Brutally Honest

If at First They Don't Succeed...

Posted by guest blogger, BroKen.

Apparently, they didn’t get it done. The legislature is going back to Frankfort to try again.

The issue the governor used to call the special session which starts next week was a projected budget shortfall of about one billion dollars. It seems the legislators in February didn’t feel the shocks in the economy that we’ve all been experiencing for the last nine months. Perhaps they wrote their budget while wearing rose-colored glasses. So, now the governor says they have to try again to fill a billion dollar gap.

But a lot of people think that the REAL reason for the special session is to try to pass laws which would allow video gambling at race tracks around the state. The argument goes like this. Horses are being attracted to racetracks in other states which have larger purses. Those large purses come from other forms of gambling allowed in those states. In order to compete, they say they have to have more gambling like video poker or video slot machines. The income from those machines would allow larger purses for the horse races and “save the horse industry in Kentucky.” Hurray!!

But they (the racetracks around Kentucky) also say they would spend about 1 billion dollars to buy the machines and renovate their tracks to make room for them. Wow! They will spend a billion for video poker but not spend that money to raise the purses in order to attract better horses. Seems to me that a billion dollars might be enough for the horse industry to save itself.

Now, back to that other billion dollars; the shortfall in the budget. Did you know that Kentucky is supposed to receive about three billion dollars from the federal stimulus package? I am no economist but it wouldn’t seem too hard to stretch three billion dollars over a one billion dollar gap. But the governor needs the legislators to help him do that. At least they will try again.

You’ve got to give them credit for persistence. The governor says that the lawmakers didn’t get the budget right. So try, try again. The horse industry is determined to get more money from poor slobs who believe the lie that anyone can win (might as well be me!) So, if they keep the purses low, they can make it appear that they need more forms of gambling. They have the money to raise purses all by themselves. But no, they want to spend that money on video slot machines. They haven’t been allowed to yet, but they are going to try, try again.

Yet here is an idea that hasn’t been tried yet. If those in Frankfort are really concerned about Kentucky money going to other states through gambling, then why not authorize the attorney general to sue those states (or the casinos) on behalf of the poor slobs who have lost their homes through gambling debts. That’s something I’d like to see them try.

Obama administration engaging in a little Napolitano CYA (UPDATED)

Bob Owens weighs in:

If I didn't know better, I might suspect that the addition of an obscure left-wing terrorist who planted two bombs that caused no injuries and only minor property damage to "Most Wanted" list was a political calculation, perhaps made specifically to help take the heat off a DHS Secretary under fire for supporting the release of a controversial report that labeled mainstream conservative values as those belonging to extremists, and who more or less stated military veterans were too stupid to keep from being duped into joining extremist groups.

Devlin Barrett is either playing Obama Administration stenographer when claiming that a left wing terrorist is the first domestic terrorist added to the FBI's "Most Wanted" list at such a politically suspect time, or Barrett is shockingly ignorant.

I'll leave it to others to judge which.

Bob is of course reacting to this news:

For the first time, an accused domestic terrorist is being added to the FBI's list of "Most Wanted" terror suspects.

Daniel Andreas San Diego, a 31-year-old computer specialist from Berkeley, Calif., is wanted for the 2003 bombings of two corporate offices in California.

Authorities describe San Diego as an animal rights activist who turned to bomb attacks and say he has tattoo that proclaims, "It only takes a spark."

A law enforcement official said the FBI was to announce Tuesday that San Diego was being added to the "Most Wanted" terrorist list. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to discuss the announcement ahead of time.

San Diego would be the 24th person on the list, and the only domestic terror suspect.

FBI spokesman Richard Kolko declined to comment on the pending announcement.

The move to add a domestic, left-wing terrorist to the list comes only days after the Obama administration was criticized for internal reports suggesting some military veterans could be susceptible to right-wing extremist recruiters or commit lone acts of violence. That prompted angry reactions from some lawmakers and veterans groups.

An arrest warrant was issued for San Diego after the 2003 bombings in northern California of the corporate offices of Chiron Corp., a biotechnology firm, and at Shaklee Corp., a nutrition and cosmetics company. The explosions caused minor damages and no injuries.

Methinks Bob's instincts are right on... it's yet another smoke and mirrors move intended to do one thing... talk a good game without having to play.

With this bunch, it's all about lip service.

UPDATE: Bob has issued a correction:

Correction: As Jim notes in the comments, there are two distinct "Most Wanted" lists maintained by the FBI, the traditional "Most Wanted" list that focuses on criminals and one created specifically for terrorism suspects in 2002. While Kaczynski and Rudolph are without a doubt domestic terrorists, they were listed on the FBI's traditional "Most Wanted" list, and not the terrorism list. The AP article was correct in listing San Diego as the first domestic terrorist added to the terrorism list, even if he wasn't close to being the first domestic terrorist.

