The Urgent Danger in the Senate
Think your state has equal representation in the Senate? Well, that could be eliminated soon.Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid—a Democrat from Nevada—is trying to ensure that he personally has the final say on all legislation. And under one plan being considered, only three other Senators would be allowed any meaningful contributions.
Reid has been talking with Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) about an agreement on this nefarious plan. But whether it passes with McConnell’s blessing or without, it is dangerous to everyone not represented by Harry Reid.
Until, of course, Harry Reid is no longer a Senator. Then, the scepter of power would pass to the next Majority Leader. But Reid and his gang aren’t thinking about that day. They’re thinking about today—and the ability to pass legislation without any opposition.
The ill-named “filibuster reform” proposals floating around on Capitol Hill include the following:
- Make it easier for one party to pass legislation, even if half the Senate disagrees: To stop debate on a contentious issue, 60 votes are now required. But the proposal being floated would create a way for the Majority Leader to pass any proposal with only 51 votes.
- Create four “Super Senators” who hold the true power: Only four Senators would be able to offer amendments to legislation, effectively shutting out the other 96 from the legislative process.
- Special power for the Majority Leader: The Majority Leader (now Reid) would have the special authority to add an amendment after debate is finished on a particular bill. Combined with the 51-vote threshold, this change would allow the Majority Leader to jam through just about anything without the Senate even debating it.
It’s such a bad idea that even Reid himself argued against similar changes—when he was in the minority.
Back then, so long ago in 2005, Reid was a strong defender of the minority party’s right to filibuster legislation and slow the progress of bills.
Reid said then:
one of the good things about this institution we have found in the 214 years it has been in existence is that the filibuster, which has been in existence since the beginning, from the days of George Washington…in all the political writings about filibuster, that is one of the things they talk about as a positive. It forces people to get together because sometimes in this body you become very fixed.Likewise, then-Senator Barack Obama agreed in 2005:
what [the American people] don’t expect, is for one party, be it Republican or Democrat, to change the rules in the middle of the game so that they can make all the decisions while the other party is told to sit down and keep quiet…everyone in this chamber knows that if the majority chooses to end the filibuster—if they choose to change the rules and put an end to democratic debate—then the fighting and the bitterness and the gridlock will only get worse.Much as he did with the debt ceiling, President Obama has already made the case against his party’s current position. And a good case it was.
Think of all the legislation Democrats want to pass in the new Congress—and then imagine them doing it without any opposition whatsoever. That’s the urgent danger in the Senate.
http://blog.heritage.org/2013/01/24/harry-reid-filibuster-reform-taking-over-the-senate/
3 Incredibly Outrageous Evasions by Hillary Clinton About Benghazi
During a long day of testifying before House and Senate panels, outgoing Secretary of State - and presumptive Democratic Party candidate for the presidency in 2016 - Hillary Clinton batted away contentious questions from Republicans like Ted Williams at a Little League game. She also soaked up extreme adulation from Democrats (including a a not-so-coded call to run for president by Sen. Barbara Boxer, who said, "You will be missed, but I for one hope for not too long").
The scene reminded me of nothing so much as Oliver North's appearance before a joint Congressional committee investigating Iran-Contra back in the 1980s. Not because of anything Clinton said but the way that she carried herself and the ease with which she wrapped herself in the flag and tragedy to obscure the simple fact that she wasn't going to answer anything. North famously showed up to testify in a military uniform that had nothing to do with his day job of subverting the U.S. Constitution from the basement of the Reagan White House. Clinton couldn't repeat that fashion statement but she was able to pound the table and choke up at all the right moments to evade serious discussion not simply of major screw-ups, but major screw-ups that will go unaccounted for.
Three major evasions from her appearances yesterday include:
1. "I take responsiblity."
From a Fox News report of the Senate hearing:
During the opening of the hearing, Clinton said she has "no higher priority" than the security of her department's staff, and that she is committed to making the department "safer, stronger and more secure."Taking responsibility is the classic dodge in Washington, where pols assume the mantle of leadership and them promptly do nothing to address the situation for which they are in hot water. What does it mean to take responsiblity for the absolute breakdown of security at a consulate where your ambassador gets murdered (along with three others)? Judging from Clinton's subsequent actions, nothing other than showing up when the dead are brought home. Worse still is Clinton's misting up over the tragedy. That makes her a little too much like the kid who kills his parents and then asks the court to take mercy on him because he's now an orphan.
