Election 2006

Lieberman swore up and down during his campaign that he would not switch parties. Now he isn't sounding so sure. Editor and Publisher has a preview of an article slated for tomorrow's Time magazine:

"Independent" Sen. Joe Liebeman receives a mini-profile titled "What Joe Wants," a key question since he is "the Senate's one-man tipping point." Republicans, the magazine says, are "courting him" and Lieberman "has been indulging in some fairly immodest political footsie."

Lieberman calls jumping to the Republican side, and tilting the Senate, "a remote possibility," which means there's at least a chance of that. Time seems to push Lieberman in this direction, as the article concludes: "Lieberman's GOP flirtation has its risks--and a time limit....The longer he waits to capitalize on his moment, the greater the danger that he'll be tagged as one of those politicians for whom having power is more important than using it."

You know what Joe, you two faced fuck - Go for it. The Senate is basically ineffective as it is. So the Democrats are in the minority, so what? They can filibuster. The Republicans proved that can still happen. But wait until 2008. There are a lot of Republican seats up for grabs and the possibility of the Democratic majority growing is very high. After that happens then what? Will you switch back to being a Democrat/Independent? I wouldn't doubt it because you have no morals. You are a scam that cares nothing about the people of Connecticut, or this country. You care only about yourself.

I am so fed up with his bullshit, and I hope the Democrats call him on it. If I were Harry Reid I would remove him from his committees and say "go for it". Principal is more important than majority. Joe has none, but I believe the Democratic leadership has some. Tell this two-faced, whiney, self-righteous, back stabbing, bastard to take a hike. Let him answer to his constituents then.

Oh and hey Joe - Whatever happened to your "website hack"? I have been watching for charges on it. Oh yeah - it was more of your self centered bullshit. You were to tight to pay for actual hosting and overloaded a server. You used that as an excuse to attack your competition. Boy I bet God has a nice place in Hell for a habitual liar like you!

A classic moment brought to you by TPMmuckraker

I wonder how Goode felt shaking his hand. Will his racist side send him to the bathroom to scrub his hands clean? Would he have done the same if he was meeting Thomas Jefferson?

Cheney almost appears in pain swearing in all these new Democrats:

In the weeks leading up to last month's elections, there were tons of stories coming out of possible wrong-doing by mostly GOP candidates. Well now it seems that the FBI is playing catch up with investigations into these claims, and here is another one to add to the mix:

A federal investigation is underway after allegations surfaced against US Rep. Tim Murphy.

Sources tell KDKA federal agents have begun interviewing former Murphy staffers on whether they did political work for the congressman on government time.

Murphy denies the allegations.

"There's absolutely nothing and no staff has ever been ordered to say anything about voting or political, never," he told KDKA in November.

But while neither the FBI nor the U.S. Attorney's office will confirm or deny an investigation, the probe concerns just that.

Just think of how much more money our federal government would have if these politicans could follow the laws they are suppose to create. We need stiffer penalties put in place for congressmen who violate the laws - something similar to punishments for doctors who abuse their powers.

With the victory of Ciro Rodriguez in TX-23 last night, many have forgot who to really thank. I even forgot, but Kos reminded me. This is the sweet gift of one Tom Delay. His redistricting plan in Texas, which could still land him in jail, was a big winner for Democrats.

(Graphic courtesy of Swing State Project. Visit them for the bigger picture)

Of course the media is ignoring the fact that this year's Democratic victory was HUGE! Chris does a good job of reminding people about that. True the right wing blogosphere can only focus on the minor defeat of Ned Lamont. I guess we can let them gloat on that small fact, while they sit back and squirm in the minority these next 2 years.

Now that Democrats are looking towards larger scale ethics reform, I am sure many Republicans are glad they lost, while many who did win are still running scared.

Josh sums it up perfectly

One factor that helped push Democrats over the top last week was the campaign ads. The Republicans took to their typical negative campaign ads, as well as new stunts such as the automated robo-calls. This pissed off a lot of voters and they showed their dissatisfaction with these tactics at the polls.

Now we have a Democratic Congress and they are planning on putting their new found majority to work to help rid our democracy of these vile problems:

With their new power, Democratic leaders want to craft a constitutional way to stop voters from being flooded with robo-calls peddling deceptive information. They are floating the notion that authorizing calls with fraudulent content should be a crime. "These robo-calls, somehow, constitutionally, we are going to have to find some way to stop this," Reid said.

Schumer said he and Rep. Rahm Emanuel -- the boss of the House Democratic campaign committee, who is expected to be elected to a leadership spot today -- made a list of what they consider abusive campaign practices. In some cases, the volume of calls that went out to targeted likely Democratic voters was so heavy as to constitute harassment.

