Congressman

Indicted Louisiana congressman loses re-election bid — Indicted Louisiana congressman loses re-election bid... [Tags: congressman, louisiana]

Congressman Opposes PNC, Nat City Merger — Rep. Dennis Kucinich says rejection of the merger is necessary to protect jobs for Cleveland-area residents.... [Tags: cleveland area, congressman, dennis kucinich, jobs, merger]

Laura Packard: On the bus with Jim Martin, Georgia Candidate for Senate — This weekend, I hit the road as a volunteer with the Jim Martin for Senate campaign again as we toured Georgia by bus. You can read my previous post from yesterday here. With the runoff on Tuesday the spotlight is shining brightly here. We've traveled all over, holding rallies at Campaign for Change offices (formerly Obama offices) and press conferences across Georgia to motivate our volunteers and get out the vote. We began Sunday afternoon with a somewhat depleted bus - several of the Martins (Joan and Jim have five kids) were still at church in the Atlanta area with... [Tags: al sharpton, atlanta area, campaign office, claudia kennedy, congressman]

Chris Weigant: Political Parties Are Not "Checks" Or "Balances" — There's an old inside-the-Beltway joke where a new House member is being shown around by a veteran of his own party. He is awed by entering the House floor for the first time, and is shown his new seat. He asks, pointing across the aisle to where the other party sits, "Is that where the enemy sits?" The older and wiser Congressman replies, "No, no, here in the House of Representatives we call our opponents 'the loyal opposition.' You're new, so you need to understand this. 'The enemy' is the Senate." This joke came to mind while listening and reading... [Tags: aisle, checks and balances, chris weigant, congressman, deliberation]

MTA the Target of New Terrorist Threat — Photo Courtesy AP/Kathy Willen Reports have surfaced about a new terrorist plan to attack the New York City transit system using suicide bombers. The FBI called the plot "uncorroborated, but plausible" that was allegedly triggered by information obtained from a Pakistani citizen arrested overseas last week. Despite the unsubstantiated nature of the threat, it drew extra attention due to its involvement of top aides to Osama Bin Laden. Newsday reports that "sources said the target would have been trains arriving at Penn Station." While there has been no adjustment to the terror threat level for the city or the... [Tags: congressman, holiday season, house committee on homeland security, maximum carnage, nature of the threat]

Evil And The Right — A reader writes: I was reading your post about George Weigel's view of Catholics who voted for Obama, and it reminded me of something.  Weigel and people like him seem to think that ideology defines who is good and who is evil in our world.  It would be helpful for people who think this way to remember that the worst spy in American history was a conservative, devout Catholic family man who was a member of Opus Dei (Robert Hanssen) and that one of the heroes of the Cold War was an alcoholic, womanizing, pro-choice, liberal congressman from Texas who... [Tags: american history, bush administration, catholic family, catholics, charlie wilson]

Death of the Regional Newspaper Bureau in Washington — This story by Jennifer Dorroh in AJR points to a trend in our business that should worry everyone: "These days, all the major bureaus have space they're renting out. We've all become landlords looking for subtenants," says Condon, who was bureau chief when he accepted a buyout from the company, which closed the bureau after the presidential election. "The real tragedy is that as more newspapers cut back, you're not going to have anybody watching the congressional delegation," he says. "In our case, we're sure that there's a certain former congressman who's sitting in prison in Arizona who has got... [Tags: attrition, bribes, bureau chief, buyouts, condon]

Goode riddance! — Super-Jerk Virgil Goode (R-VA) has had his backward, racist ass handed to him at last. Roll Call (subscription) reports that Tom Periello's victory in VA-05 over the repugnant Virgil Goode has been certified: Virginia’s State Board of Elections on Monday morning certified attorney Tom Perriello (D) as the winner by 745 votes in the highly competitive 5th district contest, although Rep. Virgil Goode (R-Va.) has yet to concede defeat. The race was one of the closest of the 2008 cycle, and Goode’s narrow margin of defeat means the Congressman could still request a formal recount from the state. Goode,... [Tags: arabic numerals, board of elections, congressman, district contest, holy texts]

San Francisco Can't Party Like Big Kids? Yes We Can! — Well, it seems some people had the right idea after all— with a little spit and polish, the Civic Center can be every bit the Obama mosh pit the city needs. At least that's what concert organizer NextArts bet on last spring when they booked the area for a big inaugural bash. They obviously didn't get the memo on San Francisco not having a proper space to gather. Of course, NextArts' foresight begs the question— What would they have done (on the off-off chance) if McCain had won? Anyway, the party starts at 7 in the morning (good luck getting... [Tags: bet, chill dude, civic center, civic workers, congressman]

Next Year's Model: An Early Look At Next Cycle's Races — There's always an election more or less around the corner, and in this case, 2009 and 2010 should be exceptionally interesting years in term of the balance of power in the Senate, and the control of governorships prior to the 2010 census and subsequent redistricting. So here's an early look at how 2009-2010 races appear at the outset. Everything is speculation at this point, of course, but if you're curious about specific races and possible candidates, here's a little bit of information. In the first of several instalments on the 2009-2010 races, let's look at the first eight states alphabetically... [Tags: agriculture commissioner, alabama history, artur davis, balance of power, barack obama]

