Blogging Blue

• It’s hard to believe it’s December 21st and the 2008 election is still not over. Al Franken now leads incumbent Norm Coleman by 35-50 votes in the Minnesota U.S. Senate recount, but things aren’t over yet. Officials still have to sort and count approximately 1,600 absentee ballots that were mistakenly rejected before the vote is certified, so it could be a bit longer before any winner is formally announced.
• The inauguration of president-elect Barack Obama, which is expected to draw over 2 million people to our nation’s capital, is also expected to have a big price tag. Officials in Washington D.C. have requested an additional $15 million from Congress to help the city cover costs. That would double the $15 million Congress has already allocated to pay for all national events and demonstrations in Washington during 2009, making the Obama an inauguration a truly pricey affair.
• Sherry Johnston, the mother of Levi Johnston, was arrested Thursday in Wasilla, Alaska on six felony counts of misconduct involving a controlled substance. You’ll remember Levi Johnston as the young man having a baby with the daughter of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. The undercover investigation that resulted in Sherry Johnston’s arrest “had been going on for a while,” according to Alaska State Police, and it seems a little far-fetched to believe no one in the Johnston family knew anything about what was going on.
• Thanks to the latest snowfall we received, this December has been the second snowiest on record in Milwaukee. With three storms expected to dump 7-15 inches of snow on the Milwaukee area during the coming week, the record of 49.5 inches that fell in December 2000 could be in jeopardy.

• Democrat Al Franken has pulled to within 2 votes of incumbent Norm Coleman in the U.S. Senate recount in Minnesota. I’ve heard a lot of screaming from some conservatives about how Franken and his people are trying to steal the election, but after what happened in the 2000 presidential election in Florida, I’m all for making sure each and every vote is counted.
• The Milwaukee School Board voted 7 to 2 Thursday night to investigate whether board member Charlene Hardin violated the board’s code of ethics in connection with a trip she took to Philadelphia in July. Hardin was among the two board members voting against the investigation, and in a statement, she accused the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel of “a high tech lynching” of her. You’ll remember Dan Bice of the Journal Sentinel first broke the story about Hardin’s attendance - or lack thereof - at a conference in Philadelphia, a trip that was paid for by taxpayers.
• I know there’s been somewhat of a furor over president-elect Obama’s decision to have Rick Warren deliver the invocation at Obama’s inaugural ceremony, but I think this is just much ado about nothing. I know Rick Warren has some positions that many liberals don’t agree with - his stance on same-sex marriage being one I can think of off the top of my head - but I see this as a principled decision by a man who’s always held Rick Warren in high regard. President-elect Obama had this to say in defense of his decision:
  

  “And I would note that a couple of years ago, I was invited to Rick Warren’s church to speak, despite his awareness that I held views that were entirely contrary to his when it came to gay and lesbian rights, when it came to issues like abortion. …

  “And that dialogue, I think, is part of what my campaign’s been all about: That we’re not going to agree on every single issue, but what we have to do is to be able to create an atmosphere … where we can disagree without being disagreeable and then focus on those things that we hold in common as Americans.”

  President-elect Obama had to know his choice of Rick Warren to give the invocation at the inauguration would raise eyebrows and elicit criticism from many on the left, and the fact that he chose Warren knowing the likely repercussions speaks volumes about president-elect Obama’s willingness to stand on principle rather than doing what’s most politically opportune.

Well, apparently president-elect Barack Obama finally made a Cabinet choice that liberals don’t seem to have mixed feelings about, and that choice is Rep. Hilda Solis, who will head the Labor Department in the Obama administration. Labor leaders were effusive in their praise for the choice of Rep. Solis:

“The daughter of two immigrant workers and union members … she will be a secretary of labor working men and women can finally count on to stand up and fight for them,” said Andy Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union.

“For Rep. Solis, serving as secretary of labor will not just be a job, but the culmination of a lifetime of action serving as a voice for people who work,” Stern said.

AFL-CIO President John Sweeney said the nation’s largest organized labor organization was “thrilled” that Solis would be the next labor secretary.

“We’re confident that she will return to the labor department one of its core missions — to defend workers’ basic rights in our nation’s workplaces,” Sweeney said.

Hopefully the choice of Rep. Solis as Labor Secretary will assuage some of the concerns liberals have had about Obama’s Cabinet choices, considering she’s about as liberal as anyone and she’s well-liked by organized labor.

At the risk of losing my good standing as a card-carrying liberal, I’ve got a confession to make…

I’m not a fan of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.

To be honest, I’ve never been a fan of Speaker Pelosi, but that could be because she’s never really done anything impressive during her time as Speaker. The current House and Senate majorities are a direct result of the hard work of Rahm Emanuel and Sen. Chuck Schumer, and while Speaker Pelosi has served a valuable purpose as a fundraiser, she’s done nothing during her time as Speaker to distinguish herself.

…and I’ve come to the conclusion that if the Big Three don’t get bailed out by the White House and do end up in bankruptcy, resulting in our economy slipping into a full-fledged depression, the GOP will have dug themselves a hole that they’ll spend a generation or more digging themselves out of. After all, they’ll shoulder much of the blame if the Big Three fail and the economy slips into a depression, and I can see Democrats using the refusal of some Republicans to vote in favor of the bailout as fodder for more than a few campaign ads.

Personally, I’d much rather have seen Republican senators vote in favor of a bailout for the Big Three, but from a purely political standpoint, their votes against the bailout will certainly serve a valuable political purpose if our nation ends up in another depression as a result.

On his final visit to Iraq, President George W. Bush got a reminder of his unpopularity, as an Iraqi reporter threw his shoes at President Bush during a news conference:

“This is a farewell kiss, you dog!” shouted the protester in Arabic, later identified as Muntadar al-Zeidi, a correspondent for Al-Baghdadia television, an Iraqi-owned station based in Cairo, Egypt.

