January 30, 2015 Last updated: Friday, January 30, 2015, 3:03 PM
By Darius Amos
Staff Writer | The Ridgewood News
North Jersey doesn’t have much skin in this weekend’s big game, but Ridgewood is still finding plenty of reasons to focus its attention on Super Bowl Sunday.
And most of those reasons revolve around parties and celebrating with family and friends – though supporting either the New England Patriots or the Seattle Seahawks might also have something to do with it.
“Football’s replaced baseball as America’s game so you naturally want to watch and enjoy the game with others,” said Midland Park resident Mark Livingston, 45, as he nestled onto his perch inside Mac Murphy’s bar in Ridgewood late Wednesday afternoon. “The Super Bowl is the last game of the year, and the biggest game of the year. Even if the local teams aren’t playing, fans will still watch. They’ll watch any football game.”
Indeed, the Jets and Giants failed to reach this year’s NFL playoffs, but Bergen County still has a slight connection to the game. The Patriots’ Devin McCourty played his high school football at nearby St. Joseph Regional, but that local angle isn’t enough to win the favor of some fans in this area.
Livingston, a Giants fan, will be pulling for a Seahawks’ victory since he always roots for the team representing the Big Blue’s conference. His brother, Eric, said he’ll be cheering for Seattle simply because of his disdain for the Patriots.
90 RHS Students qualify for the next round of competition at NJ DECA State Conference held in Cherry Hill in February
On January 7, 196 RHS students competed in the NJ DECA Regional Competition at Ramapo College; about 90 of these students qualified for the next round of competition by placing in the top 18 of all students competing in their event.
Some outstanding First Place overall performances included Abigail McKenna, for Apparel & Accessories Marketing Series; Elisabeth O’Neill, for Buying and Merchandising Management Team Decision Making; Rebecca Tomilchik andSamantha Constant, for Financial Services Team Decision Making; Madeleine Phillips and Shea Darienzo, for Marketing Communications Team Decision Making; and Grace McCormick, for Principles of Marketing. These students, along with the others who placed, will move on to the State Conference held in Cherry Hill in February.
VC Firms Rain Down Cash on Tech Startups, Is Bubble Brewing?
SAN FRANCISCO — Jan 16, 2015, 6:16 PM ET
By BRANDON BAILEY AP Technology Writer
Cash rained down on startups in 2014, as venture capitalists poured a whopping $48.3 billion into new U.S. companies — levels not seen since before the dot-com bubble burst in 2001. Strong technology IPOs are luring investors chasing the next big return, but with valuations this high, critics suggest some investors may be setting themselves up for a major fall.
“It’s not that many businesses aren’t viable, but the question is, what are you paying for them?” said Mark Cannice, a professor of entrepreneurship at the University of San Francisco.
Venture funding surged more than 60 percent in 2014 from the prior year, most often fueling software and biotechnology companies, according to a new “MoneyTree Report” issued by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association, based on data from Thomson Reuters. But the money wasn’t spread around to buoy many more companies. A few just got huge piles of cash.
Last year saw a record 47 “mega-deals,” defined as investments of more than $100 million. That’s nearly twice as many as reported in 2013, said Mark McCaffrey of PricewaterhouseCoopers, who leads the accounting and consulting firm’s global software practice.
Uber Technologies, the ride-hailing service disrupting the transportation industry and generating plenty of press, received the top two biggest rounds of investment last year. Each raised $1.2 billion for Uber, and the company’s value is now pegged at $41 billion. Other major deals included $542 million (mostly from Google Inc.) invested in Magic Leap Inc., a secretive startup working on virtual reality technology; $500 million in Vice Media, which operates online news and video channels; and $485 million in SnapChat, the popular messaging service.
Upcoming monthly meetings: March 12, April 9 and May 14 at 7:30 p.m. in the RHS Library.
Dues are due. Make $165 check payable to “RHS Class of 2015” and mail to Sharon Walker, 94 Sherwood Road, Ridgewood, NJ 07450.
Baby pictures are needed by January 15. Click here for the flyer.