The timing of adding left-wing bomber San Diego, a minor figure in every respect, at this time, is still highly suspect.

Here is a Bill, But It's Only a Bill... in Kentucky

Posted by guest blogger, BroKen.
(When I posted this and this, I promised that I would keep you updated on the bill's progress. So, here ya go. And, oh, the link on "Jim Gooch" is an interview on global warming you might find interesting.)

Well, it was a long shot. I realized it didn’t have much of a chance. Still, I was holding out hope. I thought that maybe our representatives in Frankfort would actually represent the people who send them there.

Last week I urged you to contact Frankfort to influence the Democratic leadership of the house to consider passing House Bill 241 which includes provisions to allow a woman to view ultrasound images of her fetus before deciding to abort it. I know that some of you did so, and I want to personally say’ “Thanks.” But perhaps you have already heard. Once again, the leadership of the House of Representatives refused to allow this common sense measure to come to a vote on the floor.

Last week the Democratic caucus met to decide whether they would allow pending bills to come to the floor during their final two days or only vote to override vetos from the governor. They have the power to suspend their rules and allow any changes. Republicans were not invited to help decide. Apparently, Speaker of the House, Greg Stumbo, called for a hasty “voice vote” on the issue. He says that he didn’t hear any “nays”.

I called our representative, Jim Gooch, to express my disappointment with the Democrats’ action. I had spoken with him last week and he told me that he was in favor of House Bill 241 and described himself as a man who speaks his mind regardless of what others think. So, I left our conversation with hope that he would at least speak up. But he didn’t.

To be fair, I have to say that Mr. Gooch said that there was quite a bit of dissension among the Democrats but that the “voice vote” was held very quickly without much of a chance to even say “nay.” I told him it seemed like the Speaker of the House “rolled over you guys.” Mr. Gooch objects to that characterization. He saw the “voice vote” as a sort of referendum on the leadership of the house and that most of the Democrats thought that their leaders had done a good job during the session.

Whether the Speaker “rolled over” the dissenters in the party or whether the dissenters just went along in order to get along, the “ultrasound” bill is still just a bill, not a law. One thousand lives might have been saved had some Democrats stood up and said “nay“.

There are conservative Democrats like Mr. Gooch who will sometimes speak their mind. But often they are worn down but the leadership of their party. Mr. Gooch himself had served on the Health and Welfare Committee that reviewed the original ultrasound bill. Had he still been on that committee, it probably would have passed. But the Democratic leadership decides who serves on which committee.

Now all we can do is pray for the women and their babies. And you know, that is really more important than what happens in Frankfort anyway.

Update on a Local Issue: An Ultra-Sound Bill

Posted by guest blogger, BroKen.

My original post on this Kentucky bill to allow a woman to view her ultrasound before an abortion is here. You'll see that I updated it with the fact that the House committee killed the bill and refused to let it on the floor. But now some courageous senators have attached the essence of the bill to one already passed in the House. The House bill had to do with regulating body piercing parlors. So now it will return to the House for a vote... unless the House leadership refuses to bring it to the floor. I'll let you know what happens. If you are so inclined, say a prayer for us in Kentucky whose House of Representatives is... well, you know. 

Informed Consent

Another local issue posted by guest blogger, BroKen.

Have you ever had surgery? You remember the form they ask you to sign that says the doctors have told you everything that might happen to you, from infection, to stroke, to death? The nurses and doctors always down play that form. They say that they have to tell you all the possibilities. They don’t want to scare you but they are required BY LAW to tell you everything. It is called “informed consent.” They can’t perform the procedure unless you know what you are getting into and agree that it is for the best. You must be fully informed.
Imagine for a moment that you are a young woman who, a few years ago, terminated her pregnancy thinking that it would be best for all concerned. You were told that at 8 weeks, 9 weeks, the fetus is a just a "coagulation of cells" easily removed so that your problems are solved. Sometime afterwards you see a science special on PBS that reveals the wonders of fetal development and you see the fingers and toes. You see thumb-sucking in the womb. You see a baby and you wonder about what was done to your little one. What a tragedy! If only you had known! If only you had been told.
Right now in Frankfort, the legislature is debating the merits of a bill (Senate Bill 79) which would require that women seeking an abortion be given the opportunity to see an ultrasound of their fetus so that they can make an informed decision about that procedure.
Fact is, abortion providers already do an ultrasound in order to determine the gestational age of the fetus. Their fees are based on that age. This bill would simply require that the woman have the option of seeing the ultrasound images so that she can make up her mind whether the termination is really in the best interest of all concerned.
In the past, opposition to SB 79 has been centered in a few powerful representatives who refused to allow the bill to come out of their committee. Now the committee chairmanships in the House of Representatives have changed and the bill has a chance of being heard by the entire body.
Doesn’t it make sense that if a doctor is required to get your informed consent before they take out your appendix, that doctors also give a woman an opportunity to see what they are going to remove in an abortion? Wouldn’t that be necessary for informed consent before the procedure? Seems like a reasonable requirement to me.
As I have done before (and will probably do again) I urge you to contact Frankfort and express your views. Tell them you want them to pass Senate Bill 79 so that women will know the truth before they decide on a procedure like abortion. You can do so by calling the free legislative message line at 1-800-372-7181. The receptionist can help you find your state representatives, if you don’t already know.

