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Sources on the Hill say they’ve never seen anything like it coming out of the White House. Rahm is dealing as furiously as he did during NAFTA, and will stuff everyone with so much pork that they have to vote for the supplemental.
They will evidently try to jam Cash for Clunkers into the conference report – a $4 billion bid to buy votes from progressives in auto manufacturing states:
| Ohio: | |
| Marcy Kaptur (committed to voting "no") | (202) 225-4146 |
| Dennis Kucinich (committed to voting "no") | (202) 225-5871 |
| Marcia Fudge | (202) 225-7032 |
| Michigan | |
| John Conyers (committed to voting "no") | (202) 225-5126 |
| Illinois | |
| Luis Gutierrez (committed to voting "no") | (202) 225-8203 |
| Jan Schakowsky | (202) 225-2111 |
| Jerry Costello | (202) 225-5661 |
| Phil Hare | (202) 225-5905 |
| Minnesota | |
| James Oberstar | (202) 225-6211 |
| Keith Ellison (told people he’s voting "no," but now wobbling) | (202) 225-4755 |
John Conyers is taking a very brave stand as a committee chair in voting his conscience against leadership. He deserves big props. So does everyone on the list who has made the commitment to vote against the bill. They deserve calls of thanks and support.
The one person on the list I have to say I am confounded by is Jan Schakowsky. I have easily heard from a dozen people that she won’t commit. I guess times have changed:
“The only reason I ever voted for the first supplemental was because it had timelines and deadlines,” said Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) “I don’t know how I could get there” if they were dropped, he said.
But others acknowledged there might be room for another approach.
“It could be in a timeline, or in how long we give him the money,” said Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.). “There are a lot of factors that could be changed in some way without sacrificing principles.”
Dropping timelines could help Pelosi pick up support among moderates. Rep. Gene Taylor (D-Miss.), for one, said such deadlines were “the major part of my heartburn” that led him to vote against the first bill.
Democrats are also hoping that moderate Republicans will soon begin turning against the war, a development that would lessen pressure on liberal Democrats to stick with the party line.
“With every day that passes… the position of ending it is getting more powerful,’’ Schakowsky said. “I think Republicans are really weary of this war.”
Schakowsky hosted Pelosi at a Democratic fundraiser Friday in Chicago, where the speaker showed no sign on of softening her opposition to Bush on Iraq, again calling the conflict "the biggest ethical issue facing our country.”
That was two years ago. Republicans haven’t grown weary of their war, they just gifted it to the Democrats. But Schakowsky’s still right — it’s still the "biggest ethical issue facing the country."
I really, really hope that after all the fundraising she’s done among anti-war activists that she’s not going to now use that cred to lead a progressive exodus.
Update: Schakowsky says that she’s "get-able no votes." I really don’t know how to interpret that as anything other than her anti-war principles are up for sale.
If anyone wants to ask for a clarification, her office numbers are (773) 506-7100, (847) 328-3409 and (202) 225-2111.
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Sorry Jane.
Breaking; Go Al!
Sorry oldnslow, that is yesterday’s news.
And I read Schakowsky’s quote at The Hill, and she’s absolutely declared herself for sale. Get-able indeed. Color me disappointed.
Thanks msmolly. I missed that yesterday. Very busy day.
Jane:
I know she announced the other day that she won’t pursue Obama’s old Senate seat. Do you think Rahm(and by extension Obama) are, or have been, holding this over her head? Basically threatening to cut off sources of campaign cash to her.
I would have, too, but it was front and center somewhere online that I landed. When I saw your “breaking” I thought maybe the court had ruled! ;-(
Schakowsky certainly has a way with words – why didn’t she just say that she hadn’t decided yet? Geez, for sale, indeed.
Rahm, his appointment to chief of staff, one of the earliest of a growing string of letdowns and back pedalling on the part of Obama, a major throwback to the machine party politics days, an anachronism. He’s Democratic in Name Only.
That would be Rahm’s style, at any rate.
Or he is an old style Chicago dem.
Or he is
an old style Chicago dem. just a dick.Redundant?
JESUS!! We are BROKE. WE. HAVE. NO. MONEY. So he’s out there buying votes for pork with MONEY WE DON’T HAVE?????
I can’t stand him. Soon, everyone will hate him and he won’t be able to whip anything for Obama. And he will be rendered USELESS.
JUST. A. DICK.
AND A HUGE EGO MANIAC.
Here’s Katymine’s list of toll-free phone numbers to reach a Capitol Hill operator:
1 (800) 828 – 0498
1 (800) 459 – 1887
1 (800) 614 – 2803
1 (866) 340 – 9281
1 (866) 338 – 1015
1 (877) 851 – 6437
I called Ann Kirkpatrick’s office this morning and pointed out the Supplemental has money in it to bail out European banks, and asked if she would vote for it if it contained that money.
The staffer said she was leaning against it; I said good, then I said:
The staffer laughed and said he didn’t think that was necessarily true, but admitted that Republicans would try to frame a vote that way.
It was among the most amiable conversations I have had with a congressional staffer to tell the truth.
Marcia Fudge staff says she is voting for Sup…please put on the list to primary.
Wonder of he’ll go hardball like this for ’single payer’?
Yeah, right!
Cash for Clunkers is mostly another welfare for the wealthy and well-off program named to make it seem as if its for the not-so well-off, who are lets face it the folks who drive a clunker or more likely ride the bus or the tubes.
The use of the word “old” is pure propaganda depending for its truth value on the meaning that your current vehicle is your “old” one as compared to the new one you are going to buy. You might have bought it off the showroom floor yesterday, but it’s still your old car and, we would all hope, not a clunker. Pfft!
What this program really should be called is: Trade in Your Hummer For Something Not So Environmentally Egregious, Asshole, and We’ll Give You a Tax Break. But Hummer owners are probably not concerned with an insignificant tax break and the likelihood that they care about the environment, anything, or anyone else other than their own desires is probably close to zip.
So, really, this is at best political bullshit.
*Nodding to jayt and VADEM*
Yes, Emanuel is simply, a Dick.
I love my older cars. Who needs all that stupid electronic computerized junk anyway? It just makes it more expensive to repair. (Good for repair shops). Taking perfectly good running older cars off the road is just a waste of precious resources anyway. More production of new cars just chews up the environment.
Way off topic:
Three phases of the 21st century decline and fall of the depraved Republican Party:
1. Goosestepping right along with the Bush gangster regime and all their criminality. Supporting Bush, Cheney and Rumsfeld’s torture, treason and tyranny from Jan. 2001 to Jan. 2009.
2. After falling out of power in the November 2008 Elections, the Republicans become the Party of No and the Goofy Obstructionist Party.
3. Six months after losing their dictatorial powers of the Bush White House, right-wing extremist Republicans start a campaign of domestic terrorism by murdering a doctor and a policeman.
GOP, 1854 – 2009. R. I. P.