When are Democrats in Congress going to start acting like they're in the majority? (The Nation)

[marmar]

BLOG | Posted 05/23/2007 @ 3:24pm
You Have The Power!
Ari Berman


It feels like everything and nothing is occurring on the Hill these days.

Democrats in Congress are caving on Iraq, compromising on trade, backtracking on ethics reform and pushing for an immigration bill that nobody likes.

Governing with a razor-thin majority ain't easy. And Democrats have done a robust and effective job at oversight, as promised. But they still lack either the backbone or the discipline to take real risks and fight the status quo.

It was fascinating to hear Nancy Pelosi hint that she will vote against her own House's latest Iraq funding bill. Could you imagine Tom DeLay acquiescing like that? Not to suggest that DeLay is a model for governance, but he would've pushed to get what he wanted--and only scheduled a vote once he did.

Ditto on immigration. Immigrant rights groups like the bill that passed the Senate last year, under Republican rule, better than the accord struck last week.

Even popular and straightforward measures, like raising the minimum wage, have been stalled for months.

Yesterday House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer released a five-month progress report, trumpeting Democratic successes. It was an odd bit of timing.

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/notion?bid=15

[cascadiance]

1. When the DLC acknowledges that they really are in the Corporatist Party!

... instead, along with all of the Republicans and note that they have a super majority along with the president! Of course they need to clamp down on control over the voting machines and elections a little more first...

[theoldman]

2. After they get the majority in 2008 and not before.

[MADem]

3. Well, if the CT governor switched parties, and Lieberman was hit by a bus,

she could appoint Ned Lamont to the job until the special election....

If Lieberman gets pissed off, he could flip the Senate. And he's LOVING being the eight hundred pound gorilla in the room.

And on edit, here's his latest bullshit-threatening whine: http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aJGabSW6Ddzo&refer=home

Read the whole thing and VOMIT:

Lieberman, Sticking With Democrats for Now, Warns Them on Iraq

By Laura Litvan

May 22 (Bloomberg) -- Senator Joe Lieberman, a Connecticut independent, says his disagreement with the Democrats over the Iraq war won't prevent him from working with his former party. For now.

``I hope the moment doesn't come that I feel so separated from the caucus'' that he decides to shift allegiance to the Republicans, he said in an interview.....The 65-year-old lawmaker is the margin of difference in the Democrats' 51-49 control of the Senate. A switch to the Republicans, which he won't rule out, would create a 50-50 tie that would allow Vice President Dick Cheney to cast a deciding vote for Republican control....Lieberman said he already has seen much he doesn't like from the Democrats, particularly Majority Leader Harry Reid's decision to co-sponsor, and then allow a vote last week on, legislation cutting off war funding by March.

`A Fundamental Disagreement'

Leiberman said Reid's recent remark that the war is lost undermined troop morale and left him ``terribly'' bothered. ``I just have a fundamental disagreement,'.....The senator, the Democrats' 2000 vice presidential nominee, was defeated in last year's primary after three terms by anti- war candidate Ned Lamont. Lieberman created a new line on the ballot, ``Connecticut for Lieberman,'' and won a five-way general election with 50 percent of the vote.

Democratic leaders wooed him to caucus with the party this year, naming him chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. At one point, Lieberman stopped attending weekly party caucus meetings, though he resumed at Reid's behest.

Lieberman said that while he has experienced ``moments of real awkwardness and aloneness,'' he generally relishes his added clout and ability to stake out independent positions: ``The first words that come to mind are that I've returned feeling empowered and liberated.''...

[marmar]

4. I really hate that man....

:grr:

[MADem]

5. That man, just YESTERDAY, again threatened to SWITCH parties.

Then, we won't have Harry Reid to kick around anymore, will we? People don't realize what a horrible tightrope Reid is on. It's way too easy to pile on the guy. I find it, frankly, amazing that people aren't seeing this VERY LIKELY reality.

Read the attention-whore's latest pronouncements, here:

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aJGabSW6Ddzo&refer=home

If he does do it, well, Cheney will be the Senate Decider, in actual fact. We'll be treated to Mitch McConnell's jiggling jowls and dulcet tones, with Trent Lott cackling in the background. We'll have to pray for Byrd's continued good health, keep Obama and Clinton close to DC at all times (fuck that campaigning, let Mitt Romney eat up all the airtime), and wheel Johnson in while still recovering from his brain insult to even have a hope of getting close to anything.

And it will be way easier for the wavering Dems who lean a bit to the right to take the path of least resistance.