"As I have said many times, I take responsibility, and nobody is more committed to getting this right," Clinton said, later choking up when describing how she greeted the families of the victims when the caskets were returned.
2. "1.43 million cables come to my office."
ABC News reporting from the House hearings:
Rep. Michael McCaul, R-Texas, asked Clinton this afternoon why her office had not responded to a notification from Stevens about potential dangers in Libya.Come on, already. The question is plainly not whether Clinton is reading every goddamned communication addressed to her but whether she's got the right people in charge of assessing risk and making sure resources are apportioned accordingly. Tragically, the answer was no, especially given the fact that State had cut security in Benghazi despite attacks prior to the deadly 9/11 one! This just ain't no way to run things.
"Congressman, that cable did not come to my attention," Clinton calmly told the House Foreign Affairs Committee hours after her Senate testimony this morning. "I'm not aware of anyone within my office, within the secretary's office having seen that cable."
She added that "1.43 million cables come to my office. They're all addressed to me."
3. "What difference at this point does it make?"
From a CBS News account of a confrontation between Secretary Clinton and Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.):
“We were misled that there were supposedly protests and an assault spraying out of that and it was easily obtained that it was not the fact the American people could have known that within days and they didn’t know that,” Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) said.Clinton's statement may set a new standard for politically motivated evasions of basic truth and decency. Seriously: What difference does it make? Just for low-stakes starters, there's a guy in California who was put in jail basically because the Obama administration said his stupid, irrelevant video trailer for "The Innocence of Muslims" was to blame for anti-Americanism in Libya and beyond. President Obama went to the United Nations and bitch-slapped free expression in front of a global audience on the premise that "Innocence" was the cause of the attack on Benghazi. Our own U.N. ambassador, Susan Rice, took to the talk shows to peddle a line that was either wilfully misleading or simply totally wrong (Rice was the admin's point person in early appearances about Benghazi partly because, as Clinton explained yesterday, she doesn't like doing Sunday morning shows!).
“The fact is we had four dead Americans. Was it because of a protest or was it because of guys out for a walk one night and decided they’d go kill some Americans? What difference at this point does it make?” Clinton responded.
Contra Clinton, it makes a great deal of difference because understanding how this all happened is the first step to making sure it doesn't happen over and over and over again.
Congressional grillings of outgoing cabinet members are not the best forum to seek truth and justice and too many of the GOP inquisitors seem determined merely to score partisan points. Then again, the Obama adminstration, at least when it comes to Benghazi, hasn't done much to be the transparent change it says it wants in all areas of government. After a blistering Senate report on the situation found "systematic failures," essentially nothing happened (at least that we know about). Two minor staffers have been booted as a result of Clinton's taking of "responsibility."
Worse still: As Hillary Clinton leaves the high-stakes world of international intrigue, she's set to be replaced by John Kerry, who somehow manages to be an interventionist and supposedly informed by the nation's experience in Vietnam at the same time.
So things can - and likely will - only get worse.
http://reason.com/blog/2013/01/24/3-incredibly-outrageous-evasions-by-hill
Sen. Ron Johnson: Secretary Hillary Clinton, you failed
During her Senate testimony, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated that approximately 25 Americans who were on the ground or who witnessed the terrorist attack in Benghazi were immediately evacuated. Secretary Clinton also revealed that neither she, nor her senior people, debriefed or spoke with those people immediately after the attack, or for months afterward, to understand what happened. She stated that she didn't want to be later accused of playing politics.When I questioned her about the misinformation disseminated for days by the administration, most notably by Ambassador to the U.N. Susan Rice on Sunday news programs five days after the attack, she asked, "What difference does it make?"
If you don't expeditiously debrief the people who witnessed the attack, how can you understand who initiated it, what weapons they used and who may have been involved? How do you initiate a proper response if you don't know what transpired? How do you move properly to protect other American assets and people in the region? How do you know what failures occurred, so that you can immediately correct them, if you have not debriefed the very victims of those failures? And lastly, how do you tell the truth to the American people if you don't know the facts?
