Congress votes to toughen ethics, lobbying laws
Measure that would force greater disclosure of pet projects goes to Bush






Updated: 3:02 p.m. ET Aug 2, 2007
WASHINGTON - The Senate voted Thursday to make lawmakers disclose more about their efforts to fund pet projects and raise money from lobbyists, a move some called the biggest advance in congressional ethics in decades.

The 83 to 14 vote, which sends the bill to President Bush, prompted Democrats to claim fulfillment of their 2006 campaign promise to crack down on lobbying abuses that sent some lawmakers and a prominent lobbyist to prison.

The bill would require lawmakers to disclose those lobbyists who raise $15,000 or more for them within a six-month period by "bundling" donations from many people. Lawmakers seeking targeted spending projects, or "earmarks," would have to publicize their plans in advance, although critics said the requirements are hardly airtight.



The Democratic-crafted bill would bar lawmakers from taking gifts from lobbyists or their clients. Former senators would have to wait two years before lobbying Congress; ex-House members would have to wait one year.

'Landmark' or loopholes?
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., called it "the most sweeping reform bill since Watergate."

But several Republicans said it fell short of requiring full disclosure of earmarks, which have soared in number -- and controversy -- in recent years. Some earmarks fund popular civic projects that boost a lawmaker's re-election prospects. Others help large contractors or other companies that hire lobbyists and donate to campaigns.

The bill "has completely gutted the earmark reform provisions we overwhelmingly passed in January," said Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz. He broke with several former allies on ethics matters, including Sen. Russ Feingold, D-Wis.

"By any measure," Feingold said in the debate, the bill "must be considered landmark legislation."




Lawmakers seeking earmarks would have to publicize their plans 48 hours before a Senate vote. They would have to certify they have no direct financial interest in the items.

McCain and others, however, said senators could circumvent the requirements by stating that prompt disclosure was not technically feasible, or by having the majority leader declare a bill earmark-free.

Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said it was ludicrous to suggest someone in his position would "cheat and lie" to hide earmarks.

Embattled senator among 'nay' votes
All 14 senators who voted against the bill were Republicans.

Among those voting for it was GOP Sen. Ted Stevens, whose Alaska home was searched this week by federal agents probing alleged influence-peddling involving earmarks.

Self-styled watchdog groups acknowledged that the bill was less stringent in several respects than were versions embraced by the House and Senate in January. But they hailed it as a major leap by an institution generally loath to police itself.

Public Citizen said it amounts to "far-reaching lobbying and ethics reforms."

Fred Wertheimer of Democracy21 called it "a great victory for the American people and a major accomplishment for Congress and its leaders." He said it will give the public "comprehensive information about the multiple ways in which lobbyists provide campaign funds and other financial support" to lawmakers they seek to influence.

The 107-page bill would require senators, and candidates for the Senate or White House, to pay full charter rates for trips on private planes. House members and candidates would be barred from accepting trips on private planes.

Senators' secret "holds" on legislation would be banned. Lawmakers convicted of bribery and other serious crimes would lose their congressional pensions.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., gave the measure a lukewarm endorsement.

"This bill isn't nearly as tough as it would have been on earmarks if Republicans had been involved in writing it," McConnell said. "But weighing the good and the bad, many provisions are stronger than current law."

The White House did not immediately say whether Bush will sign the bill.

Recent scandals
The legislation marks Congress' most far-reaching reaction to scandals involving former lobbyist Jack Abramoff and former Rep. Randy "Duke" Cunningham, R-Calif. Both are now in prison on corruption charges that in some cases involved congressional earmarks.

Reform advocates said the bill's main achievement involves greater disclosure of lobbyists who bundle campaign donations to lawmakers and political parties by soliciting checks from numerous people. Under current disclosure laws, their efforts often go undetected, but the recipients are well aware of the help they received.

Earlier versions of the bill would have required lobbyist-bundlers, rather than the recipients, to disclose such contributions. They also had set the reporting threshold at $5,000 over six months, rather than $15,000.

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"Embattled senator among 'nay' votes
All 14 senators who voted against the bill were Republicans."

Seems as likely that if Republicans were in control this bill would have never been written let alone passed. Now it's up to a Republican president to sign it into law. Oh, well maybe congress will have the 3/4ths override vote.

That same compliment your woman sent me. Gee thax!

Rambill I think your years of observation made you complacent in you views and you would rather keep the status quo.

Rambill I know you don't believe in reincarnation but is it possible that in a past life you were a work horse with blinders that you got use to seeing only what's in front of you and not what's around you.

"Fact is that the "average white makes more than the "average" black in this country. if you are relying on your court appointed attorney, you are in trouble in our courts."

Ramble I fear you don't believe in Justice.

