a good week to be Right
now playing: shane nicholson, "let's get started"
ok, i've held out long enough.
has anyone noticed what a great week this has been to be a republican?
first of all, from the washington post (registration required):
BOSTON, Feb. 8 -- A federal judge in New Hampshire sentenced the former president of an Alexandria political consulting firm on Tuesday to five months in prison, the first jail term handed out in connection with the jamming of state Democratic Party phone lines on Election Day in 2002.
Allen Raymond, who headed the now-defunct company GOP Marketplace, which was hired by New Hampshire Republicans for election-related telemarketing services, pleaded guilty last summer to one count of conspiring to make harassing phone calls.
He apologized before U.S. District Judge Joseph DiClerico, who imposed the sentence. It included a $15,600 fine.
"Your honor, I did a bad thing," he said, according to the Associated Press. "While what I did was outside my character, I take full responsibility for my actions."
Raymond was the first to be sentenced of three men charged after the revelation that Democratic get-out-the-vote efforts in Manchester, Nashua, Rochester and Claremont were peppered with more than 800 computer-generated calls over a period of 90 minutes on the morning of Nov. 5, 2002.
Firefighters in Manchester, who were offering rides to the polls independently of the two parties, were also targeted, prosecutors said. Police later determined that an Idaho-based firm called Milo Enterprises had been engaged by GOP Marketplace to make automated hang-up calls.
State Democratic Party Chairman Kathy Sullivan said the incident -- which occurred as voters were choosing a senator, two House members, a governor and many state officials -- was designed to boost GOP prospects by suppressing turnout. Republicans swept most major races that day.
"They were trying to make it difficult for seniors and people who were economically depressed to get to vote," Sullivan said. "This was way more than a dirty trick. This was a serious crime, and the judge clearly took it seriously."
Republican State Committee Chairman Warren Henderson said in a written statement that he was "personally offended at this illegal and unethical assault on the integrity of our democratic process."
but, HEY - the biggie this week:
Medicare Drug Benefit May Cost $1.2 Trillion
Estimate Dwarfs Bush's Original Price Tag
By Ceci Connolly and Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, February 9, 2005; Page A01
The White House released budget figures yesterday indicating that the new Medicare prescription drug benefit will cost more than $1.2 trillion in the coming decade, a much higher price tag than President Bush suggested when he narrowly won passage of the law in late 2003.
The projections represent the most complete picture to date of how much the program will cost after it begins next year. The expense of the new drug benefit has been a source of much controversy since the day Congress approved it, with Democrats and some Republicans complaining that the White House has consistently low-balled the expected cost to the government.
As recently as September, Medicare chief Mark B. McClellan said the new drug package would cost $534 billion over 10 years. Last night, he acknowledged that the cumulative cost of the program between 2006 and 2015 will reach $1.2 trillion, but he cited several major savings and offsets that he said will reduce the federal government's bottom-line cost to $720 billion.
The disclosure prompted new criticism by Democrats about the administration's long-term budget estimates. It also showed that Medicare, the national medical insurance program for seniors, may pose a far more serious budgetary problem in the com- ing decade than concerns about the solvency of Social Security.
At a House Ways and Means Committee hearing, Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) taunted Treasury Secretary John W. Snow about the rhetorical discrepancies.
"If you're looking for a crisis, I would suggest you look at a crisis that was self-made in just last year, because the crisis exists in what's happened to Medicare by weighing it down," Emanuel said. "Those of us who told you it was going to cost twice as much were right."
and not that you needed me to tell you this:
Blueprint Calls for Bigger, More Powerful Government
Some Conservatives Express Concern at Agenda
By Jim VandeHei
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, February 9, 2005; Page A01
President Bush's second-term agenda would expand not only the size of the federal government but also its influence over the lives of millions of Americans by imposing new national restrictions on high schools, court cases and marriages.
In a clear break from Republican campaigns of the 1990s to downsize government and devolve power to the states, Bush is fostering what amounts to an era of new federalism in which the national government shapes, not shrinks, programs and institutions to comport with various conservative ideals, according to Republicans inside and outside the White House.
Bush is calling for new federal accountability and testing requirements for all public high schools, after imposing similar mandates on grades three through eight during his first term. To limit lawsuits against businesses and professionals, he is proposing to put a federal cap on damage awards for medical malpractice, to force class-action cases into federal courts and to help create a national settlement of outstanding asbestos-related cases.
On social policy, the president is pushing a constitutional amendment to outlaw same-sex marriage in the states and continuing to define and expand the federal government's role in encouraging religious groups to help administer social programs such as community drug-rehabilitation efforts.
"We have moved from devolution, which was just pushing back as much power as possible to the states, back to where government is limited but active," said John Bridgeland, director of Bush's domestic policy council in the first term. Bridgeland and current White House officials see Bush's governing philosophy as a smart way to modernize the government, empower individuals and broaden the appeal of the GOP.
Bush maintains a stated desire to streamline the government. On Monday, he sent Congress a budget that would eliminate or consolidate 150 programs. But a growing number of conservatives are uneasy with what they deride as "big-government conservatism."