Class of 2015 Project Graduation Representatives
Chairpersons Tara Callaghan 201-803-7778 and Rosie McCooe 201-602-8097
Chairpersons email: [email protected]
Treasurer Sharon Walker [email protected]
Communications Jeff Coster [email protected]
Scott Garrett U.S. Representative for New Jersey’s 5th congressional district, senior member of the House Budget Committee
Republicans take the reins in Congress with Commanding Majorities
By Alexander Bolton – 01/05/15 06:00 AM EST
It’s game time for Mitch McConnell and John Boehner.
For the first time since 2006, Congress is convening this week under full GOP control, with McConnell (Ky.) reaching the pinnacle of Senate majority leader and Boehner (Ohio) poised to win a third term as Speaker.
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With a 54-46 majority in the Senate, and an expanded majority in the House, Republicans are under pressure to deliver on their promises and move a raft of legislation to President Obama’s desk in the first few months of the year.
But in order to achieve that goal, McConnell and Boehner will need to unify their troops around a shared agenda — a task that will begin in earnest later this month, when House and Senate Republicans will hold a joint retreat in Hershey, Pa., to prepare for what one GOP aide described as the “frictions that will inevitably arise.”
Right off the bat, Boehner will have to deal with the political fallout from the revelation that House Majority Whip Steve Scalise (R-La.) spoke to a white supremacist group in 2002, which has cast a cloud over the new session. The Chicago Tribune and conservative commentator Charles Krauthammer have called on Scalise, the No. 3 ranking House Republican, to step down.
Boehner has stood behind Scalise, putting his clout on the line ahead of Tuesday’s vote for Speaker. Defections are expected, but Boehner can afford to lose up to 28 Republicans before the Speaker vote would go to a second ballot.
Once the pageantry of Congress’s opening days is through, Republican leaders are hoping to get off to a fast start.
McConnell and Boehner, who consult weekly, set the tone after the midterm elections with an agenda that emphasizes jobs and the economy.
“That means a renewed effort to debate and vote on the many bills that passed the Republican-led House in recent years with bipartisan support, but were never even brought to a vote by the Democratic Senate majority,” Boehner and McConnell wrote in a joint op-ed in The Wall Street Journal.
The bicameral retreat, meanwhile, will give House and Senate Republicans an opportunity to coordinate their strategy for 114th Congress, which is likely to be dominated as time goes on by the politics of the 2016 presidential race.
This much is true: Both President Obama and top Republicans are saying the right things about tax reform right now.
Whether that means that the two sides will make the progress in 2015 necessary to overhaul the tax code before Obama leaves office is another question entirely.
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At his year-end news conference, Obama insisted that he would put out more specific tax reform proposals in the coming months, answering GOP critics who’ve said the White House hasn’t put in the necessary work on rewriting the code.
Incoming Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), has said that tax reform is on the short list of issues – also including trade and infrastructure improvements – with the best chance for bipartisan cooperation once Republicans take full control on Capitol Hill in January.
And Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), who will be the House’s top tax writer next year, has said he’s willing to compromise on one of the GOP’s top priorities for reform – that the individual and corporate systems be revamped together.
Republicans are putting the Keystone XL pipeline at the top of the agenda as they seek to move a stack of legislation to President Obama’s desk in 2015.
Incoming Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) has promised that a vote on approving the $8 billion oil sands project would be his first order of business in the majority, and legislation is set to move quickly in the opening days of the new Congress.
A Senate panel will hold a hearing on legislation to approve construction of the pipeline next week, followed by a markup on Thursday, raising the potential for a final vote in mid-January.
If all goes as planned, Keystone proponents will have the filibuster-proof majority needed to get a bill to Obama, setting the stage for what could be his first veto in the new Republican Congress. But securing a veto-proof majority will be challenging in both the House and the Senate.
“The Senate needs to get back to work, and Leader McConnell chose Keystone, a bipartisan infrastructure bill, as the first for consideration because a final decision on this pipeline project is grossly overdue,” said McConnell spokesman Michael Brumas.
The Threat to Political Speech Online: Q&A With Former Elections Chief Lee Goodman
Melissa Quinn / @MelissaQuinn97 / January 03, 2015
The Federal Election Commission has steered clear of regulating political speech on the Internet. But the FEC’s outgoing chairman, Lee Goodman, warns that the commission could well impose rules on Americans who disseminate information on blogs, video channels or podcasts.
