Politics Daily

Jill Lawrence on WHYY: Final Stages of the Health Care Reform Push

Colin McDonald — 2010-03-19T14:50:00 00:00

Politics Daily columnist Jill Lawrence appeared Friday on the "Radio Times with Marty Moss-Coane" to discuss the upcoming House and Senate votes on health care reform legislation and other national political news. Click here for more information and to listen to the segment.

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Two More Ohio Democrats Now Backing Health Care

Tom Diemer — 2010-03-19T14:20:00 00:00

Filed under: House, Democrats, Barack Obama, Health Care, Obama Administration, 2010 Elections, Congress, Lobbying

Maybe President Barack Obama should take his campaign for health reform to Ohio more often. Four days after his latest visit to the state, two more Ohio Democrats announced Friday that they would support the health care bill nearing a critical vote in the U.S. House on Sunday.

Reps. John Boccieri and Charles Wilson joined Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) in leaving the ranks of the undecideds and saying they would vote for the $940 billion bill, which is expected to provide coverage to some 32 million uninsured Americans. Kucinich, who was lobbied by the president in Strongsville, Ohio, on Monday, came aboard two days ago, as Democratic leaders counted heads for what is likely to be a tight roll-call vote.

Boccieri said he was inspired by Obama's account of the plight of Natoma Canfield, a 50-year-old cancer patient who said she had to give up her health insurance because she could no longer afford it. Obama talked about her in his speech in Strongsville, a Cleveland suburb.

Boccieri, who represents a swing district that includes the city of Canton, said he had concluded that voting against the bill "perpetuates the status quo, where insurance company bureaucrats make life-and-death decisions in the name of a profitable bottom line." The freshman lawmaker faces a tough re-election battle in a district that was dominated by Republican Ralph Regula for 36 years.

Wilson said he was swayed by a recent Congressional Budget Office report that said the health bill would trim federal budget deficits by $138 billion over 10 years. An anti-abortion Democrat in hilly southeastern Ohio, Wilson said he was convinced the Senate bill would not permit federal funds to be spent on abortions.

Wilson and Kucinich were recognized by the president in the audience at the Strongsville event on Monday. But Boccieri, who voted against the health care bill when it passed the House the first time in 2009, sklpped Obama's appearance.

"This (Senate bill) not only gives patients choice, it further reduces cost, further protects coverage, and further reduces waste, fraud and abuse," Boccieri said Friday. "The previous bill we voted on did not go far enough to produce these results."

Obama, sensing momentum for the bill, was across the Potomac River in Fairfax, Va., on Friday speaking to students at George Mason University. "A few miles from here, Congress is in the final stages of a fateful debate about the future of health insurance in America . . ." he said. "It's a debate that's not only about the cost of health care, not just about what we're doing about folks who aren't getting a fair shake from their insurance companies, it's a debate about the character of this country, about whether we will meet the challenges of our time; whether we still have the guts and the courage to give every citizen, not just some, the chance to reach their dreams."

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Intensity of Support Among Rank-and-File Democrats Grows as Health Finale Nears

Bruce Drake — 2010-03-19T14:13:00 00:00

Filed under: Health Care, Polls, Poll Watch

As the health care reform battle nears its climax, the gap between the number of those who "strongly" oppose the measure has narrowed as rank-and-file Democrats appear to be rallying around the proposal,according to a Kaiser Health Tracking Poll conducted March 10-15.

Overall, a plurality opposes the measure, with 46 percent against, 42 percent in favor and 12 percent undecided. "Strong" supporters outnumber "strong" opponents 33 percent to 28 percent, but that is a significantly closer margin than January when it was 31 percent to 19 percent.

Among Democrats alone, the level of "strong" support has risen from 30 percent in January to 52 percent. That result may give some credence to the belief of some political analysts that making good on the promises of White House and Democratic congressional leaders to push through health care reform is necessary if they hope to keep the party base energized in the midterm elections.

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Student Loan Overhaul Heading Toward Vote With Health Care Bill

Tom Diemer — 2010-03-19T11:57:00 00:00

Filed under: House, Democrats, Economy, Education, Obama Administration, Congress

It's been pushed to the background by the health care debate, but an impending overhaul of the student loan program is almost as important to the parents of college-age children.

Legislation that would largely remove private banks from the loan process and increase Pell Grants for the economically disadvantaged from $5,350 annually to $5,975 could be voted on in the House as soon as Sunday, possibly in a package with health care legislation. The change is a high priority for the Obama administration.