Our diplomatic forces in Benghazi were denied the security they repeatedly requested for many months before Sept. 11, 2012. Secretary Clinton stated that she was not told of those desperate requests in the most dangerous region in the world. As a result, our people in Benghazi were ill-prepared to repel or avoid that attack, and four Americans were murdered. For many days after the event, the American people were also misinformed as to the nature and perpetrators of that attack.
In truth, Benghazi is a failure of leadership — before, during and after the terrorist attack.
To answer Secretary Clinton, it does make a difference. It matters enormously for the American public to know whether or not their president and members of his administration are on top of a crisis and telling them the truth.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/01/23/benghazi-hearing-hillary-clinton/1860097/
PK'S NOTE: Do they not see how illogical this is? Apparently not.
Feinstein: Goal is to Dry Up the Supply Of Weapons Over Time
Surrounded by law enforcement officers, mayors, police chiefs, gun
“safety” groups, Democratic legislators and a display of semi-automatic
rifles and pistols, California Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced her
new gun control legislation today on Capitol Hill.
“This is a tough battle,” Feinstein said in her opening remarks. “Some of us have been working to reduce gun violence for decades.”
The event kicked off with Rev. Gary Hall preaching about gun violence to the cameras, a mix of church and state liberals typically frown upon unless it serves a certain political purpose.
"As people of faith we have an obligation to stand together to end gun violence,” Rev. Gary Hall said. “I believe the gun lobby is no match for the cross lobby.”
For weeks we’ve been given a preview of Feinstein’s new “assault weapons” legislation, which she outlined today. The bill includes a ban on guns with only “one military characteristic,” slide iron stocks, a ban on importation of assault weapons and large capacity magazines, a ban on certain semi-automatic “assault pistols” and shotguns. The exact definition of "military characteristic" is still unknown. The 10 year “sunset rule” has been stripped form the bill, meaning if passed, the firearms included in the legislation will be banned forever. Grandfathered firearms that are either sold or transferred will require a background check.
“No weapon is taken from anyone,” Feinstein said. "The purpose is to dry up the supply of these weapons over time.”
New York Rep. Carolyn McCarthy expressed a similar sentiment saying, “ If they’re [assault weapons] not in the stores, they can’t be bought,” implying mass shooters won’t look on the black market to purchase weapons or steal them from legal owners (as Adam Lanza, the Newtown shooter, did).
Feinstein repeatedly slammed the gun lobby, invoked the tragedy in Newtown where it was convenient and gave Americans a misleading picture of how guns are bought and sold on a regular basis to law-abiding citizens.
“The common thread in these mass shootings is that in each a sami-autic, semi-automatic was used,” Feinstein said. “They are sold out of trunks and back seats of automobiles and at gun shows.”
No gun purchased at a gun show has ever been used in a mass shooting.
Feinstein also did her best to reassure hunters their rights wouldn’t be trampled on, failing to mention the Second Amendment has nothing to do with hunting in the first place.
“It will not effect hunting or sporting firearms, instead the bill will protect hunters and sportsman,” Feinstein said, adding that 2200 “hunting” guns are specifically exempted in the bill.
Meanwhile, Illinois Senator Dick Durbin made it clear he doesn’t think it matters whether Feinstein’s legislation violates Second Amendment rights.
“This isn’t an issue of simply Constitution, it’s an issue of conscious,” Durbin said. "We need responsible hunters and sportsman to step up and join us."
Feinstein’s legislation will be placed into the record Thursday afternoon.
“We have done our best to craft a responsible bill to ban assault weapons,” Feinstein said. “This is really an uphill road.”
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2013/01/24/feinstein-goal-is-to-dry-up-the-supply-of-weapons-over-time-n1496561
“This is a tough battle,” Feinstein said in her opening remarks. “Some of us have been working to reduce gun violence for decades.”
The event kicked off with Rev. Gary Hall preaching about gun violence to the cameras, a mix of church and state liberals typically frown upon unless it serves a certain political purpose.
"As people of faith we have an obligation to stand together to end gun violence,” Rev. Gary Hall said. “I believe the gun lobby is no match for the cross lobby.”
