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Senator Baucus Nominated Mistress for U.S. Attorney

Baucus Nominated Girlfriend for U.S. Attorney

By John Stanton
Roll Call Staff
Dec. 4, 2009, 10:32 p.m.

Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus’ office confirmed late Friday night that the Montana Democrat was carrying on an affair with his state office director, Melodee Hanes, when he nominated her to be U.S. attorney in Montana.

According to a source familiar with their relationship, Hanes and Baucus began their relationship in the summer of 2008 – nearly a year before Baucus and his wife, Wanda, formally separated in April. The Senator has since divorced his wife.

http://www.rollcall.com/news/41188-1.html?ET=rollcall:e6074:80052652a:&st=email
Tags: baucus   ethics  
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Senate Dems to Try to Limit Pay of Executives at Health Insurance Companies

Senate Democrats targeting the pay of health insurance executives

By Alexander Bolton - 12/04/09 03:53 PM ET
Senate Democrats will offer an amendment this weekend to curb the pay of executives at health insurance companies that benefit from federal subsidies, fueling the growing feud with the powerful industry.
 
Sens. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.), Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) and Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) have sponsored an amendment that would prohibit health insurance companies from deducting more than $400,000 in executive compensation per individual. The cap would apply to companies that earned 25 percent or more of their income from Americans who buy insurance from government-created exchanges.

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/70709-democrats-target-pay-of-health-insurance-executives
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Senators This Year Have to Work Really Hard

Senate to vote on health amendments over weekend

By Jeffrey Young - 12/04/09 03:07 PM ET
The Senate will hold votes on amendments to its healthcare reform bill on Saturday and Sunday, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said Friday.

In addition to debating several amendments over the unusual full-weekend session, Reid indicated that Senate Democrats may convene for a caucus meeting to discuss the healthcare bill Sunday.

http://thehill.com/homenews/senate/70695-senate-to-vote-on-health-amendments-over-weekend
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Public More Open to Torture Being Justified Now than in the Last Five Years

The public and CFR members continue to support divergent policies to combat terrorism. Most notably, 19% of the public says the use of torture is often justified to gain important information from terrorist suspects, while 35% say the use of torture in these circumstances is at least sometimes justified. Just 2% of CFR members say torture is often justified, and 11% say it is sometimes justified, to gain important information from suspected terrorists.

The proportion of the public saying torture is at least sometimes justified against suspected terrorists has increased modestly over the past year. Currently, 54% say torture is at least sometimes justified to gain important information from suspected terrorists, compared with 49% in April and 44% in February.

http://people-press.org/report/569/americas-place-in-the-world
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Politico "Forgets" to Ask Gore About Climategate

POLITICO Q&A: Al Gore



By JOHN F. HARRIS & MIKE ALLEN | 12/4/09 10:48 AM EST

Former Vice President Al Gore, who won the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his work on climate change, talked with POLITICO’s John F. Harris and Mike Allen about climate issues and the upcoming United Nations conference in Copenhagen. Here are edited excerpts.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1209/30063.html

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Homeland Security Panel Under Investigation

Homeland Security panel faces ethics scrutiny after credit card hearing

By Carol D. Leonnig and Spencer S. Hsu Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, December 4, 2009; 2:54 PM

At a hearing in late March, the nation's credit card companies faced the threat of expensive new rules from an unlikely regulator: the House Committee on Homeland Security, chaired by Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.).

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/04/AR2009120402256.html?hpid=topnews
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Reid Still Losing in the Polls

SENATE RACE: Reid in a battle, poll reveals

Nine Republicans running for seat

Nevadans aren't warming up to Sen. Harry Reid, despite plenty of early advertising designed to boost his image, a new poll shows.

Just 38 percent of respondents said they had a favorable opinion of the Democratic Senate majority leader, the same percentage as in October and 1 point higher than in August.

The survey of 625 registered Nevada voters by Mason-Dixon Polling & Research suggests the promotional bombardment that Reid launched more than six weeks ago has yet to hit its target.