"With one move, Congress can make college more affordable, keep jobs in America, prepare young people for our global economy, and reduce our deficit by billions," said Rep. George Miller, chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee.

Miller, a California Democrat, said the bill "offers the most sweeping changes in a generation" to the 45-year-old federal program, the New York Times said.

The idea is to take out financial institutions as middlemen in the process, thereby saving the government $61 billion in the next decade that would have gone for subsidies to guarantee the bank loans against default. Instead, if the bill passes, the government would expand its own lending to families of college students, with interest rates remaining about the same.

The Times said the banking community has lobbied hard against the legislation, calling it an unnecessary government takeover of a successful private-sector program.

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Probe of John Ensign Expands as Senator's GOP Pals Are Called to Testify

Tom Diemer — 2010-03-19T10:35:00 00:00

Filed under: Republicans, Ethics

The Justice Department has widened its investigation of Nevada Sen. John Ensign's efforts to find lobbying work for a onetime aide who was also the husband of the senator's mistress.

A federal grand jury has subpoenaed the National Republican Senatorial Committee -- a campaign arm of Senate Republicans -- and also Sid Rogich and Pete Ernaut, two well-connected Nevada Republicans, the Las Vegas Review-Journal reported.

Rogich, who served as an adviser to Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, told the newspaper that Ensign called him about a year ago to ask if he would meet with Doug Hampton, husband of Cindy Hampton, who had a nine-month affair with the senator in 2007 and 2008. Rogich said he had a brief meeting with Doug Hampton, but nothing came of it.

Authorities have asked for documents from the senatorial committee, which recruits candidates and raises campaign funds and which Ensign once chaired. He is also facing an inquiry from the Senate Ethics Committee. The grand jury is trying to determine whether his attempts to help Doug Hampton get a job violated federal law.

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American Woman, 'Jihad Jane,' Pleads Not Guilty to Terror Charges

Tom Diemer — 2010-03-19T09:59:00 00:00

Jihad Jane says she's innocent.

The Pennsylvania woman, real name Colleen R. LaRose, pleaded not guilty Thursday to charges that she recruited men on the Internet to take part in terrorist activities in Europe and southern Asia. Wearing a green jumpsuit with her hair in cornrows, LaRose entered her plea in a Philadelphia courtroom to charges of conspiracy and vowing to commit murder, the New York Times reported. She was allegedly plotting to kill a Swedish cartoonist named Lars Vilks for drawing an offensive caricature of the prophet Muhammad.

LaRose, 46, was arrested in October after visiting Europe with a stolen passport that she intended to pass on to one her co-conspirators, authorities said. In a 2008 YouTube video, LaRose said she was "desperate to do something" to ease the suffering of Muslims.

Seven others were arrested in Ireland in the case, but five of them were later released. Two men, Ali Charaf Damache of Algeria and Abdul Salam al-Jahani of Libya, face relatively minor charges, the Times said.

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Amanpour Leaving CNN to Take Over ABC's 'This Week'

Tom Diemer — 2010-03-19T08:46:00 00:00

Filed under: Media, Culture, International

Christiane Amanpour, a veteran cable news international correspondent, is leaving CNN after more than 25 years to join ABC News as host of its Sunday public affairs show, "This Week."

CNN made the announcement Thursday, saying Amanpour had covered "defining news events of our time" in Iraq, Israel, Pakistan, Somalia, Rwanda and the Balkans.

For the past year, she has hosted a daily interview show on the cable network. Amanpour is 52 and was born in London.

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Immigration Reform Revived in Bipartisan Bill

Tom Diemer — 2010-03-19T08:17:00 00:00

Filed under: Senate, Democrats, Republicans, Barack Obama, Immigration, Obama Administration, Congress

Two influential senators, a Democrat and Republican, have revived immigration reform with the blessing of the White House. Sens. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) want to require U.S. citizens and legal immigrants to carry tamper-proof biometric Social Security cards that employers could swipe through a verification checker to make certain a prospective worker can be hired legally.

Those already in the country illegally "would be required to admit they broke the law and to pay their debt to society by performing community service and paying fines and back taxes," the senators said in a Washington Post op-ed piece Thursday.

Schumer and Graham would also beef up security along the border with Mexico. They did not say when they would introduce their bill or what other senators would join the bipartisan effort.

