Tag: harry reid

Harry Reid hates Christmas.

Almost as much as Harry Reid hates working for a living, apparently: the word is out that he’s going to take all that legislation that the Democrats didn’t bother working on when they had a mere 59/41 Senate majority and make Congress work on it over Christmas break… when the Democrats will have a 58/42 majority. He is also blaming this on the Republican party, of course… mostly because Reid is too lazy to come up with even a semi-plausible excuse.  Or possibly too contemptuous of the whole process; I don’t think that we’ve ever had a Senate Majority Leader who visibly enjoys the job less than Harry Reid does.  Why he kept the position is beyond me: he clearly hates it, and he’s not very good at it, and nobody really is better off for Reid keeping it.  It’s a mystery, really.

Anyway, Congressional staffers are no doubt even now calling their relatives and loved ones to tell them that, well, maybe they won’t be home for Christmas after all.  I’m reserving all my sympathies for the Republicans caught up in this last act of petulance of the 111th Congress, of course – but I’d like to remind the Democrats likewise in a vise on this one that it’s their own blessed fault, or more accurately, the fault of their various bosses.  After all, if a majority of Democratic legislators had had the guts to throw out the leadership that led them en masse into a wood chipper this November then maybe more of said legislators’ employees would actually get to go home for the holidays…

Moe Lane (crosspost)

Dems facilitating Indian Casinos.

The method is rather… elegant, in a certain sort of way: obnoxious, but elegant. What the Democrats are plotting to do is to finish passing legislation (that would appear in the continuing spending resolution that’s substituting for an actual budget) that would allow the executive branch of the government (in the guise of the Secretary of the Interior) to unilaterally take into trust land offered to them by Native American ‘tribes.’ ‘Tribes’ is in scare quotes because the new legislation makes the determination of tribal status for this purpose the sole province of… the executive branch of the government. Why this matters is because once the government has the land it can give the ‘tribe’ the use of that land back; which means that the ‘tribe’ is free to build a casino there with no interference from state governments.

This is, by the way, not an exaggeration: readers may recall that Senator Barbara Boxer’s family profited mightily earlier this decade from a similar scam involving the Miwok Indians, the Department of the Interior, and a proposed San Francisco-area casino. What this new deal would do is eliminate the need for pesky legislation granting individual recognition of tribal status: instead, groups interested in ignoring local gambling restrictions would simply apply to the Great Wh… err, the President… in Washington for the necessary permissions. And, needless to say: the Democrats are likely to look favorably on the petitions of such fine, loyal donors businessmen.

If this really bugs you, you may want to give your Senator a call at (202) 224-3121 and let him or her know that this provision shouldn’t be in the Senate version of the continuing resolution.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

H/T Instapundit.

Reid trying to add online gambling to tax bill?

Via Instapundit, the Politico is reporting that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid is trying to add language permitting online gambling to the tax compromise negotiated between the GOP and the President.  This is a reversal for Reid, who was opposed to online gambling, right up to the point where certain casinos (who are now in favor of the legislation) dumped at least 500K into Reid’s re-election campaign.  It is also precisely the sort of greedy trough-swilling that we’ve come to know, expect, and even kind of count on from the Democrats in the 111th Congress: I can’t imagine how a progressive could feel comfortable about this sort of tacit surrender by the Democratic leadership on the issue of hiking taxes.  Reid isn’t trying to to scupper the legislation: he’s trying to take advantage of it in order to pay off two campaign contributors.  He’s also doing it in a fairly clumsy fashion, but then nobody’s ever accused Harry Reid at being particularly good at his job.

The odds that this will pass are slim, by the way: there’s almost certainly enough Senate votes to prevent cloture and the House GOP will balk en masse.  Which means that Harry Reid is pretty much wasting people’s time with this, during a session that’s already being overloaded by all the demands being made on it by panicky Democrats…

Continue reading Reid trying to add online gambling to tax bill?

#rsrh On Reid and NRA renewals.