Goodman, a Republican, last year headed the six-member FEC, which oversees campaign finance laws. In an exclusive interview with The Daily Signal before his term ended, he discussed a 3-3 decision by the six-member commission in response to a complaint filed against a nonprofit group called Checks and Balances for Economic Growth.
The nonprofit had posted two campaign videos on YouTube without making disclaimers or divulging production costs. The complaint alleged that Checks and Balances violated the Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 because it didn’t disclose the information.
Goodman and the two other Republicans on the panel contended that free postings on the Internet are exempt from the law. However, FEC Vice Chairman Ann Ravel, a Democrat, called for a “re-examination of the commission’s approach to the Internet.” Such a review, Ravel said, is “long overdue.”
Ravel has not made definitive proposals for new Internet regulations, a spokesman told The Daily Signal, but she plans to meet with technology and media leaders this year.
This transcript of the interview with Goodman was edited for style, clarity and length.
The Daily Signal: What was the basis for your ruling that Checks and Balances for Economic Growth did not violate the Federal Election Campaign Act?
Goodman: In 2004 and 2005, the FEC undertook a rulemaking specifically addressing Internet communications and Internet political activity. The commission heard public comments from over 800 citizens and organizations. The commission drew a fairly bright line in its regulations as a result of that process. And under the 2006 rule, the commission will regulate paid advertising on the Internet.
If my organization wants to take out a banner ad or place an Internet video on a commercial website and pay a fee for that advertising space, the FEC regulates that expenditure just like it would a TV ad or radio ad. However, if an organization places content for free on the Internet, there is no expenditure to regulate because the dissemination cost is free.
In the process of drawing that line in the rulemaking process, certain organizations proposed that the FEC count production costs of websites and podcasts and YouTube videos as an expenditure, and the commission declined to adopt that proposal.
Since 2006, if your dissemination on the Internet is free or low-cost, such as posting a free video on YouTube or building a website or organizing a social media platform, or any number of Internet-based political activities, you are unregulated.
The American public has embraced this freedom, as evidenced by the hundreds of thousands of YouTube videos, blogs, websites, podcasts, social media posts, social media platforms and other Internet-based activities that have gone unregulated without so much as an inquiry from the FEC.
I don’t think there is any evidence that this robust exercise of freedom on the Internet has corrupted any politician in America. Moreover, it’s clear that the Internet has facilitated a free marketplace of ideas and political expression, where individuals and small groups compete with large, well-funded voices on a level playing field.
For all these reasons, my two Republican colleagues and I voted the way we did in the Checks and Balances matter, and will oppose efforts to impose far greater regulation of political speech on the Internet.
Republicans on the FEC ‘will oppose efforts to impose far greater regulation of political speech on the Internet,’ Goodman says. (Photo: Newscom)
The Daily Signal: If this discussion is brought before the FEC as Vice Chairman Ann Ravel said, what implications could this have on the blogging community, on any Web-based news organization, on people with YouTube channels or organizations posting YouTube videos?
Goodman: I don’t think we can begin to contemplate all of the severe consequences to online political speech as a result of even opening this discussion within the FEC.
First, I believe that opening this issue will serve only to deter low-cost and free discussion of political issues on the Internet. As people begin to hear that the Federal Election Commission is considering a crackdown on Internet political speech, some people will be discouraged from participating. I think that’s a shame, and that’s one reason I’m speaking out loudly and clearly that three Republican commissioners will oppose any effort to restrict freedom on the Internet.
“Republican commissioners will oppose any effort to restrict freedom on the Internet,” says 2014 FEC Chairman Lee Goodman of online political speech
Second, I cannot imagine how the Federal Election Commission will begin to regulate hundreds of thousands of blogs, YouTube videos, chat rooms, emails and links, and all sorts of Internet-based political discussion because of how vast political discussion on the Internet currently is.
The problem for the FEC as a practical matter — put aside the philosophical and policy implications — what the vice chair is inviting the FEC to do is to establish an Internet review board where a room full of government bureaucrats sit on a daily basis and troll the Internet for political commentary — to identify online commentators who did not register or report their expenses in connection with their website, and to issue subpoenas seeking information about their expenditures.
I know of no other way that the FEC could regulate the hundreds of thousands of posts on the Internet, absent such a review process.