But President Obama is on board. He called the legislation a "promising framework" and pledged to "do everything in my power to forge a bipartisan consensus this year on this important matter."

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Chaos Theory - Health Care: Back From the Dead

Robert and Donna Trussell — 2010-03-19T08:15:00 00:00

Filed under: Chaos Theory

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Glenn Beck, Jim Wallis, and Falwell-esque Dangers of Mixing Politics and Faith

Peter Wehner — 2010-03-19T05:01:00 00:00

Fox's Glenn Beck and Sojourner's Jim Wallis are dueling about the meaning of social justice and the Bible. Neither man will be mistaken for Reinhold Niebuhr.

The dispute started when Beck, on his radio show, said, "I beg you, look for the words 'social justice' or 'economic justice' on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. . . . Am I advising people to leave their church? Yes! If I am going to Jeremiah Wright's church. If you have a priest that is pushing social justice, go find another parish. Go alert your bishop."

Wallis fired back in a post, saying:

Beck says Christians should leave their social justice churches, so I say Christians should leave Glenn Beck. I don't know if Beck is just strange, just trying to be controversial, or just trying to make money. But in any case, what he has said attacks the very heart of our Christian faith, and Christians should no longer watch his show. His show should now be in the same category as Howard Stern.

"When your political philosophy is to consistently favor the rich over the poor," Wallis added, "you don't want to hear about economic justice."

There are several things to untangle in this dispute. The first is that Glenn Beck is hardly an authority who can (or should) speak to such matters. There is a critique to be made here, but this is not the manner in which it should be made. I have made it clear any number of times that Beck is not someone I find particularly appealing -- and have I spelled out some of the things he has said that I find outright offensive:

The second thing to say has to do with the terms "social justice" and "economic justice." They are simply not offensive terms per se. The Hebrew Bible and the New Testament are filled with admonitions to pursue justice. And showing concern for the poor and the dispossessed, the alien and the sojourner, the widow and the orphan, is clearly scriptural. There are vastly more verses dealing with our treatment of the poor than there are, for example, dealing with homosexuality. So, to be in favor of social justice is not itself problematic and, rightly understood, is commendable.

At the same time, however, the term "social justice" and "economic justice" have, in the hands of politically religious activists like Jim Wallis, been cheapened. They have gone from being a set of important biblical principles to becoming a justification for a liberal/Left political agenda. That's not entirely surprising in the case of Wallis, who himself is a fairly radical political figure, as anyone who has read Sojourners and Wallis over the years can attest.

Let's see where this self-described "public theologian" has come down on various issues over the years. We could start, I suppose, with Wallis' extraordinary claim years ago about the Vietnamese boat people. "Many of today's refugees," he said, "were inoculated with a taste for a Western lifestyle during the war and are fleeing to support their consumer habit in other lands."

In the 1980s, Jim Wallis said of the United States and the Soviet Union, "We must refuse to take sides in this horrible and deadly hypocrisy." According to Wallis, "a totalitarian spirit fuels the engines of both Wall Street and the Kremlin." About the communist Sandinistas in Nicaragua, Wallis said their policies "are designed to benefit the poor majority of the country more than the middle and upper classes." He declared as well that "the gift of democracy to the Nicaraguan people came from the Sandinistas." (See Katherine Mangu-Ward's excellent story, "God's Democrat," for chapter and verse.)

During the welfare debate in the mid-1990s Wallis was a fierce critic of reform, saying, "The results we can now expect [from welfare reform] will be nothing short of disastrous for many people. . . . A million more children will likely be thrown into poverty, and 3 million to 4 million already in poverty will be plunged into deeper jeopardy." Nor has Wallis been at all shy about criticizing Republican budgets as being an attack on the poor.

Some of Wallis' comments have been morally indefensible. Beyond that, though, he doesn't bring any particular knowledge or competence to matters of public policy or governing. And so he often makes claims that in time are exposed as ridiculous. Overhauling welfare, for example, ranks among the most successful social reforms of the last half-century. (For more, see the discussion of welfare reform here.)

