In what very well may be the first time Greg Walden has appeared in video on Loaded Orygun--as well as the first time for a Greta van Sustern clip--we bring you an issue which really should transcend partisan boundaries: adequate time to read pending bills before voting.
I have a bit of a different take than where I think most of the heat for this is coming, however; at the disrupted town halls this summer the chant of "Read the Bill!" was designed to intimidate Congresspeople and shame them into admitting they hadn't, in fact, gone through the whole text. It would be nice if the Members read them beforehand, sure--but the reality is that staffers and advisors exist to assist with helping their bosses understand legislation, and frankly most Members (like the rest of us) aren't necessarily adept at reading legislative language, which is crafted in boilerplate legal-ish language that often reads like an Old English schoolbook.
I'm never going to be optimistic that giving more lead time will actually force more Members to read the bills. What it WILL do, however, is give the rest of US time to read them--and in the age of the internet, that can be a valuable tool. Ordinary citizens and subject experts on the topic in the bill have already proven highly useful in this regard, pointing out odd snippets and codiciles and getting them into the public discussion.
So despite the fact that I don't necessarily find Walden's motives pure, I can't much argue with the concept. Here's what he had to say last night:
OK, I'm kidding about the "very important" part, but I did think this was of nominal interest as I scanned the House docket for today, courtesy of DailyKos/CongressMatters:
H.R. 2741 - To amend the Reclamation Wastewater and Groundwater Study and Facilities Act to authorize the Secretary of the Interior to participate in the City of Hermiston, Oregon, water recycling and reuse project (Rep. Walden - Natural Resources)
H.R. 2971 - To designate the facility of the United States Postal Service located at 630 Northeast Killingsworth Avenue in Portland, Oregon, as the "Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Post Office" (Rep. Blumenauer - Oversight and Government Reform)
OK, last item first: remember when I was saying last week (during a rant about the shameful cowardice our representatives showed with regard to ACORN) that you almost never see the entire House delegation from Oregon lean the same way on a bill? There was a reason I made an exception for symbolic or "no-brainer" bills, and it's exactly the kind of stuff we're talking about here--purely aesthetic measures that only someone with a political death wish would take exception to. Blumenauer proposed it, and the other four Reps are co-sponsors, so there you go. For five minutes, unity!
So the PO in NE will now be known as the MLK PO--and given that it's located at 6th and Killingsworth, the same people who avoid MLK Boulevard based on a fear of crime will probably add the PO to their list of places not to go (whether their fears are founded or not).
The other bill, 2741, I confess I don't know a lot about. From what I can tell, it's what--if it were a Democrat sponsoring it--Walden might call "pork;" the bill authorizes Interior to "participate" in Hermiston's water reclamation project. And by participate, I mean pay for--up to 25% of the total costs, it would seem. I'm not against it per se; I'm sure that Hermiston could use the help. But given that it's in Walden's district, and there are no other cosponsors--not even in his own state--call me skeptical. Anyone else have some insight, either on the bill or on the project?
Anyway, thought it might be interesting to see the kinds of things that REALLY takes up a Congressman's day--not all that difficult health care, climate change and budgeting stuff. Post offices and recycling plants--that's the real currency of the House, and our guys are trading on it every day, ostensibly for our benefit. I know I'll sleep better tonight-- secure in the knowledge that we're one step closer to our goal of not having a single federal building left in America that has not been renamed for someone dead and famous. Take us to DefCon 5, Commander, and stand down the missiles!
It's an extreme rarity when Oregon's entire Congressional delegation finds a way to vote in unison on any bill that's not blandly symbolic, splashily ceremonial or a blatant pander to a constituency no one dislikes. Obviously in this hyperpartisan age, it's a foregone conclusion that they won't all vote the same way, as long as there's an Eastern Oregon Republican thrown into the mix with our six Democratic representatives. But even with the Ds, and even just the House Dems, somebody dissents from the group for one reason or another from time to time.
Not yesterday. In a capitulation to the GOP fringe notable even in this Season of Caving for its speed and sense of political repulsion, both the House and Senate overwhelmingly passed bills banning any federal funding for the non-profit community group ACORN. In the House just 75 Members stood up to defend the truly massive sums being doled out (about $3.5 million per year--million with an M), and in the upper chamber there were only seven votes opposed to the funds cutoff. Naturally, all 82 legislators were Democrats; if there's one group that knows how to fall in the line with the bell rings, it's the Congressional GOP.
But in one of the more shameful, cowardly, politically-eskeert votes I can recall, not a single one of those 82 lawmakers were Oregonians:
Earl Blumenauer? Fuck you, ACORN.
Peter DeFazio? Suck it--I might run for Goobernor!
David Wu? I may be from a minority community, but it's the overachieving one
Kurt Schrader? Don't look at me--I'm the new guy!
Ron Wyden? I couldn't--what would Chuck Grassley say?
Jeff Merkley? File this turkey with his Yea allowing loaded guns in parks.
Greg Walden? Well, natch. You get a pass as a lost cause...
Well, now wait--why is this such a bad vote? Isn't ACORN that group that commiitted massive voter fraud, getting Mickey Mouse and Donald Duck to vote for Obama last election? Don't they tell people in child prostitution rings how to evade the law? Aren't they just some nefarious underground cabal of Chicago style "community organizers?"