Grijalva in Running for Interior — By Juliet Eilperin Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.) has emerged as a leading contender for Interior Secretary in the next administration, according to sources familiar with the transition. Grijalva's experience and background meshes nicely with some of the Obama team's top requirements. The son of a migrant worker who grew up in Tucson, Grijalva boasts a strong environmental record and chairs the House Resources Subcommittee on National Parks, Forests and Public Lands. Choosing the congressman, who...Please click on the title to continue reading this entry.... [Tags: ariz, congressman, contender, environmental record, forests]

John W. Whitehead: What Kind of Revolutionary Will You Be? — "We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily given up by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed." -- Martin Luther King, Jr. With the government's relentless assault on our pocketbooks and freedoms, the economic and fiscal picture for many Americans is bleak. The national debt is approaching $10 trillion. People are losing their homes and jobs, and five million have fallen into poverty. At the same time, lucrative tax breaks exist for the corporate rich, while the average citizen is heavily taxed. The Constitution and civil liberties have been undermined at every step. And don't... [Tags: apathy, better time, civil liberties, congressman, corrective measures]

Waxman's win leaves Gov't Oversight chair vacant — You can't chair two committees. Them's the rules. So now that Henry Waxman has succeeded in wresting control of the Energy & Commerce Committee from John Dingell (a victory which Dingell has, in conciliatory fashion, congratulated Waxman), the chairmanship of the Oversight panel that Waxman led is up for grabs. And even though the Waxman-Dingell contest appears to have undone the seniority system, it's alive and well in other quarters (and might not be as dead as all that, anyway, given that Waxman's hardly a newcomer to E&C). TPM is reporting that the chair of Oversight and Government Reform is... [Tags: cbc members, colleague, commerce committee, committee chairmanship, congressional black caucus]

Another Dem Leadership Battle May Be Brewing — Henry Waxman's hard-fought capture of the House Energy and Commerce Committee chairmanship has created an opening for his soon-to-be-former seat atop the House Oversight Committee. The upset also sent a message across Capitol Hill that seniority is no longer the prime merit for a chairmanship post -- a message that could shake up the race for Waxman's old seat. The official word is that Rep. Ed Towns is the favorite to take over the post. With Waxman gone, the New York Democrat assumes the role of senior official on the Oversight committee, and his office says he wants the job.... [Tags: 110th congress, capitol hill, cbc, commerce committee, committee chair]

Maia Szalavitz: Obama Drug Czar Pick: No Recovery from War on Drugs? — On paper, Jim Ramstad-- who is rumored to be Obama's choice for drug czar-- looks like the ideal man for the job . He's a recovering alcoholic himself and a Congressman who championed legislation recently passed to provide equal insurance coverage for addictions and other mental illnesses. To top it off, he's a Republican, giving Obama what looks like a relatively harmless way to make his cabinet more bipartisan. Choosing Ramstad would appear to make a powerful statement about addiction as a medical, not a moral issue. Unfortunately, Ramstad may be a drug warrior in recovering person's clothing. There... [Tags: addictions, ama, barry mccaffrey, bill clinton, congressman]

Dan Treul: Congress Scraps a Good Car with Bad Steering — Congress might as well be arguing about the sale of the state of Michigan as it debates the proposed bailout of the Big Three automotive makers. Whatever message voters sent to the GOP on Tuesday, Nov. 4, it's become increasingly apparent the party leadership has not received it. The remarks of Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-AL) - ranking Republican on the House Financial Services Committee - today are a disappointing case in point: "My constituents do not understand why their tax dollars should go to support what they consider less efficient businesses," Bachus said today during the committee's hearing with Detroit... [Tags: american auto industry, automaker, automotive industry, bailout, case in point]

Raven: The Untold Story of The Reverend Jim Jones and His People — Thirty years ago yesterday, 900 people living on a commune in Guyana under the religious guidance of Jim Jones killed themselves, or were murdered. The story of Jonestown is an amazingly twisted tale involving faith, trust, charisma, control, and politics. In my opinion, that story has never been synthesized better than in Raven: The Untold Story of The Reverend Jim Jones and His People, just republished this week. Tim Reiterman, the main author of the 1982 book and former San Francisco Chronicle reporter, was investigating the cult for more than a year before the suicides. During a fact-finding mission... [Tags: amazon, charisma, congressman, cult, fact finding mission]

You2Gov offers services to partner websites — You2Gov, a political communication site, announced Tuesday that it will start offering its "Direct Democracy 3.0" service to organizations and businesses that want to add social networking features to their websites and allow visitors to contact their elected officials, as well as form online communities around issues, and stay up-to-date on relevant topics. "We just watched the Obama campaign masterfully use the internet to raise record amounts of money, energize supporters, educate the public about the candidate, and get out the vote," said Alan W. Silberberg, CEO of You2Gov in a statement. "In 'Direct Democracy 3.0', organizations have the... [Tags: advocacy tools, bob walsh, ceo, congressman, cryptic error message]

Federal Judges to Hear Arguments in Marine's Defamation Suit Against Murtha — An appeals court will hear whether Rep. Murtha should testify in the defamation suit brought by a Marine accused by the congressman of committing "cold-blooded murder and war crimes" in Iraq.... [Tags: appeals court, cold blooded murder, congressman, defamation suit, federal judges]