At other times Wallis comes across less like a self-styled prophet and more like Paul Begala. Take as just one example this posting by Wallis in the aftermath of a "60 Minutes" episode:

I believe that Dick Cheney is a liar; that Donald Rumsfeld is also a liar; and that George W. Bush was, and is, clueless about how to be the president of the United States. And this isn't about being partisan - I was raised in a Republican family with two Republican parents that I loved more than any two people in the world. I've heard plenty of my Republican friends and public figures call this administration an embarrassment to the best traditions of the Republican Party and an embarrassment to the democratic (small d) tradition of the United States. They have shamed our beloved nation in the world by this war and the shameful way they have fought it. Almost 4,000 young Americans are dead because of the lies of this administration, tens of thousands more wounded and maimed for life, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis also dead, and 400 billion dollars wasted -- because of their lies, incompetence, and corruption.

But I don't favor impeachment, as some have suggested. I would wait until after the election, when they are out of office, and then I would favor investigations of the top officials of the Bush administration on official deception, war crimes, and corruption charges. And if they are found guilty of these high crimes, I believe they should spend the rest of their lives in prison -- after offering their repentance to every American family who has lost a son, daughter, father, mother, brother, or sister. Deliberately lying about going to war should not be forgiven.

This comes from a man who calls for a "politics of compassion, community, and civility." Wallis' rants would qualify him as just another partisan (and uncivil) voice on the Internet, except for the fact that he so often justifies his views by placing on them the imprimatur of God, the obvious and indisputable position held by those who care about "social justice." Indeed, Wallis authored a book modestly titled "God's Politics" and is described on the Web site of Sojourners as a "bestselling author, public theologian, preacher, speaker, activist, and international commentator on ethics and public life."

With that write up one would think he would bring a seriousness of purpose and a reasonable tone to the debate of the issues of our time. But one would be wrong.

Many of us believe that it is fully appropriate, and in some cases honorable, to be involved in politics and governing. Politics is a means to advance the moral good. "The end of the state," Aristotle wrote in "The Politics," "is not mere life; it is, rather, a good quality of life." He went on to argue that "it is the cardinal issue of goodness or badness in the life of the polis which always engages the attention of any state that concerns itself to secure a system of good laws well obeyed."

At the same time, those in politics who speak in the name of Christianity can, if they are not careful, do great harm to their faith and their witness. Their faith becomes a means to a political end, a cudgel with which to beat up those with whom one disagrees. It vulgarizes and can even corrupt Christianity; people, both within and outside that faith are understandably turned off when partisans use it to advance ideological ends.

Which returns us to Jim Wallis. In many respects he is, ironically enough, the mirror image of the late Jerry Falwell. Like Falwell, Wallis is drawn to power and attention like a moth to a flame on a dark summer night. Like the former founder of the Moral Majority, Wallis takes biblical principles and simplistically connects the dots to public policies he supports. He has, as the Reverend Falwell had, enormous confidence that he knows the mind of God on matters of politics. And Wallis says harsh and irresponsible things about those who hold views different than his. It is reasonable to say, I think, that there is little evidence of a spirit of grace and reconciliation in the words of Wallis.

"Identification of Christian social ethics with specific partisan proposals that clearly are not the only ones that may be characterized as Christian and as morally acceptable," the Christian ethicist Paul Ramsey once wrote, "comes close to the original New Testament meaning of heresy." That assessment is a wise and serious one -- and it is one Jim Wallis, a person who undoubtedly longs to be faithful to his Lord, should carefully reflect on.

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Democrats' Momentum Building for Sunday Health Vote

Patricia Murphy — 2010-03-19T05:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Senate, House, Democrats, Republicans, Nancy Pelosi, Health Care, The Capitolist, Congress

After months of debate, delays and intraparty disarray, Democrats in Washington seemed to gain crucial momentum toward passing a health care reform bill by week's end. But legislative booby traps and fickle election-year politics mean that significant hurdles await the bill in the Senate, even if it passes the House in a likely Sunday vote.

The tide seemed to turn for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Democrats on Thursday morning, when the Congressional Budget Office released a very preliminary, but highly favorable, cost estimate for the newly combined House and Senate bills that the chambers will take up under reconciliation.

CBO Director Doug Elmendorf told Congressional leaders their compromise bill, which would extend coverage to 32 million Americans without insurance, will total $940 billion in new federal spending over 10 years. More importantly, he said, it will cut the deficit by $130 billion in the first 10 years and by $1.2 trillion in the 10 years after that. It will also overhaul the nation's student loan program, saving billions of dollars by eliminating private banks from most transactions.

Pelosi opened a Thursday press conference, her third in three days, with the CBO numbers on a large poster board beside her, a smile on her face, and a victorious message to the assembled crowd.

"They say a picture is worth a thousand words," she said. "But a number is worth a lot, too."