The Daily Signal: It seems like this would hurt the little guys starting blogs, as opposed to big companies and news organizations. Is that the case?
Goodman: The specter of regulation of Internet political speech will discourage small groups and individuals from using the Internet to express their political opinions. If we regulate it, we will necessarily discourage it and get less of it. It’s an axiom that if you regulate it, you will deter it and get less of it.
Under current law, there are two important exemptions from FEC regulation: One is the media exemption. Congress wrote in the Federal Election Campaign Act an explicit exemption for the media, the press.
The second important exemption, created in the commission’s 2006 rulemaking, is the Internet exemption. If the commission were to abolish the Internet exemption, many online bloggers who have been protected by it would resort to protection under the media exemption.
However, the distinction between a bona fide media organization and blogger online is a blurred line. And there are three Democratic commissioners on the FEC today who have consistently voted to constrict the definition of the press entitled to the media exemption.
It is unclear whether online bloggers would be exempt from regulation under the press exemption, and it would embroil the FEC in determining which bloggers are the press and which bloggers are not the press. That would be a significant consequence and complication if the FEC were to follow Vice Chair Ravel’s proposal.
The Daily Signal: Would this, then, be regulated by the government combing blogs to see if the blogs meet the qualifications for what the FEC rules as a media organization?
Goodman: That’s correct. Look at the medium. This is not as easy as identifying who has a broadcast license from the Federal Communications Commission. The Internet has placed a printing press in the hands of every citizen in America. And many small groups and individuals have started political commentary pages or websites on their kitchen tables and have grown those blogs into being significant daily publications.
The Internet has democratized not just political speech generally, but journalism specifically. Imagine the FEC having to comb all blogs in America to determine which ones are exempt, are bona fide press entities, [and] which ones are not bona fide press entities and would be regulated because the Internet exemption has been abolished. I believe this is an area where the government ought to leave well enough alone.
On Nov. 5, national and local newspapers in New York report on the results of the previous day’s mid-term elections. (Photo: Richard B. Levine/Newscom)
The Daily Signal: Isn’t it the First Amendment right of Americans to record podcasts and write on the Internet?
Goodman: Absolutely, and let me take it a step further. This is the fundamental error in the proposal to regulate the Internet. The Supreme Court consistently has ruled that the FEC has no constitutional authority to regulate speech for the sake of regulating speech.
The FEC exists solely to regulate large contributions to candidates and to require public disclosure of large expenditures to influence elections because the money involved in the contributions and the expenditures has the potential to corrupt politicians.
The vast majority of posts on the Internet, from YouTube videos to websites to blogs, are low cost or free. Therefore, if we were to begin regulating online political speech, the FEC would be in the position of regulating speech and not expenditures for speech.
Absolutely it’s a First Amendment right to speak to the world through your personal computer without governmental interference, so long as you’re not corrupting politicians.
The Daily Signal: Is the concern that someone who is running for Congress is going to find a blog and be corrupted?
Goodman: I cannot speak for the vice chairman. I infer from her statement that my Democratic colleagues are concerned that Internet speech has become highly effective and influential in the political process.
Pew issued a report one year ago indicating that one-half of Americans report the Internet as a primary source of obtaining political news, information and advocacy. So the Internet clearly is an influential medium in America today.
I believe that’s what captured the attention and regulatory impulses of Vice Chairman Ravel. Just because it is influential or effective does not give the FEC a writ to regulate it.
“Just because it is influential or effective does not give the FEC a writ to regulate it,” says 2014 FEC Chairman Lee Goodman of online political speech
The Daily Signal: It seems this is a nonpartisan issue. You have Democrats and Republicans who would benefit from an unregulated Internet.
Goodman: The proposal to regulate Internet political speech would have ecumenical consequences. It would deter political speech on the right and the left of the political spectrum. More importantly, it would deter thousands of populist voices that have found a voice on the Internet.
The Daily Signal: Do you think this move has anything to do with the U.S. Supreme Court’s rulings in Citizens United and McCutcheon v. FEC, even though those decisions deal with monetary contributions?