(Local Update)

My state senator (Democrat) called me to say he voted for the bill and it passed in the senate (controlled by Republicans) with only three votes against it. But it has always been the house (controlled by Democrats) where the bill gets stuck.

(UPDATE NO. 2)

Just got word today (March 10, 2009) that this bill was killed again in committee. The vote was a tie: 8-8, so the whole house (where it would pass overwhelmingly) won't see it this year. Democratic leadership in action! Makes me sick.

GOP looking for your ideas

Firewall?

Chambliss wins Ga. Senate runoff:

Georgia Sen. Saxby Chambliss won re-election Tuesday in a runoff, dashing Democrats' hopes of capturing enough seats in the U.S. Senate to thwart Republican filibusters.

Chambliss' election to a second term gives the GOP a firewall against Democrats eager to flex their newfound political muscle in Washington. The monthlong runoff battle against Democrat Jim Martin captured the national limelight, drawing political luminaries from both parties to the state and flooding the airwaves with fresh attack ads.

With 70 percent of the precincts reporting, Chambliss captured 60 percent to Martin's 40 percent. Chambliss' win is a rare bright spot for Republicans in a year where they lost the White House as well as seats in the House and the Senate.

'Hard and tough'
"It's been a hard and tough four weeks," Chambliss said at a victory party in Cobb County. "We had a hardcore campaign on both sides, and while things look good right now, we're going to continue to follow the returns as they come in."

Chambliss' mantra on the runoff campaign trail was simple: His re-election was critical to prevent Democrats in Washington from having a blank check.

With liberal Republicans like Olympia Snowe, Susan Collins and Gordon Smith, I'm not so sure that the firewall idea holds a lot of water, nevertheless, it's a vctory for the good guys.

We'll take it.

He who sings (UPDATED)

Posted by guest blogger Leslie.

I've been picking away at a book I found over at Angry Roughneck called Another Sort of Learning. Aimed at university students, James Schall discusses how to get an actual education while dippy-dooing your way through academia. It's highly readable. (I started out life an avid reader and now find reading pretty tough...so when I say highly readable I mean, even I can read it.) In it, he asks his class,

"Was Plato right after all about music and politics: What you like reveals what you become? That change in music portends the first sign of political change?"

Now camels don't read much Plato, but they should. Regardless, enter The Singing Revolution and Estonia's rise to independence. I'm not smart enough to figure out how to embed the trailer into my post, so go over there and experience it for yourself. It is magnificent. An excerpt of the voice over:

It was an extraordinary show of mass defiance in the Baltic region of the Soviet Union. Whenever you give free speech to people then things get out of hand. This singing together, this was our power. If 20,000 people start to sing one song then you just cannot shut them up. It's impossible. What role can singing play when a nation is faced with annihilation by its neighbours. Can culture hold a people together?

Given all the political antics of late, I'd say in Canada North America, we've lost our song.

Yours truly,

Alice the Camel. And also Leslie at the Broom.

h/t

Related: George Gershwin in Denmark. No words; no comment. Just a few bars of "It Ain't Necessarily So"

UPDATE: The video trailer mentioned above:

The will of the people will not be denied

Unless you're in California:

Prepare to be chilled to the core. And be afraid. Be very afraid.

The Los Angeles Times reports that Democratic legislators are asking the state Supreme Court to void Prop. 8, regardless (or because) of the fact that it won a majority vote among California's citizens.

Forty-three Democratic legislators, including leaders of the California Senate and Assembly, filed a brief Monday urging the California Supreme Court to void Proposition 8.

Assembly Speaker Karen Bass, Senate President Pro Tem Don Perata and incoming President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg signed the friend of the court brief, filed with the state Supreme Court.

No Republican legislator signed the petition, though Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican, denounced the anti-gay marriage measure over the weekend.