The CBO numbers, it turned out, were worth crucial votes for the bill as the day went on. Moments after Pelosi presented the findings to her caucus, Rep. Baron Hill (D-Ind.), a fiscally conservative holdout on the final bill, emerged from the meeting and said the deficit reduction projected by CBO would make a major difference in his thinking. "I'm pretty happy about the numbers," he said. "That moves me a step forward, and I want to get to a place where I can support it, but I'm not there yet."

Reps. Bart Gordon (D-Tenn.) and Betsy Markey (D-Colo.) said the numbers had done even more for them -- they will change their previous "no" votes to "yes."

With the CBO estimates softening resistance among the Blue Dog Democrats, some persuasion from the president seemed to be changing other Democrats' minds. When Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-Ohio) announced Wednesday he would change his "no" to a "yes," the usually high-minded progressive spoke in starkly practical terms, saying President Obama had urged him to decide on the bill as it is, "not as I would want it to be."

Rep. Dale Kildee (D-Mich.), a pro-life supporter of Rep. Bart Stupak's language on abortion funding restrictions, announced Wednesday that he, too, would vote for the bill he had resisted for months. "We must not lose sight of what is at stake here -- the lives of 31 million American children, adults and seniors who don't have health insurance," he said in a written statement. "There is nothing more pro-life than protecting the lives of 31 million Americans."

A final group of holdouts from the Hispanic caucus relented on Thursday as well and endorsed the bill as pressure built against their resistance to the final package, which will prohibit illegal immigrants from purchasing health insurance through newly created exchanges with their own money.

Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-Ill.), who made his frustration with the president over immigration reform well known over the last weeks, said, "I cannot see that voting against this health care bill is going to bring us any closer to comprehensive immigration reform. I do see that a success and a victory on health care will allow this president to be strengthened and to be able to carry out with more political capital our ultimate goal."

With votes lining up behind the Democrats, Rules Committee Chairwoman Louise Slaughter said she plans to convene her committee Saturday to vote on the rules for the House debate on the health care bill, and that she will most likely use the "deem and pass" procedure. That would allow Democrats to vote on changes they want to make to the deeply unpopular Senate health bill, and in the same vote "deem" that the underlying bill has passed as well.

"It is our protection to make sure the Senate bill is changed," she said. "It's not that complicated. It's been used here forever. This notion that this is some brand new byzantine thing we brought up out of the cave is nonsense." She said the House will most likely vote Sunday afternoon.

Meanwhile, Republicans vowed Thursday, as they have every day, to do everything possible to delay, dismantle, or destroy the health care bill.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell called the bill "a government take-over of health care" and said Democrats' relentless efforts to pass their legislation will backfire. "That kind of arrogance usually proceeds a big fall," he said.

House Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio accused Democrats of trying to "ram, ram, ram this through the Congress" and promised, "We're going to do everything we can to make sure this bill never, ever passes."

He and his fellow Republicans lived up to their word Thursday, offering two separate measures to force the House to vote directly on the Senate bill. Both measures failed, but won the votes of all Republicans and several Democrats.

It remained unclear whether Pelosi and her deputies had indeed secured the 216 votes necessary to pass their bill through the House on Sunday. Stupak (D-Mich.) remained firmly against the abortion funding language in the bill and maintained that several of his pro-life colleagues would join him in switching their yes votes to nos. And even with a victory in the House, it is clear that the health care reform saga will only continue in the Senate.

Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.), the chairman of the Budget Committee, described an arduous process of vetting each portion of the House bill though the Senate parliamentarian to ensure it complies with the rules. He also noted that Senate Republicans can offer an unlimited number of amendments to the Senate bill, which they have planned to do for months. If even one amendment is added or one provision is stripped out of the House-passed bill, the entire package will go back to the House to begin the process again.

But McConnell insisted he hasn't thought that far ahead. "Our plan is for it not to come to the Senate. Our plan is for it to be defeated in the House in the next few days."

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Don't Give the Roberts Court the Chance to Kill Health Reform

Walter Shapiro — 2010-03-19T05:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Senate, House, Democrats, Republicans, Nancy Pelosi, Health Care, Supreme Court, Congress

Searching for health care votes with the desperation of...well...a family without medical insurance trying to pay a hospital bill, Nancy Pelosi must find the temptation nearly irresistible.