Ok, Ramble suppose your interpertation of facts is that it's money that cause of the imbalance. But my point is, and hopefully you understand logic, if black on white murder is executed more often but black on black murder is not executed as often, as the study show, the conclusion is the system is bias in punishing murder according to race of the victim. Where's the justice of the black family of the victim of black on black murder than the justice of the family of the victim of black on white murder. This is why I stated that and let me repeat myself "Even in death there's no equality."

ajhagena I would respond to you with something more articulate but by the looks your pic your a bucket head and those word would be lost on you.

"The courts are equal oppertunity oppressors."

Ramble the only part of the that statement I agree with is "oppressors."
I see you've read through article and made your own conclusion by dismissing facts.
Look at the sky, it's blue not green!

"Never think that a poor white man will get a better shake than a poor black man."

I would I agree with you if the study included the finicial situation of the death row inmate and the results showed it was the same. But the study only states that whites who killed non-white were still less likey to be executed than black who killed whites. So there is imblance in the system. One of the reasons, the study says, is that procecuters win on elections where high profile cases involved black murder trials. If it were white on non-white murder it would receive attention and the white murder would get off with a easier sentece. More disturbining is that black on black murders get off easier than black on white murders, which stirs indications of youthasia base on racial standards set by the system. It suggest that black on white murder deaths are more important that black on black murder deaths. In other words a murder of a black man is not as important than the murder of white man. Even in death there is no equality.

Here's the full article by the way....

Aug. 1, 2007 - Is American justice colorblind? A new study finds that blacks on death row convicted of killing whites are more likely to be executed than whites who kill minorities. It also concludes that blacks who kill other minorities are less likely to be executed than blacks who kill whites. The authors of the report say their findings raise serious doubts about claims that the U.S. criminal justice system is colorblind.

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Appearing in the August issue of American Sociological Review, the report claims to be the first of its kind to study whether the race of murder victims affects the probability that a convicted killer gets the ultimate punishment. The study examined outcomes of 1,560 people sentenced to death in 16 states between 1972 and 2002. NEWSWEEK's Eve Conant spoke to David Jacobs, coauthor of the study and a professor of sociology and political science at Ohio State University. Excerpts:

NEWSWEEK: Why did you do this study?
David Jacobs: Because the role of race is a fundamental question about the death penalty. There was a lot of research, mostly on one or two Southern states, which found that if an African-American killed a white, that they'd be more likely to get the death penalty. But you have to remember that only about 10 percent of those who get the death sentence actually get executed. Most people wind up leaving death row and going back to prison where they serve long sentences. But we really didn't know much about what happened to offenders after they were sentenced to death and that's what's unique about this study. We didn't know the factors that cause executions. There have been a few studies, but we didn't know if a black or Hispanic who kills a white person would be more likely to be executed. We knew it was more likely that these offenders would get the death sentence. But we didn't know if they were more likely to actually get executed.

So what did you find?
Holding a whole bunch of stuff constant, including several political variables, we found that if a black person killed a white person they were more likely to get executed. If a Hispanic killed a white person they were also more likely, but this probability wasn't quite as strong. There is more than a twofold greater risk that an African-American who killed a white will be executed than a white person who kills a nonwhite victim. A Hispanic is at least 1.4 times more likely to be executed if such an offender kills a white. Both findings are statistically significant. Also, the findings indicate that blacks who kill nonwhites are less likely to be executed than blacks who kill whites, which shows that the postsentencing capital-punishment process continues to place greater value on white lives.

Can we tell if the differences have been getting more even or time or not, given the time span of the study?
No, most executions happened in the 1990s, so we really couldn't discover period effects. As a result of the appeals process, people spend a long time on death row, so there weren't that many executions in the 1980s.

Was age at all a factor, or just race?
We checked for age but it was not significant.

Or the nature of the crime? Or was it simply race?
We don't have much data on the nature of the crime. But Supreme Court regulations require a state to come up with aggravating and mitigating factors for capital cases. Aggravating factors might include, say, the killing of a child or torturing a victim. Mitigating factors might include the age of the offender or their childhood experience, whether they were abused, etc.

So why do you think that blacks are twice as likely to get the death penalty for killing a white than a white for killing a nonwhite?
There are two plausible explanations. Prosecutors often win higher office if they win well-publicized cases. When a black kills a white such killings gets more publicity and we have evidence for that. Secondly—and perhaps even more plausible—appellate court justices at the state level are often subject to elections, called retention elections. That means they run unopposed without a party label. It's hard to blow an election like that. But some appellate justices in California and a few other states supposedly granted relief in too many death penalty appeals and got unelected in these retention elections. That's also why some states that are reluctant to execute just stall. California has something like 650 people who've been on death row, and since 1976 but this state has only executed about 15 people. They are dragging it out because they see the pressure and don't want to lose their seats. My fundamental point is that the death penalty is intrinsically political.

But also about race; that's what your study found.
Yes, it's both. The findings, in short, show that we clearly value white lives more than those of blacks or Hispanics.

You've been researching race in the judicial system for years. Was there anything in this study that particularly surprised you?
What is interesting is the characteristics of states that make the death penalty legal and lead to additional executions. At the state level we found that … the greater the strength of the Republican Party in the state, the more likely you'll have executions, death sentences or that capital punishment will be legal in the state.

What about the size of the African-American population in any given state, does that play any role?
Yes, up to a point. As the black population grows in a given state, then executions become more likely, probably because whites fear blacks. But after a point—when the black population reaches about 16 percent—executions start to diminish probably because blacks become politically strong enough to reduce executions when their proportions reach that level. What bothered me about this study is that we couldn't get more cooperation from state corrections departments. We'd like to expand beyond the 16 states we studied: Arizona, California, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Maryland, Missouri, New Jersey, Ohio, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia and Washington.

Even more reasons to outlaw capital punisment!

I also found it interesting in the study that in states that are Republican leaning are where more execution occur.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20072722/site/newsweek/

LOS ANGELES - A Republican-backed ballot proposal could split left-leaning California between the Democratic and GOP nominees, tilting the 2008 presidential election in favor of the Republicans.

California awards its cache of 55 electoral votes to the statewide winner in presidential elections _ the largest single prize in the nation. But a prominent Republican lawyer wants to put a proposal on the ballot that would award the statewide winner only two electoral votes.

The rest would be distributed to the winning candidate in each of the state's congressional districts. In effect, that would create 53 races, each with one electoral vote up for grabs.

California has voted Democratic in the last four presidential elections. But the change _ if it qualifies for one of two primary ballots next year and is approved by voters _ would mean that a Republican would be positioned the following November to snatch 20 or more electoral votes in GOP-leaning districts.

That's a number equal to winning Ohio.

The so-called Presidential Election Reform Act is being pushed by Thomas Hiltachk, a lawyer in a Sacramento firm that represents the California Republican Party and has worked with Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. He did not return phone messages left Monday at his office.

A Schwarzenegger spokeswoman said the governor is not involved with the proposed initiative, and party officials said they have no connection to it.

Democratic consultant Chris Lehane called the plan "an effort to rig the system in order to fix the election."

"If this change is made, it will virtually guarantee that a Republican wins the White House in 2008," Lehane said in an e-mail.

Nineteen of the state's 53 congressional districts are represented by Republicans. President Bush carried 22 districts in 2004, while losing the statewide vote by double digits.

Only Maine and Nebraska allocate electoral votes by congressional district.

A draft of the proposed initiative says nixing the winner-take-all system would give presidential candidates "an incentive to campaign in California. ... Many of the geographic areas of the state would be as important to a candidate's chance for victory as many of the smaller states."

"We'll take a serious look at it, once it qualifies for the ballot," state Republican Party Chairman Ron Nehring said.

If it does qualify, Democrats probably would have to spend millions of dollars to defeat it, which could drain money from other races. And there are expected to be additional ballot proposals on abortion and other social issues that could drive up GOP turnout.

The state already moved its presidential primary to Feb. 5 in an attempt to increase its clout in national politics.

In that primary, Republicans will award delegates only to the top vote-getter in each congressional district. A Democrat can qualify for a delegate by winning at least 15 percent of the vote in a district.

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So Republicans can't win California out right so they try to divide it up so the can win elections. Gerrimandering at it highest, or should I lowest, level.

A move like this would only divide the state up like the Bush team divided national unity. A presidential canidate would only campange in he districts he's popular and not the entire state.

I like to see Republicans complain if Democrat proposed a similar measure in Texas. (Note to self contact the Democratic HQ in Texas.)

Interesting article it seems that Iraq might be salavagible... if only the Iraqi goverment is replaced. That Times opinon article did mention that the it's goverment need to get it's self in order. But look at this article on Iraqi gov corruption..... http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/20043428/

Bush recently said he still supports the current Prime Minister. The the Iraq is corrupt himself.

Here's an article that more believible on the subject

By JEFF KOSSEFF
Rep. Peter DeFazio, D-Ore. (Photo by Faith Cathcart)c.2007 Newhouse News Service

WASHINGTON — Constituents called Rep. Peter DeFazio's office, worried there was a conspiracy buried in the classified portion of a White House plan for operating the government after a terrorist attack.

As a member of the House Committee on Homeland Security, DeFazio, D-Ore., is permitted to enter a secure "bubbleroom'' in the Capitol and examine classified material. So he asked the White House to see the secret documents.

On Wednesday, DeFazio got his answer: DENIED.

"I just can't believe they're going to deny a member of Congress the right of reviewing how they plan to conduct the government of the United States after a significant terrorist attack,'' DeFazio said.

Homeland Security Committee staffers told his office that the White House initially approved his request, but it was later quashed. DeFazio doesn't know who did it or why.

"We're talking about the continuity of the government of the United States of America,'' DeFazio said. "I would think that would be relevant to any member of Congress, let alone a member of the Homeland Security Committee.''

Bush administration spokesman Trey Bohn declined to say why DeFazio was denied access: "We do not comment through the press on the process that this access entails. It is important to keep in mind that much of the information related to the continuity of government is highly sensitive.''

Norm Ornstein, a legal scholar who studies government continuity at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, said he ``cannot think of one good reason'' to deny access to a member of Congress who serves on the Homeland Security Committee.

"I find it inexplicable and probably reflective of the usual knee-jerk overextension of executive power that we see from this White House,'' Ornstein said.

This is the first time DeFazio has been denied access to documents. DeFazio has asked Homeland Security Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., to help him access the documents.

"Maybe the people who think there's a conspiracy out there are right,'' DeFazio said.

(Jeff Kosseff can be contacted at jeff.kosseff(at)newhouse.com)

A cowboy walks into a bar, a few miles West of
Brokeback Mountain, and, after two steps in, he
realizes it's a gay bar.

"What the hell," he says to himself, "I really want a
drink."

When the gay waiter approaches, he says to the cowboy,
"What's the name of your 'willy'?"

The cowboy says, "Look, I'm not into any of that. All
I want is a drink."

The gay waiter says, "I'm sorry but I can't serve you
until you tell me the name of your 'willy'. Mine for
instance is called NIKE, for the slogan 'Just Do It.'
That guy down at the end of the bar calls his
SNICKERS, because 'It really Satisfies."

The cowboy looks dumbfounded, so the bartender tells
him he will give him a second to think it over.

So the cowboy asks the man sitting to his left who is
sipping on a beer, "Hey bud, what's the name of
yours?"

The man looks back and says with a smile, "TIMEX." The
thirsty cowboy asks, "Why Timex?" The fella proudly
replies, " 'Cause it takes a lickin' and keeps on
tickin!'"

A little shaken, the cowboy turns to two fella's on
his right, who happen to be sharing a fruity Margarita
and says, "So, what do you guys call yours?"

The first man turns to him and proudly exclaims,
"FORD, because "'Quality is Job One." Then he adds,
"Have you driven a Ford lately?"

The guy next to him then says, "I call mine CHEVY,
'Like a Rock!' And gives a wink!

Even more shaken, the Cowboy has to think for a moment
before he comes up with a name for his manhood.

Finally, he turns to the bartender and exclaims, "The
name of my 'willy' is SECRET. Now give me a beer."

The bartender begins to pour the cowboy a beer, but
with a puzzled look
asks, "Why Secret?"

The cowboy says, "Because it's 'STRONG ENOUGH FOR A
MAN, BUT MADE FOR A WOMAN*

I came across an article that had me laughing. "How to meet and marry a Billionaire."


http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/19505458/

Pope John Paul the 2nd is on his death bed and he asks the nurse for one last wish. He ask her to bring both George W. Bush and D*ck Cheyene before he dies for one last photo op. When George and D*ck hear the last dying wish of one of the most well know and popular world figures they think it would help their popularity in world's view. They go to the Pope with the world press and cammeras poised for the Pope's last words. George Bush asks the ailing pope "Why have you asked us to be by your bedside in your last moments on earth?" The pope replies "In my like I have acted like Jesus as has lived, and like Jesus I will die as He died, between two lying theives!"

Here are clips that the Fox network is now trying to ignore the war
because it makes Bush look bad. Now if only Bush administration could
ignore problems like; the war, wherther to pardon Scooter Libby and how
that would look, the immigration bill, the attorney general firings
probe, and maybe, just maybe they'll go away.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pN3oL8FGBP4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=78MJctdjS6Q

Dogma, as per the American Heritage Dictionary, : 1. A corpus of
doctrines set forth by a religion 2. An authoritative principle or
belief, esp, one considered to be absolutely true

Interestingly the word after that is...

Dogmatic: Marked by authoritative, arrogant assertion of unproven
principles

It happens in that in many anicent religions that they used drug like
alcohol, tobacco, payote, cocca (cocaine), oppeium, and other drug in
their rituals. The use of these drugs were a way of becoming one with
their god or gods. And after reading some parts of Revelations I get a
strong feeling that early christians use some halucinogen that's evident
in that book.

Cut and paste link below.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=p-ESqEAzv5o