Emergency Election Called for in Illinois - Today in Politics
Only time will tell how badly Rod Blagojevich's racketeering scandal damaged the world's trust in people with ethnic names, but his greed has very quickly put Illinois Democrats in a world of shit.
Democratic leaders in both Illinois and Washington are asking the state's legislature to hastily cobble together a special election to fill Barack Obama's vacant senate seat, which the rotten Blagojevich had been trying to "sell" for hundreds of thousands of dollars in favors.
Illinois Senate President Emil Jones, who called the charges shocking, said he would call the chamber into session to pass a bill to establish a special election to fill the vacancy.
"The faith of the citizens of Illinois has once again been shaken," Jones said in a statement. "I will call the Senate back in to session to pass legislation that would create a special election for the U. S. Senate seat to help restore the confidence of the people of Illinois during this difficult time."
In our opinion, this is how it should have been all along. The citizens of Illinois deserve the right to choose the next filthy crook who shall lord over them and steal a shitload of their tax dollars. It's only fair.
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Post tags: Crime, Filthy Cheaters, Illinois, Liars, Politics, Rod Blagojevich
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Obama, Gore talk energy, the environment - Political News
Former Vice President Al Gore visited with President-elect Barack Obama on Tuesday, but the topic was expected to be the planet rather than Gore’s formal return to Washington.
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From CIA leak case to taking down a governor - Political News
For Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, it’s too bad prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald ever came home.
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Ill. official starts ball rolling for special election - Political News
Democratic leaders in Washington and Illinois are calling for a special election to fill President-elect Barack Obama’s vacant Senate seat rather than leaving it to accused Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
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IL-Sen: A Special Election Instead Of An Appointment - Democratic Source?
Interesting. Dick Durbin is calling for a special election to determine Barack Obama’s successor.
Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois called today for a special election to fill Barack Obama’s Senate seat, saying that “no appointment could produce a credible replacement” in light of this morning’s arrest of Gov. Rod Blagojevich.Durbin says he spoke with a member of the state’s general assembly this morning, urging the legislature to enact a law calling for a special election and saying that a “tainted” appointment by the governor — arrested this morning on corruption charges swirling around the politics of the appointment itself — would be unacceptable.
“I think it’s the only way out at this point,” Durbin said today at a press conference on unrelated legislation.
More from CNN:
Currently Blagojevich has the sole authority to select Obama’s successor, and is still able to do so unless he resigns or is impeached from office.“No appointment by this governor under these circumstances could produce a credible replacement,” Durbin said.
Possible stumbling block: the law calling for the special election, which apparently is in the works right now, can be vetoed by the governor. This is a really strange situation because this appointment is still very much at the whim of Blago; he can even make a legal appointment from prison. Which is precisely why the legislature is also pursuing impeachment proceedings against him.
Tags: il-sen, rod blagojevich, barack obama (all tags)
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Retrial begins for ex-Bush aide in corruption case - Political News
A former White House executive “lied, denied and misled” when officials investigated his relationship with disgraced Republican lobbyist Jack Abramoff, federal prosecutors said Tuesday as they tried to restore their overturned conviction of David Safavian.
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Obama Statement on Blagojevich Charges - Cited by Sharpy News
MSNBC just read a statement from President Elect Barack Obama on today's arrest of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
Obama said he's saddened and sobered by the charges.
No mention of being “shocked.” Interesting.
Random note: Blagojevich may be the most cumbersome name to type since Schwarzenegger. Anyone have a shorthand way of remembering how to spell it?
Update: Obama says he was not aware of Blagojevich’s attempt to sell his Senate seat, a point, as we wrote earlier, was also made by U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald this morning.
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Durbin urges special election to succeed Obama - Political News
Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois says the state’s legislature should order a special election to fill President-elect Barack Obama’s vacant Senate seat rather than allow Gov. Rod Blagojevich to pick a new senator.
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The Unfriendly Skies: JetBlue/TSA Officials Pay $240,000 for Grounding Arabic T-Shirt - Cited by Sharpy News
When it rains, it pours… stories about discrimination at the airport. As AirTran Airways scrambled to make good after excluding a Muslim family from one of their flights last week, a discrimination case from 2006 was settled when two Transportation Security Authority officials and JetBlue Airways paid Raed Jarrar $240,000 to settle charges that they illegally discriminated against the U.S. resident based on his ethnicity and the Arabic writing on his T-shirt.
On August 12, 2006, Jarrar was at New York’s JFK Airport waiting to board a flight from New York to his home in Oakland, California. He was wearing a T-shirt that read "We Will Not Be Silent" in English and Arabic. While waiting in the gate area, Jarrar was approached by two TSA officials. One of them told Jarrar that he needed to remove his shirt because other passengers were not comfortable with the Arabic script. One of the officials told Jarrar that wearing a shirt with Arabic writing on it to an airport was like "wearing a T-shirt at a bank stating, ‘I am a robber.’"
Jarrar tried to assert his First Amendment right to wear the shirt, but TSA and JetBlue officials surrounded him and made it clear that he would not be allowed to board the plane unless he covered it up. Terrified of what they would do to him, Jarrar reluctantly covered up his shirt with a new T-shirt purchased for him by JetBlue.
But the story doesn’t end there — even after Jarrar covered his shirt, he was not allowed to board until JetBlue changed his seat and made him ride in the back of the plane.
The outcome of this case should send a clear message to all TSA officials and airlines that what happened to Jarrar was not okay. Perhaps the $240,000 settlement, which was paid out on Friday, January 2, can serve as a symbol of what the new year could bring — an end to racial profiling and speech discrimination, just maybe?
A video of Jarrar talking about the case is here.
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Bush Obama now talking $300 bn in tax cuts - Democratic Source
But don’t worry, if we just appease the Republicans this once, they’ll stop being mean to us.
President-elect Barack Obama plans to include about $300 billion in tax cuts for workers and businesses in his economic recovery program, advisers said Sunday, as his team seeks to win over Congressional skeptics worried that he was too focused on government spending.The legislation Mr. Obama is developing with Congressional Democrats will devote about 40 percent of the cost to tax cuts, including his centerpiece campaign promise to provide credits up to $500 for most workers, costing roughly $150 billion.
So Obama is talking tax cuts because it will help us avoid another Great Depression, because it was a campaign promise (and for some unexplained reason those must be implemented immediately), or because we’re trying to buy off the Republicans? Two of those three reasons have nothing to do with the purpose of this legislation. (Joe discovered a fourth reason for including more tax cuts: “To get 80 votes in the Senate.” It’s also not clear what that has to do with saving the economy from a Depression.)
PS I wonder if upper middle class Obama voters in big expensive cities will see a dime of these ever-expanding tax cuts?
UPDATE: Okay, I just visited Josh Marshall’s “Talking Points Memo” and saw that Josh had posted about this story late last night. Here is what Josh had to say:
Can someone help me come up with an argument for why the Obama stimulus plan isn’t turning out to be a painful joke?
A painful joke? Ouch. As I’ve written before, when Josh gets snarky about Democrats it makes for an interesting bellwether - especially when the Democrat is Barack Obama. Here is what I wrote about Josh, and his concerns about Obama, back in August:
When Josh exhibits this kind of frustration publicly, we take notice. Josh is one of the cooler heads in the blogosphere. He’s not as prone to fits of temper as, well, I might be. And he has a solid background in journalism that gives him a certain gravitas that the corporate media respects. So when Josh starts to blow a gasket, even in his typically subdued way, it means something.
All the effort going into getting Republicans on board. I wonder if anyone will try to get actual Democrats on board as well.
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