Federal law makes it a crime for anyone “who directly or indirectly, promises any employment, position, compensation, contract, appointment, or any other benefit” to someone else “as consideration, favor, or reward for any political activity or for the support of or opposition to any candidate or any political party in connection with any general or special election to any political office.” It is also illegal for a government official to use “his official authority for the purpose of interfering with, or affecting, the nomination or the election of any candidate” for Senate.And Bauer hides behind their obvious trick of doing it indirectly. The White House did not contact Sestak... But had Clinton do it. Doesn't matter. it was a bribe. And besides, everyone does it - breaks this law. In Bauer's words:
There have been numerous, reported instances in the past when prior Administrations -- both Democratic and Republican, and motivated by the same goals -- discussed alternative paths to service for qualified individuals also considering campaigns for public officeAnd it is Bauer's job - after admitting guilt - to say that the illegal is legal, so he does. OK, lapdogs, NY TImes, WA Post, all of you. Others chased out the scandal. Just report on it. Not on an obscure blog, but on the front page. Ask some questions.
Elena Kagan, President Barack Obama’s choice to replace retiring Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens on the Supreme Court, is best known for moving Harvard Law School away from the 100-year old “case-law method” of legal study. But in the process, critics say, she moved the nation’s premier law school away from requiring the study of U.S. constitutional law towards the study of the laws of foreign nations and international law. As dean, Kagan won approval from the faculty in 2006 to make major changes to the Harvard Law's curriculum. “My understanding is that she instituted three new courses to the required curriculum and, in so doing, got rid of a requirement to take constitutional law,” Robert Alt, senior legal fellow and deputy director of the Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at the Heritage Foundation, told CNSNews.com. “Currently, at Harvard, constitutional law is not required for first-year law students, or even for graduation,” Alt added. ...
"The central finding of this paper is that positive shocks to the seniority of a state's congressional delegation cause large and persistent increases in government allocated funding to the states, and significant retrenchment on the part of the corporations headquartered in the state. This retrenchment appears to be a response to the large and persistent increase in federal funding that the state receives following the shock. Following the appointment of a senator to the chair of a powerful committee, we estimate that his state experiences, on average, a 40-50 percent increase in its share of congressional earmark spending, and a 9-10 percent increase in its share of total state-level government transfers. At the same time, firms residing in the state cut their capital expenditures by 8-15 percent, reduce R&D by 7-12 percent, and increase payout by 4-13 percent. Employment and sales growth are also impacted, as corporations scale back employment growth by 3-15%, and sales growth falls by up to 15%."Via Wash Policy Council
The Tourism Board of Mexico took out a two-page ad the weekend of May 23 that threatens the people of Arizona. The ad shows a soldier in a camouflage hemet looking through binoculars and says:In Sonora we are looking for people from Arizona.Is it reasonable to conclude that they are giving the same message that their President Calderone gave to Congress last week? He said Arizona has no business enforcing US immigration laws. And Democratics stood and cheered. Salon
The Mexican authorities must act to halt the continuing abuse of migrants who are preyed on by criminal gangs while public officials turn a blind eye or even play an active part in kidnappings, rapes and murders, Amnesty International said in a new report released on Tuesday. Invisible Victims: Migrants on the Move in Mexico, documents the alarming levels of abuse faced by the tens of thousands of Central American irregular migrants that every year attempt to reach the US by crossing Mexico. "Migrants in Mexico are facing a major human rights crisis leaving them with virtually no access to justice, fearing reprisals and deportation if they complain of abuses," said Rupert Knox, Mexico Researcher at Amnesty International. "Persistent failure by the authorities to tackle abuses carried out against irregular migrants has made their journey through Mexico one of the most dangerous in the world." Kidnappings of migrants, mainly for ransom, reached new heights in 2009, with the National Human Rights Commission (CNDH) reporting that nearly 10,000 were abducted over six months and almost half of interviewed victims saying that public officials were involved in their kidnapping. An estimated six out of 10 migrant women and girls experience sexual violence, allegedly prompting some people smugglers to demand that women receive contraceptive injections ahead of the journey, to avoid them falling pregnant as a result of rape. On 23 January 2010, armed police stopped a freight train carrying over 100 migrants in Chiapas State, southern Mexico. Veronica (not her real name) said that Federal Police forced her and the other migrants to leave the train and lie face down on the ground, before stealing their belongings and threatening to kill them unless they continued their journey by foot along the railway....
