Harry Reid Attempting To Resurrect SOPA And PIPA

February 13, 2012

WebProNews

By Drew Bowling

While details about a proposed cyber-security bill remain elusive, one frightful speculation seems to be making the rounds lately: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has not abandoned his effort to shackle the Internet.

After Internet commoners and companies alike pushed back in a determined way last month against the Stop Online Piracy Act and Protect IP Act, many were content to pat themselves on the back for defeating the bill. The bills, though, while delayed, were not convincingly defeated.

Harry Reid appears unwilling to let SOPA go quietly into the night. An article published last night on RT reports that Reid may be trying to resurrect SOPA by couching it within a new cyber-security bill. Worse, the new bill would also reawaken the proposed Kill Switch bill from last year. Kill Switch, another Internet-regulating bill that was lobbied by Sen. Joe Lieberman, would instill the White House with the executive power to shut down the Internet in response to a cyber threat. Awesome, right?

Last month, it was hard to imagine that any legislature could be worse for the Internet than SOPA. Now that Reid may be attempting to include Kill Switch with his renewed efforts to pass the bill, he may officially become the Dr. Frankenstein of monstrous bills that seek to muzzle the Internet.

Click here for the full report from WebProNews.

Harry Reid: Government Jobs Must Take Priority Over Private-Sector Jobs

October 20, 2011

The Hill

By Pete Kasperowicz

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Wednesday indicated Congress needs to worry about government jobs more than private-sector jobs, and that this is why Senate Democrats are pushing a bill aimed at shoring up teachers and first-responders.

“It’s very clear that private-sector jobs have been doing just fine; it’s the public-sector jobs where we’ve lost huge numbers, and that’s what this legislation is all about,” Reid said on the Senate floor.

Reid was responding to recent comments from Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), who accused Democrats of purposefully pursuing higher taxes as part of the teacher/first-responder bill, S. 1723, so that Republicans would oppose it. McConnell said the bill was meant to fail in order to give Democrats an issue to run on in the 2012 election, but Reid said the Republicans are simply trying to defeat President Obama any way they can.

The legislation Reid is defending is part of Obama’s jobs package. Vice President Biden was in Pennsylvania, an important election state, on Tuesday to push for the administration’s plan on increasing the number of teachers.

Reid reiterated his emphasis on creating government jobs by saying Democrats are looking to “put hundreds of thousands of people back to work teaching children, have more police patrolling our streets, firefighters fighting our fires, doing the rescue work that they do so well … that’s our priority.” He said Republicans are calling the bill a “failure” because they are “using a different benchmark for success than we are.”

Private-sector jobs have increased over the last 19 months, while government jobs have lagged. They’ve also seen cuts in several states that are struggling to balanced their books.

Despite these comments, a spokesman for Reid pointed out that Senate Democrats have tried to pass several bills aimed at spurring private sector job growth, but have been blocked by Republicans. Among other things, Democrats have proposed tax cuts to help companies hire workers and write off expenses, as well as infrastructure jobs that would add to private construction payrolls.

“Senator Reid believes that Congress must work to spur job-creation in the private sector, which is why he’s working to pass tax cuts for small businesses to hire new workers, tax cuts for small businesses to write off business expenses, and investments to create private-sector construction jobs,” Spokesman Adam Jentleson said. “Republicans are blocking all of these proposals to create jobs in the private sector because they care more about defeating President Obama than putting Americans back to work.”

Reid also said a majority of people polled support the bill, and that the tax hike needed to fund the $35 billion spending program is minimal.

“My friend, the Republican leader … is complaining about a tax of one-half of 1 percent … on people who make more than $1 million a year to pay for a program that would stop teachers from being laid off and rehire some of the teachers that have been laid off,” Reid said.

Democrats who support the bill have said it would help save 400,000 teacher jobs and thousands of first-responder jobs that have either been cut or could soon be cut. Reid said Wednesday that these layoffs are “rooted in the last administration,” but did not explain further.

Senate Democrats are hoping to pass S. 1723 as early as this week, although votes could be delayed until early November, depending on the progress made on passing a 2012 spending bill.

Reid also dismissed efforts by the Republican House to ease environmental regulations as a way to create jobs.

“The Republican response has been cutting back environmental health safeguards, I guess hoping that a sicker, more polluted country is a better place to create jobs, and it’s not,” Reid said.

