Documenting Instanity

"Journalists" need to get out more

Today we will have a look at Diane Carman's views on Senator Wayne Allard. Not that anybody should care what a columnist thinks about a particular politician, but it is revealing of a syndrome that is killing the newspaper business in this country. They need to get out and chat with the folks every once in a while. They are under the impressions that all of America agrees with their lefty coworkers in the news room.

National Journal recently ranked him one of the three "most conservative" senators in the country,

Um, Diane, it is a RED state and it was a lot redder when Sen. Allard was sent to Washington. I hope, and expect, our other Senator who ran as a centrist and then immediately began voting as a lefty will get that message when he comes up for re-election. Red states tend to send conservative folks to Washington. Some of them are good, others are not so good, but Ted Kennedy isn't getting elected here state-wide.

and last month he set out to enhance his impeccable conservative street cred by denouncing his colleague Wisconsin Sen. Russ Feingold on local radio.

In the opinion of most conservatives, this is a major accomplishment. More of it should be done. Daily.

He said Feingold, a Democrat, had "taken the side of the terrorists" when he called for censure of Bush for engaging in domestic wiretapping without a warrant. He called censure "unconstitutional."

Again, Feingold did take the side of terrorists in attacking this program, at least in the eyes of most conservatives. Kudos.

Then when he found out that fellow Republicans were fleeing from his comments frantically, and when somebody mentioned to him that Andrew Jackson actually had been censured by the Senate in 1834, so clearly it was constitutional, he quickly and decisively declined further comment. He went back to being a workhorse instead of a show horse.

This is rich. First, I only saw fellow Republicans say that they don't generally criticize their fellow Senators. I didn't see any number "run away" from the thrust of the statement. Second, while I don't agree that censure of the President is unconstitutional the fact that the Senate did it in 1834 does not make it constitutional. The Senate has done thousands of things that are unconstitutional. To my knowledge nobody has ever bothered to attempt to take a censure vote to the Supreme Court to determine the constitutionality of it. Why would they? Why would the Court hear the case?

Lastly, I guess Diane hasn't bothered to read the case history surrounding the issues of (what we believe is) the NSA international (it is international, not domestic as much as that bothers Diane and her fellow libs) wiretapping order. If she had she would know that multiple rulings have been made on these issues and ALL of them are in favor of the President's right and responsibility to order the NSA to engage in this behavior. So while censure itself is most likely not unconstitutional, censuring the President for violating the law/constitution when he quite clearly has not is incredibly stupid.

Still, even with all that political capital accumulated from his slavish loyalty to Bush, he hasn't been able to get anybody appointed to fill the vacancy in the U.S. attorney's office here. The job's been open for more than a year.

And Senator Allard is somehow responsible for this? Why is he, and not Senator Salazar responsible for this? Has Senator Allard voted for filibuster on any appointment of the President? How about Senator Salazar?

One thing that's undeniable about Allard is his responsiveness to his constituents, particularly those who contribute heavily to his campaigns.

Among them: the National Rifle Association, which he responded to by voting for immunity from lawsuits for gun manufacturers; the National Pro-Life Alliance, which got his vote against a $100 million program to reduce teen pregnancy through education and contraception; the pharmaceutical industry, which got his vote against negotiating bulk purchasing for Medicare prescription drugs; the energy industry, which appreciated his vote against stricter regulations on mercury emissions from their smokestacks; and military contractors, who got his vote against investigating questionable contracts for work in Iraq and Afghanistan.

OK, let's take these one at a time from a conservative voters perspective:
Immunity for gun manufacturers: Correct
Naral/Planned Parenthood funding: Correct
bulk pricing for Medicare: Wrong, although the legislation should have been better
unreasonable mercury emissions regs: Correct

And lastly, he didn't vote against investigating, he voted against ANOTHER investigation after the first ones showed up nothing more than routine book keeping problems which the process self corrected. CORRECT!

Allard, a longtime member of the Senate Banking Committee, ranked ninth out of 100 senators for contributions he received from big accounting firms at the time he sent a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission opposing reforms to the accounting industry in 2000.

Any guesses what percentage of the 8 ahead of him are on a Banking Committee? I don't know, but isn't it an interesting question. And what, exactly were those reforms? Sarbanes-Oxley has been a freakin' disaster. It is a classic case of the cure being far worse than the disease.

The record shows our senior senator voted against raising the minimum wage to $7.25 from $6.25, against increasing tax deductions for college tuition, and for the repeal of work rules designed to protect workers from repetitive stress injuries.

Again, good conservative votes.

OK, maybe the little guy is not generally his thing.

Actually, the little guy who wants to start his own business is very happy to have the Senate intrude less on his aspirations.

Still, he has said that one of his "proudest achievements" since he was elected to the world's greatest deliberative body is getting the federal government to give the town of Dolores a ballpark.

OK, so I am way against this as are all true conservatives but do I really need to relist all the Robert Byrd named bridges, roads, buildings, etc? It is highly unfortunate that politicians feel they have to "bring home the bacon" to get re-elected but it is true. If one ballpark in Dolores is the worst case of senseless federal spending Allard is guilty of I may have to campaign for him.

I notice that Diane didn't list our Senator's recent votes on tax cuts and tax cut extensions. Interesting?

posted by mailgeek @ 10:31 AM