U.S. Politics part X

[DanteGabriel]

I'm just pleased that Palin mentioned Letterman "evolving" as she graciously accepted his apology (after duly inflaming and misinterpreting his jokes and squeezing some attention and donations out of it).

See, she does believe in evolution.

[DanteGabriel]

Senator John Ensign (R-Nevada) is publicly fessing up to an extramarital affair... with the wife of one of his staffers.

http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/06...air.php?ref=fpa

I look forward to Senator David "I'm on the DC Madam's Rolodex" Vitter to denounce Ensign as morally unfit to lead, as he once denounced Bill Clinton.

[lokisnow]

so the senator from nevada just admitted to having an affair with a staffer.

unfortunately it wasn't harry reid. :(

It was however a Republican, so win one for family values!

[TrackerNeil]

I look forward to Senator David "I'm on the DC Madam's Rolodex" Vitter to denounce Ensign as morally unfit to lead, as he once denounced Bill Clinton.

Keep looking. :unsure:

It's an unhappy fact that Democrats who cheat on their wives are supposed to resign; Republicans who do so can merely repent.

[DanteGabriel]

Keep looking. :unsure:

It's an unhappy fact that Democrats who cheat on their wives are supposed to resign; Republicans who do so can merely repent.

As Talking Points Memo informs me, Senator Ensign is a longtime member of the Promise Keepers.

I have no further comment.

ETA: Okay, one more comment on Senator Ensign... or actually just a quote from the Salon note about this story:

At the very least, the revelation will prove embarrassing because of Ensign's own history of moralizng. As David Weigel observes, while in the House, Ensign voted to impeach then-President Clinton. More recently, in a speech about same-sex marriage on the Senate floor, he declared, "Marriage is the cornerstone on which our society was founded. For those who say that the Constitution is so sacred that we cannot or should not adopt the Federal Marriage Amendment, I would simply point out that marriage, and the sanctity of that institution, predates the American Constitution and the founding of our nation. Marriage, as a social institution, predates every other institution on which ordered society in America has relied."

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/

Hey Republican morality scolds, if you stop caring so much about where other people put their genitals, you can go ahead and bang whatever employee's wife or random stranger in a men's room you want, without all this tiresome covering up and blatant hypocrisy. We liberals will be happy to leave it between you and McJesus.

[Shryke]

I got good news for everyone:

President Barack Obama plans to extend health care and other benefits to the gay and lesbian partners of federal employees.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_...EMPLATE=DEFAULT

Hi5!

[TrackerNeil]

I got good news for everyone:

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_...EMPLATE=DEFAULT

Hi5!

This is great news. In a way, I can't help but think that with these incremental steps Obama is paving the way for the repeal of DOMA he used to support. First this, then ENDA, then perhaps DADT...

[Shryke]

He'll get there eventually I'm sure. Alot of this stuff is on hold right now as he prepares to ram Health Care Reform straight down Congress's throat.

If nothing else, if/When he gets a 2nd term, he'll probably go crazy with this sort of thing.

[Shryke]

They are disappointed, but they had largely unrealistic expectations from my experience talking to people about this whole thing.

Basically, they thought he'd be repealing DOMA and DADT and such within days of taking power, whereas if you ever listened to what the guy actually talked about, you could pretty much guess that most of that stuff was gonna be sitting on the backburner for a bit while he tackled Heath Care and the Economy, 2 issues he believes (and I'd agree with him) are much more pressing.

[Lord O' Bones]

you could pretty much guess that most of that stuff was gonna be sitting on the backburner for a bit while he tackled Heath Care and the Economy, 2 issues he believes (and I'd agree with him) are much more pressing.

Not to mention Iraq, Guantanamo Bay, Afghanistan, North Korea, Iran. And if he believes as many do that full equality for the LGBT community is an inevitability, these issues could slip even further down the list of priority.

[Inigima]

That's great news.

Not sure why Ensign outed himself -- I'm guessing someone else was about to break it and he decided to control the story? Anyway, I don't really give a shit except that his party gave a shit when someone in ours did it.

[TrackerNeil]

They are disappointed, but they had largely unrealistic expectations from my experience talking to people about this whole thing.

Basically, they thought he'd be repealing DOMA and DADT and such within days of taking power, whereas if you ever listened to what the guy actually talked about, you could pretty much guess that most of that stuff was gonna be sitting on the backburner for a bit while he tackled Heath Care and the Economy, 2 issues he believes (and I'd agree with him) are much more pressing.

I agree largely with this. Obama will do more good for the gay community by signing ENDA than he will by pushing fruitlessly for a repeal of DOMA or the end of DADT. I'm not writing off those things, mind you, but I think we'll have to be patient. Better to win a fight in a year than to lose it today.

[WarGalley]

That's great news.

Not sure why Ensign outed himself -- I'm guessing someone else was about to break it and he decided to control the story? Anyway, I don't really give a shit except that his party gave a shit when someone in ours did it.

I read he was being blackmailed by the woman's husband for money but came out instead.

[Shryke]

I read he was being blackmailed by the woman's husband for money but came out instead.

He was.

Apparently, according to the latest I read, it went like this:

1) Ensign and wife are "seperated" or "On a break" or some such

2) Ensign starts fucking around with some guys wife

3) Ensign gets back together with his own wife, breaks it off with other women

4) Other women's husband says "Give me money to stay quiet"

5) Ensign says "Fuck you" and goes public with the story

[Lord O' Bones]

#5 makes me dislike the guy a little less than if he'd said "OK, how much?"