Ignoring the NRA’s get-eaten-last strategy for the moment… I dunno, Glenn.  Based on the numbers: if we’re spotting an additional five points to the Senate races then if Reid had lost he’d have been joined with Bennett and Murray, making the end result a 50/50 tie and Joe Biden expected to explicitly sign off on all the legislation that gets passed in the 112th Congress.  That would have been fun.

But what’s done is done.

Did Harry Reid pull strings to protect aide in immigration conspiracy?

The facts of the case are these: in 2003 Diana Tejada entered into a fraudulent conspiracy with Lebanese national Bassam Mahmoud Tarhini, with the aim of securing permanent US residency for the latter (there was also and investigation whether Mr. Tarhini had links to ‘extremist groups,’ but nothing was ever confirmed).  Money changed hands.  For the next five years Ms. Tejada continued to misrepresent her relationship with Mr. Tarhini, despite official inquiries by immigration services; her eventual confession took place in November, which was one month after she joined current Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s staff.  Despite her confession, Ms. Tejada was not charged with any crime at all, let alone a felony; in fact, Ms. Tejada was misidentified as still being at her former job (La Raza) by immigration officials at Tarhini’s deportation proceedings.  Harry Reid’s office has fired Ms. Tejada only in the last month (she was an official Reid spokesperson for the latest DREAM Act push), and claims that they had no prior knowledge of her activities: this has been contradicted by Fox’s own sources, which insist that Tejada’s confession was partially motivated by concerns relating to her new job with Harry Reid; and that in any case it would be standard operating procedure for the Senate Majority Leader to be made aware of a situation of this magnitude that involved one of his own aides.

And this is where it frankly beggars belief that Senator Reid was unaware of the situation.  Tarhini’s being the subject of a counter-terrorist investigation, coupled with the news that his partner in conspiracy was also an aide to the Senate Majority Leader, would have absolutely required that the Senator be informed at what could have been a hideously dangerous security leak in his own office.  It is much less difficult to believe that Senator Reid was told, concluded that the situation was not actually all that dire, and simply arranged matters so that his new aide – and more importantly, himself – wasn’t dragged through the wringer of an official investigation.  And in late 2008/early 2009 that may have seemed a reasonable decision.

Unfortunately, in late 2010 that looks suspiciously like a callous indifference to national security and an arrogant abuse of political power.  Not to be cliched about this, but here goes: this raises serious questions, that must be answered.

Moe Lane (crosspost)

PS: In point of fact: yes, politicians can be that stupid.  In fact, doing something stupid is how they usually trip and fall from the high places.

#rsrh Harry Reid has a problem.

His problem is that passages like this:

Someone got up and announced that Sharron Angle would speak next, because she had a plane to catch. Angle is a small woman, a sixty-one-year-old grandmother with a broad, open face, a toothy smile, and red hair worn in a pageboy. She has a friendly manner and a firm handshake, along with a set of basic political skills that Harry Reid lacks. These include the ability to chat pleasantly for a minute or two and then tactfully extract herself, and to say what she stands for quickly, with real passion but usually without seeming odd or threatening.

…and this…

Although [Harry Reid] first ran for office at the age of twenty-eight and he is now seventy, he is still strikingly bad at the public part of his job. His voice is soft, with little resonance. When he’s talking to someone, he has a habit of looking down instead of into the person’s eyes. His gestures on a podium are awkward hand chops.

…and this:

Two years ago, Reid published an autobiography, “The Good Fight,” written with the assistance of Mark Warren, of Esquire. Like the autobiographies of Reid’s Republican colleague John McCain, it was meant to “humanize” (as they say in politics) a top-ranking official who had a reputation for being hard to love. But what shines through is Reid’s lack of the natural gregariousness and geniality that most people associate with the political personality.

…are showing up in what are supposed to be puff pieces about him. Continue reading #rsrh Harry Reid has a problem.

Reid: Gillibrand ‘hottest’ Senator.

You’ve come a long way, baby.

