News of the Day:
--> Barack Obama may have a new supporter among the community of African-American political figures (yes, there are indeed some that haven't endorsed him). The key is that this one is from across the aisle. While he has already donated money to the McCain campaign, General Colin Powell admitted that he may end up casting his vote for Barack Obama. Of course, he made these comments in Canada, so this may be a strategic ploy to fool our enemies to the north into a false sense of security...at least before Operation Human Shield commences. Yes, in this allegory, the part of Colin Powell will be played by Isaac Hayes.
--> If you see tons of people in wearing Obama pins and waving registration forms at you this weekend, don't panic. It's just a part of the campaign's first wave of volunteers, 3,600 to be precise, who are being deployed to 17 states for the next six weeks. For the record, I was sent an email by the Obama campaign two months ago suggesting I apply for one of these "Obama Organizing Fellowships." So be grateful I'm here educating you virtually, and not banging down your door demanding that you waive your rights to electoral privacy immediately.
And speaking of Obama campaign-related violence, it turns out that these Obama fellows will be armed...
--> With guns. That's right, forgetting his healing, above-the-fray spark and turning instead to the tough battle he needs to wage in order to win back the White House and this country, Barack Obama referred to the tough attacks that he will face from the GOP as follows: "If they bring a knife to the fight, we bring a gun." The McCain campaign immediately attacked the remarks as a sign that Obama's pledge of "new politics" is already in the past. Of course, he never used that phrase, but it'll be an interesting dynamic we'll see throughout this campaign as the GOP tries to paint Obama far from heralding the new age of political discourse that his supporters expect.
--> So it appears that there may be a quiet, behind-the-scenes race among the Democrats in Congress for the role of Secretary of State were Obama to be elected. Right now the competitors appear to be Senator Joe Biden (D-DE), Senator John Kerry (D-MA), and Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT). Kerry was the first to endorse Obama of the three, and this favor may pay off for him 7 months. Biden has a ton of foreign policy experience, and his active role on the campaign in the coming months may make him Obama's go-to guy on affairs of international intrigue. Dodd is a bit of a darkhorse, but he has his own problems to worry about...
--> Back on Thursday, here at EDC we broke the story (you know, after ABC, NB
C, CBS, CNN, Fox, Huffington, and every other journalist out there) about Jim Johnson resigning his post on the Obama VP-search committee. Of course, I didn't mention why. Allow me to explain. He was given favorable mortgage terms by Countrywide Financial. Apparently, this is a bigger deal than I thought, because now Portfolio.com has broken a story that VIP loans were procured from this company by several government officials. Notables on the list included former UN Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, Bush Cabinet member Alphonso Jackson (HUD) and Clinton Cabinet member Donna Shalala (Health & Human Services), and two U.S. Senators: Kent Conrad (D-ND) and, you guessed it, Chris Dodd. These guys may face legal problems, but at the very least this is a political problem for the two elected officials. Luckily, neither of them are running for re-election this year. This may be an issue this year, however, due to both their proximities to the Obama campaign. Conrad was one of the first officials to endorse Obama during the primary (in fact, the first not from Illinois). We'll see how this plays out.
C, CBS, CNN, Fox, Huffington, and every other journalist out there) about Jim Johnson resigning his post on the Obama VP-search committee. Of course, I didn't mention why. Allow me to explain. He was given favorable mortgage terms by Countrywide Financial. Apparently, this is a bigger deal than I thought, because now Portfolio.com has broken a story that VIP loans were procured from this company by several government officials. Notables on the list included former UN Ambassador Richard Holbrooke, Bush Cabinet member Alphonso Jackson (HUD) and Clinton Cabinet member Donna Shalala (Health & Human Services), and two U.S. Senators: Kent Conrad (D-ND) and, you guessed it, Chris Dodd. These guys may face legal problems, but at the very least this is a political problem for the two elected officials. Luckily, neither of them are running for re-election this year. This may be an issue this year, however, due to both their proximities to the Obama campaign. Conrad was one of the first officials to endorse Obama during the primary (in fact, the first not from Illinois). We'll see how this plays out.--> Talks between the two campaigns over the proposed town hall debates have broken down. The Obama camp was hesitant to begin with to give the cash-strapped McCain (whose wooden posture plays better in small, more informal audiences) free coverage and the McCain camp believed that their candidate's superior experience would shine through especially in that setting. Obama's proposal is still for 5 debates: the 3 normal debates, an in-depth foreign policy debate in August, and a town hall debate on 4th of July weekend; this would be the most in a modern campaign.
4 comments:
I'm poaching this directly from "my left nutmeg" but it is the best I've seen on this story that isn't a story:
"This same kind of thing comes up from time to time, and to my view, is a red herring. Dodd -- more than probably anyone in the entire Federal government -- uses his office to give ordinary people the advantage in dealing with banking institutions, and in the process has cost banks a huge, huge amount of money that they would have been otherwise able to extract from consumers.
See here: http://progressivepunch.org/members.jsp?issue=G3&search=selectScore&chamber=Senate&x=61&y=14
to view the records of sitting Senators in putting government checks on the banking industry. Dodd earns a 100% -- and rose to the head of the Banking committee as a fierce opponent of the bankruptcy bill that Biden and the rest of the MBNA caucus shafted us with in 2004 and 2005.
Dodd doesn't want to destroy the banking industry -- he's a Senator from Connecticut, after all -- but he has been more willing to rein in their practices than anybody else, so I'm pleased with the job he's done in that area. I think he could go further, but there is nobody doing more.
In comparison to Dodd's 100% record, Congressman Shays has a 10.7% voting record on reining in banking industry power, which, grotesquely, situates him as roughly at the median in terms of the House of Representatives.
Now, if Dodd got a break because of his position, he should give it back and apologize, whether he was aware that he was getting a sweetheart deal or not. Even better might be to personally give the difference to a nonprofit that helps families on the bad end of the housing crisis. And perhaps someone with some better knowledge than I of how loan rates are determined could clue us in as to what rate someone with around $270,000 in annual income (disclosures here) would get on $780,000 worth of loans.
But keep in mind, before you jump down his throat, that Dodd votes against the bastards every single time, while there isn't a single elected Republican in the House or the Senate who votes to regulate banks even 25% of the time."
I'm in no way anti-Dodd, I'm just reporting that this is a political problem. Unfortunately, it's probably blown out of proportion, but right now this blog is dealing with the political realities of this story, not the legal realities.
"Unfortunately, it's probably blown out of proportion, but right now this blog is dealing with the political realities of this story, not the legal realities"
It's probably blown out of proportion? It's TOTALLY blown out of proportion and by glibly passing it along in the way you have, you've fanned the fire. The political reality for Dodd is that if people would take the time to look at this rationally -- EVEN when they are looking at the "political realities" of the story - it would be the non-story that it is...You've beciome part of the problem.
All right, you're clearly giving me wayyyy too much credit. I'm not part of the media that's creating opinion in this country. I don't write articles, books, or TV segments. I write a homemade blog that merely delivers my chosen political news of the day to my audience of maybe twenty people. This isn't a big deal, and you're right that Dodd has nothing to worry about, but at the time of this posting, it was certainly an issue that pundits were concerned about.
Now take a deep breath.
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