"He keeps expanding the federal involvement into state and local affairs," said Chris Edwards, a tax and budget expert at the Cato Institute, a think tank that often supports the president's agenda. "My hope would be that there would be an electoral rebuke of big [-government] Republicans like there was when the tectonic plates shifted in 1994."
how does this sort of thing play out from city to city, town to town, across our fair country?
well, one need only look as far as a couple of well-hidden articles in our very own reading eagle to find out:
(right next to one another on page A6 of today's paper)
McMahon hits Bush on proposed budget
Reading's mayor says cutting grants for law enforcement by 46 percent in the next fiscal year would be unconscionable.
Mayor Tom McMahon on Wednesday called President Bush's proposed crime-fighting budget cuts irresponsible, urging residents to write letters to the president and local legislators to show their opposition.
"This is unconscionable, and I am absolutely aghast," McMahon said of the president's proposal that would cut $1.85 million in crime-fighting programs in Berks. "It's inconceivable that he would propose these budget cuts."
Under his proposed $2.57 trilliion budget unveiled Monday, Bush wants to cut grants to law enforcement by 46 percent - to $1.5 billion from $2.8 billion.
oh, and right next to that:
Cuts would have huge impact in Berks, officials say
The elimination of Community Development block grants would cost the county about $3 million annually, according to an official.
Road, sewer, playground, and other projects would go undone or local taxes would be forced upward to pay for them under President Bush's budget proposal, local community-development officials said Wednesday.
Berks County has been receiving about $3 million annually in federal Community Development block grants to distribute to municipalities for such projects...that translates to about 0.2-mill in county taxes, or $20 annually on a property assessed at $100,000.
Also in jeapordy is $140,000 that goes to the Berks Community Action Program's family-center program and $50,000 that goes to the Greater Berks Food Bank.
Community action would lose another $650,000 for other programs, such as job training and youth mentoring.
Under Bush's $2.57 trillion budget proposal unveiled Monday, a long list of programs for housing and urban development, commerce, agriculture, financial initiatives and health and human services would be eliminated.
In their place, Bush would create the Strengthening America's Communities Initiative. The money would go only to low-income communities.
"If this happens, Berks County wouldn't qualify for any of these funds," said Community Development Director Kenneth L. Pick. "The city might."
Read that last sentence again, once or twice, all you assclowns who helped Bush carry Berks County.
I'm still chuckling at you gullible bastards.
(oh, by the way - the Eagle is about the last possible paper one could label "liberal media". I had to type those two articles myself, because they were conspicuously absent from their webpage, FYI.)
ok, i've held out long enough.
has anyone noticed what a great week this has been to be a republican?
first of all, from the washington post (registration required):
BOSTON, Feb. 8 -- A federal judge in New Hampshire sentenced the former president of an Alexandria political consulting firm on Tuesday to five months in prison, the first jail term handed out in connection with the jamming of state Democratic Party phone lines on Election Day in 2002.
Allen Raymond, who headed the now-defunct company GOP Marketplace, which was hired by New Hampshire Republicans for election-related telemarketing services, pleaded guilty last summer to one count of conspiring to make harassing phone calls.
He apologized before U.S. District Judge Joseph DiClerico, who imposed the sentence. It included a $15,600 fine.
"Your honor, I did a bad thing," he said, according to the Associated Press. "While what I did was outside my character, I take full responsibility for my actions."
Raymond was the first to be sentenced of three men charged after the revelation that Democratic get-out-the-vote efforts in Manchester, Nashua, Rochester and Claremont were peppered with more than 800 computer-generated calls over a period of 90 minutes on the morning of Nov. 5, 2002.
Firefighters in Manchester, who were offering rides to the polls independently of the two parties, were also targeted, prosecutors said. Police later determined that an Idaho-based firm called Milo Enterprises had been engaged by GOP Marketplace to make automated hang-up calls.
State Democratic Party Chairman Kathy Sullivan said the incident -- which occurred as voters were choosing a senator, two House members, a governor and many state officials -- was designed to boost GOP prospects by suppressing turnout. Republicans swept most major races that day.
"They were trying to make it difficult for seniors and people who were economically depressed to get to vote," Sullivan said. "This was way more than a dirty trick. This was a serious crime, and the judge clearly took it seriously."
Republican State Committee Chairman Warren Henderson said in a written statement that he was "personally offended at this illegal and unethical assault on the integrity of our democratic process."
but, HEY - the biggie this week:
Medicare Drug Benefit May Cost $1.2 Trillion
Estimate Dwarfs Bush's Original Price Tag
By Ceci Connolly and Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, February 9, 2005; Page A01
The White House released budget figures yesterday indicating that the new Medicare prescription drug benefit will cost more than $1.2 trillion in the coming decade, a much higher price tag than President Bush suggested when he narrowly won passage of the law in late 2003.
The projections represent the most complete picture to date of how much the program will cost after it begins next year. The expense of the new drug benefit has been a source of much controversy since the day Congress approved it, with Democrats and some Republicans complaining that the White House has consistently low-balled the expected cost to the government.