The Debate, sponsored by UW Law School, Federalist Society and other groups 4:30 pm Thursday May 27 Room 138 of William H. Gates Hall at U of Washington Law School This is mentioned in a post on the developments this week in the court battle at Cato@Liberty Blog. The Seattle Times also.ON A DIFFERENT TOPIC the night before:
Shapiro will speak about Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan. 6:30 pm Wednesday May 26 Washington Athletic Club, sponsored by Puget Sound Federalist Society Lawyers Chapter Cost $25 - Registration required - Contact Michael Bindas (206) 341-9300 mbindas AT ij.org Posted on the Sound Politics Public Calendar
An investigation that found thousands of dollars in unauthorized purchases of clothing, gold coins, flat-screen televisions, gym memberships and college tuition payments by employees of the Federal Protective Services using government purchase cards has resulted in no disciplinary action. Twenty-one FPS employees took advantage of an 18-month transition period during which the security agency was moved from the General Services Administration to the Department of Homeland Security "to loot GSA resources by purchasing unauthorized goods," according to the GSA's office of inspector general. Investigative documents obtained by The Washington Times through a Freedom of Information Act request said the California-based FPS employees used the government cards to buy, among other things, $17,000 in suits at Macy's and the Men's Wearhouse, $15,000 in gold and silver coins, $60,000 in tuition payments and professional memberships, and $8,000 in gym memberships in 2003 and 2004. The FPS employees, who are responsible for securing federal buildings, also used expense vouchers to get reimbursements for more than $9,000 in clothing, including an $800 tuxedo. Investigators said employees with the security force bought the questionable items but concealed them by not entering them into the government computer system known as "Pegasys," which processes and reconciles financial transactions. The purchases were the subject of an investigation by the inspector general's office that spanned five years. In September, investigators closed the case and noted that of the 21 employees involved in making the inappropriate purchases, three resigned and four retired. Five employees faced a possible reprimand and no action had been taken against nine others.Our Senator Patty Murray is protecting these people, because they are her kind of people. Not us.
Date: March 11, 2008
"... [r]eal solutions to fix our broken borders cannot wait that long. Human and drug smuggling rings continue to thrive in Arizona, crossing our border and using our cities as major hubs to transport crosser throughout the country. While we wait for real progress on the "virtual fence," border communities in Arizona will continue to be strained by the millions of dollars in costs they must absorb due to the state of border security." .... Yours very truly, Janet Napolitano GovernorGreta at Fox News comments: In reading the above letter, would you not think DHS Napolitano would be Arizona's biggest champion in Washington? Would you not think she, of all people, would understand the frustration in Arizona? Don't you think she would be pushing her boss, President Obama, to help Arizona? and get President Obama to push Congress to help this state? Instead DHS Napolitano had to recently embarrassingly admit that she did not read the Arizona illegal immigration law. And before you get all whooped up about whether the Arizona statute is constitutional or not, that is not the issue. The statute is a cry for help and the current fight over it a distraction. The issue is the FAILURE of the federal government to help the STATE of ARIZONA. The statue, while probably unconstitutional for trying to set immigration policy in contravention of our Constitution, is a cry for help -- one that has been utterly ignore. [PS if you think that is the ONLY letter we have from then Gov Napolitano, you are dead wrong. I just finished studying a bunch of her letters pleading the case for Arizona when she was Governor. Tune in tonight to ON THE RECORD at 10pm.]
... The truth is the public option is alive and well, residing in Section 1334, pages 97-100, of the new health care law. That section gives the U.S. Office of Personnel Management — which presently manages the federal civil service — new responsibilities: establishing and running two entirely new government health insurance programs to compete directly with private insurance companies in every state with coverage for people outside of government. Quoting the new law, former OPM director Donald Devine notes that it makes the OPM boss a health care czar, with power to set “‘profit margin premiums and other such terms and conditions of coverage as are in the interest of enrollees in such plans.’ That’s open-ended. You can do anything.” Dan Blair, another former OPM director, calls the new program “nothing but a placeholder for the public option.” Indeed, the OPM head is also given the authority to “appoint as many employees” as needed to run the program, and to spend “such sums as may be necessary” to establish and administer it.And Boss Pelosi promised to be open and transparent....