Goodman: I haven’t heard anyone articulate that being the problem. But the major concern after Citizens United was that large, corporate-funded voices would drown out all other voices in the political process. On the Internet, the smallest of bloggers has the level playing field to make their ideas heard as easily as the largest of corporations.
The decentralized architecture of the Internet gives each citizen an equal place to have his voice heard. What goes viral on the Internet is interesting political speech that resonates with people. Much of what goes viral — by “going viral” I mean gets millions of viewers — is creative and interesting content, and not necessarily well-funded content.
Look at “Obama Girl” in 2008. I daresay that video has had, on YouTube alone, 30 million hits. And because it goes viral and other people pick it up and send links to it, who knows how many Americans have seen that video. JibJab.com [animation with political themes] went viral. I don’t think the production cost of JibJab cartoons is very expensive.
What large corporations tend to do and what well-funded advocacy groups tend to do is they buy advertising. They buy banner ads, for example, and we regulate those expenditures. If you pay Yahoo or AOL to post a banner ad [for] your advocacy message, we regulate that. But what’s going viral and being seen by millions of Americans on the Internet is predominantly low-cost production.
What’s viral on the Internet is a populist phenomenon. Someone posts something interesting or something that resonates, and then millions of Americans talk to each other through email and links and say, ‘Look at this.’ I believe that the Internet is the antidote to the concerns raised after Citizens United. We don’t need to ruin it for the American people.
The Daily Signal: Those are interesting examples. How would FEC regulation change that process?
Goodman: BarelyPolitical.com produced “Obama Girl” and other videos — all politically themed – about John McCain, about Rudy Giuliani. There were at least a dozen politically themed videos that they produced and posted for free on YouTube. It was the first one that went viral. They had millions of viewers for all of them.
Under a regulatory regime, there would be several implications. First, each video would have to carry a disclaimer at the bottom indicating who paid for it and whether it was authorized by a political candidate. Second, BarelyPolitical.com would have to file expenditure reports with the Federal Election Commission disclosing the first date on which they post each YouTube video and how much they spent on the production.
Screen shot from an “Obama Girl” video. (Photo: BarelyPolitical.com/YouTube)
The FEC would have to issue regulations on what would be included in the production costs – do I consider purchasing costs of your personal computer, the editing equipment that you used? What about the video cameras you use? Did you pay the girl who performed in the video? Did you pay anyone else?
We would have to have a regulation prescribing what is described in production costs. The software that you purchased — and by the way, that goes for individual bloggers, too — up to computer, the software you purchased, your monthly Internet access charge. The FEC would have to get into this granular level of prescriptive regulation to tell people what to include in their expenditure reports to the FEC.
Then the content creator would have to disclose anyone who contributed money for the purpose of supporting the blog or YouTube post. And then, last but not least, if they coordinated their communication at all with a campaign or political party — for example, if they republish any campaign materials from a candidate — then that would count as a contribution to the candidate if the blogger or YouTube poster is incorporated. And that would mean the expenditure being reported is an illegal corporate contribution.
These are the consequences of regulating what has been a wholly constructive forum for Americans to speak and share ideas. Government needs to know when to leave well enough alone. The specter of government regulation of hundreds of thousands of websites and YouTube posts and chat rooms is ominous. It’s the regulatory Pandora’s box.
Ridgewood NJ, The RHS Department of Fine & Applied Arts is hosting the tenth annual Alumni Art Show, of work created after graduating from RHS. The show is mounted in the Carroll Art Gallery, Room 137, through January 9, 2015. An artists’ reception wil be held on Thursday, January 8 at 7:30 p.m. All students, alumni, friends, family and staff are invited to the reception as well as to view the exhibition during school hours.
Questions may be directed to the Department of Fine & Applied Arts at 201-670-2800, ext. 20542, or email the department in care of [email protected].
Event information and other news is continually updated on the Arts at Ridgewood Public Schools’ Twitter profile: @Arts_at_RPS and Facebook account page, www.facebook.com/TheArtsatRPS.
Reality TV facing its own reality: a ratings slump
By Scott Collins
Just a few years ago, underemployed TV writers were complaining that reality programming was taking over their industry.
Now the scribes are having their revenge: Unscripted programming is mired in an unexpected slump.