With almost 11 million ballots tallied, Proposition 8 had 52.3% of the vote to 47.7%. Although many ballots remain to be counted, the 500,000-vote spread is viewed as insurmountable.

"The citizens of California rely on the Legislature and the courts to safeguard against unlawful discrimination by temporary, and often short-lived, majorities," the legislators said in the document, written by attorneys at the firm Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher.

The measure won with 52.3% of the popular vote, nearly the same percentage of votes won by Barack Obama in the presidential election.

Two questions:

1. Should Congressional Republicans hire Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher to write a petition to the Supreme Court to "safeguard" against "temporary, and often short-lived, majorities" and usurp the presidential election?




2. Are legislators - who write California's laws - incapable of writing their own petition?

This is patently absurd and should amount to a Constitutional crisis in California if successful.

Check that. It would be absurd if usurping the vote through the courts was patently implausible. Instead, it is nothing short of alarming.

Alarming indeed... and an omen of things to come.

Count on it.

Paulson's bailout before the bailout.

Posted by guest blogger Renee.

"We're left now with congressional Democrats that have spines like overcooked spaghetti. So who is going to stop the Treasury secretary from doing whatever he wants?"

That quote from Lee A. Sheppard, a tax attorney who is a contributing editor at the trade publication Tax Analysts as found in an MSNBC article, "A quiet windfall for U.S. banks; With attention on bailout debate, Treasury made change to tax law" by Amit R. Paley.

So how is it that Paulson was able to do in one day what Republicans have been trying to legislate unsucessfully for decades, and do this prior to the passage of the bailout bill?   

The guidance issued from the IRS caught even some of the closest followers of tax law off guard because it seemed to come out of the blue when Treasury's work seemed focused almost exclusively on the bailout.

"It was a shock to most of the tax law community. It was one of those things where it pops up on your screen and your jaw drops," said Candace A. Ridgway, a partner at Jones Day, a law firm that represents banks that could benefit from the notice. "I've been in tax law for 20 years, and I've never seen anything like this."

More than a dozen tax lawyers interviewed for this story -- including several representing banks that stand to reap billions from the change -- said the Treasury had no authority to issue the notice.

Seems Paulson has his timing down to a science...   

The notice, which relaxed the Section 382 rules only for domestic banks, was released on a momentous day in the banking industry. It not only came 24 hours after the House of Representatives initially defeated the bailout bill, but also one day after Wachovia agreed to be acquired by Citigroup in a government-brokered deal.

The Treasury notice suddenly made it much more attractive to acquire distressed banks, and Wells Fargo, which had been an earlier suitor for Wachovia, made a new and ultimately successful play to take it over.

The Jones Day law firm said the tax change, which some analysts soon dubbed "the Wells Fargo Ruling," could be worth about $25 billion for Wells Fargo. Wells Fargo declined to comment for this article.

The tax world, meanwhile, was rushing to figure out the full impact of the notice and who was responsible for the change.

Jones Day released a widely circulated commentary that concluded that the change could cost taxpayers about $140 billion. Robert L. Willens, a prominent corporate tax expert in New York City, said the price is more likely to be $105 billion to $110 billion.

Over the next month, two more bank mergers took place with the benefit of the new tax guidance. PNC, which took over National City, saved about $5.1 billion from the modification, more than what it spent to acquire the bank, Willens said. Banco Santander, which took over Sovereign Bancorp, netted an extra $2 billion because of the change, he said. A spokesman for PNC said Willens's estimate was too high but declined to provide an alternate one; Santander declined to comment.

Attorneys representing banks celebrated the notice. One week after it was issued, former Treasury officials now in private practice met with Solomon, the department's top tax policy official. They asked him to expand the notice even further, so that foreign banks could benefit from the tax break, too.

Congress looks for answers.

And so they did ...

Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa), ranking member on the Finance Committee, was particularly outraged and had his staff push for an explanation from the Bush administration, according to congressional aides.

In an off-the-record conference call on Oct. 7, nearly a dozen Capitol Hill staffers demanded answers from Solomon for about an hour. Several of the participants left the call even more convinced that the administration had overstepped its authority, according to people familiar with the conversation.

But lawmakers worried about discussing their concerns publicly. The staff of Sen. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), chairman of the Finance Committee, had asked that the entire conference call be kept secret, according to a person with knowledge of the call.

"We're all nervous about saying that this was illegal because of our fears about the marketplace," said one congressional aide, who like others spoke on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the matter. "To the extent we want to try to publicly stop this, we're going to be gumming up some important deals.

I am beginning to wonder if Paulson and those driving this crisis have discovered a new weapon of mass destruction...

Fear.