Click Here For The Full Report From The Hill

House Passes Funding Bill, Set To Die In Senate

September 23rd, 2011

The Huffington Post

By: Elise Foley

House Republicans set the stage early Friday for another fight over government funding, passing a stopgap bill that Senate Democrats say will not make it through the Senate.

The bill, which funds the government until Nov. 18 and provides emergency disaster aid to the Federal Emergency Management Agency, passed in a 219 to 203 vote, mostly along party lines. Two dozen Republicans voted against the bill.

It won almost full support from Republicans, an improvement for Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) over a failed vote on a nearly-identical funding bill just a day prior. But to win over members in his own conference, Boehner and other GOP leaders inserted a provision that would make it even more unpalatable to the other side, adding more offsets for disaster funding that Democrats say should not be offset at all.

Senate leaders said they will not back down, offering to stay in session next week to ensure FEMA and government funding are in place.

“The bill the House will vote on tonight is not an honest effort at compromise,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said in a statement before the vote. “It will be rejected by the Senate. …. The Senate is ready to stay in Washington next week to do the work the American people expect us to do, and I hope the House Republican leadership will do the same.”

Both chambers settled on a funding figure for the government more than a month ago, while setting the terms for a debt ceiling increase. But since then, a number of disasters have occurred that made emergency funding for FEMA a necessity.

Republicans, urged by their constituents to cut as much government spending as possible, moved to offset disaster funding in the continuing resolution by cutting $1.5 billion from an energy loan program. But those spending cuts were not enough for 48 Republicans, who voted on Wednesday against the funding bill in hopes for higher cuts. Leaders responded with one addition that, though relatively small, went after a program that provided loans to the failed and politically embarrassing Solyndra company, a solar energy company once hailed by the Obama administration as a model green company, but now under an FBI investigation after filing for bankruptcy last week.

Senate Democrats rejected the idea that disaster aid should be offset at all, arguing Congress should approve aid first and find the money later.

“The feeling in there [the caucus] is we’re fed up with this,” Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said after a caucus meeting on Thursday. “They know what it takes for us to extend the [continuing resolution] and keep the government in business and this brinkmanship of maybe we will and maybe we won’t — we’re sick of it, we’re tired of it. The American people are sick of it too.”

They stuck to a firm message they have used all week: Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were approved without offsets, so why should emergency disaster aid be subjected to them?

“The general [sense] was look, we’re dealing with folks who spend money on nations overseas unpaid for all of the time,” Rep. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) said Thursday. “They’re unwilling to pay for nation-building here, and it’s wrong.”

The question now will be whether the House and Senate can come to an agreement — and when. Either way, both sides have said it will be the other’s fault if disaster aid is delayed by partisan bickering.

“The Senate should pass this bill immediately, and the president should sign it, because any political games will delay FEMA money that suffering American families desperately need,” Boehner spokesman Michael Steel said Thursday in a statement.

Click here for the full report from The Huffington Post

Government Shutdown Risked In Fight Over Disaster Aid

September 21st, 2011

The Huffington Post

By: Jennifer Bendery and Elise Foley

Congressional leaders are gambling with the prospect of a government shutdown next week as they wait to see who will blink first in a fight over billions of dollars in emergency disaster aid.

With government funding set to expire on Sept. 30, House Republican leaders are moving forward Wednesday with a continuing resolution to keep the government funded through mid-November. While nobody opposes that effort, Democrats and even some Republicans have a problem with something GOP leaders tucked into the bill: $1.5 billion in emergency disaster aid, paid for with money pulled from one of Democrats’ priority programs.

The effort by House Republicans to pay for disaster aid with funds from an Energy Department fuel-efficiency loan program has infuriated Democrats, who say the move is unprecedented since Congress routinely passes emergency spending without offsets since it is, by its very nature, for an emergency. They have also howled about Republicans tying the paid-for disaster aid to the continuing resolution, a must-pass measure. Instead, Democrats are pushing for a separate, standalone bill that provides $6.9 billion in disaster aid, none of it paid for. That bill cleared the Senate last week with bipartisan support, namely with the help of Republicans whose districts have been hit by recent disasters.

But House GOP leaders maintain their push to pay for emergency disaster aid is in line with the new era of austerity on Capitol Hill. And they say they don’t have the votes in their party to pass new spending without paying for it, so their proposal is the best way forward.