"I'd be worried," said Michael Franz, an assistant professor at Bowdoin College in Brunswick, Maine, who studies political advertising. "I'd stop if I had aired ads for two or three weeks and it wasn't moving the needle."

According to the poll commissioned by the Review-Journal, 49 percent of respondents had an unfavorable opinion of Reid, while 13 percent were neutral.

...

In hypothetical general election matchups, respondents favored Lowden over Reid 51 percent to 41 percent, with 8 percent undecided. They favored Tarkanian over Reid 48 percent to 42 percent, with 10 percent undecided. The margin of error was plus or minus 4 percentage points.

http://www.lvrj.com/news/reid-in-a-battle-poll-reveals-78503217.html


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"Safe" Schools Czar's List of Approved Books

Via Gateway Pundit:

Friday, December 4, 2009, 6:13 AM
Jim Hoft

Scott Baker from Breitbart-TV.com and Co-Host of ‘The B-Cast‘ submitted this shocking report today on Obama’s deviant Safe Schools Czar Kevin Jennings.

—-Warning on Content—–

I was recently approached by a team of independent researchers that I have known for some time and have come to trust. They prepared this report involving ‘Safe Schools Czar’ Kevin Jennings and the organization he founded, GLSEN, and asked that I find a way to help draw attention to what they uncovered. Knowing that Gateway Pundit has followed Kevin Jennings since his appointment, as we have on The B-Cast (here, here, and here), and on Breitbart.tv (here, here, here, here, here, here, here, here and here), I felt this would be an appropriate place for this report.

Warning: The following material is very explicit.

http://gatewaypundit.firstthings.com/2009/12/breaking-obamas-safe-schools-czar-is-promoting-porn-in-the-classroom-kevin-jennings-and-the-glsen-reading-list/

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"Mainstream" Media Still Not Covering Climategate

Day Fourteen and Counting
December 04, 2009 08:45 ET

Alexandria, VA – For the fourteenth straight day, the three broadcast networks have failed to report on the great and growing ClimateGate scandal on their weekday morning or evening news programs.  How to explain this?

Perhaps it is that ABC, NBC and CBS have not yet heard of the story, despite two weeks of non-stop reporting on and discussion of ClimateGate in a whole host of media outlets.

Perhaps the broadcast networks only trust their fellow liberal press outlets, like the New York Times.  Perhaps they don’t realize the Times exhibited journalistic diligence on ClimateGate, with a front page story the day the story broke. 

http://mrc.org/press/releases/2009/20091204124643.aspx
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Get Ready for Second Stimulus

Pelosi Endorses Spending Bank Bailout Funds on Second Economic Stimulus
Friday, December 04, 2009

(CNSNews.com) – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said that excess funds from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), the legislation approved to bailout the financial industry, can and should be used to fund additional stimulus programs that the House of Representatives is considering.
 
Pelosi said the unspent (and repaid) funds from the financial industry bailout would be a “good pay-for” for a second round of stimulus spending.

http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/58027
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Surprised: Pelosi Rejects a Tax

Pelosi Rejects War Surtax Proposal
Friday, December 04, 2009
By Matt Cover, Staff Writer

(CNSNews.com) – House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has all but killed a proposal by senior House Democrats to levy a tax on nearly all Americans to pay for the Afghanistan war.
 
Pelosi, speaking at her weekly press briefing Thursday on Capitol Hill, said she was “not in support” of the war surtax idea – adding that when Obama requests more funding for the war in Afghanistan, then Democrats will decide how to pay for it.

http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/58025
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'Uncertain Trumpet'

Uncertain Trumpet
by Charles Krauthammer

WASHINGTON -- We shall fight in the air, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields, we shall fight in the hills -- for 18 months. Then we start packing for home.

We shall never surrender -- unless the war gets too expensive, in which case, we shall quote Eisenhower on "the need to maintain balance in and among national programs" and then insist that "we can't simply afford to ignore the price of these wars."

The quotes are from President Obama's West Point speech announcing the Afghanistan troop surge. What a strange speech it was -- a call to arms so ambivalent, so tentative, so defensive.

