Prairie Weather

Bad ending for Congressional Republicans

They figured they were going out with a flourish.  No way.  Republicans face more trouble, scrutiny.

The highly publicized case of Mr. Foley, who served in the House leadership as a deputy whip, threatened to build into an institutional scandal as House leaders acknowledged that they had known about the messages for nearly a year, but had relied on Mr. Foley’s word that nothing inappropriate had occurred.

But that was not all. Republicans were unable to win final approval of a bill to regulate domestic wiretapping, which Democrats feared would become a political weapon more potent than the bill governing terrorism suspects. The disclosure of a National Intelligence Estimate saying the war in Iraq was fueling terrorism called attention to the issue Democrats most want to campaign on — discontent with the administration’s handling of the war. A new book by Bob Woodward did the same, claiming that the administration had ignored high-level warnings that it would need more troops.

And Republicans wrapped up the way they started the year, with new revelations about Jack Abramoff, the disgraced lobbyist whose guilty plea on Jan. 3 roiled the party and set off the events that led to the resignation of Representative Tom DeLay, a powerful party force. “It was not a graceful exit,” said Representative Jeff Flake, Republican of Arizona, as events swirled on Friday.

Republicans were clearly rocked by the Foley episode. It gave Democrats, who need 15 seats to gain a majority, a new opening to pick up a seat in a Republican-leaning district. Florida Republicans were to meet to choose a replacement for Mr. Foley, but his name will remain on the ballot against a well-financed opponent.

Psst! Want to head a Congressional committee? Got $100,000?

To move up the ladder in Congress, you must do more than win votes. You are, quite literally, expected to pay your dues. If you are a rank-and-file member of the House, the amount is up to $100,000. If your ambitions are to preside over a powerful committee, the duty is $300,000. For a top party leader, the tally can climb beyond $600,000. Make those checks payable to the Republican or Democratic Congressional campaign committees.

Looking at the body language of George W. Bush. Reading revelations about the White House.

Think oedipal when you think of George W. Bush.  So much of what he does (including hired Rumsfeld) seems to be in opposition to his father who went so far as to campaign for the removal of Rumsfeld.

The New York Times will "out," in tomorrow's edition, the chasm in the Administration caused in part by Donald Rumsfeld.

In June 2005, two senior national security officials in the Bush administration came together to propose a sweeping new approach to the growing problems the United States was facing with the detention, interrogation and prosecution of terrorism suspects. In a nine-page memorandum, the two officials, Gordon R. England, the acting deputy secretary of defense, and Philip D. Zelikow, the counselor of the State Department, urged the administration to seek Congressional approval for its detention policies. They called for a return to the minimum standards of treatment in the Geneva Conventions and for eventually closing the detention center at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba. The time had come, they said, for suspects in the 9/11 plot to be taken out of their secret prison cells and tried before military tribunals. The recommendations of the paper, which has not previously been disclosed, included several of the major policy shifts that President Bush laid out in a White House address on Sept. 6, five officials who read the document said.

The moment Rumsfeld saw the memo "it so angered Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld that his aides gathered up copies of the document and had at least some of them shredded."

Bush's decision to alter policy was in keeping with the recommendations of the memo.  But Cheney fought hard against the moderation.

Even as the White House negotiated with Congress in recent weeks, administration forces led by the vice president’s office re-emerged. Officials said Mr. Cheney’s staff and its government allies played crucial roles in guiding the negotiations, while their adversaries in the administration scrambled to keep up with details of the bargaining. In the end, the White House pressed Republican senators to accept a broad definition of “unlawful enemy combatants” whom the government can hold indefinitely, to maintain some of the president’s control over C.I.A. interrogation methods and to allow the government to present some evidence in military tribunals that is based on hearsay or has been coerced from witnesses.

“Basically, they were left to get back whatever they could from Congress,” one senior administration official said, referring to compromises that officials led by Mr. Cheney made before the president’s announcement. “And they did.”