Onetime smashes such as “Survivor” and “Dancing With the Stars” are drooping with age. Coca-Cola recently wrapped up its 13-year sponsorship of “American Idol” after Fox’s singing hit plummeted in the ratings last season. NBC’s own singing show, “The Voice,” saw its season finale drop nearly 10% this month.
And what’s worse, no new hits are taking their place.
Fox bet the farm early this season on “Utopia,” a voyeuristic series in which a group of isolated “pioneers” was observed trying to create a new society. Viewers yawned, and the network eventually canceled the program, for a loss that insiders pegged at more than $50 million. ABC drew disappointing results this summer with its gimmicky singing show “Rising Star.”
“Reality TV was supposed to be a long-term fix to the problems of television, but that optimism was misguided,” said Jeffrey McCall, a media studies professor at DePauw University in Greencastle, Ind. “Program executives overestimated the true value of the commodity and drove the genre into the ground.”
Even cable networks, a longtime proving ground for the genre, are seeing diminishing returns.
A&E’s “Duck Dynasty” ratings have plunged, even though they are still high by cable standards. TLC this fall quickly shelved its hit “Here Comes Honey Boo Boo” after matriarch Mama June was accused of dating a sex offender, but viewership had already declined sharply. And this fall, AMC largely abandoned a three-year foray into unscripted programming, deciding to return its primary focus to its signature scripted series such as “Mad Men” and “The Walking Dead.”
SNORE: Jeb Bush takes step toward 2016 run
By Cameron Joseph
Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) on Tuesday announced he plans to “actively explore” a run for the White House in 2016.
Bush said in a Facebook post that he intends to create a new leadership PAC in January “that will help me facilitate conversations with citizens across America to discuss the most critical challenges facing our exceptional nation.”
It did not take much time before Twitter ignited in debate and conversation over former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush’s pre-announcement announcement about his bid for the White House.
National Journal ✔ @nationaljournal
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We’re actively exploring…oh, is this joke over already? https://trib.al/fLo7KVd
Sean Davis @seanmdav
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Trying, and failing, to come up with a better example of American stagnation than a Bush/Clinton 2016 race.
Jedediah Bila @JedediahBila
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My whole timeline is filled with Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton. I feel a nap coming on.
David Limbaugh @DavidLimbaugh
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Unlike some I have great respect for the Bush family, especially W, but as for W’s policy ideas I didn’t like, Jeb embraces them on steroids
Melissa Clouthier @MelissaTweets
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Jeb Bush is running. God save us. #commoncore #STUPID
Razor @hale_razor
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Jeb Bush announces and will do a fine job, just like Presidents Dole, McCain, and Romney.
Ben Casselman ✔ @bencasselman
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If we have to live through Clinton-Bush again, can we at least get the ’90s economy too?
Tom O’C @teeocee
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As a Democrat? MT @JebBush: I am excited to announce I will actively explore the possibility of running for President of the United States
The Senate CIA Report and Democratic Treachery
December 10, 2014 by Arnold Ahlert 65 Comments
Arnold Ahlert is a former NY Post op-ed columnist currently contributing to JewishWorldReview.com, HumanEvents.com and CanadaFreePress.com. He may be reached at [email protected].
n Tuesday, the Senate Intelligence Committee released the 500-page executive summary of the report on the CIA’s enhanced interrogation of terrorist detainees. Democrats, the media and Republican Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) are using it as an opportunity to hammer the CIA and the Bush administration, while American embassies, military units and other U.S. interests are preparing for possible reprisals. But adding further threats to Americans already in harm’s way matters not. Beleaguered congressional Democrats are desperate for a political boon and have turned to an old standby: sabotaging national security and sacrificing American lives.
Since their betrayal of the Iraq war, Democrats, particularly in the Senate, have panned the techniques used by the CIA to garner critical information in the days following 9/11 as “torture,” and have claimed that they yielded no useful intel. Though the use of these techniques was long known to Democrats — with virtual indifference toward them at the outset — many Democrats have since claimed they were unaware of what was occurring, which explains their lack of opposition to their government supposedly engaging in “torture.”
Having deprived Congress of regular order for nearly the entire tenure of the current administration, Harry Reid and his cohorts have milked every partisan advantage from this circumstance that they could possibly dream up. The same goes for his shamelessly executed plan to eliminate the Senate filibuster rule, so helpful in ushering committed statists and hardcore political progressives into important appointive federal government posts by depriving the political opposition of their only effective means of applying political leverage during the Senate confirmation process.