Which made his last-minute assertion of "resolve unwavering" so hollow. It was meant to be stirring. It fell flat. In August, he called Afghanistan "a war of necessity." On Tuesday night, he defined "what's at stake" as "the common security of the world." The world, no less. Yet, we begin leaving in July 2011? Does he think that such ambivalence is not heard by the Taliban, by Afghan peasants deciding which side to choose, by Pakistani generals hedging their bets, by NATO allies already with one foot out of Afghanistan?

http://townhall.com/columnists/CharlesKrauthammer/2009/12/04/uncertain_trumpet
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Obama Can Claim Success

Unemployment Takes a Dip

URGENT: Jobless rate dips to 10 percent in November as U.S. employers cut 11,000 jobs, the lowest monthly job loss in nearly two years
Tags: economy  
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Jobs, Jobs, Jobs

In panic over jobs, Dems detour from health care

By: Byron York
Chief Political Correspondent
December 3, 2009

There’s a reason Barack Obama squeezed a hastily-arranged "Jobs Summit" into a White House schedule dominated by national health care and Afghanistan.  You can find it on every page of "The Economy and Politics of 2010," a new survey of voter attitudes circulating among Democrats that, despite its dry title, betrays a sense of dread and horror among party strategists hoping to avoid defeat in next year's mid-term elections.

The report is the work of Democracy Corps, the influential polling organization run by Democraic strategists James Carville and Stanley Greenberg.  The two men found voters are nearly beside themselves about unemployment, angry about the deficit, pessimistic about the future, and in a mood to punish Democrats if things don't get better soon. "This is about the economy, and it's not pretty," they write.

Most ominous for Democrats is the rise in the number of people who believe the country is on the wrong track.  That number grew steadily through the later Bush years, reaching a high of 85 percent just before last November's elections.  But with Obama's win, discontent began to subside.  By inauguration day, the number was 66 percent.  By March, it was 56 percent, and by May it was 46 percent.  It was a remarkable turnaround, attributable mostly to the new president.

But since then the turnaround itself has turned around.  By July, the wrong track number had inched up to 50 percent.  It was 55 percent in September.  Now, it's 58 percent.

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/In-panic-over-jobs-Dems-detour-from-health-care-78440547.html
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Interview with Governor-Elect Bob McDonnell

Full Interview with Governor-Elect Bob McDonnell
by Cal Thomas

Q. What will be your first two or three agenda items after you become governor next month?

A. Jobs, jobs, jobs. That's what I campaigned on; that's what I'm going to govern on. We've got tough economic times and economic development will dominate the first (General Assembly session) for me. I've got to find as many ways as possible to promote small businesses, keep our tax and regulatory climate good and strong, recruit business to Virginia and put other economic development and incentives in place so we can be the most competitive state in the country. MSNBC and Forbes have ranked us as the most business friendly state in America three years in a row. I want to make sure we keep it that way. We've got a 6.7 percent unemployment rate. That's below the national average but it's still the top issue I campaigned on and it's the top issue people are concerned about.


Q. How do you plan to do this? The standard Republican approach has been to cut taxes and reduce spending. What kind of cooperation do you anticipate from the legislature?

A. I've met with the leaders of both parties in both houses. Everybody understands this fiscal plight we're in. We will have to grow our way out of it with good economic policies. I think we're going to get a lot of cooperation from both parties. What they've told me is that we have to increase tax revenues for economic development. There are some who want to raise taxes, but they know I'm not going to do that. I'm looking at restructuring parts of government, cutting spending and making our economic development apparatus work better. I've outlined several different tax credits; retooling the Governors Opportunity Fund, which gives the governor the ability to offer incentives to get businesses to come to Virginia. And I want to go to foreign countries to extend the economic machine. We have no offices in India, China and other places where there should be good opportunities to exploit Virginia's goods and services and I want to be present there.

http://townhall.com/columnists/CalThomas/2009/12/04/full_interview_with_governor-elect_bob_mcdonnell

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