harry reid – Page 10

Speaker Pelosi, Senator Reid and the Bad Touch.

(Via @CalebHowe) If you still need it confirmed that Senator Reid lacks any ability to function in the outside world, you can see it here, in eighteen seconds.

Madame Speaker, we have had our differences in the past: but if in the future you ever feel the need to knee Senator Reid in the testicles for touching you when you don’t want to be touched, well, I promise not to rake you over the coals for it. I might critique your execution, but it’d be meant constructively.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

SEN-NV: Jon Porter reconsidering not going for GOP nomination?

(via @BrianFaughnan) I don’t actually have an opinion on whether Porter should, or whether he can jump back in at this point: but the fact that he’s seriously considering trying for the Republican nomination again says volumes about how weak Senator Reid is right now. You’d think that a former boxer and (current) Senate Majority Leader wouldn’t have had such a glass jaw…

Crossposted to RedState.

Update of IG-Gate: Grassley holding up nomination until answers given.

Background information available here: the executive summary is that the Inspector General of Americorps was fired earlier this year, under circumstances that appear at best to be part of a whitewash of an administration crony. Senator Grassley (R) of Iowa has taken an interest in the case, and is making it clear that he’s not going away:

Republican Sen. Charles Grassley has blocked the ambassadorial nomination of Alan Solomont, currently chairman of the board of the government agency that oversees AmeriCorps, in retaliation for what Grassley says is the administration’s stonewalling of Congress over documents relating to the firing of AmeriCorps inspector general Gerald Walpin. Specifically, Grassley has sought, and been denied, information relating to the White House’s role in the decision to fire Walpin.

Solomont, a major Democratic donor, is chairman of the Corporation for National and Community Service, which includes AmeriCorps. His term ends in October, and President Obama has nominated him to be U.S. ambassador to Spain. The nomination was approved by the Senate Foreign Relations Committee last week and now moves to the Senate floor — except that Grassley has placed a hold on it, meaning it will go nowhere until the senator’s objections are resolved.

Continue reading Update of IG-Gate: Grassley holding up nomination until answers given.

Cook Political Report upgrades Harry Reid’s seat to ‘Toss-up.’

I don’t have a subscription, so I can’t give their reasoning precisely why – but I understand it has something to do with the fact that Reid now trails a ham sandwich in the polls.

You know,iIt’d be funny if somebody lost their race next year because the DSCC had to give Reid money to help his campaign out. It’d be funnier if Reid lost his race next year because the DSCC didn’t give him any money to help his campaign out. It’d be funniest of all if both things happened.

Crossposted to RedState.

Even post-adultery, Ensign still more popular than Reid.

Admittedly, Ensign’s taken one heck of a drop, but he’s still at least more liked than disliked.

Favorable / Unfavorable
Sen. Ensign (R): 39 / 37 (May 12-14: 53 / 18)
Sen. Reid (D): 34 / 46

Job Approval/Disapproval
Reid: 43 / 55
Ensign: 48 / 45

Jim Geraghty thinks that Reid should try having an affair; I will not be cruel and write the first three things that come to mind*. I will however, note that the Presidential numbers:

Favorable / Unfavorable
Pres. Obama: 49 / 32
Job Approval/Disapproval
Obama: 47% Excellent/Good, 50% Fair/Poor

…seem a bit weak for somebody who won Nevada 55/43.

Moe Lane

*But not the fourth: “Nobody needs shoes that bad.”

Crossposted to RedState.

Obama privileged to be in Las Vegas.

So. Back in February the President went to Elkhart, Indiana and made a speech where, as Deceiver.com helpfully reminds us, he included this part:

You can’t go take a trip to Las Vegas or go down to the Super Bowl on the taxpayers’ dime. There’s got to be some accountability and some responsibility, and that’s something that I intend to impose as president of the United States.

Earlier this week, the President took a trip to Las Vegas on the taxpayers’ dime. His privilege. He went there to raise money for the wildly unpopular Senator Harry Reid. Likewise, his privilege. He did this even though the current Governor is quite upset at the President for helping to lose his state about 131 million in revenue so far this year – and upset from afar, because the President didn’t meet with either him or the (Democratic) mayor of Las Vegas. Once again, the President’s privilege – hey, do you know the etymology of the word ‘privilege?’

It’s Latin: it means ‘private law.’

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Harry Reid attacked Barbara Bush in his book.

The Online Left have the Senate Majority Leader that they deserve.

(Via AoSHQ): In 1988, I was a Democrat. I came from a long line of Democrats; we were a good union household, the old blue-collar generation pushing the new generation into white collar. When it came to political heroes, it was FDR, Truman, JFK all the way: my parents voted for Carter, and grumbled about Reagan throughout his term. 1988 was my first election, and I went right down to the polling place and proudly voted for Dukakis/Bentsen. In short, I was a Democratic voter in a Democratic family in a Democratic state in a Democratic region who voted for two Democrats.