Senator Reid now stands ready to take full political advantage of his political opponent’s stated desire to restore Regular Order in the federal budgetary process, and to bring back the filibuster rule. Come January, leaders in the new majority party in the Senate will (or at least should) be torn between two different goals or aspirations, each with its own unique merits:
On the one hand, they will wish to repair the institutional damage done to the Senate and restore its potency as a strong and independent actor in our republican form of government under the U.S. Constitution. This means moving Congress out from underneath the dark cloud of executive branch dominance that has overspread all of Washington D.C. in recent year, as well as re-establishing the unique power of a single senator to stand in the way of ill-advised legislative measures, to the chagrin and consternation of reason-blind ideologues who rely on group-think and public shaming techniques to achieve their public policy goals.
On the other hand, they will wish to make of Congress an even greater and more insurmountable obstacle to the current administration’s stated goal of fundamentally transforming this country. Along the way, they will also be eager to cooperate freely with the House of Representatives to pass a series of clean bills for the president to sign or veto (most likely the latter) that will serve to draw into the starkest possible relief two competing and contrasting visions for how this country should move forward. To be the beneficiary of such an historic mid-term electoral landslide without then seizing and exploiting every available partisan advantage would be to appear naive and unwilling to engage in the largest and most momentous political struggle this country has seen since the Adams versus Jefferson ‘Clash of the Titans’ circa 1797-1800 (culminating, of course, with Jefferson’s historic inauguration, preceded that day by the remarkable scene of a humiliated but still office-holding John Adams emerging from the cavernous new executive mansion in the pre-dawn mist, hailing a ride in a passing public carriage like any other ordinary citizen, and high-tailing it back to New England to enjoy the rest of his life as America’s first one-term president).
So to say that Mitch McConnell could (or at least should) be experiencing mixed feelings about acting in good faith to restore the filibuster rule as it applies to Senate debates, or to plot a return to Regular Order in support of the Constitutionally-required process of preparing and passing an annual budget for federal governmental outlays, is the understatement of this rapidly ending but remarkable year.
An Open Letter To The Republican Leadership In Congress
John Hawkins | Dec 13, 2014
While it would certainly be cathartic to flog the GOP for the lousy omnibus bill House Republicans just passed, it seems more productive to tackle a bigger issue. After a historic, yet unearned (Obama was the real GOP MVP) election victory, isn’t it time for the Republican leadership to try to heal the rift with the base that’s tearing the party apart?
Do Republican leaders REALLY want to spend the next two years of a presidential election cycle getting trashed the way they are right now by activists, Tea Party leaders and radio talk show hosts? Anyone who thinks the base is going to sit down and shut up or that the GOP can thrive over the long-term with this kind of intra-party feuding going on is kidding himself.
So realistically, here’s what the Republican Party leaders need to do to help get everyone back on the same page.
1) They should never, ever, under any circumstances trash their base again. That means if the words “Tea Party, “Senate Conservatives Fund,” “Mark Levin,” “Rush Limbaugh,” “Club for Growth,” “Heritage Action,” etc., etc., come out of their mouths, then they better be saying something nice at best or neutral at worst. Additionally, staffers who mouth off about the base should be unceremoniously fired. At first, Republican politicians shouldn’t expect to have that favor to be returned, but if you’re a politician who wants unconditional love, go buy a dog.
2) The GOP has to keep its promises — and quite frankly, more than a few Republicans seem to have a pre-YouTube era mentality about that. They think they can say anything they want on the campaign trail and then do something completely different in the office without people being any the wiser. For example, after the NRSC backed Charlie Crist over Marco Rubio, I fought it tooth-and-nail over that decision. After he won, Marco Rubio was one of my favorite politicians, but the moment he lied to us by breaking his campaign pledge to fight amnesty, he was dead to me. I will NEVER forgive Rubio for his dishonorable behavior, no matter what he does. Don’t lie through your teeth to people who took you at your word and then expect us to be stupid enough to trust you again.