As recently as September, Medicare chief Mark B. McClellan said the new drug package would cost $534 billion over 10 years. Last night, he acknowledged that the cumulative cost of the program between 2006 and 2015 will reach $1.2 trillion, but he cited several major savings and offsets that he said will reduce the federal government's bottom-line cost to $720 billion.
The disclosure prompted new criticism by Democrats about the administration's long-term budget estimates. It also showed that Medicare, the national medical insurance program for seniors, may pose a far more serious budgetary problem in the com- ing decade than concerns about the solvency of Social Security.
At a House Ways and Means Committee hearing, Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.) taunted Treasury Secretary John W. Snow about the rhetorical discrepancies.
"If you're looking for a crisis, I would suggest you look at a crisis that was self-made in just last year, because the crisis exists in what's happened to Medicare by weighing it down," Emanuel said. "Those of us who told you it was going to cost twice as much were right."
and not that you needed me to tell you this:
Blueprint Calls for Bigger, More Powerful Government
Some Conservatives Express Concern at Agenda
By Jim VandeHei
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, February 9, 2005; Page A01
President Bush's second-term agenda would expand not only the size of the federal government but also its influence over the lives of millions of Americans by imposing new national restrictions on high schools, court cases and marriages.
In a clear break from Republican campaigns of the 1990s to downsize government and devolve power to the states, Bush is fostering what amounts to an era of new federalism in which the national government shapes, not shrinks, programs and institutions to comport with various conservative ideals, according to Republicans inside and outside the White House.
Bush is calling for new federal accountability and testing requirements for all public high schools, after imposing similar mandates on grades three through eight during his first term. To limit lawsuits against businesses and professionals, he is proposing to put a federal cap on damage awards for medical malpractice, to force class-action cases into federal courts and to help create a national settlement of outstanding asbestos-related cases.
On social policy, the president is pushing a constitutional amendment to outlaw same-sex marriage in the states and continuing to define and expand the federal government's role in encouraging religious groups to help administer social programs such as community drug-rehabilitation efforts.
"We have moved from devolution, which was just pushing back as much power as possible to the states, back to where government is limited but active," said John Bridgeland, director of Bush's domestic policy council in the first term. Bridgeland and current White House officials see Bush's governing philosophy as a smart way to modernize the government, empower individuals and broaden the appeal of the GOP.
Bush maintains a stated desire to streamline the government. On Monday, he sent Congress a budget that would eliminate or consolidate 150 programs. But a growing number of conservatives are uneasy with what they deride as "big-government conservatism."
"He keeps expanding the federal involvement into state and local affairs," said Chris Edwards, a tax and budget expert at the Cato Institute, a think tank that often supports the president's agenda. "My hope would be that there would be an electoral rebuke of big [-government] Republicans like there was when the tectonic plates shifted in 1994."
how does this sort of thing play out from city to city, town to town, across our fair country?
well, one need only look as far as a couple of well-hidden articles in our very own reading eagle to find out:
(right next to one another on page A6 of today's paper)
McMahon hits Bush on proposed budget
Reading's mayor says cutting grants for law enforcement by 46 percent in the next fiscal year would be unconscionable.
Mayor Tom McMahon on Wednesday called President Bush's proposed crime-fighting budget cuts irresponsible, urging residents to write letters to the president and local legislators to show their opposition.
"This is unconscionable, and I am absolutely aghast," McMahon said of the president's proposal that would cut $1.85 million in crime-fighting programs in Berks. "It's inconceivable that he would propose these budget cuts."
Under his proposed $2.57 trilliion budget unveiled Monday, Bush wants to cut grants to law enforcement by 46 percent - to $1.5 billion from $2.8 billion.
oh, and right next to that:
Cuts would have huge impact in Berks, officials say
The elimination of Community Development block grants would cost the county about $3 million annually, according to an official.
Road, sewer, playground, and other projects would go undone or local taxes would be forced upward to pay for them under President Bush's budget proposal, local community-development officials said Wednesday.
Berks County has been receiving about $3 million annually in federal Community Development block grants to distribute to municipalities for such projects...that translates to about 0.2-mill in county taxes, or $20 annually on a property assessed at $100,000.
Also in jeapordy is $140,000 that goes to the Berks Community Action Program's family-center program and $50,000 that goes to the Greater Berks Food Bank.
Community action would lose another $650,000 for other programs, such as job training and youth mentoring.
Under Bush's $2.57 trillion budget proposal unveiled Monday, a long list of programs for housing and urban development, commerce, agriculture, financial initiatives and health and human services would be eliminated.
In their place, Bush would create the Strengthening America's Communities Initiative. The money would go only to low-income communities.
"If this happens, Berks County wouldn't qualify for any of these funds," said Community Development Director Kenneth L. Pick. "The city might."
Read that last sentence again, once or twice, all you assclowns who helped Bush carry Berks County.
I'm still chuckling at you gullible bastards.
(oh, by the way - the Eagle is about the last possible paper one could label "liberal media". I had to type those two articles myself, because they were conspicuously absent from their webpage, FYI.)
posted by tom at 23:00
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