Tag: Susan Collins

Sen. Mike Enzi’s ‘Pack of Lies’ vs. 9/11 Victims

The best people America has to offer have been getting sick and dying from their heroic efforts at the World Trad Center. As you can see from this recent Daily News front page, Mike Enzi is not the only Republican to tell the 9/11 first responders and heroes to drop dead.

The James Zadroga 9/11 Health and Compensation Act that provides $3.2 billion for long-term health care for rescue and construction workers at Ground Zero, plus another $4.2 billion in compensation for others who were exposed to airborne toxins will be out of time once the Republicans control the House.

These heroes who answered the call for help on September 11, 2001 and the horrible weeks that followed have been pushing hard for justice before it is too late. After a barrage of local media coverage, multiple visits to Washington from Ground Zero worker, victim’s family members pleading with the Senate and a huge bipartisan effort from tri-state politicians, one Republican has signed on. The rest have voices disagreement with Sens. Schumer and Gillibrand’s method of financing healthcare for heroes. The cloture count is now at 59 and their big day in the Senate is tomorrow.  

Now that there is some hope for a bill named after an NYPD detective who died at age 34 of a respiratory disease attributed to participation in the rescue and recovery operations at the World Trade Center, Mike Enzi is working hard to stop the bill from going forward. His reasoning is that the nation has already given enough.

Seeking Republican Patriots: How Reining in Anonymous Attack Ads Can Help Save Our Democracy

Does Olympia Snowe really want to be the target of waves of anonymous attack ads in support of some conservative primary challenger? Wouldn’t a retiring George Voinovich prefer to leave some shards of our democracy off-limits to being sold to the highest bidder? Could John McCain remember why McCain-Feingold was once of his proudest legacies and acknowledge how profoundly the Supreme Court’s Citizen’s United decision damaged everything he was trying to do to safeguard American democracy?  

Pressure Mounts For Moderate Republicans To Support the DREAM Act

Originally posted on Citizen Orange.

Senator George LeMieux (R-FL) is starting to feel the heat of pro-migrant voters, specifically Latino voters. Tonight, Univision will air a debate in which current Florida governor and U.S. Senate nominee Charlie Crist will come out in support of the DREAM Act.  The day before yesterday, Representive Kendrick Meek (D-FL), and also a nominee for U.S. Senate, hand delivered a letter to LeMieux.  This part of Meek’s letter says it all:

The Stars Have Aligned: The Time Is Now for the DREAM Act

Originally posted at Citizen Orange.

If you haven’t been on facebook, twitter, or following the news, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) announced yesterday that he would be introducing the DREAM Act as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act.  Univision anchor Jorge Ramos tweeted last week that Reid wanted to move the DREAM Act before November.  Now we know how Reid wants to move it.  The DREAM Act could come up for a vote as early as Tuesday of next week.

A Clear difference: setting the Price of Carbon, so WE get a Share

Clearly America needs to reach for, and achieve, a Clean Energy Future.

Not so Clear is the Road we will take, if any, to ultimately get there …

Kerry says Obama intends to move votes on energy

Reporting by Timothy Gardner and Richard Cowan, Editing by Sandra Maler, Reuters — June 22, 2010

WASHINGTON – […]

Obama is slated to meet leading Republican and Democratic senators on Wednesday to discuss a way forward for the energy legislation.

[…]

Kerry said the bill must include ways to price carbon but was not “locked into any one single way of doing it.”

“The fact is if we don’t price carbon, we will create one tenth of the jobs and reduce only one tenth of the emissions,” he said. “It would essentially be an energy-only bill.”

The Empire Strikes Back — in the Fight for our Energy Future

The Empire Strikes Back (1980)

Yoda: I am wondering, why are you here?

Luke: I’m looking for someone.

Yoda: Looking? Found someone, you have, I would say, hmmm?

Luke: Right…

Yoda: Help you I can. Yes, mmmm.

Luke: I don’t think so. I’m looking for a great warrior.

Yoda: Ohhh. Great warrior.  [Yoda laughs and shakes his head]

Yoda: WarsNOT — make one great.

Not even wars, for control and mining of strategically important geo-politcal Natural Resources — that may or may not, determine the course of the world’s future …

‘Cap and Dividend’ turns Carbon Caps into a Profit-Sharing Gig

Did you know that ‘Cap and Trade’ is an Old School Solution?

There’s a new Carbon Solution in play, that is CLEARLY a contender …

Cap and Dividend:

The CLEAR Climate Solution

The cap-and-dividend CLEAR Act, introduced by Senators Maria Cantwell and Susan Collins, is simple, fair and built to last. Simple: a 100% auction of permits to pollute, a return of most of the money raised directly to the people, with the remainder used for clean energy investments. Fair: each American gets an equal monthly refund from auction proceeds so that those who use less energy will do better than those using more.

http://chesapeakeclimate.org/c…

KBR linked to “the vast majority” of fraud in Iraq and Afghanistan

 

April Stephenson, the director of the Defense Contract Audit Agency (DCAA), told the bipartisan Commission on Wartime Contracting in Iraq and Afghanistan on Monday that Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR) is connected to “the vast majority” of alleged fraud cases in the Iraq and Afghanistan combat zones.

Plus, the majority of the $13 billion in “questioned” and “unsupported” bills to the Pentagon were submitted by KBR, reports the Washington Post. “KBR’s work accounts for 43 percent of the Pentagon’s audited Iraq contracting dollars”.

“I don’t think we’re aware of a program, contract or contractor that has had this number of suspensions or referrals,” Stephenson said…

Stephenson also revealed that some $553 million in payments have been suspended or blocked because contract officials questioned them or said they were invalid.

Since 2004, 32 cases of alleged bribery, overbilling, or other fraud have been sent to the inspector general for possible legal action.

Bipartisanship No, Working Majority Yes

Republican demanding bipartisanship


The topic below was originally posted on my blog, the Intrepid Liberal Journal.


In the grown up world, honorable and reasonable people may initially disagree but eventually compromise upon a collective review of empirical evidence. It was in this spirit, that the nascent Obama administration reached out to Republicans with respect to their proposed American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, which finally passed both houses of congress yesterday.

Whistleblower Protection provisions quietly removed from Stim Bill

(Cross posted at the GOS)

When, in the coming days, weeks and months, the right wingnut noise machine (predictably) starts cranking up the squeeze box and running around with their hair on fire, screaming that taxpayer’s money from the “stimulus” bill is being wasted on the Democrat’s long delayed pet projects,  it will behoove progressives to remind them that: the key measure in said bill designed to help expose that waste was quietly removed from the bill late last night — and, by one of their own, a senator who touts herself as a proponent of fiscal responsibility.

Republicans Running Scared from GOP Convention

As of right now, Republican Gordon Smith, Elizabeth Dole, Ted Stevens, Bob Schaffer and Susan Collins are all skipping the GOP convention. Has this ever happened? We’ve had recent defectors like Zell “duel challenger” Miller, but have we ever had numerous incumbents skip out on honoring their party in such a public fashion?

Full disclosure, I am the netroots director for OR-Sen candidate Jeff Merkley

Crushing the Next 20 Years of Republicanism Now

Let’s get one thing straight, now.  There are no liberal Republican Senators.  But the GOP’s got a secret-play in its handbook: the media carte-blanche from being an “independent”-minded poseur.  And 2006 showed us it works for Republicans..