In a week scarred with personal and public bad news, what a joy it was to follow the heroic exploits of Bernie Sanders on the Senate floor. Our own "Mr. Smith" did us proud once again, fighting the corruption of power and defending the little guy. I am sure he will now be smugly relegated by the right to Poster-Boy-in-Chief of left-wing crazy. That was to be expected. With all the irresponsible wing-nuts the Republicans have steering their agenda these days, they'll point to any demonstration of independence on the other side as somehow being equivalent. They'll say, "There goes Vermont again, getting too big for its britches. Remember Howard Dean?"
But that won't sell much beyond the filthy rich and "take-back" right. This country is bleeding fast, filled to the brim with the walking wounded, as Wall Street and the banks divvy up the spoils from their economic empire-building. If Congress doesn't listen with empathy to the words of the Independent Senator from Vermont, the vast majority of Americans who are looking at a future of diminishing returns for their toil in the bleeding classes will.
The tired old arguments for extending the Bush Tax Cuts for the rich are so lacking in economic merit and substance that it is only the arcane gymnastics of Congressional deal-making that have allowed extension of these entitlements to get serious consideration at all. Resigned to their lot as insignificant place-holders in an increasingly unjust society, most people are too busy just treading water to invest time and energy in closely monitoring the senate process. So they simply accept that, once again, the rich will get richer and the poor will get the shaft.
It may just be a glorious tilt at the windmill of inflexible power, but Bernie's eight-plus hours of scorching rhetoric yesterday cannot help but reach the minds and ears of the suffering masses...and that is a start. It's what every one of us would do if we found ourselves in his position, but how rarely does that happen in "real life."
Have a good lie-down this weekend, Senator Sanders. You've earned it. I'm not one of those who hope Bernie runs for President. I hope he stays right where he is and continues to do what he does best, bringing truth and justice to the seat of power. One bruised and busted hero in a generation is enough for me.
And the outrages continue. Just in from Bernie Sanders' office - the GOP just filibustered $250 checks for Social Security recipients:
The Senate today voted 53 to 45 for a proposal by Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) to provide $250 payments to some 58 million Social Security recipients and disabled veterans, but the vote fell seven short of the 60 needed to overcome a Republican filibuster and advance the bill...
Without action by Congress, there will be no cost-of-living adjustments for retirees and the disabled for only the second time since 1975, when a law took effect linking benefits to inflation. The outdated formula for calculating living costs does not accurately take into account the budgets of senior citizens who spend a disproportionate amount on increasingly expensive health care and prescription drugs.
...at a time when this country has a $13.7 trillion national debt it would be a huge mistake, over a ten year period, to add another $700 billion to that debt by providing more tax breaks for the wealthiest people in this country.
Citing the growing income inequity in this country and the desperate need of many on the lowest rungs of the economic ladder, Sanders insists that we simply cannot afford to continue this largesse to the rich:
For people earning more than $1 million a year, the continuation of the Bush-era tax cuts would amount to an average tax break of about $100,000 a year. With the top one percent already earning, in 2007, 23.5 percent of all income in this country - more than the bottom 50 percent makes, that would be morally unfair and economically unwise. Lastly, if we provide these tax breaks to people who don't need them and drive up the national debt, the demand to cut spending on programs of importance to the middle class and working families of our country would only accelerate. That means cuts in health care, education, nutrition, housing, LIHEAP, etc.
Senator Sanders is also proposing that in lieu of a cost of living adjustment (COLA), seniors and veterans be given, "at the very least," a one-time emergency check of $250.
The issue of extending the Bush-era tax cuts is likely to come up in the next week or so, says Sanders. One can only hope that, with the Blue Dogs largely a memory in the upcoming Congress and Republican obstructionism looming as an even harsher reality, the Democrats will take this one last chance to address the ugly reality that we are slipping into the economic habits and profile of a third world country.
If Chittenden County is the heart of Democratic Vermont, Franklin County is it's arthritic right shoulder. I can say that because I love the place and am one of the stalwarts who regularly apply the necessary analgesic. Be that as it may, Bernie Sanders is generally a good draw up here, and he was the headliner in this morning's breakfast rally at the Franklin County Museum for Peter Shumlin and the entire Democratic Roster.
Sharing the stage with Bernie and Peter were candidates Steve Howard, Jim Condos, Doug Hoffer, former candidates Doug Racine and Susan Bartlett, and Franklin County Democratic Senator Sarah Kittell. Randy Brock challenger Michael McCarthy provided coffee and treats from his "Cosmic Bakery;" and reps. Jeff Young, Kathy Keenan, Michel Consejo and Dick Howrigan were all in attendance. For that sizeable delegation of elected representatives and hopefuls, there was an audience of about sixty enthusiastic Democrats and Progressives on hand.
Last evening's smaller local rally at Dem Headquarters on Main St. did almost as well, as over fifty individuals packed the tiny space, cheek to jowl, downing hot cider after a brisk honk-and-wave to cheer speeches by Peter Welch, Peter Shumlin and Sara Kittell. I saw some duplication in the crowds, but many people who were in the Friday night group didn't make it to the Saturday morning event.
Amid the turmoil and suspense surrounding an inconclusive primary outcome, we can turn to our Vermont delegation for a reminder of how good it feels to all be on the same progressive page. In a joint-press release, Senators Leahy and Sanders, and Rep. Welch announced yesterday that Vermont would be the beneficiary of an injection of federal funding to help some low-income Vermonters achieve energy savings through the use of "smart" metering and installation of thermal and solar hot water systems in their homes. Sen.Leahy is quoted as saying:
Vermont is a national leader in using the Weatherization Program’s stimulus funds for cost and energy savings for low-income households...With our older housing stock and longer winters, these investments are likely to save Vermont families far more than the national average of $400 a year in reduced energy costs.”
To which Sen. Sanders adds:
This federal support will be a major step forward in moving our state toward a greener economy.”
The Vermont Energy Investment Corporation, a non-profit better known to Vermonters as "Efficiency Vermont," will have charge of administering the $700,000. federal investment, which represents reinforcement for an earlier $69. million stimulus from the feds. It should be noted here that the Douglas/Dubie administration has consistently opposed funding of Efficiency Vermont. The projection is that, with the new funding, assistance can be provided to approximately 750 low income households to help them reduce and better utilize their energy consumption so that they can realize cost savings, while Vermont's greater economy and environment benefit at the same time. According to Peter Welch:
This additional $5.7 million award recognizes Vermont’s past successes, while paving the way for future savings.”
Well done, Gentlemen. I dare anyone to characterize this green investment in a cash-strapped population as "pork."
Here's to tilting at windmills. May we forever rise to the occasion!
It's not even Memorial Day, and we're broiling like lobsters in record heat. (Thank you, Climate Change Foot-Draggers!) Confronted with what is by far the worst oil spill in U.S. history, the man we all worked so hard to send to the White House is telegraphing helplessness back to us. What is there to celebrate, as we enter this odd little weekend wienie-roast commemorating the dead of war?
Well, we've got Bernie; and it looks like he's finally had enough of the go-along-to-get along. Channeling the frustration and anger of all environmentally sentient Americans, Bernie Sanders is calling once and for all for an end to offshore drilling. Besides banning offshore drilling, his "Clean Coasts and Efficient Cars Act" would exact full restitution for the spill from BP, and force automakers to finally deliver on the fuel-efficiency they've been kicking down the road now for decades. Does he have any chance of moving this thing forward? Who knows? Certainly there is no better time to make the argument; but it feels awfully good to see our guy stand up and speak the words to power that we all long to scream.
Kudos to Bernie Sanders for once again hitting the nail on the head. Charging that conflicts of interest may have tainted Fed decisions in dispensing bank bailouts, Sanders has called for specific language addressing such conflicts, to be included in the regulatory bill that is currently under consideration by the Senate.
From the Feds on down through state and local government, conflicts of interest have become so interwoven with the process that it is next to impossible to tease them all out. Selectmen and planners may have active interests in real estate development. Governors take contributions from corporations and appoint judges and regulatory overseers who know from whence their marching orders come. Senators, congressmen and presidents do the same. Though much posturing is made in the law about avoiding conflicts of interest, definitions are vague, and relatively little provision has been made for monitoring and truly meaningful penalties.
The end result is a Supreme Court that has the temerity to bestow personhood on corporations, giving them carte blanche to execute the acquisition of our democracy.