Well, for all we know, there was a #4.5 in there somewhere.

[Annelise]

No one else will probably appreciate this, but if the Detroit News is correct in its reporting.. hahahahahahha

Monica Conyers, chairwoman of the Detroit City Council and wife of House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.), has reportedly been offered a plea agreement in an ongoing federal corruption probe in the Motor City.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/23822.html

This is the lady who got called out by the 8th grader for childish, unprofessional behavior, if any of you happened to see those gems on youtube.

Get her, Feds.

[Annelise]

On finance reform:

HAVING spent much of the past year putting out fires, America’s leaders are now turning their attention to preventing future blazes. Barack Obama unveiled proposals on Wednesday June 17th that would refashion the federal rules governing almost every corner of finance, pushing government much more deeply into private markets and partially rolling back a quarter-century of liberalisation. Eye-catching though the 85-page “white paper†is, it might have been bolder. It merely sounds the opening salvo in a battle that could stretch into next year, because much of the plan requires approval in Congress, where jurisdictional and ideological clashes beckon.

The emphasis is on closing gaps that allowed risk to build in the shadows. Supervision of all firms big enough to threaten overall stability will be consolidated under the Federal Reserve. These entities will be made to hold more capital and liquidity than smaller firms, though all will face higher requirements (to be determined after a report at the end of this year). The Fed will be advised by a council of regulators that will also scan the horizon for emerging risks. Another priority is the construction of a mechanism to wind down any failed financial giant, not just banks, as is the case now, so that officials no longer face an unenviable choice between bail-outs (American International Group) and system-shaking collapse (Lehman).

[...]

Perhaps the most eye-catching—and certainly the most populist—measure is the creation of a Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA). Taking some powers from the Federal Reserve and other bank regulators, this would have broad rule-writing and enforcement powers in mortgages, credit cards and the like.

On weak points perceived by the Economist:

Dropping the idea of a single bank regulator and a merger of the agencies that oversee securities and derivatives, both of which were early Obama goals, was, say officials, a cold-blooded calculation based on the strength of political opposition. This could come from congressional leaders, such as Barney Frank, who have cooled to the idea of a unified regulator in the wake of Britain’s unhappy experience with the FSA. It could also come from the committees that police, and take contributions from, banks and exchanges.

Leaving the framework largely intact is risky. The current set-up is not all bad, to be sure: one regulator may spot a problem that another misses. But, even with the OTS gone, banks will be able to shop for friendly charters. Disagreements between agencies over the dangers lurking in commercial property led to a delay in urging banks to tighten standards. And inter-agency feuding has been growing: witness the skirmishes between the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation’s Sheila Bair and other regulators over deposit insurance and their treatment of Citigroup. In a sign of lingering concerns over such squabbles, the new systemic-risk council will be given the job of resolving disputes between agencies.

Other punches have been pulled, too. For big insurers, frustrated at having to be regulated state by state, the wait for an optional federal charter goes on. Nor were concrete proposals offered on money-market funds, runs on which greatly added to the trauma following Lehman’s demise. Officials argue, with some justification, that these omissions are sound tactics: Congress can swallow only so much esoteric reform in one go, even after a hundred-year flood.

Even without these measures, the white paper may get beaten black and blue...

http://www.economist.com/world/unitedstate...atures_box_main

[Annelise]

This feels like a somewhat gutsy move on Obama's part because Wall Street's influence is so deeply pervasive in Washington.

True, but he also couldn't ask for better timing. Dodd and Frank are predicting they'll have it done by the end of the year, though I'm sure there will be alterations.

We shall see.

[Annelise]

Jon Stewart on the media blame game over recent acts of political violence:

http://www.salon.com/mwt/broadsheet/2009/06/17/tds/

Hee.

[Annelise]

GOP unveils healthcare plan:

You can't really blame House Republicans for rushing out various plans on hot-button issues like the federal budget, climate change and healthcare reform. Democrats are getting all that oxygen, and when the GOP hasn't released its own proposals, it's gotten tagged as the "party of 'no,'" a label it would rather not have in a country with a weak economy and a popular president.

But at some point, they're going to have to rethink their current strategy.

On Wednesday, the House GOP made a big show of unveiling its own healthcare reform plan. But, as they have in the past, the congressmen didn't wait to ensure the proposal had some heft to it and was more than just the usual campaign rhetoric -- they didn't even bother to come up with any numbers for how many Americans would get coverage under their bill, or how much it would cost.

[...]

The press conference that marked the official roll-out of the plan got testy, with reporters repeatedly pressing the congressmen for details that were not forthcoming. And a negative article in the Washington newspaper Roll Call has defined the day for the GOP, setting the narrative about the proposal with this opening paragraph:

House Republicans presented a four-page outline of their health care reform plan Wednesday but said they didn’t know yet how much it would cost, how they would pay for it and how many of the nearly 50 million Americans without insurance would be covered by it.

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_room/?la...gop_healthcare/

ETA: Okay, you didn't want Hillarycare and you don't want Obamacare. Fair enough. But are we really expected to wait years, again, for the GOP to play catchup on this issue and come up with a credible plan? That's .. :mad: