Pelosi In Favor Of Bringing Back “Fairness Doctrine”
John Gizzi over at Human Events had the opportunity to speak with Nancy Pelosi yesterday. Gizzi asked her what she thought about Rep. Mike Pence’s bill to kill any future “Fairness Doctrine” proposals once and for all. She said his bill would not see the light of day and would not be allowed on the floor for a vote.
Pelosi went on to say that she’s in fact a strong supporter of bringing back the so-called “Fairness Doctrine.” For those who don’t know what the Fairness Doctrine is, let me briefly explain.
The Fairness Doctrine was ended under the Reagan Administration, but liberals have dreamt of bringing it back for decades. What it did was force radio stations to give equal time by law to opposing viewpoints. Meaning that if a radio station allows Sean Hannity or Rush Limbaugh to have 4 hours of air time, then by law that same radio station would have to allow a 4 hour block of time for a left-wing radio show as well.
The reason that’s completely insane is that it destroys the concept of free markets. Why should a radio audience be forced to listen to something they don’t want to? Right now the free market dictates who’s on the radio. If a liberal can attract listeners he/she is more than welcome to have a radio program.
Liberals want the Fairness Doctrine because they can’t get an audience on their own. So now they want the government to step in and force people to listen to what they have to say.
The irony here is that liberals control every single medium except talk radio, so it should be conservatives who want more “fairness.” But conservatives aren’t interested in the government telling anyone else what they have to listen to.
It’s pretty amazing that left-wingers aren’t content with owning the print media, network news, CNN, MSNBC, PBS, and a large chunk of the blogosphere.
-Chris Jones
Clinton Backers Warn Pelosi
From Reuters:
A group of prominent Hillary Clinton donors sent a letter to House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Wednesday asking her to retract her comments on superdelegates and stay out of the Democratic fight over their role in the presidential race.
The 20 prominent Clinton supporters told Pelosi she should “clarify” recent statements to make it clear superdelegates — nearly 800 party insiders and elected officials who are free to back any candidate — could support the candidate they think would be the best nominee.
Pelosi Turns Congressional Cafeteria Into Gourmet Experience
A revolution is afoot at the deli counters, grills and salad bars of the U.S. House of Representatives.
According to Politico, the cafeteria in The U.S. House of Representatives is now a very different place.
The processed cheese has been replaced with brie. The Jell-O has made way for raspberry kiwi tarts and mini-lemon blueberry trifles. Meatloaf has moved over for mahi mahi and buns have been shunted aside in favor of baguettes.
The menu transformation is part of Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s “Greening the Capitol” plan to make the House campus more environmentally friendly and “socially progressive.”
Some employees are complaining that this new “socially progressive” campus is also becoming progressively more expensive.
“It’s a big jump from high school cafeteria to fancy-pants gourmet. I just wish my pay improved,” said Caryn Schenewerk, a staffer for Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).
House officials counter that the fresher and more varied foods were indeed more expensive but that they had tried to preserve low-cost alternatives such as pizza, sandwiches and prepared salads, which remain around the same price.
When you actually read what some of the new meal choices are you really can’t help but laugh. The food sounds good, but it just seems out of place in the congressional cafeteria.
You can now get pan-roasted Chesapeake rockfish with sweet potato fennel hash and yellow pepper relish. Or something a bit lighter like Pears with Stilton cheese and watercress.
Staffers who find themselves emotional and weary after a long day fighting for a precipitous withdrawal from Iraq might wish to dine on Cumin-scented leg of lamb with almond couscous.
There are also vegetables with funny names, like bok choy, arugula and jicama. There are baked goods with Italian names, like biscotti, focaccia and frittati.
With the immigration debate raging it only made sense to put something besides “Juan Valdez” in the vending machine that sells coffee.
Employees can now enjoy more politically neutral coffee from famed chef Wolfgang Puck, in flavors like “Vive la Crème Caramel” and “Tropic of Chocolate.”
Even the things that haven’t changed seem odd because their names are in foreign languages. The taco bar is the “Taqueria.” The grill is “A la Plancha.” The salad bar has expanded to “Salad/Antipasti.”
A person eating in the cafeteria is also afforded the opportunity to save the earth in a variety of new ways.