Bernie Sanders to Make Sure Public Option Gets Up-or-Down Vote, Defying Reid, Durbin
-- By: Jon Walker
We recently learned that Harry Reid (D-NV) and Dick Durbin (D-IL) were actually whipping against the public option and trying to deny the American people a real up-or-down vote on the issue in the Senate. It is good to see that Bernie Sanders (I-VT) is willing to defy them and instead go with the will of the American people. From Greg Sargent:
"I think somebody should do that, and I'd certainly be prepared to do that," Sanders told me when I asked him if he'd be willing to commit to introducing a public option amendment. This is, in effect, a commitment to introduce the amendment if no one else does.
As I have explained earlier, if even one senator offers a public option amendment, and it is ruled germane, it would likely receive an up-or-down vote as part of the reconciliation vote-a-rama. Designing a public option/public program buy-in that would be ruled germane and does not violate the Byrd rule should definitely be possible.
Durbin's argument against the public option amendment, or any other smart, pro-consumer, Democratic amendments, is that they could endanger passage of the reconciliation bill if it is sent back to the House. Given that Republican sources are saying the Senate parliamentarian ruled the House must first pass the comprehensive Senate health care bill before the reconciliation fixes can be taken up, the fear that the public option amendment could derail the reconciliation fixes seem strange.
If it gets to that point, Durbin will already have the health care reform bill he originally voted for signed into law. The reconciliation fixes are minor, and clearly not overly important to Durbin, since he already voted for a bill with all the "problems" in it. Since Durbin does not want the important student loan reform bill as part of reconciliation, there is no reason to actually worry about the fate of the reconciliation sidecar bill from his stand point.
TheSargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law has isued a scorecard for every member of Congress showing how they voted in 2009 on fifteen key bills in the fight against poverty.
It's not surprising that our Congressional delegation got straight A's, or in the case of Bernie Sanders and Peter Welch, A +.
At a time when there is much to criticize, it's important to recognize the good that our representatives in Congress do.
Vermont's scorecard:
= vote to fight poverty = vote against fighting poverty
A decision announced today by the U.S. Supreme Court opens the floodgates of corporate dollars and influence on our foundering democracy. If yesterday you were among those of us ordinary citizens who were already concerned that U.S. corporations held undue influence on national policy, today you should be in orbit with alarm!
Here's the story as it appears in the Christian Science Monitor.
We have to end privately-financed national campaigns before it is too late to save our democracy. Are you listening Senators Sanders and Leahy? Congressman Welch?
And so the HCR debate continues... Those of you following this closely are aware of Firedoglake's Jane Hamsher's campaign to prevent the passage of the Senate version of the bill in it's current form, which Bernie Sanders has agreed to support.
Anyways, our own Odum has teamed up with Jane to get a petition going to put some pressure on Bernie. The petition can be found here.
Go below the jump for the complete email letter that went out today.
Whenever I see Art Woolf's name on the op-ed page, I brace myself for another truly incredible argument from beyond the looking glass. His letter in the Nov. 30 Messenger (cross-posted on Vermont Tiger) once again renders me near speechless. He begins by observing that Vermont dairy farmers are "in a terrible pickle." Ignoring completely the role that dairy conglomerates and retail giants like Walmart have played in creating this "pickle," Woolf advances the following argument which barely alludes to the toll his beloved "free market capitalism" has taken on U.S. dairy farmers:
"Prices for their products are way down (in part due to the tremendous reduction in international demand for milk caused by the financial crisis and economic recession) and their costs keep going up. But it is disingenuous for Senator Sanders to suggest that despite being against allowing "guest" workers into the U.S., the predicament of the dairy industry in Vermont and elsewhere is so "desperate" that a guest worker program is needed to provide the farms with workers willing and able to do the manual labor jobs that farmers are unable to fill with local workers."
He then goes on to state the obvious:
"Agricultural laborer jobs just don't pay enough to attract Vermonters..."
and that
"If Vermont farmers had to pay a wage high enough to attract Vermonters, their economic plight would be even worse than it is today and even more farms would go out of business."
That said, Woolf's interest in the dairy farmers' plight and any consequent threat to local food security seems to have been spent as he moves quickly to the real meat of his matter; namely, equating small local dairy farmers with financial institutions that benefitted from TARP!
I think something has to be said here regarding the ACORN vote. Our Vermont Senators are going to take a thumping on this, come re-election time. We need to come out strongly in support of their vote, and absolutely on-message.
