Use of Filibuster Threat Explodes – The frequency of filibusters — plus threats to use them — are measured by the number of times the upper chamber votes on cloture. Such votes test the majority’s ability to hold together 60 members to break a filibuster by the minority party.
The 104th Congress in 1995-96 — when Democrats were in the minority — required 50 cloture votes.
Last year, the first of the 111th Congress, there were a record 112 cloture votes.
In the first two months of 2010, the number already exceeds 40. That means, with 10 months left to run in the 111th Congress, Republicans have turned to the filibuster or threatened its use at a pace that will exceed 240 cloture votes, more than triple the old record.
Conservative Film Maker Edited Tapes to Meet Agenda – Prosecutors on Monday cleared ACORN of criminal wrongdoing after a four-month probe that began when undercover conservative activists filmed workers giving what appeared to be illegal advice on how to hide money.
While the video by James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles seemed to show three ACORN workers advising a prostitute how to hide ill-gotten gains, the unedited version was not as clear, according to a law enforcement source.
“They edited the tape to meet their agenda,” said the source.
While his edited version shows O’Keefe posing as a pimp, he actually presented himself to ACORN employees as a boyfriend trying to rescue a prostitute from a violent pimp. At the time of the incident, O’Keefe was wearing normal clothes and not the outrageous pimp costume he later edited into his films.
Senator Causes Furlough of 2,000 Highway and Transit Workers – Two-thousand workers in federal highway and transit programs have been furloughed because of objections raised by one senator, Republican Jim Bunning. The bill would have also improved Medicare reimbursement rates (known as “doc fix”), funded issuance of flood insurance policies, allowed licensing for satellite TV providers to carry local channels in rural areas where they are unavailable with an antenna, and provided unemployment benefits for about 400,000 Americans.
Pressed to rescind his persistent objections Friday, Bunning reportedly responded by saying “tough shit.” Later, he reportedly flipped the bird to an ABC reported who was questioning him about his objections.
Bunning travels with a special police escort, at taxpayer expense. His explanation? Al-Qaida may be out to get him.
Conservative Commentator Critiques Health Care Summit That He Says He Didn’t Watch – Conservative Commentator and Fox News regular Bill Kristol claims he didn’t watch any of the Health Care Summit, but that didn’t stop him from giving Chris Wallace his critique of the event. If he didn’t watch it, how does he know how the President, Ryan and Alexander did? And of course him saying he didn’t watch it didn’t stop Chris Wallace from hanging on his every word while he explained what he thought about what he didn’t watch.
Senator Lamar Alexander Doesn’t Know History – On the ABC This Week panel Sunday, Republican Senator Lamar Alexander said that reconciliation had only been used in the past for small things and “to reduce the deficitâ€. However, he seems to forget that reconciliation was used to pass the two major Bush tax cuts, which increased the deficit — by $1.8 trillion. So much for that argument.
Goldman Sachs’s Board Rejects Shareholder Demands To Cut Excessive Pay, Bonuses – Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said Monday it has rejected demands by shareholders to investigate the Wall Street bank’s compensation practices.
Shareholder lawsuits filed recently in New York and Delaware charge that Goldman’s compensation levels in 2009 were too high, Goldman said in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing. The lawsuits seek to recover some of the pay and force the bank to adopt pay reforms. Goldman said shareholders have made similar demands in letters to its board.
Lawmakers and shareholders sharply criticized Wall Street pay after the biggest banks lost billions of dollars on bad mortgage bets, helped cause the recession and then had to be bailed out by the government.
In its filing, Goldman said government agencies and regulators have sought information about its pay practices. The bank said it was cooperating with those inquires but won’t grant shareholders’ demand for an internal probe or wider pay reforms.
Workers Fired For Jaywalking – More than 40 workers at a construction site at the Marathon Oil Refinery in Detroit have been told they no longer have a job.
The workers are contractors at the plant and they told Local 4 it’s because they were jaywalking.
Workers who did not want to be identified said they were given termination papers because they crossed the public street in front of the refinery without using the crosswalk.
“I was floored. I was in awe. I couldn’t believe I got terminated over it,” said the worker.
The company said it just had a safety meeting with the workers and talked specifically about crossing at the crosswalk.
“The workers were well aware of the need to follow the rules and procedures. Some, of reasons unknown, decided to take their lives in their own hands,” said company spokeswoman Chris Fox.
Marathon officials told Local 4 the workers were suspended for 90 days. The workers said they were terminated and showed Local 4 the notice that stated “not eligible for rehire.”
“It could possibly be a way to cut down the workforce and not want to pay unemployment. That would be the best way,” said one employee.
Regards,
Jim
Andy Hailey