Regular trash bins have been replaced with recycling stations. Each station has four differently shaped slots to sort garbage and lengthy directions on proper sorting. Soup containers go into the square-shaped “compostable” slot, but soup lids end up in the rounded “landfill waste” slot.
Other environmental touches include Energy-efficient vending machines that sport a 6-foot-tall illuminated image of trees.
A poster trumpets the existence of a “pulper,” a big machine that mashes up waste into little cubes that go to compost centers, where, eventually, they biodegrade into dirt.
Nearly everything in the new cafeterias is biodegradable, from plates to utensils to straws. The biodegradable straws have caused considerable outcry, because when placed in hot liquids they allegedly disintegrate.
House officials contend that employees need to quit crying about the straws and sip their coffee like normal human beings, because “we’re trying to save the planet here.”
There is absolutely nothing wrong with making the cafeteria more environmentally friendly and the food a bit better quality.
The hilarious part of all this is the menu. Those menu choices certainly validate the stereotype of “liberal elites” and “limousine liberals” being so out of touch with ordinary Americans.
It is certainly a bit presumptuous on Nancy Pelosi’s part to assume that most people would want expensive gourmet cuisine.
I also suspect PETA may take issue with the idea that being “socially progressive” is munching on lamb legs.
-Chris Jones
Pelosi: Republicans “like” Iraq War
It took a while, but I think Nancy Pelosi is finally starting to understand the Iraq war debate.
“They like this war. They want this war to continue,” Pelosi, D- Calif., told reporters. She expressed frustration over Republicans’ ability to force majority Democrats to yield ground on taxes, spending, energy, war spending and other matters.
“We thought that they shared the view of so many people in our country that we needed a new direction in Iraq,” Pelosi said at her weekly news conference in the Capitol. “But the Republicans have made it very clear that this is not just George Bush’s war. This is the war of the Republicans in Congress.”
Yes, Nancy that’s what we’ve been trying to tell you all this time! Republican’s DO NOT share your view that we need a new direction in Iraq, because we already have one.
-Chris Jones
Top Democrats Briefed on Waterboarding in 2002
From The Washington Post:
In September 2002, four members of Congress met in secret for a first look at a unique CIA program designed to wring vital information from reticent terrorism suspects in U.S. custody. For more than an hour, the bipartisan group, which included current House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), was given a virtual tour of the CIA’s overseas detention sites and the harsh techniques interrogators had devised to try to make their prisoners talk.
Among the techniques described, said two officials present, was waterboarding, a practice that years later would be condemned as torture by Democrats and some Republicans on Capitol Hill. But on that day, no objections were raised. Instead, at least two lawmakers in the room asked the CIA to push harder, two U.S. officials said.
“The briefer was specifically asked if the methods were tough enough,” said a U.S. official who witnessed the exchange.
Congressional leaders from both parties would later seize on waterboarding as a symbol of the worst excesses of the Bush administration’s counterterrorism effort. The CIA last week admitted that videotape of an interrogation of one of the waterboarded detainees was destroyed in 2005 against the advice of Justice Department and White House officials, provoking allegations that its actions were illegal and the destruction was a coverup.
Yet long before “waterboarding” entered the public discourse, the CIA gave key legislative overseers about 30 private briefings, some of which included descriptions of that technique and other harsh interrogation methods, according to interviews with multiple U.S. officials with firsthand knowledge.
With one known exception, no formal objections were raised by the lawmakers briefed about the harsh methods during the two years in which waterboarding was employed, from 2002 to 2003, said Democrats and Republicans with direct knowledge of the matter. The lawmakers who held oversight roles during the period included Pelosi and Rep. Jane HarmanJohn D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), as well as Rep. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.) and Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan). (D-Calif.) and Sens. Bob Graham (D-Fla.) and John D. Rockefeller IV (D-W.Va.), as well as Rep. Porter J. Goss (R-Fla.) and Sen. Pat Roberts (R-Kan).
This article just confirms a pattern of behavior from the Democratic leadership. They were briefed on the “Terrorist Surveillance Program” and had no objections. Once the program was leaked to the public, the Dems pretended to shocked and outraged at this so-called “illegal wiretapping.”
The Democratic leadership was briefed about our enhanced interrogation program repeatedly including the use of waterboarding, and they raised no objections. Once that program was leaked to the public, the Dems once again pretended to be shocked and outraged that the President would allow “torture.”