The vote was not a referendum on the legitimacy of ACORN'S agenda. It was to determine whether the conventional non-partisan review process that is applied to all applicants for federal funding could be selectively overridden in a political way. We should be asking why the remaining Senators did not have the wisdom (or integrity?) of our two Vermont representatives in recognizing the threat such action would represent to the First Amendment rights and best interests of the American people.
It is no surprise that the target of this organized attempt at financial censure is an entity that represents the interests of the poorest and least powerful members of society. It is perhaps beside the point that the allegations of wrong-doing by ACORN workers are largely unproven; and even if fully supported by evidence, are extremely few considering the size and scope of ACORN's workforce and the importance of their efforts on behalf of the poor and disenfranchised.
Instead of pointing the finger at Bernie Sanders and Patrick Leahy and asking why they voted their conscience when faced with a politically inhospitable situation, we should be celebrating their courage and commitment to the value of independence that Vermont has long cherished.
I'm sure that most readers of this site will find this utterly unacceptable. President Obama ran on a platfom of delivering health care reform, and the fraudulent package he is apparently willing to accept is a betrayal of all of us who worked so hard to put him in office.
If you agree that health care "reform" without even the watered-down public option is no reform at all, please contact your congressional delegation and ask them to oppose any health care package that does not include the public option.
Sometimes the squeaky wheel gets the grease (via TPM). Apparently, the caption under the official Bush portrait to be displayed at the Smithsonian said the following, that Bush's term was:
marked by "the attacks on September 11, 2001, that led to wars in Afghanistan and Iraq."
Sanders fired off a letter to Martin Sullivan, director of the National Portrait Gallery in Washington:
When President Bush and Vice President Cheney misled our country into the war in Iraq, they certainly cited the attacks on September 11, along with the equally specious claim that Iraq possessed vast arsenals of weapons of mass destruction. The notion, however, that 9/11 and Iraq were linked, or that one "led to" the other, has been widely and authoritatively debunked ... Might I suggest that a reconsideration of the explanatory text next to the portrait of President Bush is in order[?]
Sullivan's reply? They're removing the words "led to" and revising the statement for accuracy. Nice job, Bernie.
If you could write the caption under the portrait, what would you have it say?
According to Colbert, he's got "huevos rancheros". Colbert was quite funny, going on about "dribble-down" economics and "the market will take care of poverty". Bernie was... Bernie. All in all, it was a great forum for Bernie to get his message out there.
Unfortunately, I couldn't get the embed to work, but you can watch it here.
UPDATE: kestrel has it working, it's in the comments.
The following piece was produced by the Huffington Post's Off the Bus.
Rolling Stone's Matt Taibbi: Screw the Bus
He's often referred to as the next Hunter Thompson but the truth of the matter is, Matt Taibbi is unique. Taibbi is a contributing editor for Rolling Stone magazine and covers national politics in columns called "Road Rage" and "The Low Post" for the magazine's online version. Taibbi has written for Rolling Stone since the 2004 election and is known for some of his outrageous antics, such as covering the John Kerry campaign in a gorilla costume, interviewing a former drug czar while tripping on acid, and working undercover as a Bush-Cheney campaign volunteer. Prior to that, Taibbi worked for ten years as a journalist in Russia, founded a satirical magazine called The eXile, played baseball for the Red Army, and professional basketball in Mongolia. Upon returning to the States, Taibbi started a Buffalo, NY alternative weekly called The Beast, and covered stories for The New York Daily News, The Nation, and others. But what Taibbi is really know for is his astute no-holds-barred writing style.
In his first book, Spanking the Donkey (The New Press), Taibbi covers the 2004 election and cuts through the dog-and-pony shows that clutter an election year: the perfect backdrops, the puffed-up speeches, and campaign journalists that constantly cover the meaningless and the absurd. Is Howard Dean too prickly to become president? Is John Kerry a good snowboarder or does his ability to speak French hurt his chances to win? Taibbi documents these offenders in a chapter called "Wimblehack," where journalists compete in a Final Four-like tournament for the worst campaign journalism of the 2004 election.