For weeks we’ve been given a preview of Feinstein’s new “assault weapons” legislation, which she outlined today. The bill includes a ban on guns with only “one military characteristic,” slide iron stocks, a ban on importation of assault weapons and large capacity magazines, a ban on certain semi-automatic “assault pistols” and shotguns. The exact definition of "military characteristic" is still unknown. The 10 year “sunset rule” has been stripped form the bill, meaning if passed, the firearms included in the legislation will be banned forever. Grandfathered firearms that are either sold or transferred will require a background check.
“No weapon is taken from anyone,” Feinstein said. "The purpose is to dry up the supply of these weapons over time.”
New York Rep. Carolyn McCarthy expressed a similar sentiment saying, “ If they’re [assault weapons] not in the stores, they can’t be bought,” implying mass shooters won’t look on the black market to purchase weapons or steal them from legal owners (as Adam Lanza, the Newtown shooter, did).
Feinstein repeatedly slammed the gun lobby, invoked the tragedy in Newtown where it was convenient and gave Americans a misleading picture of how guns are bought and sold on a regular basis to law-abiding citizens.
“The common thread in these mass shootings is that in each a sami-autic, semi-automatic was used,” Feinstein said. “They are sold out of trunks and back seats of automobiles and at gun shows.”
No gun purchased at a gun show has ever been used in a mass shooting.
Feinstein also did her best to reassure hunters their rights wouldn’t be trampled on, failing to mention the Second Amendment has nothing to do with hunting in the first place.
“It will not effect hunting or sporting firearms, instead the bill will protect hunters and sportsman,” Feinstein said, adding that 2200 “hunting” guns are specifically exempted in the bill.
Meanwhile, Illinois Senator Dick Durbin made it clear he doesn’t think it matters whether Feinstein’s legislation violates Second Amendment rights.
“This isn’t an issue of simply Constitution, it’s an issue of conscious,” Durbin said. "We need responsible hunters and sportsman to step up and join us."
Feinstein’s legislation will be placed into the record Thursday afternoon.
“We have done our best to craft a responsible bill to ban assault weapons,” Feinstein said. “This is really an uphill road.”
http://townhall.com/tipsheet/katiepavlich/2013/01/24/feinstein-goal-is-to-dry-up-the-supply-of-weapons-over-time-n1496561
Dems looking to expose gun makers to liability claims
If you can't go after the guns, go after the people who make them.The Hill:
House Democrats on Tuesday proposed legislation that would ease current law to allow people to file civil law suits against gun manufacturers and others in the industry when they act irresponsibly.
The Equal Access to Justice for Victims of Gun Violence Act, from Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), would amend the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act (PLCAA). According to Schiff, that 2005 law gives gun manufacturers, distributors and gun dealers immunity from most civil negligence and product liability actions.
Schiff said his bill is needed to allow suits to go forward when these entities are found to be negligent, or for product liability issues.
"Numerous cases around the nation have been dismissed on the basis of PLCAA even when the gun dealers acted in a fashion that would qualify as negligent if it involved any other product," Schiff said in a letter to House colleagues seeking support for his bill. "The victims in these cases are denied the right to even discover and introduce evidence of negligence.
"My bill will reinstate the intent of PLCAA, allowing civil cases to go forward against irresponsible actors," he added. "Letting courts hear these cases would provide justice to victims while creating incentives for responsible business practices that would reduce injuries and deaths. At the same time, my bill will provide protection for gun companies who are sued when they do not act negligently, which was the purpose of PLCAA."
Schiff added that current law only protects the "worst actors in the industry," and said that "good gun companies don't need special protection from the law; bad companies don't deserve it."Ah yes - the old "good gun company/bad gun company" distinction. Good and bad being defined by Democrats, of course. No details on what would constitute a "bad" gun company, or even a negligent one. The purpose of the PLCAA was to prevent morons like Mayor Bloomberg and former Chicago Mayor Daley of attempting to bankrupt gun manufacturers by holding them liable for gun deaths. You wouldn't hold knife manufacturers responsible for people who died of a stabbing. But no one is out to destroy jnife manufacturers while Democrats believe they can solve the problem of gun violence by disappearing those who make them.
This bill isn't going anywhere, but it shows the mindset of the gun control lobby.
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