pushing back against excessive government spending. Problem is, they may have forgotten to elect anyone who's actually planning on real budget cuts.
Rep. John Boehner, presumptively the next Speaker of the House and a longtime rhetorical foe of earmark spending in its present form, told a Fox News host on Thursday that the proposed ban on congressional earmarks he'd been talking up was officially off the table.
An article appearing in today’s Dayton Daily News, as well as a bunch of other local newspapers in Ohio’s 8th, has me laughing:
As John Boehner’s political star rises quickly toward a likely term as Speaker of the House, his constituents in the 8th District may wonder how the job has affected others who have held it.
The past two Republican Speakers of the House represented their home districts well, according to newspaper editors within the representatives’ respective districts.
Dennis “Denny” Hastert, R-Illinois, had a constant presence in his district before, during and after he was the 59th Speaker of the House of Representatives.
John Russell, associate news editor with the Beacon-News in Aurora, Ill., said Hastert hung out at local barber and coffee shops, and, as an antique car enthusiast, hung out at auto shops.
One of the largest complaints about Boehner, one that is shared amongst Democrats and Republicans alike that he represents, is that he doesn’t do enough in this district and is never around. Do they really think that will change now? Boehner avoids this are like the plague. As matter of fact when Boehner was asked about what he has done for his district he couldn’t even name five things. That’s horrible given the number of years he has served.
Following up on my previous post, I want to point out that Boehner’s only position I have seen so far this election cycle is one of self. All we hear him say is “I could be the next Speaker of the House”. People around here already talk about how little Boehner does for his district and now we have him giving proof of that. He expects us to vote for him so he can advance his own political agenda? I think not. It’s time for the people of OH-08 to send one of the most worthless members of Congress packing. I would take Dick Cheney as my representative over do-nothing John.
Last night I noticed something rather interesting. Before the breaking news email alerts went out of the suspected “shoe bombing” aboard United Flight 663 the right side of the blogosphere jumped into action. It was like watching a seed turn into a tree in some cartoon where they put some sort of Acme Super Grow on it. Blog posts just bloomed on the right instantly over what turned out to be a very bad joke.
Compare that to two other big stories this week involving separate cases of men being arrested for threatening to kill sitting members of Congress, including the Speaker of the House. There has not been a peep out of the right side of the blogosphere in regards to these stories. I mean not one. I have searched and can’t find a single mention despite these stories getting some big press time nationally. Talk about one organized noise machine.
Remember all the rage from the right a couple of months ago when Nancy Pelosi aid the CIA mislead Congress? Well according to the head of the CIA, Pelosi may have just been telling the truth:
The director of the Central Intelligence Agency, Leon E. Panetta, has told the House Intelligence Committee in closed-door testimony that the C.I.A. concealed “significant actions” from Congress from 2001 until late last month, seven Democratic committee members said.
Now this adds a new layer to the outrage manufactured y the right over Pelosi’s comments. They twisted what she said and made it out that she was accusing the CIA of lying to Congress, a violation of law. Of course this was something that Republican members of Congress had also done in the past, including the top Republican on the intelligence committee and the minority leader.
So why did the Republicans get into such an uproar over Pelosi’s comments? Sure it could be in part that they saw blood and a way to go after the Speaker of the House, but could there be another reason given this admission by Panetta? Perhaps the Republicans knew that this was happening under the Bush administration and figured they better pull the old “slight of hand” move so that no one would look at the legal issues raised by the Bush CIA. This is even more plausible when you look at the two Republicans who lead the charge against Pelosi – the very two who made the same claims as Pelosi in the past.
CQ Politics has an article up worthy of a full read. In short, the NSA was listening in on an Israel operative, with court approval. During these intercepts, a call from Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) is picked up. Its reported that Harman said she would lobby the Justice Department to reduce charges against an Israeli charged with espionage in exchange for support of Nancy Pelosi to become the Speaker of the House. Then Gonzales got into the action and stopped the taps, because he needed Harman to defend the warrantless wiretapping program – which she did.
This story will be going radioactive today.
The Republicans have been going ape shit over a post of Judicial Watch showing that Nancy Pelosi uses military aircraft to fly around the country. Coming to the defense of Pelosi, out of all places, is ABC:
The treasure trove of documents obtained by Judicial Watch from the Department of Defense regarding Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi's use of military aircraft doesn't seem to prove the organization's allegation that Pelosi has made "unprecedented demands" for the flights.
In fact, it appears that Pelosi uses military aircraft less often than her predecessor, former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert.
The documents cover the period from January 2007 to November 2008 and show that Pelosi made the equivalent of 20 round-trips between Washington (Andrews Air Force Base) and San Francisco. That's an average of less than one round-trip per month. In contrast, former Speaker Hastert traveled home to his Illinois district virtually every weekend and, his former aides tell ABC News, he would almost always travel on military aircraft. Like Hastert, Pelosi also occasionally leads Congressional delegations on foreign trips (the documents show six foreign trips: one to Asia, three to the Middle East and two to Europe).
Nothing new here, but it does merit mentioning:
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi boldly defended a move to add birth control funding to the new economic "stimulus" package, claiming "contraception will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government."
Pelosi, the mother of 5 children and 6 grandchildren, who once said, "Nothing in my life will ever, ever compare to being a mom," seemed to imply babies are somehow a burden on the treasury.
The revelation came during an exchange Sunday morning on ABC's THIS WEEK.
First things first. When people are stuck at home then they find things to do at home. At the top of that list is sex. The last thing we need is a baby boom coming out of this economy.