In other examples, the calls peddled disinformation -- whether about a candidate or the location of a polling place. Criticizing the robo-call dirty tricks, Schumer was blunt. "It's despicable" and the perps "should go to jail for 10 years."

Schumer said he and Emanuel are looking at legislation applying criminal penalties to certain kinds of campaigning and creation of a separate unit at the Justice Department to prosecute.

This is very good news for America as a whole. If a candidate can only run on smears, then they have nothing to offer. If they can only win by tricking voters or suppressing them, then they have already lost the battle.

We are supposed to be the definition of democracy, but we act like a third world nation. This step will be the first in many to put us back on the right track to becoming the beacon of democracy. Hopefully once this is done, the Democrats will start working on campaign finance reform, something I feel should be public, and problems with voting machines. There is a lot of work to do and only a couple of years until the next Presidential election, so the new Congress will have to get busy and not spend all their time off - something else this article addresses:

As of Wednesday, the House this year has met only 96 times -- and 23 of those days involved votes that did not happen until after 5:30 p.m. As a practical matter, many House members fly in late Tuesday and escape Thursday afternoon. The Senate was only a little better, scheduling votes on only 129 days. According to a study by Paul Blumenthal of the Sunlight Foundation, the last time Congress spent so little time in Washington was at the end of World War II.

[SNIP]

"We're going to work long hours," Reid declared Wednesday at a Christian Science Monitor breakfast, introducing his leadership team to reporters. That's Reid and Illinois Sen. Dick Durbin, the income majority whip/assistant majority leader; Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, conference secretary, and Sen. Charles Schumer of New York, in the newly created slot of vice chair of the conference, a reward for running the Senate Democratic political operation. "We're going to work more than Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday," Reid said.

Pelosi has been saying for months that she wants to increase the amount of time House members are in Washington. Evidence of that commitment will be clear when the previously light January will become weeks of workdays.

To put it nicely, the Republican controlled Congress was lazy. They spent a record number of days off and when they were in session, their legislation amounted to gifts to the corporations, ultra-wealthy, or deciding on the fate of a single woman (Terri Schiavo). To add insult to injury, they even gave themselves a raise. They used the American people. We were all victimized by the 109th session of Congress and we can not allow that to happen again.

If the Democrats want to secure their newly found majority, then these steps are definitely in the right direction. Let the people see that we have a Congress actually working for the people and not spending their time off on trips paid for by lobbyists. Let the news agencies have to change the story every couple of days instead of being stuck on the same one for weeks, something easily obtained by drastic and bold new moves in Congress. This will show the American people which party truly cares about them and wants to make America better for everyone, not just a few. Then perhaps the Republicans will learn and play catch up or be left out of the American political system. This is our country and we are now taking it back.

It looks like Bush is starting to get a real lonely feeling in the international community. Members of Tony Blair's own party are now starting to blast our incompetent President:

A senior Labour backbencher has attacked the Bush administration, describing it as "incompetent" and guilty of "appalling complacency."

Former minister of state Nick Raynsford's criticism comes during a period in which transatlantic relations are under strain across a range of issues from the Middle East to climate change.

In an interview with ePolitix.com Raynsford, who was in the government until last year's reshuffle, expressed his satisfaction that the Democrats won last week's

"It's absolutely right that the American people have expressed their concern over the situation in Iraq and about the Bush administration and I'm delighted that Democrats now have control of both houses," he said.

"I think that will result in a shift of attitude and there are many areas of American policy should be changed."

On the environment he expressed his anger at the Republicans for failing to sign up to measures on reducing carbon dioxide emissions.

Perhaps we can now mend our broken ties around the globe. Of course that has to be done at the expense of our President, a cost I am sure many won't complain about.

It is offical - Allen has just conceded. Burns concede earlier today also. We are now the offical majority in the Senate. I will give Allen credit as he could have demanded a re-count that would have dragged everything out for the next month and cost Va. taxpayers big time.

It is funny how the Republicans have held the balance of Senate undecided by Allen's wide loss, yet they are quick to jump on a win in OH-15, with over 20,000 votes still uncounted:

With 20,000 ballots still uncounted and her lead just 2,835 votes, Republican Rep. Deborah Pryce yesterday declared victory over Democrat Mary Jo Kilroy in their hard-fought race for Congress.

But Kilroy and her campaign manager said Pryce is premature. They think the uncounted votes in Democratic-leaning Franklin County will be enough to overcome the deficit and send Kilroy to Congress.