So begins the standoff, which at this point shows nobody willing to budge. And with the House set to leave on Friday for a weeklong recess, lawmakers are left with just a handful of days to resolve their differences before the non-negotiable deadline of Sept. 30.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) signaled Tuesday that he is ready for a fight on the matter. During remarks on the Senate floor, he vowed to insert the Senate language into the House bill as soon as it comes to the Senate.

“Tomorrow, when the Senate receives the House bill to fund the government for six more weeks, we will amend it with the language of the Senate FEMA legislation,” Reid said.

“Of course, I know this amendment will enjoy the support of my Republican colleagues, as it did just last week, when a bipartisan group of senators agreed that helping communities destroyed by natural disasters was too important to let politics get in the way,” he added.

But House Republican leaders say they can’t pass what Reid wants, which they say means the onus is on Senate Democrats to either pass the House continuing resolution as is or be at fault for delaying desperately needed disaster money to the Federal Emergency Management Administration. FEMA’s disaster relief fund has dropped so low that the agency has already stopped approving long-term reconstruction projects in order to prioritize its resources for immediate emergency needs.

“It’ll be on Leader Reid’s shoulders, because he’s the one playing politics with it,” House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) told reporters Tuesday. “No one wants to stand in the way of disaster relief that’s needed. There’s nothing else but politics going on here.”

The continuing resolution provides $3.65 billion for FEMA’s disaster relief fund, compared to the Senate’s $6.9 billion. But it’s the $1.5 billion in “emergency” disaster spending—that is, money that would become available to FEMA immediately upon the bill’s passage, versus being rolled into annual spending bills—that’s causing the heartburn because of its offsets.

Cantor dismissed the idea that the House would be to blame for a potential government shutdown because it may adjourn before the Senate can send over its amended version of the continuing resolution. “None of us intend to bring about government shutdown,” he said. “I think our country has seen enough of that.”

Later Tuesday, Reid and his GOP counterpart, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.), had mixed takes on the possibility of the showdown resulting in a shutdown.

During a press event, McConnell told reporters he is “confident it will be resolved” before Sept. 30.

“I’m actually not that sure,” Reid countered, “because the Tea Party-driven House of Representatives has been so unreasonable in the past. I’m not as certain as McConnell because we’re not going to cave in.”

The standoff could play out in a handful of ways. Senate Democrats could begrudgingly swallow the House bill in a last-minute effort to avert a shutdown. Or House Republican leaders could find themselves short of votes to block the Senate bill, if enough frustrated Republicans side with Democrats, and pass that bill. Or both sides could hold so firmly to their position that they let a shutdown occur and blame each other in a final maneuver to nudge the other party in their direction.

Republicans in both chambers could also buck their party leaders in the end. Some conservative House Republicans are unhappy that the continuing resolution keeps the government funded at current levels and doesn’t make cuts, so they could vote against the House bill on principle. In the Senate, ten Republicans already voted with Democrats last week on the higher-figure disaster aid bill and they could stick with that bill again. Those ten senators are Roy Blunt (Mo.), Scott Brown (Mass.), Susan Collins (Maine), Dean Heller (Nev.), John Hoeven (N.D.), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska), Marco Rubio (Fla.), Olympia Snowe (Maine), Pat Toomey (Pa.) and David Vitter (La.).

The Huffington Post talked to five of those senators about which package they planned to support and most gave wishy-washy answers.

“I’m going to look carefully at what the House is offering and see if there’s any room there to do any more than they may be proposing,” Blunt said.

Asked if he could envision voting against Reid’s amendment, Blunt would only say, “I’m going to look at the options.”

“I have to take a look at it first,” Heller told HuffPost. “I support it at the levels we supported it. But before I make a final decision, I’ve got to take another look at it.”

Brown and Collins gave equally tepid answers, saying they wanted to see the details of the continuing resolution before weighing in.

Hoeven was the only one to simply say “yes” when asked if he supported Reid amending the House bill to insert the Senate language.

For now, all eyes will be on the House on Wednesday, when the continuing resolution comes to its first vote. House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) signaled Tuesday that House Democrats aren’t about to support anything that pays for disaster aid via the fuel-efficiency loan program, which spurs the production of clean-energy cars.

“I think Democrats will be loath to support that effort because we think it’s counterproductive,” Hoyer told reporters. “It is counterproductive to growth in jobs and to the growth in the economy. We think they’re making a mistake.”