Times reporter, Tim Golden, covers the wrangling within the Administration that led up to the bill passed by Congress.  The personalities involved are interesting to me.  Once again one sees men of good will up against radicals and men who appear driven, monomaniacal.

Last night I watched on CSpan about five minutes of Bush giving a speech yesterday.  I turned the sound off while I tried to pretend I didn't know the guy but was instead watching "a CEO" I was being asked to assess.  Looked at that way Bush, in addition to seeming exhausted, has the appearance of a someone utterly confused, battered, and grasping at straws.  Would I hire him?  Not on a bet.  Only nervous energy remains.  The guy looks indecisive and scary as hell.  I wonder what actual CEO's see these days when they look at President Bush. 

Never discount the ability of people to notice the hidden truths in others.

Charlie Cook on chances for Democratic majorities in both houses

Charlie Cook, of the Cook Political Report, was on NPR this morning, talking about what the numbers are showing with respect to the upcoming elections.  Excerpts.

...For the last six weeks, Republicans have had the good fortune or talent -- of whatever -- to have the focus on terrorism, national security.  I'd throw in gasoline prices for good measure.  That's helped them some because back when the focus was almost exclusively on Iraq -- say, up until mid-August -- that was a really bad place for this election to be.  I guess the way I'd put it is, if the focus is on the war in Iraq, Republicans are not going to hold onto the House. .

..Four midterm elections out of five and then, in terms of the House and Senate, nine presidential elections out of ten, the old Tip O'Neill adage of "all politics is local" is absolutely true.  But when you look at these wave elections -- 1994, the Newt Gingrich tidal wave election -- all politics was not local.  Look at 1986 in the Senate.  1982. 1980... Those were elections where all politics was anything but local.

...The amazing thing is that a year ago we had four Democratic House seats in the toss-up category and only three Republican.  Today we have eighteen Republican House seats that are toss-ups, and two that are goners.  Twenty and zero on the Democratic side.  Normally in an election like this, to have a net gain of fifteen, which is what Democrats need to take a majority in the House, you might need twenty or twenty-two to net fifteen.  Now, I don't think the Democrats are going to lose a single seat in the House. 

...The Republican majority is going to hold or fall in four states.  The worst state for Republicans right now?  Indiana.  There's an excellent chance they could lose three seats.   It's a state we normally consider pretty Republican.  Ohio -- there's a packet of highly vulnerable Republican seats there, probably the second most.  Thirdly, Pennsylvania.  And the fourth would be Connecticut.  The rest of them are sort of dogs and cats scattered around the country.  But those are the four states that are where the Republican hopes are going to live or die.

...The fascinating thing is that the focus has been in the last week or so on, gosh, there are more Republican seats [in the Senate] that are really really vulnerable than a lot of people expected -- Virginia getting tight, Democrats are basically even in Tennessee and who would have thought that?  So the possibility of the Democrats actually beating... taking six Republican seats -- it's very real.  But the problem the Democrats have is that their own seat in New Jersey where they've got an appointed Senator, Bobby Menendez, is in extreme jeopardy right now.  Democrats I don't think ever really counted on, Gosh, what if we lost on and we have to pick up seven Republican seats in order to end up with six and get a majority...  So New Jersey is really complicating the picture. If Republicans can pick off New Jersey, Democratic chances of taking the Senate go out to, I don't know, ten percent? 

...I'm going to be watching the news coverage and the public focus. Where's the spotlight?  And if the spotlight moves back onto Iraq, the House is gonna go.  And if the focus sort of remains where it's been for the past six, seven weeks -- on terrorism, on falling gasoline prices -- then I think the majority holds.

Left out on satellite radio

FYI.   

Sirius satellite radio hosts leftwing talk radio.  It is preempted regularly for sports.  Sirius also hosts rightwing talk radio.  Rightwing talk is not only not preempted (at least not when I've checked), but it's called "Patriot Radio"!   Sirius also recently dropped Public Radio International.

Cook poll

Latest Cook poll (pdf). Republicans doing a bit better.