With skittish House Democrats reluctant to ratify the heavy-handed compromises in the Senate health care bill such as the reviled Nebraska-only Cornhusker kickback, Pelosi is beguiled with a parliamentary gambit that would avoid such an awkward vote. Under a congressional sleight-of-hand called "deem and pass," House approval of fixes in the Senate bill (including rescinding the Cornhusker kickback) would be considered identical to actually passing the politically troublesome original Senate legislation.

If you are confused at this point -- and who can blame you -- here is a career tip: Do not expect to ever be a congressional parliamentarian.

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Lady Gaga, Rep. Jared Polis, and 5 Tips for Pols Who Twitter

Sandra Fish — 2010-03-19T05:00:00 00:00

Filed under: Woman Up

My congressman tweeted about Lady Gaga's new video last week, calling it "AMAZING."

Don't get me wrong, I have nothing against the queen of glam. But if I want advice on hot new videos, well, I'm kinda thinking it should be from someone other than my congressman, Rep. Jared Polis, (D-Colo.)

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Abortion Language in Health Bill Pits Catholic Against Catholic

David Gibson — 2010-03-18T22:37:00 00:00

Filed under: Senate, House, Democrats, Republicans, Religion, Abortion, Health Care, Obama Administration, Disputations, Congress, Conservatives

Democratic leaders and faith-based supporters of health care reform on Thursday stepped up their campaign to convince the public -- and perhaps a few pro-life House members whose votes are critical to passage -- that the legislation does not fund abortions and in fact would reduce abortions.

"I will be 81 years old in September. Certainly at this point in my life I'm not going to change my mind and support abortion and I'm not going to risk my eternal salvation," Rep. Dale Kildee (D-Mich.), a Catholic and staunch opponent of abortion, told reporters on a conference call organized by Faith in Public Life, a progressive group that has lobbied for passage of the reform bill.

Despite intense pressure from anti-abortion lobbies, Kildee this week announced his support for the Senate version of reform that the House will likely vote on this Sunday -- and his imprimatur came because he was convinced that, contrary to the stance of the U.S. Catholic bishops and some pro-life groups, the Senate bill does bar taxpayer funding of abortion.

Rep. Charlie Wilson, an Ohio Democrat, is another convert to the Senate bill and joined in Thursday's briefing.

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Rubio Still Leads Crist by Big Margin in GOP Primary Race, But Crist Does Better in General Election

Bruce Drake — 2010-03-18T22:18:00 00:00

Filed under: Senate, Polls, Poll Watch, 2010 Elections

Marco Rubio, the former state House Speaker, still continues to lead Gov. Charlie Crist in a Florida GOP primary by a wide margin, but Crist in a general election match-up does better than Rubio against Democratic Rep. Kendrick Meek, according to a Daily Kos/Research 2000 poll conducted March 15-17.

In the GOP primary, Rubio leads Crist by a big margin as he has had in other polls, by 58 percent to 38 percent with 12 percent undecided.

In general election match-ups, Crist leads Meek 45 percent to 36 percent with 19 percent undecided while Rubio is in a statiscal tie with the Democrat, leading him 41 percent to 40 percent with 19 percent undecided. The margin of error is 4 points.

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It's the Priests vs. the Nuns -- Again

Melinda Henneberger — 2010-03-18T20:03:00 00:00

Filed under: Senate, House, Religion, Abortion, Health Care, Congress

On the issue of health care reform, it's the priests vs. the nuns, with a coalition of the Catholic sisters who lead 60 different religious orders backing the proposed law, and the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops opposing it. Both camps are strongly anti-abortion, mind you, yet read the reform differently on that issue.

The split along gender lines -- an echo of the old Catholic school system of seating the girls on one side of the room and the boys on the other -- is certainly nothing new; in fact, women have been challenging their brothers in Christ at least as far back as Catherine of Siena, and in our own time and place for as long as I can recall. (Remember Sister Teresa Kane and her posse of 50 fellow nuns personally standing up to John Paul II in 1979 on the rule that only men may be ordained as priests?)

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Measuring the Madness: Negative Economic Impact of the NCAA Tournament

Doris Jwo — 2010-03-18T19:15:00 00:00

Filed under: The Cram

It's like clockwork. Every year, perfectly on cue, Selection Sunday comes around and the same slew of articles claim March Madness is responsible for million$ and million$ in lost worker output. Sure, people only spend a few minutes out of their day checking scores or striking up a conversation at the water cooler, but, according to the research firm Challenger, Gray & Christmas Inc., it's adds up to a whopping $1.8 billion dollars of negative economic impact. All in all, one-tenth of what the new jobs bill is going to cost us.

