Gore Leaves Door Ajar for 2008 By Chris Cillizza And Shailagh Murray
Early last month, Gore addressed more than three dozen labor leaders in Washington, a wide-ranging talk about the Democratic congressional gains and the media, said one attendee, who demanded anonymity. Asked about 2008, Gore said that he has taken a number of calls from people encouraging him to consider running but he “didn’t know whether he was going to or not,” the source said. “Everybody felt he left a small door open.”
NRA Pressured To Resist Bush Energy Policies By Blaine Harden, Washington Post Staff Writer
After years of close association with the Republican Party and hard-nosed opposition to federal land-use regulation, the National Rifle Association is being pressured by its membership to distance itself from President Bush’s energy policies that have opened more public land for oil and gas drilling and limited access to hunters and anglers.
“The Bush administration has placed more emphasis on oil and gas than access rights for hunters,” said Ronald L. Schmeits, second vice president of the NRA, a member of its board of directors and a bank president in Raton, N.M. …
But, during the past six years, an increasing number of the country’s 46 million hunters and anglers, including Republican-leaning shooting organizations such as the Boone and Crockett Club, have been grumbling about the Bush’s administration fast-tracking of oil and gas drilling leases on public lands.
PRESIDENT BUSH wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed Wednesday that “it is also a fact that our tax cuts have fueled robust economic growth and record revenues.” The claim about fueling record revenue is flat wrong, and it is shocking that the president should persist in making such errors. After all, tax cuts are the central plank of his domestic policy. How can he fail to understand the basic facts about them?
This is not just our opinion. Harvard’s N. Gregory Mankiw, an economic conservative who served as chairman of Mr. Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers, has tested the hypothesis on which Mr. Bush’s claim is based ….
If Mr. Bush does not believe Mr. Mankiw, perhaps he may believe the Congressional Budget Office. …
If Mr. Bush believes neither Mr. Mankiw nor the Congressional Budget Office, he should at least respect his own Treasury. …
Mr. Bush’s op-ed included nice statements about bipartisan cooperation. But the Democrats would be more likely to cooperate with the president if he stopped making things up.
Howard Kurtz – Opinionator-in-Chief
[Duhbya:] “It’s time Congress give the president a line-item veto. And today I will announce my own proposal to end this dead-of-the-night process and substantially cut the earmarks passed each year.”
Let me get this straight. After six years of a Republican Congress earmarking truckloads of pork for home districts, much of it for Bridge-to-Nowhere projects, Bush has suddenly decided–the day before the Democrats take control–that earmarking is an outrage?
How convenient.
It’s still a good idea to make it harder for lawmakers to slip costly goodies into bills. But when has Bush exhibited much concern for the inner workings of Congress? Whenever he’s been asked about the Foley scandal or Tom DeLay’s problems, the White House line has always been, that’s a congressional matter.
In annual predictions, Robertson predicts terrorist attack on U.S. soil in ’07
In what has become an annual tradition of prognostications, religious broadcaster Pat Robertson said Tuesday God has told him that a terrorist attack on the United States would result in “mass killing” late in 2007.
“I’m not necessarily saying it’s going to be nuclear,” he said during his news-and-talk television show “The 700 Club” on the Christian Broadcasting Network. “The Lord didn’t say nuclear. But I do believe it will be something like that.”
Robertson said God told him during a recent prayer retreat that major cities and possibly millions of people will be affected by the attack, which should take place sometime after September.
In 2006, I took about 3,000 photos. Of those, I posted 271 to Flickr and some others to various websites. The following link will take you to the first of 10 pages featuring those 271 in reverse order (newest first).
Flickr: Archive of mjhinton’s photos posted to Flickr in 2006
From that page, one can jump by page or month; larger thumbnails plus descriptions can be seen using the View: Detail link. Thumbnails are automatically cropped and sometimes differently from the photo.
I would be delighted if you’d look at some of those photos and further delighted if you were to comment there or here. mjh
My dear Merri Rudd was sworn-in as Bernalillo County Probate Judge the morning of New Year’s Day along with 4 other county officers. Fewer people attended than four years ago, but each officer had some family and friends in attendance for the brief ceremony.
A fan said Mer represents the argument against term limits. However, Mer herself favors term limits and feels 10 years in office will be long enough. Ask her again when our health insurance expires.
At home, there were chants of “Four More Years!” My second glass of Gruet champagne was the better libation for celebrating bookends and term limits. mjh