Here’s some video of the incident:

While I don’t condone throwing anything at the president - or anyone else for that matter - as a means of expressing your displeasure, I do think this incident speaks volumes about how President Bush is perceived by the very people he “liberated.”

I’ve already blogged about the efforts of some Republican senators to kill the proposed auto bailout bill and blame the failure of that bill on the United Auto Workers, and I also warned about the possible domino effect that could result if one or more of the domestic auto manufacturers closed its doors. No sooner had I clicked “publish” and I happened across this headline from Talking Points Memo:

General Motors Temporarily Closing 20 Factories Across North America

According to TPM, GM is temporarily closing 20 factories across North America, while also making broad cuts to its vehicle production:

GM said it will cut 250,000 vehicles from its production schedule for the first quarter of 2009, which includes a cut of 60,000 vehicles announced last week. Normal production would be around 750,000 cars and trucks for the quarter, spokesman Tony Sapienza said.

Many plants will be shut down for the whole month of January, he said, and all told, the factories will be closed for 30 percent of the quarter.

Things are certainly bad, but something tells me they’re going to get worse…

“It’s Herbert Hoover time”

That was the message Vice President Dick Cheney brought to a closed-door Senate GOP lunch Wednesday, December 10th, reportedly warning it would be “Herbert Hoover” time if aid to the struggling U.S. auto industry was rejected.

On Thursday night, Senate Republicans killed the auto bailout bill that had been supported by Democrats and the White House, with Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky blaming the evil boogeyman, organized labor. Sen. McConnell, who coincidentally hails from a state that has a significant presence of foreign auto manufacturers who would no doubt benefit if the domestic auto industry collapsed - blamed the United Auto Workers for failing to give greater concessions regarding workers’ pay and benefits. However, what Sen. McConnell conveniently failed to mention is that workers in many of the non-union foreign auto plants in states like Kentucky, Tennessee, and Texas often earn as much or more than their unionized counterparts working for the domestic auto manufacturers. The issue for Republicans like Sen. McConnell really isn’t workers’ pay - he and his ilk see this as an opportunity to weaken organized labor, a segment of the population that has not traditionally supported the Republican Party.

Despite last night’s setback by Senate Republicans, the White House isn’t giving up on an auto bailout, signaling that it might attempt to use Treasury financial market rescue funds to prop up the auto industry until a new Congress convenes in January:

“Under normal economic conditions we would prefer that markets determine the ultimate fate of private firms,” the administration said in a statement. “However, given the current weakened state of the U.S. economy, we will consider other options if necessary – including use of the TARP program — to prevent a collapse of troubled automakers.”

Hopefully there will be some movement on this issue, because the last thing our economy needs right now is a failed auto industry, which would no doubt result in a chain effect of business closings and layoffs of not just autoworkers, but workers in all those businesses that produce components such as seats, dashboards, etc. A collapse of our nation’s domestic auto industry could very well be the tipping point that moves our economy from a recession to a depression, and that’s the last thing any of us need right now.

Oh, and one more thing…while Sen. McConnell and his Republican colleagues in Washington are blaming the UAW for not making deep enough concessions in workers’ wages and benefits, I’d love to hear Sen. McConnell say he’s willing to take a cut in his pay and benefits until the economy picks up, lest he run the risk of being labeled a hypocrite for demanding hardworking folks take cuts in their pay and benefits while he gets a six figure salary and the Cadillac of health insurance plans.

For as bad as Wisconsin’s 5.4 billion dollar budget deficit is, things could be worse, as evidenced by California’s massive budget deficit:

The state faces a $28 billion budget shortfall over the next two years. If nothing is done, nearly $5 billion in public-works projects could be halted in little more than a week for lack of bond sales – everything from bridge replacements to a new highway tunnel and billions of dollars’ worth of school construction, according to state Treasurer Bill Lockyer.

Now a 28 billion dollar budget shortfall is bad, but the news gets worse:

The picture worsens next spring if legislators don’t pass some plan to increase revenues or cut spending or both. California will run out of operating cash in March, state controller John Chiang told the lawmakers. The recession has severely squeezed state tax revenues.

Lawmakers in California and Wisconsin have blamed the economic downturn for worsening the budget deficits in both states, but I’m just glad I don’t live in California, considering the fact that there’s been no talk of Wisconsin running out of operating cash at any point in the near future.

The Pioneer Press is reporting the FBI has started investigating allegations that a longtime friend and benefactor of U.S. Senator Norm Coleman of Minnesota tried to steer money to Sen. Norm Coleman:

Houston is where the first of two lawsuits was filed alleging Nasser Kazeminy, a Bloomington financier, tried to steer $100,000 to Coleman via his wife’s Minneapolis employer. The second suit, filed in Delaware, alleges Kazeminy initially tried to get money directly to the senator.

Both Coleman and Kazeminy have denied any wrongdoing, and Coleman last month said he welcomes an investigation.

Strangely, Sen. Coleman’s comment that he welcomes an investigation sounds strangely familiar, as if I’ve heard it before…

Yeah, it’s always a good idea to tempt fate; ask Gov. Blagojevich about that.

I hope for Sen. Coleman’s sake he’s as clean as a whistle, but I’m willing to bet Nasser Kazeminy didn’t act alone in trying to steer significant amounts of money to Sen. Coleman, and I’ll be interested to see just how much Sen. Coleman knew about Kazeminy’s efforts on his behalf.

And for what it’s worth, I’m still waiting for Fred Dooley from Real Debate to post about the Norm Coleman investigation, because it’s a situation that certainly merits “real debate.”