Heads Up, Folks.
Here is proof that the Bush cabal will not cease their nefarious and greed driven acts to subvert the spirit of American democracy until they are forced to do so.
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Recess Games
Friday, January 6, 2006; A18
HISTORICALLY, PRESIDENT Bush's decision Wednesday to make 17 job appointments during a congressional recess isn't out of the ordinary. The Constitution grants the president "Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate."
This device was intended as an emergency exception to the general confirmation rule, at a time when Congress had short sessions and frequent breaks.
But presidents of both parties have, for decades now, seized on this power as a way to sidestep Senate opposition to their choices for key jobs. Ronald Reagan made 243 recess appointments, Bill Clinton made 140. With these new announcements, President Bush has made 123 recess appointments in five years.
What's worrying about many of Mr. Bush's recess nominees is the caliber of the candidates and the importance of the jobs in which they have been installed.
Even before Wednesday's raft of appointments, the ambassador to the United Nations and the head of the Justice Department's Criminal Division held power by virtue of this maneuver.
Now Mr. Bush has added the number two official at the Defense Department, Deputy Secretary Gordon R. England, and the head of the immigration bureau, Julie L. Myers -- hardly minor jobs.
Ms. Myers was chief of staff for Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, but she has little experience with immigration issues.
Ellen R. Sauerbrey, who was given a recess appointment as assistant secretary of state for population, refugees and migration, is a long-standing Republican party loyalist and a failed Republican candidate for Maryland governor, but she has no refugee or humanitarian experience.
It's particularly ironic, and particularly disturbing, that Mr. Bush on Wednesday used this undemocratic maneuver to name three of the six members of the Federal Election Commission, including to two of the commission's Democratic seats.
This was not a situation in which nominations had languished; Mr. Bush didn't make the nominations until the Senate was about to leave town, meaning that senators had no opportunity for hearings.
That's the very least that should have happened, especially in the case of Republican Hans von Spakovsky, a Justice Department civil rights lawyer who was instrumental in approving a Georgia voter identification law over career lawyers' objections that it would harm black voters.
Finally, the resort to recess appointments is worrying because of what it reveals about the breakdown in relations between the White House and the Senate and the functioning of both institutions.
Has it really become impossible for a Republican president to get a Republican Senate to confirm someone to the number two job at the Defense Department, in the middle of a war? The fact that the well-qualified Mr. England cannot be approved in the normal manner -- his appointment was held up over disputes about shipbuilding cuts and a dispute about how to handle his private-sector pension -- speaks volumes about the Senate's performance and the White House's inability to build political coalitions.
© 2006 The Washington Post Company
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Tacoma, WA - Friday, January 6, 2006
IRS tracked taxpayers’ political affiliation
The News Tribune Last updated: January 6th, 2006 06:13 AM (PST)
WASHINGTON – As it hunted down tax scofflaws, the Internal Revenue Service collected information on the political party affiliations of taxpayers in 20 states.
Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., a member of an appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over the IRS, said the practice was an “outrageous violation of the public trust” that could undermine the agency’s credibility.
IRS officials acknowledged that party affiliation information was routinely collected by a vendor for several months. They told the vendor last month to screen the information out.
“The bottom line is that we have never used this information,” said John Lipold, an IRS spokesman. “There are strict laws in place that forbid it.”
Washington state residents do not express a party preference when they register to vote. Residents of 20 other states and the District of Columbia have to provide a party affiliation when registering. Voter registration information is publicly available.
Murray said she learned about the problem from the president of the National Treasury Employees Union, Colleen Kelly. The IRS is part of the Treasury Department.
“This agency should not have that type of information,” Murray said in a telephone interview from Seattle. “No one should question whether they are being audited because of party affiliation.”
Kelly said Thursday that several IRS employees had complained to the union about the practice. She said IRS officials weren’t even aware of it until she wrote them in late December.
In a letter to Kelly, Deputy IRS Commissioner John Dalrymple said the party identification information was automatically collected through a “database platform” supplied by an outside contractor that targeted voter registration rolls among other things as it searched for people who aren’t paying their taxes.
“This information is appropriately used to locate information on taxpayers whose accounts are delinquent,” he said.
Murray and Kelly, however, remained skeptical. Kelly said the collection of such data was even more troubling because the IRS intends to start using private collection agencies later this year to go after back taxes.
“We think Congress should suspend IRS plans to use private collections agencies until these questions have been resolved,” she said.
According to Murray’s office, the 20 states in which the IRS collected party affiliation information were Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Utah and Wisconsin.
Les Blumenthal: 202-383-0008
lblumenthal@mcclatchydc.com
Originally published: January 6th, 2006 02:30 AM (PST)
Copyright 2006 Tacoma News, Inc.