As with so much else, Obama and the Democrats did this behind closed doors. They held no public hearings on it and invited no public testimony to estimate its costs or explain its effect on OPM in its traditional role of managing the civil service.Update 5/21: A reader at Sound Politics provided the list of all the tax increases in ObamaCare passed in March (not sourced; unconfirmed):
A 40% tax on health insurance plans exceeding determined levels. Those levels are projected for 2013 to be $8,500 for self only and $23,000 for any other level. An increase from 10% to 20% on taxes of money in a health savings account not used for qualified medical expenses. For Archer medical savings accounts, an increase from 15% to 20%. A $50,000 tax on hospital organizations, which fail to meet described quality requirements. A fee based upon the sales of pharmaceutical companies in relation to the total sale of such pharmaceutical products to the public. Medical device manufacturers must pay a fee in relation to the sales of their product in the marketplace and the total sales of devices. A fee applied to all health insurance providers based upon net premiums and any third party fees associated with the administration of those programs. High income tax payers, making on a joint return over $250,000 and a standard return over $200,000, are required to pay an additional 0.5% of wages. This applies to both self-employed, and regularly employed individuals. A 1% tax increase for individuals making between $350,000 and $500,000. A 1.5% tax increase for individuals making between $500,000 and $1 million. A 5.4% increase for individuals making more than $1 million. A tax of 5% is levied upon the am mount paid for any cosmetic surgery. This does not include the need for such surgeries created by trauma or a disfiguring disease. If the tax is not collected by that professional completing the procedure, their business is still liable for the requirement.
Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Joe Lieberman, I-Conn., have managed to write a cap-and-trade energy bill that should be greeted with guffaws from both believers and skeptics of man-made global warming. At a cost of billions of dollars and millions of jobs across America, the proposal would produce virtually no reduction in global temperatures even after being in force for decades. Using the MAGICC/SCENGEN climate model originally developed for the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and assuming no other nation adopts the same measure, climate researcher Paul Knappenberger found that Kerry-Lieberman would reduce the average global temperature 0.077 degrees Fahrenheit by 2050, compared with what it would be if the bill were not adopted. That is one-fifth of one degree, which, as Knappenberger notes on the MasterResource blog, is a "scientifically meaningless reduction." One problem for Kerry-Lieberman is that China, India and the rest of the developing world show no inclination to join the United States to achieve carbon emissions reductions of 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020, 42 percent below by 2030, and 83 percent below by 2050. If anything, China is headed rapidly in the opposite direction, building hundreds of new coal-fired power plants in recent years and generating two-thirds of its electricity from the most emissions-intense fuel. China gives lip service to carbon reduction, to be sure, but it keeps building new power plants. China is also moving aggressively to increase its access to oil and natural gas, striking deals recently with Venezuela and Cuba, with the latter for exploration and production in the Gulf of Mexico. The other problem for Kerry-Lieberman is that its minuscule temperature reduction comes at immense cost. The Heritage Foundation's Center for Data Analysis found in an econometric model analysis that between 2012 and 2035, 1.1 million more jobs would be lost than would be the case without the measure's adoption. Just in the first decade, unemployment would increase by .5 percent, according to the Brookings Institution. Even after accounting for the creation of "green jobs," a study for the National Black Chamber of Commerce projected a loss of as many as 2.7 million jobs by 2030. In addition, gas prices at the pump and monthly utility bills for electricity would, in President Obama's own words, "necessarily skyrocket," while the cost of all manufactured and agricultural products would also rise sharply. Such costs with essentially no return is a bad joke, but neither global warming proponents nor skeptics are laughing. ...
Racing to secure financial aid and avoid a debt default, the Greek government has agreed to austerity measures totaling 24 billion euros (about $32 billion) that will include cutting some workers’ pay and some public sector jobs as well as opening up parts of the economy, Greek officials said Friday. A letter of intent with the International Monetary Fund was mostly complete, according to one government official, who declined to be identified because of the confidential nature of the discussions. A deal could be announced by Sunday, this official said.The letter of intent is "The Plan." Look what The Plan includes:
Another reform high on the list is removing the state from the marketplace in crucial sectors like health care, transportation and energy and allowing private investment. Economists say that the liberalization of trucking routes — where a trucking license can cost up to $90,000 — and the health care industry would help bring down prices in these areas, which are among the highest in Europe.Yes. Cut out Greece's ObamaCare. The New York Times reports it. Must be unsupervised reporters. At the very same time Obama is pushing hard and fast to get the US to emulate Greece. More government in everything. More jobs for unions. Government control of health care aka ObamaCare. We can see where that leads. Greece is broke. Obama is taking us to the same desperate situation. Via IBD