3) It’s fine for the Republican Party to recruit candidates, but it should ALMOST NEVER be involved in primaries. If you want to know what an exception looks like, Ronald Reagan and George Bush, Sr. were right to endorse the guy running against David Duke back in 1989. Everybody has a role to play and an organization that is supposed to represent all Republicans absolutely should not be involved in a race between two Republicans. It creates an ocean of bad blood so big that there aren’t enough towels in Texas to clean it up.
4) The GOP leaders need to open up some lines of communication and if they have good motives, explain what they’re trying to do and the strategy they’re using with talk radio hosts, big websites, activist groups, etc. Locking influential conservative groups out of discussions of what the GOP should be doing BEGS for them to make trouble because it’s the only way they can get their opinion heard.
4A) A few years back, Republicans in leadership did reach out a bit and while it may have helped a little, it ultimately wasn’t very effective because they looked at it as a way to try to sell what they were doing instead of having a conversation about shared goals. A lot of people, myself included, suspect the reason this isn’t done is because we don’t have the same aims on a lot of major legislation any more. I don’t think the GOP leaders have any intention of seriously trying to stop Obama’s executive amnesty. I don’t believe they’re committed to the repeal of Obamacare. I was even forced to agree with NANCY PELOSI and ELIZABETH WARREN (vomit) about the GOP’s omnibus bill decision to make it easier for big banks to gamble with derivatives and the sleazy campaign finance reform that was designed to undercut activist groups. Would the GOP leadership really want to explain something like that beforehand? Ultimately, it wouldn’t be that hard to get grassroots leaders to line up behind smart strategies to achieve conservative policy goals, but it’s an open question whether the GOP’s leadership believes in the Republican Party’s own platform enough to fight for it anymore.
5) Speaking of fights, the GOP leaders need to prove they’re willing to fight and WIN on something that really matters to conservatives. At this point, the expectation of the Democrats, the mainstream media and even the GOP base is that the Republican Party is going to cave in every time. At some point, Republicans have to prove they can go head-to-head with the Democrats and win on something that matters. Of course, congressional aides could probably name 10 things that people don’t care about that much where they’d claim to have “fought and won,” but that’s like a football team that’s behind 70-0 complaining it isn’t being given enough credit for all the 1st downs it’s gotten in the game.
6) People feel so burned by Boehner and McConnell that it would take AN INCREDIBLE amount of work for them to ever be trusted again. If someone like Jeb Hensarling took over in the House or John Thune took over in the Senate, he’d immediately get a much longer leash from the base because he’d be given the benefit of the doubt while people evaluated his performance. On the other hand, when it comes to Boehner and McConnell, symbolic gestures aren’t going to cut it because we’re at a Cold War level of trust. It doesn’t matter how much Castro tells you he loves democracy and freedom; you’ll believe it AFTER Cuba has a free election.
Last but not least, there’s toxic residue in this area that goes all the way back to the end of Bush’s first term that has never been addressed by the GOP leadership in an effective manner. There are a lot of conservatives who feel like they’ve been SCREAMING at the GOP for a decade and haven’t been respected or heard. As long as the GOP leadership insists on maintaining a system where the only way conservative activists can make an impact is by raining hell down on the GOP leaders, they better keep a lot of ice water handy because that’s exactly what they’re going to continue to get.
Sen. Bob Kerrey: Partisan torture report fails America
Bob Kerrey8:51 p.m. EST December 9, 2014
Intelligence agencies need guidance to do better, Senate Democrats failed to provide it.
I regret having to write a piece that is critical of the Democratic members of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Most of them are former colleagues and friends. I hope they will remain friends after reading this.
For eight years I served on this committee. I know how difficult and important the work of providing tough and fair oversight of our nation’s$50 billion top-secret intelligence network.
I will wait until I have fully read and considered Tuesday’s report to enter the debate over whether the CIA handled interrogation of detainees in an appropriate manner. Thanks to the 2005 and 2006 efforts of Senator John McCain I do not have to wait to be certain our interrogation policies and procedures are aligned with our core values.
I also do not have to wait to know we are fighting a war that is different than any in our country’s past. The enemy does not have an easy to identify and analyze military. In the war against global jihadism, human intelligence and interrogation have become more important, and I worry that the partisan nature of this report could make this kind of collection more difficult.