Of course, college basketball distractions run from the break room all the way up to the White House. The commander-in-chief is the most prominent subject of criticism for wasting time on bracketology. President Obama's highly anticipated bracket was revealed on Wednesday after endless debate over who he would pick to win it all. Even Mike Kryzyzewski, coach of the Duke University's men's basketball team, jokingly told reporters last March that Obama should probably focus on the economy rather than on filling out a bracket, though he may have been slightly biased after Obama picked rival team University of North Carolina to win last year's championship.

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As Bank Reform Vote Nears, a Jeffersonian Perspective

Nicholas Field — 2010-03-18T18:45:00 00:00

Filed under: Economy, The Cram

One can imagine how troubled our Founding Fathers might be at the extent of the problems facing the United States. The most upset of them all would likely be the author of the Declaration of Independence, Thomas Jefferson. Our third president would be surprised about many aspects of modern America, such as the collapse of states' sovereignty and the influence of religion in government, but he might find the state of our banking industry to be the most depressing.

The humble gentleman from Virginia had a rare and passionate hatred of banks. He greatly feared the power and reach that banking institutions could have in the United States. One of Jefferson's most widely quoted letters, written in retirement, states his belief "that banking institutions are more dangerous than standing armies." Jefferson's chief fear of banks was that they, as a small, central institution, were prone to corruption and to manipulating the finances of the nation.

Now that banking institutions have begun to stabilize after the bailouts and bankruptcies brought on by their housing market risks, legislators are debating how to prevent such occurrences. Paul Volcker, a former Federal Reserve chairman and current Obama adviser, has proposed restricting banks from making proprietary trades and speculative investments that do not benefit their customers. What has been dubbed the Volcker Rule would revive some of the reforms instituted by the Glass-Stegall Act, which was effective in regulating banks until it was partly repealed in 1980 and 1999.

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Special Provision for North Dakota Bank Removed From Health Bill

Patricia Murphy — 2010-03-18T17:03:00 00:00

Filed under: Senate, Democrats, Health Care, The Capitolist, Congress

Facing a barrage of questions, Sen. Kent Conrad (D-N.D.) Thursday sought the removal of a special provision he had written into the package of fixes to the Senate health care bill that would have applied only to the Bank of North Dakota.

The provision would have allowed the Bank of North Dakota to continue to originate and service student loans even though a pending overhaul says that all such loans will originate through the U.S. Department of Education, beginning July 1. The bill stipulated that only North Dakota residents attending North Dakota schools would be eligible for the loans.

The Bank of North Dakota is a nonprofit owned by the state and overseen by the Industrial Commission, which includes the governor, secretary of agriculture and attorney general. It is the only state-owned bank in the country.

Conrad is chairman of the Senate Budget Committee, which is taking the lead in managing the health care reconciliation bill in the Senate. Shortly after the bill became public, Conrad asked that the provision be taken out.

"In this environment, it became too much of a distraction from what is a much bigger issue," Conrad told Politics Daily.

Earlier, Conrad said he knew he risked coming under fire for creating a special exception for his state, but he felt it was the right thing to do.

"You know, the thing I have learned is you come under attack here no matter what," he said in the Capitol. "I tried to make a case for many months about this to our colleagues. They recognize this is a unique situation, but it would apply to every state. It just happens we're the only state in the nation where the people own this institution."

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Obama's Job Approval Rating Reaches Lowest Point of His Presidency

Bruce Drake — 2010-03-18T15:54:00 00:00

Filed under: Barack Obama, Polls, Obama Administration, Poll Watch, 2010 Elections, Congress

President Obama is suffering the lowest job approval rating since he was elected, with more disapproving of his performance than approving, while the public regard for Congress has also worsened, according to a Gallup poll conducted March 15-17.

Forty-eight percent disapprove of the job Obama is doing while 46 percent approved. This is also the first time the percentage of those disapproving was higher than those who approved.

Congress still fares far worse with 80 percent disapproving of its performance and 16 percent approving. The approval rate was barely above the 14 percent recorded in July 2008, which was the lowest figure since January 2007.

"Public support for President Obama and Congress -- both of which were running near their low points prior to the beginning of this month -- continues to slip," Gallup said. "That is an ominous sign heading into this year's midterm elections."

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