Taibbi's new book, Smells Like Dead Elephants: Dispatches from a Rotting Empire (Black Cat/Grove-Atlantic Inc.) has just been released and is a compilation of Rolling Stone articles covering corruption in Washington, DC, traveling through the streets of New Orleans in a dinghy with actor Sean Penn, spending three nights in Abu Ghraib prison, and much more. In his latest Rolling Stone article, available on the web and newsstands now, Taibbi covers GOP candidate Mike Huckabee. OffTheBus caught up with Matt Taibbi and discussed a range of issues from the new book and problems surrounding campaign trail journalism.
Below the fold is a portion of the interview regarding Bernie Sanders. The rest of it you have to go to Off the Bus.
How our Dem or Dem-esque elected officials apply their core beliefs in Congressional action seems to boil down to two relative standards. There's the standard of decision-making that is relative to the US Constitution, and the standard relative to the opposition - sort of a "what's the best we can hope to expect or receive from George Bush and the Republicans" approach. Although there's a time and place for the latter, it's clear that it's not with this president, and not with these republicans.
Thankfully, in regards to the nomination of Mukasey to the AG position (and his discouraging - but hardly unexpected - non-answers in his confirmation hearing), Bernie has chosen the Constitutional standard. From his office today:
President Bush’s choice to head the Justice Department, Sanders said, holds views on the sweeping powers of the presidency that are at odds with what the framers of our Constitution intended. The nominee also demonstrated at Judiciary Committee confirmation hearings a disregard for civil liberties guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.
“Of course the United States government must do everything that it can to protect the American people from the dangerous threat of terrorism,” Sanders stressed, “but we can do that effectively consistent with the Constitution and the civil liberties it guarantees.
“We need an attorney general who does not believe the president has unlimited power. We need an attorney general who understands that torture is not what this country is about, and we need an attorney general who clearly understands the separation of powers inherent in our Constitution,” Sanders added. “Unfortunately, it is clear that Mr. Mukasey is not that person”
Senator Sanders' pushback on the non-oversight exercized by the Bush Nuclear Regulatory Commision continues, with Vermont Yankee (and the dramatic collapse of its cooling tower) as Exhibit A. Bernie presented the now-famous photos of the collapse to today's oversight hearing of the Subcommittee on Clean Air, Climate Change and Nuclear Energy, and in the process prodding NRC Chair Dale Klein to concede that Vermonters may be feeling a little less than warm and fuzzy under the commission's less-than-watchful eye.
Sanders is pushing legislation that would make safety reviews more frequent, and that would empower state officials to instigate them - for example, in a bullet aimed squarely at VY, a safety inspection would be triggered by a plant looking for permission to generate more power than it was originally designed to produce.
But Bernie knows the executive regime we're stuck with in Vermont, and as such, he's cast his proposed net a bit wider. From a Sanders office press release (thanks Will), emphasis added:
Under Sanders’ legislation, power plant operators seeking to extend licenses would be subject to special inspections at the request of the governor of a state where a plant is located, or by the governor of a neighboring state affected by a plant's operation.
It may surprise some to read this here - but it shouldn't: Congress has no business telling Rush Limbaugh to shut up.
Last week, Senator Leahy and Representative Welch broke with Senator Sanders and brought several flavors of shame to the liberal community under one, all-encompassing umbrella - the vote to rebuke MoveOn. While first and foremost, I find the vote both bizarre and cowardly (for its myopic waste of time on the one hand, and the pointless "Sister Souljah"-style sacrifice of an ally deemed - apparently - disposable on the other), the fact is that it was also an affront to the tradition of free speech in this country. It's true (and important) that the naked attempt by the GOP to frame the anti-war public as crazy and uncivilized (an attempt that was successful only thanks to the assistance of Dems like Leahy and Welch) did not take any action to specifically disallow speech, but such action has a chilling effect nonetheless. As much as I took State Representative Dave Zuckerman to task for sending a chilling message, as an elected lawmaker, by accusing Stewart Ledbetter of "irresponsible journalism" for asking a question he didn't like, the MoveOn rebuke was far worse.
If Chittenden County is the heart of Democratic Vermont, Franklin County is it's arthritic right shoulder. I can say that because I love the place and am one of the stalwarts who regularly apply the necessary analgesic. Be that as it may, Bernie Sanders is generally a good draw up here, and he was the headliner in this morning's breakfast rally at the Franklin County Museum for Peter Shumlin and the entire Democratic Roster.
= vote to fight poverty 
= vote against fighting poverty 