In the speculation about whether Gov. Chris Gregoire may be headed to Washington, D.C. at some point in the near future (to replace Elena Kagan as Solicitor General, so the rumor goes), it’s useful to analyze who benefits from such speculation. As the GOP’s former party chairman Chris Vance alludes, the woman who most benefits from all this is not Gregoire, it’s Patty Murray. Point 1: Citing unnamed sources inside Washington’s congressional delegation, National Journal blew up the story on Hotline. Perhaps the Democratic White House and Congressional grapevines are closer than most imagine, in which case Hotline’s source could be any Democratic aide in Congress. But, if Gregoire were in line for a high-level slot in the Administration, such as Solicitor General, that would likely need Senate-approval. Which makes it more likely that if the Congressional aide learned about Gregoire being on a “short list” not by chance but in the normal course of Congressional business, the staffer is on the Senate side. Point 2: The first “whispers” reportedly came from Olympia, at least according to Political Buzz. So it could be this is all the result of a chatty press corps, wanting to drum up headlines to sell more papers and fill blog space. This does seem to be where the rumor started smoldering before catching fire in the National Journal. From the Tacoma News Tribune: “And why not combine the spring’s most-played political parlor game with this one. Would Dino Rossi stop considering a run for the U.S. Senate and start wrestling with yet-another run for governor? Would the state have to delay the filing period to give him more time to decide?” [end quote] Point 3: Democratic Party Chair Dwight Pelz doesn’t seem to bothered by this all. Pelz’s comms shop even tweeted a helpful “timeline for picking a replacement” for Gregoire, followed by a tweet with a comment from Pelz that he was pretty sure “[Rossi]‘d rather be Governor than Senator.” For a Party Chair who is likely to be on defense in so many races as it is, to have such eagerness for Gregoire potentially leaving town, may bespeak an ulterior motive (or a masochistic personality). Maybe Pelz is indeed eager to try his hand at playing Kingmaker? ... So, who then ultimately is fueling from [sic] all this speculation — and who benefits the most? On both counts, it’s probably one very nervous U.S. Senator, who doesn’t want the Republican’s top recruit, two-time Gregoire challenger Dino Rossi, getting into the race against her. Recall, a source, most likely from the Senate side, leaked the information. The State Party Chair is either eager for a primary battle, thinks he can play Kingmaker, or is faithfully following the Senator’s song sheet.
... But Rotunda, who is now a law professor at Chapman University Law School in Southern California, said Kagan did something more than simply disagree with the military over its policy regarding homosexuals -- she refused to follow the law, which required her make room for military recruiters. “(I)t wasn’t just a policy – it was a federal law,” Rotunda said. “And when she disagreed with federal law, she just simply decided not to follow it. ...The case went to the Supreme Court. How did Dean Kagan fare there? First, she admitted guilt:
Kagan acknowledged in her legal brief that she was deliberately ignoring the fact that the law was in effect..And she lost big:
And the Supreme Court unanimously found that the law was constitutional, and there was no reason to keep recruiters off of law school grounds." ... In a unanimous, 9-0 decision, the Supreme Court ruled that the Solomon Amendment was constitutional, and was enforceable on universities that received federal funds.Why give a life-time appointment to someone who follows the law only when she finds it convenient?
A strong majority of Americans support Arizona's controversial new immigration law and would back similar laws in their own states, a new McClatchy-Ipsos poll found. Sixty-one percent of Americans — and 64 percent of registered voters — said they favored the law in a survey of 1,016 adults conducted May 6-9. Strikingly, nearly half of Democrats like the law, under which local law enforcement officers are tasked with verifying people's immigration status if they suspect them of being in the country illegally. While the Democratic Party generally is regarded as more sympathetic to illegal immigrants' plights, 46 percent of Democrats said they favored the law for Arizona and 49 percent said they'd favor the law's passage in their own states. More than 8 in 10 Republicans and 54 percent of independents favor the law. In addition, about 69 percent of Americans said they wouldn't mind if police officers stopped them to ask for proof of their citizenship or legal rights to be in the country; about 29 percent would mind, considering it a violation of their rights; and about 3 percent were unsure. ...Did you notice? Nearly half of Democrats support the law. And Pew Research Center for the People & the Press:
Fully 73% say they approve of requiring people to produce documents verifying their legal status if police ask for them. Two-thirds (67%) approve of allowing police to detain anyone who cannot verify their legal status, while 62% approve of allowing police to question people they think may be in the country illegally. After being asked about the law's provisions, 59% say that, considering everything, they approve of Arizona's new illegal immigration law while 32% disapprove. ...
