Recently in Congress Category

From an editorial in the St. Petersburg Times, May 21, 2006:"[T]he changes that George W. Bush has made to our nation's constitutional firmament may not depart with the first family's bags. His disregard for the separation of powers has so dramatically distorted the office of the president that he may have engineered a turning point in American history....Bush has taught tomorrow's leaders that, if there are no consequences for ignoring legal constraints on power and...

Senator Jim Webb at yesterday's confirmation hearing for Ryan Crocker as the new ambassador to Afghanistan:"When we are putting hundreds of billions of dollars into infrastructure in another country, it should only be done if we can articulate a vital national interest, because we quite frankly need to be doing a lot more of that here...If there is any nation in the world that really needs nation-building right now, it is the United States." ...

Washington acts quickly....when they want to:"Congress on Thursday passed a four-year extension of post-Sept. 11 powers to search records and conduct roving wiretaps in pursuit of terrorists. Votes taken in rapid succession in the Senate and House came after lawmakers rejected attempts to temper the law enforcement powers to ensure that individual liberties are not abused.Following the 250-153 evening vote in the House, the legislation to renew three terrorism-fighting authorities headed for the president's signature...

Everyone who knows me knows that I live and breathe my profession - space exploration.  It has not been an easy time for those of us who chose this path.  Friends and colleagues of mine have suffered or are facing layoffs as the Shuttle Program ramps down and the Constellation Program is finally terminated.Unfortunately, we find ourselves in this situation because of a lack of leadership.  Neither Congress nor the previous administration heeded the warnings...

Robert Reich on Huffington Post...

So much for austerity, belt-tightening, and shared sacrifice:"Republican senators on Tuesday ramped up calls for a full 2011 defense spending measure despite calls for fiscal austerity. Several GOP Senate Armed Services Committee members joined senior military officials in pressing congressional leaders to draw up a full defense appropriations bill as soon as this week.Republican panel members were especially sharp, pressing U.S. Navy and Marine Corps leaders about whether the ongoing congressional spending standoff will hinder...

Some of you know my stats: single mom, three amazing boys young men. Heck, I have my own YouTube channel with nothing but videos of their particular accomplishments in the arts, etc. so I'm a rather proud mom.My feelings this week have really run the gamut. I'm always proud of them, happy with them, exhausted because of them (LOL), and scared shitless that something will happen to them. How very mom-like, right? I have reason to...

Shocking, huh?"The Senate's top Republican, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, said on Sunday that his party will vigorously oppose the spending initiatives President Obama plans to include in his State of the Union address on Tuesday because "it's not a time to be looking at pumping up government spending." ...Speaking on Fox News Sunday, Mr. McConnell countered that "The American public, as one pundit put it, issued a massive restraining order," against government spending and excessive...

My first inclination is to call the Republican vote to repeal health care reform yesterday meaningless, since it's unlikely to even come up for a vote in the Senate and faces a certain presidential veto even if it did,  but it actually wasn't meaningless at all. It told us everything we need to know about today's Republican party. Since they offered no alternative, only a "no" to the current law, the message was loud and...

As the new Republican majority in the House gets set to waste time this week with a repeal of health care reform that has zero chance of either passing the Senate or being able to withstand a presidential veto, the Weekly Standard's Bill Kristol appeared on Fox News Sunday yesterday to detail what the "replace" part of the alleged "repeal and replace" of health care reform might look like. As you would expect from the...