And if my Democratic parents had ever caught me calling a Republican First Lady crude names, even by implication, I would have gotten whacked on the ear*.

Speaking Bluntly
Mark Hemingway

[snip]

Three pages in, after lamely trying to establish his bipartisan bona fides by talking up George H. W. Bush, Reid shares this charming anecdote about his early days in the Senate: “[Former Texas senator and vice-presidential candidate Lloyd] Bentsen went on and on effusively about what a quality man President-elect [H. W.] Bush was. Then he paused and said, ‘But watch out for his wife; she’s a b[*]tch.’ I have never had anything against Mrs. Bush, but guided by Bentsen’s crude advice, I’ve always said that our forty-third president is more his mother than his dad.”

Which I guess makes me different from Harry Reid.

Thank God.

Moe Lane

*In fact, my mom would probably still do it. And I’d sit there and take it, too. That’s because I was raised to respect women.

Crossposted to RedState.

Burris did in fact make an offer for the Senate seat.

Harry, you ignorant slut.

I am perilously close to being gobsmacked by this transcript of the Burris/Blagojevich conversation (via Hot Air). I’m not a lawyer, but it seems to me that there’s enough there to indicate that Roland Burris flat-out lied about not trading favors and money for the Senate seat. I am not, however, so stunned as to be unable to remind people about this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this…

Hold on: let’s see that video again.

Ha!

…this, this, this, this, this, this, this, and, finally, this. In short – and may you have as an enjoyable time reviewing those posts as I did – Rod Blagojevich’s pick of Roland Burris for the Illinois Senate was a transparent trap – and Harry Reid and the rest of the Democratic Senate caucus sprung it anyway. In fact, not being content with springing the trap, Reid and his caucus insisted on making every possible mistake that they could, too. All because they were afraid. People will be writing about this act of political revenge fifty years from now, and mocking the Senator from Nevada on every page, too.

Deservedly.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to RedState.

Gitmo closing not to be funded.

“The rule is – jam yesterday, jam tomorrow, but never jam today.”
– Lewis Carroll, Through the Looking-Glass, and What Alice Found There

Fresh from Senator Webb’s decision to play bellwether – or Judas goat? – on the retreat from Gitmo (see also here) we have this latest word on the Matter of Gitmo:

AP source: Democrats won’t fund Guantanamo closing

By ANDREW TAYLOR – 1 hour ago

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Barack Obama’s allies in the Senate will not provide funds to close the Guantanamo Bay prison until the administration comes up with a satisfactory plan for transferring the detainees there, a top Democrat said Tuesday.

Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois said Obama’s plan to close Guantanamo is not dead — only that the funding will have to wait until the administration devises an acceptable plan to handle the closure and transfer the detainees. Obama has promised to close the military prison by January.

[snip]

It appears to be a tactical retreat. Once the administration develops a plan to close the facility, congressional Democrats are likely to revisit the topic, provided they are satisfied there are adequate safeguards.

Continue reading Gitmo closing not to be funded.

Senator Harry Reid’s unfavorables hits 50.

Somewhere in Nevada, a Republican has just decided to run for Senator. We do not know his or her name, but whoever it is, he or she worries Senator Harry Reid right now:

CARSON CITY — Nearly half of Nevadans have had enough of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid as the powerful Democrat heads into his re-election campaign, a new Las Vegas Review-Journal poll finds.

About a third of the state’s voters would re-elect Reid if the 2010 election were held today, according to the poll, but 45 percent say they would definitely vote to replace him. Seventeen percent would consider another candidate.

The findings are echoed by another poll question about Reid’s popularity that finds the four-term incumbent to be a polarizing figure in his home state.

Half of Nevada voters had an unfavorable view of Reid, while 38 percent had a favorable view and 11 percent a neutral opinion.

More via Chris Cillizza, who is actually going to some trouble to shoot down the most likely objections to this poll.

The article goes on to quote Reid’s campaign manager as saying “The only poll that really matters is on Election Day.” This common sentence in Politician translates to “we’re doomed, but we’re not going to give you the satisfaction of seeing us wince,” and is one of the reasons why there’ll probably be a serious challenger or challengers by this time next week. Getting below 50% favorable is a sign of alarm for a politician; having a 50% unfavorable rating is a harbinger of upcoming disaster. He can still win, but there won’t be a repeat of 2004’s easy win for him. Put another way, the Democrats don’t want to have to fight for that particular seat, but at this point they don’t have a choice…

Crossposted at RedState.