Drudge also seems to think that babies aren’t a burden on our treasury. If that is the case then can someone tell me how schools get funded? Does the magic school fairy sprinkle money all over them? And that’s not even mentioning the people who have babies they can’t afford. Should we let this new life go just because their parents are in economic hard times? If the answer is no, then who pays for it? The government in the form of welfare.
Finally I need to give a big kudos to Pelosi. Drudge probably doesn’t even realize how much he helped her, but read this line again:
Pelosi, the mother of 5 children and 6 grandchildren, who once said, "Nothing in my life will ever, ever compare to being a mom," seemed to imply babies are somehow a burden on the treasury.
The Wall Street Journal published this little gem:
The Logan Act makes it a felony and provides for a prison sentence of up to three years for any American, "without authority of the United States," to communicate with a foreign government in an effort to influence that government's behavior on any "disputes or controversies with the United States."
Of course when they published it, they were talking about Nancy Pelosi going to Syria. Why isn't the WSJ raising the same legal concerns about John McCain? He has sent a "delegation" there and been talking to the Georgian President on a daily basis. Instead the WSJ decides to give McCain a platform to further promote his propaganda.
Last I checked the Speaker of the House was higher up the chain of command than a Senator from Arizona, or did Bush executive order out that part of the Constitution also?
Dennis Kucinich filed 35 articles of impeachment against George W. Bush last night:
Rep. Dennis Kucinich, a former Democratic presidential contender, said Monday he wants the House to consider a resolution to impeach President Bush.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi consistently has said impeachment was "off the table."
Kucinich, D-Ohio, read his proposed impeachment language in a floor speech. He contended Bush deceived the nation and violated his oath of office in leading the country into the Iraq war.
This AP article, which is written more like some high school lecture notes, is interesting. This isn't the only place I had seen the reminder of Pelosi's "impeachment of the table" comment last night. Malkin even brought that up:
Will Pelosi’s pledge to keep impeachment “off the table” hold?
I would have to say Pelosi was speaking for herself. I highly doubt the Speaker of the House was telling all members of Congress what resolutions they were allowed/not allowed to introduce. Also, wasn't this statement made by Pelosi way before we had a former White House official saying the President deceived this country into war? Those new revelations should make all Pelosi's previous commments null and void.
Speaking of Scott McClellan and Michelle Malkin, on the same post Malkin posts an update at 9:35pm EST, saying that Robert Wexler is trying to get McClellan to testify before the House Judiciary Committee. Perhaps Malkin should turn off FOX news every once in awhile, because an hour before this "update", Scott was on Countdown telling Keith he would be testifying. Here's the clip from that interview:
That's the day Dennis Kucinich is planning on introducing articles of impeachment against Bush. He is also going after Pelosi:
He also fired a volley at House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California who has maintained that impeaching Mr. Bush is not on the table for Congressional Democrats. “If impeachment is off the table,” Mr. Kucinich said, “truth is off the table. If truth is off the table then this body is living a lie.”
AMEN! Impeachment, or the threat of, is one of the core principals of checks and balances and by Pelosi saying "it's off the table", she is, in effect, saying that checks and balances are off the table. This shows Pelosi is not up to the job of being Speaker of the House.
Look who is calling it quits now:
Illinois Representative and former Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert will not seek re-election, CQ.com reports. GOP sources tell CQ that a formal announcement will be made at a press conference scheduled this Friday.
Maybe it is time to start a blog called "Good-bye Asshole" where we can send parting messages to people leaving Washington.
Everyone has been blasting Pelosi for going to Syria, but there has been no critisism of Republicans doing the same. Today, Rep Darrell Issa (R-CA) is in Syria meeting with Damascus. Now Boehner is giving the Republican excuse of why Democrats can't go to Syria:
Boehner declined to criticize [fellow Republican Rep. David Hobson] for joining Pelosi, saying her stature gave the visit an imprimatur it didn’t deserve.
“It’s one thing for other members to go,†Boehner said, “but you have to ask yourself, ‘Why is Pelosi going?’ She’s going for one reason and that is to embarrass the president. She is the speaker of the House. She’s giving (the Syrian) government more credit than they deserve. They sponsor terrorism. They have not been at all helpful. I wish she wasn’t there.â€
There you got it - the old Republican double standard. Boehner showed his true colors. He believes that Republicans should have the only say in our government and Democrats shouldn't. John Boehner has once again proven his hatred for democracy.
Heard about this "Pelosi wants a military jet" crap going on? Well Josh is all over it:
Below we noted that the Washington Times story about Nancy Pelosi's demand for a military aircraft for travel back to her district appears to be a crock. According to Thinkprogress and reporting in Roll Call, former Speaker Denny Hastert used a military plane for travel to history district. But the plane he used couldn't carry enough fuel to fly nonstop across the country.
A Pelosi aide told Roll Call: "The Air Force determined that [Pelosi’s] safety would be best ensured by using a plane that has the fuel capacity to go coast-to-coast. All we’re asking for is what Hastert had."
So this seems to be the issue: a military aircraft for the Speaker has been the rule since 9/11. But a larger plane is needed for Pelosi since she flies back and forth to California, not Illinois.
I can fully understand having the Speaker of the House being granted this kind of security after 9/11. I knew Hastert had it and never complained. The Speaker is 3rd in line for the Presidency and it would be a good idea to make sure they are safe. What gets me is how this is now an issue because Pelosi wants it they want Pelosi to have it.
Of course there have been other similar issues that have not received this amount of attention. Here is one from last year:
It would seem the Secretary of Health & Human Services (HHS), Michael Leavitt, has been using a GulfStream 3 jet that belongs to the Centers for Disease Control for his own private agenda.