(Via Hot Air Headlines) If you were wondering whether or not current Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D, NV) is snapping under the strain of facing Sharron Angle, well, stop wondering.  If he was not snapping, Reid almost certainly would not have made such a strong contrast between Chuckie Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand at a recent NYC fundraiser thrown for Reid by Mayor Bloomberg.  To sum up the difference in the tenor of Reid’s remarks (subtext added):

  • Schumer: Chuckie Schumer is so smart and so good at politics!  He was great as DSCC  Chair, too – unlike that idiot we have now who can’t even get rid of one single, troublesome, inconvenient woman…
  • Gillibrand: …she’s HOT!  …And, oh, yeah, she knows something about securities law.

Continue reading Reid: Gillibrand ‘hottest’ Senator.

Sharron says, “Apologize to Petraeus.”

I stole this line from Jim Geraghty, because it’s the perfect way to visualize this latest ad from the Sharron Angle campaign. In this one, Harry Reid is reminded that lying about how you treat our military personnel is a bad idea, and that he should apologize for it:

Isn’t it nice to have a grown-up around who has some small hope of making Harry Reid behave like one?

Moe Lane Continue reading Sharron says, “Apologize to Petraeus.”

Reid’s new Angle on 9/11 mosque.

Sharron Angle went off on Harry Reid on the subject of the Ground Zero Mosque this morning – she takes the position that while people have the right to build a mosque there, they should show some delicacy of their own and build it somewhere else – and Greg Sargent was practically licking his chops in response. He was of the opinion that making opposition to the President’s position – once we figure it out – a midterm issue would be a bad idea for Republicans, and he leaped on Angle’s opposition:

Angle’s position, apparently, is that the group has the right to build the center but Obama is wrong to have voiced support for that right. After all, he didn’t directly endorse the project anywhere, nor should he have. I would like to hear Reid break his silence on the issue, though.

I’m guessing that Sargent reconsidered that wish, once Reid actually spoke out… and took the position that while people have the right to build a mosque there, they should show some delicacy of their own and build it somewhere else. Which is not surprising: the mosque is extremely unpopular, to the point where it’s even less so than, well, Harry Reid. So much so that Reid’s reflexive adoption of his opponent’s position (no matter how matter it makes knee-jerk liberals pound their heads against the wall) was preferable than taking a contrary stand. Continue reading Reid’s new Angle on 9/11 mosque.

Harry Reid is a hypocrite on birthright citizenship.

Red Dog Report, Weasel Zippers, and the Washington Times all – gleefully, as well they should – report that Harry Reid introduced legislation that would have ended birthright citizenship in 1993. This makes Reid’s recent declaration that he couldn’t understand why any Hispanic could destroy his son in the polls be a Republican seem a bit… what’s the word? Nuanced? Contradictory? I’ve got it: “hypocritical.”

Seriously, there’s no wiggle room in the language that he introduced:

TITLE X—CITIZENSHIP 4 SEC. 1001. BASIS OF CITIZENSHIP CLARIFIED. In the exercise of its powers under section of the Fourteenth Article of Amendment to the Constitution of the United States, the Congress has determined and hereby declares that any person born after the date of enactment of this title to a mother who is neither a citizen of the United States nor admitted to the United States as a lawful permanent resident, and which person is a national or citizen of another country of which either of his or her natural parents is a national or citizen, or is entitled upon application to become a national or citizen of such country, shall be considered as born subject to the jurisdiction of that foreign country and not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States within the meaning of section 1 of such Article and shall therefore not be a citizen of the United States or of any State solely by reason of physical presence within the United States at the moment of birth.

Now, I happen to oppose ending birthright citizenship. I’ve always opposed ending birthright citizenship, and I don’t think that I will ever stop oppose ending birthright citizenship* – no matter how unpopular taking that stance makes me. So it gives me no little pleasure to note that this makes me fundamentally different than Harry Reid, who is being a hypocritical, duplicitous, and quite possibly racist suckweasel on this issue; I add ‘quite possibly racist‘ because it’s entirely possible that Harry Reid tried this trick because he doesn’t believe that Hispanics know how to read…

Moe Lane Continue reading Harry Reid is a hypocrite on birthright citizenship.