It should be noted that the Terrorist Surveillance Program wasn’t called “illegal wiretapping,” and Waterboarding didn’t become “torture” until after the public became aware of them.
It really shows just how disingenuous Nancy Pelosi and the rest of her team really are. All the “investigations” they call for are just “dog and pony shows” used to score cheap political points with their incredibly ignorant Bush-hating base.
-Chris Jones
Foreign Policy: Clinton vs. Pelosi
The Politico has an interesting piece about the huge differences between the Nancy Pelosi wing of the Democratic party and the Hillary Clinton wing.
Clinton’s and Pelosi’s differences of detail cumulatively add up to something large — two distinct strands of thinking about where threats to U.S. national security lie and how aggressive to be in confronting them.
Or as I like to say “Dumb & Dumber”
Pelosi Irritated with Senate
Frustrated by lack of legislative progress in the Senate, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) is increasingly touting Democratic achievements in the House.
Her statements represent a significant shift from the stance she took six months ago. In March, the Speaker celebrated the first 100 days of the congressional majority by stating, “Democrats have brought the winds of change to the Capitol.”
These days, she’s confined to claiming those winds are blowing on her side of the building. In the minds of her caucus members, the Senate is in the doldrums and House members are paying the price for Senate inaction on Democratic priorities.
When pressed on the slow progress of spending bills during ABC’s Sunday morning talk show “This Week,” Pelosi passed the buck to the Senate, saying, “In the House we’ve passed every one of our bills.”
CodePink Protesters: Who Let These Broads Off Their Meds?
When it comes to staging a hippie protest nobody does it quite like CodePink. With their bright pink attire, catchy slogans, and total dedication, you will not find a finer or more irritating group of protesters anywhere in the world.
The CodePink Mission Statement:
CODEPINK is a women-initiated grassroots peace and social justice movement working to end the war in Iraq, stop new wars, and redirect our resources into healthcare, education and other life-affirming activities. We reject the Bush administration’s fear-based politics that justify violence, and instead calls for policies based on compassion, kindness and a commitment to international law. With an emphasis on joy and humor, CODEPINK women and men seek to activate, amplify and inspire a community of peacemakers through creative campaigns and a commitment to non-violence.
Some months back CodePink decided to literally camp out on Nancy Pelosi’s front lawn and stay there until she cut-off funding for the Iraq war. They called this gathering Camp Pelosi and it lasted for 13 days. Some still live there, but mainly it’s used as a place to hold candlelight vigils, stage rallies, and whatever else hippies do.
Nancy Pelosi was the first of several victims of what CodePink calls the “Occupation Project.” They hope to show members of Congress what it’s like to be “occupied.”
The group now has a guide posted on their website called the DIY: Do It Yourself Activist Guide to Camping Out at Your Congressperson’s Home.
Here is a piece of that guide:
15 Steps to a Successful Encampment
- Know Your Rights— Contact the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) in your community, find out city regulations for demonstrating and camping, and contact a civil rights lawyer.
- Camp site—Locate your Congressperson’s home address.
Tip: Check with the Department of Election in your local City Hall or visit www.opensecrets.org. - Be flexible and check out the “campsite”– Adapt to your new surroundings, the weather, and the situation and legal limitations. Plan to sleep in a camper van or car, inside a tent, or outdoors on a blow-up mattress or a sleeping bag.
- Petition— Have a sheet for neighbors and visitors to sign saying that they support your camp and efforts. Use the contact info to keep people in your community informed of your actions and add new sign-ups to your local listserve as well as to the national CODEPINK alert list. Click here to check out our sample petition.
- Press—Alert local newspapers and news stations about your encampment action. Click here for tips on how to contact the press. If you need help with press contacts, email dana[at]codepinkalert.org. Click here to download our sample press release.
We posted a story the other day about Speaker Pelosi’s personal reaction to all this and let’s just say she isn’t pleased. Her neighbors are apparently appalled by clothes hanging in trees and couches on the lawn.
I know all the rhetoric about “Freedom of Speech” and I’m not trying to silence the CodePink broads. I merely want to exercise my free speech rights.
I think there tactics are repugnant and pointless. When they interrupt Senate hearings with their ridiculous outfits on and begin chanting foolish slogans it infringes on my freedoms.
-Chris Jones
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