AT&T on Friday said it will record a $1 billion non-cash expense in the first quarter related to the newly passed health-care law, joining a growing list of large U.S. companies. The AT&T (T 25.62, -0.02, -0.08%) write-down is the largest reported so far. Caterpillar (CAT 67.78, +1.71, +2.59%) this week recorded a $100 million charge in the first quarter and Deere & Co. (DE 60.69, +1.23, +2.07%) said it will report a one-time $150 million expense. See previous story on industries that say warn health reform will cost them. Yet companies that still offer retiree drug benefits, mostly older industrial concerns or those with unionized employees, say the end of the deduction could force them to alter their benefit plans. In other words, they might curtail or even cancel them. "As a result of this legislation, including the additional tax burden, AT&T will be evaluating prospective changes to the active and retiree health care benefits offered by the company," AT&T said in a filing with the government on Friday.Jeffrey Anderson in Weekly Standard says that strong negative public opinion makes repeal possible:
[Opposition] has risen to 19 points (56 to 37) -- and to 28 points among independents (60 to 32 percent). Independents actually favor repeal by more than Democrats oppose it (34 percent of Democrats support repeal, while 58 percent oppose it).
The budget pays for current programs by diverting money from long-term investments like water treatment and contributions to state employee pension funds. It relies on one-time federal money and on college tuition increases too large to be repeated indefinitely. It is a budget that keeps most programs alive and most state workers employed, while taking the least possible responsibility for the long term. Budgeting this way is a failure of leadership — of the governor and of House Speaker Frank Chopp, D-Seattle; Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, D-Spokane; Senate Ways & Means Chair Margarita Prentice, D-Renton, and others. In the Senate majority caucus only Rodney Tom, D-Medina and vice chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, opposed this budget. The budget is carried on the backs of the people, who are in the same recession the state is. We had our own burdens to carry. We have had to adjust, to reset our plans. The state, for the most part, has not. Officials talked about abolishing boards and commissions, and legislators zapped a few ones you've never heard of. But they didn't have the courage even to get rid of the state liquor stores. State agencies could have rid themselves of staff people — planners, office assistants and redundant managers. For the most part, they have not. The governor could have forced the reopening of state employee contracts, so that state employees would pay more than 12 percent of their health-insurance premiums — a share more like what private employees pay. There was a way to do this. The Legislature has just saddled the private sector with a tax increase of $800 million a year. ...Christine Gregoire had the chance to provide the tough leadership to tackle the real problems. But she chose not to, or could not. She just pushed the mess onto next year, even though it is still her problem then. And she will have to work with the Republicans next year! Update: Christine Gregoire's approval rating is 35% at Survey USA.
Who’s in charge in this mess? Nobody except the Mandarins! Look below at the last map released by the British Met Office. As you can see, no ashes over the UK. So why the airplanes cannot fly?Third, NY Times has a detailed map and the impact for each airport. This is Saturday's situation and it's much worse than Friday. New York Times Fourth, BBC has some maps.
May 7, 2010 Update
FlightGlobal has a news summary pageAnd current maps
* * Live WebCam of Eyjafjallajökull that is heat sensitive * * * At Schipol Airport in Amsterdam they are giving delayed passengers a very enthusiastic welcome. *... The male workers spoke of lines that, at times, snake out of the restroom areas. "Sometimes, there's a waiting line, and the waiting line isn't insignificant," Tom McCarty [President of SPEEA, the engineers' union] said. Female employees reportedly have not faced a similar problem, likely because fewer women work at the plant, he said. McCarty said he requested a meeting with local Boeing officials, who initially agreed, but pushed back the sessions to a point where the groups never were able to get together. Boeing Charleston spokeswoman Candy Eslinger would not disclose the number of bathrooms on site, saying only that the facilities met local building code requirements. ...I was just listening to an interview of P. J. O'Rourke on the radio... This is news, not humor.
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But that doesn't suddenly equate to support for the legislation now being considered by the Senate. In exactly the same way that the public wanted healthcare reform, just not Obama's healthcare reform, they want something done to punish the perpetrators of the financial meltdown, but not at the expense of their own checking accounts -- or American economic freedom. The dirty secret of the Senate financial reform bill is that some of its biggest supporters work on Wall Street. Recipients of taxpayer bailout money have no concerns about the bill -- in fact, the CEOs of Citi and Goldman Sachs have publicly endorsed it, and several of the other big banks have expressed support. It keeps the "too big to fail" guarantees in place for another generation of financial services companies. But here's where it gets really interesting. The Democrats supporting the current legislation have assured an anxious electorate that whatever funds are used to create whatever regulatory scheme created will come from the banks, not the taxpayers. Let me emphasize that so that even casual readers will catch it: the Democrats promise that you won't pay for their legislation, banks will. Really? Since when have corporations ever paid taxes, fees or penalties? Employees end up paying in the form of lower salaries and benefits. Customers end up paying in the form of higher costs. And in this case, every account holder will be forced to pay higher fees on their checking account and savings account. That's you, my friendly reader.