Hoyer said he doesn’t know if House Republican leaders even have the votes to pass their bill if it includes the offsets for emergency aid. Some House Republicans whose districts were hit by disasters this year have sided with Democrats in recent weeks in urging GOP leaders to avoid a political fight that could delay FEMA aid.

And of course, the prospect of a government shutdown — Congress narrowly avoided one in April amid a budget fight — would have widespread consequences and cast lawmakers in an even worse light than they already are in the public’s eyes.

“Clearly, a [continuing resolution] needs to pass,” Hoyer added. “But again, it doesn’t need to pass with this in it.”

Click here for the full report from The Huffington Post

Here Are Some Members of the “Super Committee”

August 11th, 2011

The Washington Post

By: Felicia Sonmez

House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) on Wednesday announced their picks for the 12-member supercommittee charged with tackling the country’s debt problem.

Of the nine members announced so far, eight voted “yes” on last week’s debt-ceiling deal — a sign that there exists at least the possibility that the panel will be able to reach a bipartisan agreement. The one delegate announced so far who opposed the debt compromise is Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.).

The GOP picks have scored mixed reviews from budget experts, many of whom are hoping the new committee can produce far greater savings than the roughly $1.5 trillion the panel has been asked to identify.

Steve Bell, the head of the Bipartisan Policy Center and a former Republican Senate staffer, said that overall he has been “pleasantly surprised” by the selections because almost all of them are senior lawmakers with a history of legislating, sometimes across the aisle. “The truth is, you’ve got a lot of IQ points.”

Boehner has tapped House Republican Conference Chairman Jeb Hensarling (Texas), House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp (R-Mich.) and House Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-Mich.) to serve on the bipartisan panel.

Both Hensarling and Camp had been viewed as frontrunners for the committee. Hensarling is a junior member of the House Republican leadership team and has a close relationship with Boehner’s deputy, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.), while Camp heads the House panel that oversees tax and entitlement policy. Upton is also a top committee chairman.

Hensarling will co-chair the bipartisan committee along with Sen. Patty Murray (D-Wash.), whose appointment was announced Tuesday by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. Reid also selected Sens. Max Baucus (D-Mont.), the Senate Finance Committee Chairman, and John Kerry (D-Mass.).

“The lawmakers I have appointed to serve on this joint committee are proven leaders who have earned the trust and confidence of their colleagues and constituents,” Boehner said in a statement. “They understand the gravity of our debt crisis and I appreciate their willingness to serve on this panel.”

In a statement issued shortly after Boehner’s, McConnell announced that he has tapped Senate Minority Whip Jon Kyl (R-Ariz.), Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio) and Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) to serve on the committee.

Kyl and Portman had both been rumored to be among McConnell’s top picks. Kyl is the Senate’s number-two Republican and was McConnell’s delegate to the debt-reduction talks led by Vice President Biden this spring. Portman is a former director of the White House Office of Management and Budget and also served as U.S. trade representative; a freshman considered a rising star among Senate Republicans, he developed a close working relationship with McConnell throughout the negotiations on raising the country’s debt ceiling.

Toomey, like Portman, is a freshman and is the only member of the panel to vote against the debt compromise reached right before the Aug. 2 deadline. A former Wall Street executive, his selection represents a nod by McConnell to the tea-party movement; he was a leader of the group of House and Senate conservatives who argued that the country would not default on its obligations if the debt ceiling was not raised.

“My main criteria for selecting members was to identify serious, constructive senators who are interested in achieving a result that helps to get our nation’s fiscal house in order,” McConnell said. “That means reforming entitlement programs that are the biggest drivers of our debt, and reforming the tax code in a way that makes us more competitive and leads to more American jobs. The goal is to achieve a result that convinces Americans and the world that we’re committed as a nation to prosperity for all our citizens.”

Baucus and Camp have already been at work, along with Treasury officials, on bipartisan tax reform issues. Upton is a bona fide moderate who had to beat back a “down with Upton” campaign from a tea party-affiliated group in order to claim the committee chairmanship.

And Portman, as a House member a decade ago, forged alliances with some Democrats on the Ways and Means Committee to approve pension reform plans.

However, the panel’s leaders, Murray and Hensarling, hail from the more partisan wings of their respective party caucuses, and, according to former Hill aide Bell, most experts only rate a “25 percent chance” that the group can forge a bipartisan deal that can win approval because of the entrenched partisan atmosphere in the Capitol.

“You’re not part of the team. You’re not part of the tribe,” Bell said, explaining the pressure that will come to bear on the committee members.