In unofficial figures released late yesterday by the Franklin County Board of Elections for the entire 15 th District, the Upper Arlington Republican had 100,343 votes and Kilroy had 97,508. Pryce, a seven-term incumbent, gained her margin in Union and Madison counties.

This race doesn't affect the balance of power in the House - that is long decided now. This is just another typical Republican wanting to make sure every vote doesn't count. This is also a Republican who helped cover up for Mark Foley. It will be interesting to see what happens with this.

(NOTE: John has returned from his cross country adventure so things are getting back to normal, and normal posting will resume.)

According to MSNBC via Raw Story, George Allen is to concede his race this afternoon at 3:00 pm est. This seals the deal on the Senate and we can move forward as a nation under a Democratic congress. Listen closely at 3:00 for the loud "ughhhh" coming from all the wingnuts.

We did an amazing job this year. Everyone worked their asses off to save this country from the grip of corrupt Republicans. Now we have to focus on the changes we want to make in order to bring this country back to being America and remove the piss stains from the Constitution that has been placed their by the GOP. Get ready because the next few months will be exciting.

 You Better Lawyer Up George W.

SFGATE:

House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi warned that a Republican victory Tuesday would prolong the U.S. involvement in Iraq another 10 years, as she embarked on a final push in a campaign that could make her speaker.

In an interview from her Capitol office, Pelosi characterized Tuesday's vote as a referendum on the war, shrugged off President Bush's efforts to make her liberalism a national issue, described the current GOP leadership as a "freak show," and expressed confidence about her party's prospects to pick up the 15 seats it needs for a majority.

"I know where the numbers are in these races, and I know that they are there for the 15; today (it's) 22 to 26," Pelosi said Friday.

Pelosi cautioned that the number of Democratic House victories could be higher or lower and said her greatest concern is over the integrity of the count -- from the reliability of electronic voting machines to her worries that Republicans will try to manipulate the outcome.

"That is the only variable in this," Pelosi said. "Will we have an honest count?''...read on

So while Pelosi is giving interviews, as well as campaigning, we still don't know where Hastert is. The Washington Post hasn't forgotten about our missing speaker:

House Speaker J. Dennis Hastert's future is in doubt even if the Republicans retain control of the House because of unease among GOP lawmakers about his handling of the Foley page scandal and what a House ethics committee investigation might conclude about him, according to several Republican aides.

House Chief Deputy Whip Eric I. Cantor (R-Va.) said last week that the House Republican leadership elections scheduled for Nov. 15 should be postponed until the ethics committee delivers its final report. House Majority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) confirmed yesterday on "Fox News Sunday" that he and Hastert have discussed that possibility. "We'll see how Tuesday goes and then we'll make some decisions." ...read on

Perhaps Hastert is busy packing up his Speaker's office. While a Democratic victory in the House tomorrow is all but certain, even more certain is that Hastert will be changing offices next term.

This is from today's Columbus Dispatch

Things are looking real Blue here in the buckeye state and talk around the country is we could be a pivotal state in determining the ruling party in the House now. The Ohio Democrats GOTV effort this week should also provide the extra buffer needed to prevent any funny business from Blackwell's buddies at Diebold.

I find this appalling. Today John Boehner, my congressman, decided to blame the generals on the ground for the failures in Iraq.

How dare Mr. Boehner take such a stance against our military. This on the very day he threatened to "beat Mr. Kerry to death" because of Kerry's comments.

Now will the media attempt to clear themselves of their label of "media bias" and report none stop on what Mr. Boehner said today? John Kerry is not running for office this year, John Boehner is. This story demands at the very least the same amount of attention that the Kerry story received. We have the Majority Leader blasting our troops on the ground and our President making jokes about the very reason why 2,800+ United States soldiers have died.

The following is a release from Harry Reid:

WASHINGTON, Nov. 1 /U.S. Newswire/ -- Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid released the following statement on House Majority Leader John Boehner's decision to blame the troops for Republican failures in Iraq.

"John Boehner ought to be ashamed. He's blaming our troops for failures in Iraq. If he wants to cast blame, he can start by looking in the mirror because he and his Congressional Republican colleagues have rubberstamped the Bush Administration's failed policy for nearly four years. Our troops in Iraq have performed bravely. It's political leaders like Congressman Boehner and Donald Rumsfeld, who have failed. I expect President Bush and Congressional Republicans, who demanded John Kerry apologize, hold their own party's majority leader to a much higher standard. There's no spinning his disparaging comments. He made them. He needs to apologize."

Aravosis has a copy of the statement Howard Dean has released.