___________________________________________________________________
Recess Games
Friday, January 6, 2006; A18
HISTORICALLY, PRESIDENT Bush's decision Wednesday to make 17 job appointments during a congressional recess isn't out of the ordinary. The Constitution grants the president "Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate."
This device was intended as an emergency exception to the general confirmation rule, at a time when Congress had short sessions and frequent breaks.
But presidents of both parties have, for decades now, seized on this power as a way to sidestep Senate opposition to their choices for key jobs. Ronald Reagan made 243 recess appointments, Bill Clinton made 140. With these new announcements, President Bush has made 123 recess appointments in five years.
What's worrying about many of Mr. Bush's recess nominees is the caliber of the candidates and the importance of the jobs in which they have been installed.
Even before Wednesday's raft of appointments, the ambassador to the United Nations and the head of the Justice Department's Criminal Division held power by virtue of this maneuver.
Now Mr. Bush has added the number two official at the Defense Department, Deputy Secretary Gordon R. England, and the head of the immigration bureau, Julie L. Myers -- hardly minor jobs.
Ms. Myers was chief of staff for Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, but she has little experience with immigration issues.
Ellen R. Sauerbrey, who was given a recess appointment as assistant secretary of state for population, refugees and migration, is a long-standing Republican party loyalist and a failed Republican candidate for Maryland governor, but she has no refugee or humanitarian experience.
It's particularly ironic, and particularly disturbing, that Mr. Bush on Wednesday used this undemocratic maneuver to name three of the six members of the Federal Election Commission, including to two of the commission's Democratic seats.
This was not a situation in which nominations had languished; Mr. Bush didn't make the nominations until the Senate was about to leave town, meaning that senators had no opportunity for hearings.
That's the very least that should have happened, especially in the case of Republican Hans von Spakovsky, a Justice Department civil rights lawyer who was instrumental in approving a Georgia voter identification law over career lawyers' objections that it would harm black voters.
Finally, the resort to recess appointments is worrying because of what it reveals about the breakdown in relations between the White House and the Senate and the functioning of both institutions.
Has it really become impossible for a Republican president to get a Republican Senate to confirm someone to the number two job at the Defense Department, in the middle of a war? The fact that the well-qualified Mr. England cannot be approved in the normal manner -- his appointment was held up over disputes about shipbuilding cuts and a dispute about how to handle his private-sector pension -- speaks volumes about the Senate's performance and the White House's inability to build political coalitions.
© 2006 The Washington Post Company
______________________________________________________________
Tacoma, WA - Friday, January 6, 2006
IRS tracked taxpayers’ political affiliation
The News Tribune Last updated: January 6th, 2006 06:13 AM (PST)
WASHINGTON – As it hunted down tax scofflaws, the Internal Revenue Service collected information on the political party affiliations of taxpayers in 20 states.
Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., a member of an appropriations subcommittee with jurisdiction over the IRS, said the practice was an “outrageous violation of the public trust” that could undermine the agency’s credibility.
IRS officials acknowledged that party affiliation information was routinely collected by a vendor for several months. They told the vendor last month to screen the information out.
“The bottom line is that we have never used this information,” said John Lipold, an IRS spokesman. “There are strict laws in place that forbid it.”
Washington state residents do not express a party preference when they register to vote. Residents of 20 other states and the District of Columbia have to provide a party affiliation when registering. Voter registration information is publicly available.
Murray said she learned about the problem from the president of the National Treasury Employees Union, Colleen Kelly. The IRS is part of the Treasury Department.
“This agency should not have that type of information,” Murray said in a telephone interview from Seattle. “No one should question whether they are being audited because of party affiliation.”
Kelly said Thursday that several IRS employees had complained to the union about the practice. She said IRS officials weren’t even aware of it until she wrote them in late December.
In a letter to Kelly, Deputy IRS Commissioner John Dalrymple said the party identification information was automatically collected through a “database platform” supplied by an outside contractor that targeted voter registration rolls among other things as it searched for people who aren’t paying their taxes.
“This information is appropriately used to locate information on taxpayers whose accounts are delinquent,” he said.
Murray and Kelly, however, remained skeptical. Kelly said the collection of such data was even more troubling because the IRS intends to start using private collection agencies later this year to go after back taxes.
“We think Congress should suspend IRS plans to use private collections agencies until these questions have been resolved,” she said.
According to Murray’s office, the 20 states in which the IRS collected party affiliation information were Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Louisiana, Massachusetts, Michigan, Nevada, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Texas, Utah and Wisconsin.
Les Blumenthal: 202-383-0008
lblumenthal@mcclatchydc.com
Originally published: January 6th, 2006 02:30 AM (PST)
Copyright 2006 Tacoma News, Inc.
posted by FancyRage at 12:56 PM
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