Wednesday’s announcements were also noteworthy for who was not selected to serve on the panel. Boehner did not choose House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), who has been among his party’s top voices on fiscal issues and was the leader behind House Republicans’ fiscal year 2012 budget.

Ryan said in a statement that he had asked Boehner not to consider him for the panel, as “only the Budget Committee can write legislation to reform the budget process.”

“As Budget Committee chairman, my plan has long been to work on this critical issue throughout the fall,” Ryan said. “This past year has shown that the federal budget process is more broken than ever and needs to be reformed. If we are truly going to put the country’s fiscal house in order, it will not be enough to temporarily reduce what Washington spends. We must permanently reform the process by which working Americans’ hard-earned tax dollars are spent.”

He added that Boehner had selected “three excellent Republican members” for the panel.

Also missing from the panel will be any lawmakers among the “Gang of Six,” the bipartisan group of senators who for months worked to produce their own comprehensive deficit reduction plan, which they unveiled late last month. Some members of both parties’ bases had viewed the Gang’s proposal with skepticism, as it advocated for a broad approach that included both entitlement cuts and tax increases. But the plan has also been viewed by many members as the most-detailed plan thus far to tackle the country’s debt.

Boehner also did not choose any members from among the 87-member class of House Republican freshmen.

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has not yet announced her picks for the supercommittee; leaders have until Aug. 16 to announce their choices.

Click here for the full report from The Washington Post

Congress’ Next Challenge: Forming The Debt “Super Committee”

August 4th, 2011

CBSNews.com

By: Stephanie Condon

Now that Congress has passed a bill to raise the debt limit and address the deficit, leaders have two weeks to choose delegates to a new “super committee” that will recommend further deficit and debt reduction ideas.

At least one lawmaker has taken himself out of the running for the 12-member committee, while other congressmen mull over who’d be a good fit for the “super” group.

Congressional leaders will choose three House Democrats, three Senate Democrats, three House Republicans and three Senate Republicans. They’ll have to consider which members could survive the political liability that comes with making hard decisions ahead of the 2012 elections. They’ll also have to decide whether to choose members that are typically loyal to party ideology or are more interested in compromise.

Once the group is selected, they have until Thanksgiving to draft a plan to create $1.2 trillion in savings. Seven of the 12 members would have to approve the plan to send it to Congress. The full Congress can then either approve the plan or allow across-the-board cuts to security and entitlement programs to kick in.

Sen. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., one of the senators who voted against the debt limit package Tuesday, said this morning he wouldn’t serve on the super committee if asked, the Hill reports.

“They’re not going to [ask], and if I voted for it and they asked me to, I still wouldn’t serve on it,” Nelson said on the Nebraska radio show KLIN News Talk.

The senator predicted the committee will get hung up in partisan gridlock and suggested that creating such a committee was the wrong approach to policy making.

“I don’t think we can take politics out of every difficult decision,” he said. “I don’t like to cede away or give away my responsibility, and certainly I don’t like to authorize a group of my colleagues to do what I was sent to Washington to do.”

Two other senators, Republican Sen. Saxby Chambliss of Georgia and Democratic Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, expressed their skepticism about the new super committee on Tuesday to CBS Evening News anchor and managing editor Scott Pelley.

“I think it’s going to be very difficult for this select committee to come up with any resolution, any meaningful resolution,” Chambliss said. Added Warner, “I’m not sure the committee is going to get the job done.” (embed the video of the interview)

Both Chambliss and Warner were part of a group of six bipartisan senators who earlier this year put forward their own ideas for deficit reduction.

So far, congressional leaders have indicated there may be at least some partisan politics at play when it comes to picking the super committee. House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said Tuesday that the House Democratic representation in the super committee will protect entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare.

“I know that whoever’s at that table will be someone who will fight to protect those benefits,” she said.

Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, meanwhile, reassured conservatives on Tuesday that there’d be no litmus test for appointees to the committee. McConnell clarified that after the conservative magazine the Weekly Standard reported that McConnell would not appoint members who voted against the debt deal on Tuesday.

“There is no vote position requirement to serve on the committee,” a McConnell spokesman responded, adding that the Republican leader “will have serious discussions with all those who are interested in serving prior to making any appointments.”

For what it’s worth, politicians and pundits without any say in the final decision are suggesting candidates for the super committee. Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona said on Fox News Tuesday that Republican Sen. Rob Portman of Ohio would be a good candidate. Additionally, Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus says that Rep. Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona, who is recovering from being shot in the head, would make a good honorary chair of the group, to remind lawmakers the importance of transcending partisan bickering.

In spite of the skepticism of some members, both McConnell and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid have expressed optimism that the super committee will succeed.

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner also expressed optimism in a Washington Post op-ed published Wednesday morning.

The threat of across-the-board cuts should Congress fail to pass the committee’s plan “creates a strong incentive to compromise,” Geithner wrote. He added, “Beneath all the bluster, the prospects for compromise on broader and deeper reforms are better than they have been in years.”

Regardless of who sits on the committee, they are sure to feel intense pressure from lobbyists, Politico reports. Several lobbyists told Politico they expect to see a full-court press of Congress as it weighs spending cuts and revenue increases.

Update: In an interview with the Wall Street Journal Wednesday, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said there’s been quite a bit of interest in the committee. “The speaker is the one who makes the selection, and I have gotten a lot of calls and emails from members who want to serve and want to participate in solving the problem,” he said.

Click here for the full report from CBS News

Congressional Staffers Gain From Trading in Stocks

July 15th, 2011

The Wall Street Journal

By: Brody Mullins, Tom McGinty and Jason Zweig

Chris Miller nearly doubled his $3,500 stock investment in a renewable-energy firm in 2008. It was a perfectly legal bet, but he’s no ordinary investor.

Mr. Miller is the top energy-policy adviser to Nevada Democrat and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who helped pass legislation that wound up benefiting the firm.

Jim Manley, a spokesman for Mr. Reid’s office, initially defended Mr. Miller’s purchase of shares in the company, Energy Conversion Devices Inc. He said the aide had no influence over tax incentives for renewable-energy firms, and that other factors boosted the stock.

But on Sunday, Mr. Manley added: “Mr. Miller showed poor judgment and Senator Reid has made it very clear to Chris and all his staff that their actions must not only follow the law, but must meet the higher standards the public has a right to expect from elected officials and their staffs.”

Mr. Miller isn’t the only Congressional staffer making such stock bets. At least 72 aides on both sides of the aisle traded shares of companies that their bosses help oversee, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of more than 3,000 disclosure forms covering trading activity by Capitol Hill staffers for 2008 and 2009.

But on Sunday, Mr. Manley added: “Mr. Miller showed poor judgment and Senator Reid has made it very clear to Chris and all his staff that their actions must not only follow the law, but must meet the higher standards the public has a right to expect from elected officials and their staffs.”

Mr. Miller isn’t the only Congressional staffer making such stock bets. At least 72 aides on both sides of the aisle traded shares of companies that their bosses help oversee, according to a Wall Street Journal analysis of more than 3,000 disclosure forms covering trading activity by Capitol Hill staffers for 2008 and 2009.

The aides identified by the Journal say they didn’t profit by making trades based on any information gathered in the halls of Congress. Even if they had done so, it would be legal, because insider-trading laws don’t apply to Congress.

A few lawmakers proposed a bill that would prevent members and employees of Congress from trading securities based on nonpublic information they obtain. The legislation has languished since 2006.

“Congressional staff are often privy to inside information, and an unscrupulous person could profit off that knowledge,” says Vincent Morris, a spokesman for Rep. Louise Slaughter (D., N.Y.), a leading backer of the “Stop Trading on Congressional Knowledge Act,” or STOCK Act. “The public should be outraged there is no law specifically banning this.”

When the bill was introduced nearly five years ago, just 14 other lawmakers endorsed it. The current version of the bill has fared worse: Only nine lawmakers support it. There is no companion legislation in the Senate.

Congressional aides have ringside seats on the making of laws that affect American business. Receiving salaries up to roughly $170,000 a year, they can glean information about policies and government action before the public. They have access to information about hearings or legislation that can move stocks and markets.

The current Congressional disclosure rules on stock trading stem from a scandal involving Robert Baker, a senior Senate aide, in the early 1960s. Mr. Baker was accused of using his Senate office for personal gain, partly involving the operation of a network of vending machines. He was eventually convicted of income-tax evasion and spent 16 months in prison.

The scandal led to a Senate rule in 1968 that required lawmakers and aides to disclose information about their finances. The House of Representatives imposed similar requirements about the same time.

The rules require all members of Congress and about 2,900 of the highest-paid congressional aides to disclose information once a year on their finances, such as their assets, debts, spouse’s employment and other sources of income they earn, including capital gains from trading securities. Some 15,000 lower-paid Congressional staffers aren’t covered by the disclosure rule.

Unlike many Executive Branch employees, lawmakers and aides don’t have restrictions on their stock holdings and ownership interests in companies they oversee. Congressional rules say that requiring employees to do so could “insulate a legislator from the personal and economic interests that his or her constituency, or society in general, has in governmental decisions and policy.”

Click here for the full report from The Wall Street Journal

Government Shutdown Threat Prompts Obama, GOP To Scramble To Strike Budget Deal

April 8th, 2011

The Huffington Post

Uncomfortably close to a deadline, President Barack Obama and top congressional leaders have only hours to avert a Friday midnight government shutdown that all sides say would inconvenience millions of people and damage a still fragile economy.

Obama said he still hoped to announce an agreement on Friday but did not have “wild optimism.”

In revealing nothing about what still divides them, Obama and the lawmakers, House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., all said another late night of talks in the Oval Office had narrowed their differences over cutting federal spending and other matters.

But Obama said ominously that the machinery of a shutdown was already in motion.

“I expect an answer in the morning,” Obama told reporters Thursday evening as representatives from the White House and Capitol Hill plunged ahead with negotiations into the night.

The aides were trying to cobble together a deal on how much federal spending to slash, where to cut it and what caveats to attach as part of a bill to fund the government through Sept. 30. A temporary federal spending measure expires at midnight Friday.

As the pressure mounted, Obama abruptly postponed plans to promote his agenda in Indiana on Friday.

For a nation eager to trim to federal spending but also weary of Washington bickering, the spending showdown had real implications.

A closure would mean the furloughs of hundreds of thousands of workers and the services they provide, from processing many tax refunds to approving business loans. Medical research would be disrupted, national parks would close and most travel visa and passport services would stop, among many others.

Click here for the full report from the Huffington Post

The Kevin Trudeau Show: 1-28-11

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Harry Reid Meets With ‘Dictator’ Hu Jintao — and Reporters Are Told to Keep Mum

January 27th, 2011

Politics Daily

By: Alex Wagner

Two days after Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid called Chinese President Hu Jintao a “dictator” on a Nevada talk show, the two men met face to face in the Capitol on Thursday morning.

On the heels of Hu’s joint press conference with President Obama yesterday — where the tense subject of human rights dominated the discussion — journalists covering the congressional meeting were told by staff that the two men would not take questions during a photo opportunity, and that reporters were expected to adhere to journalistic standards and codes of ethics, or risk being ejected from the room. (Presumably, this meant no questions about sensitive subjects including Reid’s dictator comment and the fate of jailed Nobel Peace Prize winner Liu Xiaobao.)

Nonetheless, one reporter did manage to ask what business Reid “expected to get done with a man he had called a dictator.” Neither Hu nor Reid responded. Joining the two men in a private meeting following the photo op were Chinese officials including Foreign Affairs advisors Dai Bingguo, Cui Tankai and Yang Jeichi, as well as Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.), John Kerry (D-Mass.), Richard Lugar (D-Ind.) and U.S. Ambassador to China John Huntsman.

As part of his swing through Washington — which has been accorded the full pomp and circumstance of a state visit — Hu traveled to Capitol Hill Thursday to meet with congressional leaders a day after the White House feted him with a state dinner.

House Speaker John Boehner, like Reid, did not attend the dinner — his office said Boehner would instead discuss matters privately with Hu Thursday morning. (A spokesman for Reid said the Nevada Democrat could not make the dinner because he was traveling Wednesday.)

From outside indicators, Hu had a fruitful meeting with House leaders, including Boehner and Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), which ran overtime and caused a delay in the Chinese president’s meeting with Senate leaders. Among the subjects discussed, according to Boehner’s office, were economic ties between the U.S. and China, North Korean aggression, intellectual property violations, and “human rights” issues, including China’s one-child policy. Pelosi’s office noted that she broached the subject of Liu Xiaobao’s detention and climate change with the Chinese leader.

In his comments Tuesday, Reid said that Hu “is a dictator. He can do a lot of things through the form of government they have.”

Reid quickly realized his word choice was problematic, saying: “Maybe I shouldn’t have said ‘dictator,’ but they have a different type of government than we have and that is an understatement.”

Click here for the full report from Politics Daily

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