Below the fold, I'll let Glenn Greenwald lay it out for you.
Wanna get a close-up look at a Cowardly Lion? Who better than the titular head of the national Republican Party, Michael Steele, who recently showed off his glass cojones by criticizing--and then almost immediately apologizing to--the de facto head of the party, Pill-Poppinfresh himself, Rush Limbaugh?
That's right--if you're a fan of trainwrecks and have $40 in (very) disposable income, you can shuffle on down to the Portland Hilton and catch wind of Steele's plan to "renew and rebuild" the GOP {pdf}. And what better place to talk about it, than one of the states where the party has very nearly hit rock bottom? There will be a statewide elected Republican official at the event, 2nd CD Congressman Greg Walden. Of course, I didn't need to tell you that, since he's the ONLY statewide elected official the GOP has in Oregon.
To fill out the schedule I guess, they're also recycling former Senator Gordon Smith, who also keynoted the annual Dorchester Conference on the coast last week. Formers Bob Smith and Vic Atiyeh will also attend, as will the Minority Leaders of the Legislature and state chair Bob Tiernan. Think of it as a Who's Who of Hacks and Has-Beens.
But Michael Steele--he's a star! The invite itself calls his ascension to the GOP throne "historic," as opposed to say, a craven gesture of tokenism designed to bleed off a little of the good vibe from the Obama election. You have to wonder how many of the attendeees will be hoping for a little revisionist history on that front, given the outcry from bedrock conservatives about the Chair's terrible (momentary) dissing of a convicted drug addict and entertainer who merely said that he hopes the US economy fails under the new administration. Like everywhere, the reduction of Republican registrations has left Oregon with a GOP shed of moderates and full of those bedrockers. Will Steele be booed? Will some sit on their hands? Oh, the palpable tension!
By now the story of the stimulus bill and House Republicans' doubleshot of unanimous negative energy on same are well known points of discussion in the blogosphere. Correctly, traditional liberal groups and their allies are making note of those Members and not only mounting accountability campaigns, but are also tracking their statements and attempts to have it both ways--voting no, but then taking credit for the benefits that come into their district, for their constituents.
In Oregon we only have one such Republican to discuss, and it's Second District Congressman Greg Walden. He's entrenched, he's usually weakly opposed--get used to it. Until the DPO and the leaders of the 2nd CD Democrats find and properly fund a meaningful challenge to Walden, he will continue to be the Anomaly of the East, clinging to the now-powerless seat he holds.
But there were actually two Representatives who voted against the stimulus, although the Democrat did vote Yea on the original House version (Walden was a big Nay on both that one and the much-watered-down Senate compromise bill last week). Pete DeFazio played the role of populist in (safely) voting down the stimulus conference bill, larded as it was with tax cuts and nonbudgeted items that should have been normally budgeted, like AMT reform, instead of more directly stimulating activity.
So they both voted No, had totally different reasons for doing so, and in the end probably won't suffer materially from it. There is some risk for Walden however, and we'll talk about that below.
From Sunday's Bend Bulletin (sub only) during a discussion of energy policy being debated in Congress, a little insight into whether Oregon's federal delegation has grasped at least the optics of responsible transportation, if not a heartfelt conversion:
Oregon’s lawmakers have also taken different approaches to their personal energy consumption. Wyden owns a 1993 Ford Explorer but said he rarely drives it because he lives just a few blocks from his Washington, D.C., office. Blumenauer bikes to work on an orange Trek. Walden drives a hybrid Toyota Prius, both in Washington and Oregon. Smith drives a Mercedes in Washington, D.C., and a Jeep in Oregon, he said.[emph mine]
Walden could probably get away with quietly driving a gas guzzler in Washington while putting on a good show at home, so credit for taking the Prius to DC with him. I'm not sure I buy that Wyden doesn't drive enough in his life to make the purchase of a newer, cleaner car a good option for the Senator, but if he's walking to work he gets a pass. Earl of course is the gold standard of practicing what you preach.
And then there's Gordon. Oh, Gordon. It's unclear what models he's driving, but a quick check of the 2008 fuel ratings from EPA suggests that neither the Benz nor the Jeep he owns are drawing more than about 20mpg on the highway. I guess leading by example just isn't on his agenda. Buying a smarter car (or even a SmartCar) won't convince anybody that Smith is ready to join Greenpeace, but it might help people stop doubting his sincerity when he votes for energy policy bills he knows will safely fail.
The suspense over whether Gordon Smith would sign on to a multi-year timber county payments deal that offered a lifeline primarily to voters in his base, is over--he never got the chance. By a 53% Yes margin, the bill carried a majority 218-193, but failed to pass on supermajority rules. Which really, how is Pelosi not able to block that kind of bar being applied? Frustrating.
I guess Earl Blumenauer was kind of frustrated too. Not foaming at the mouth frustrated, like Greg Walden (and to a lesser extent Peter DeFazio), but pretty ticked off. From his release:
I am extremely disappointed that the House failed to keep our promise to help rural counties overcome the loss of federal logging revenues. For six years, the Republicans failed to address this, and I appreciate Congressman DeFazio’s tireless effort to keep the issue alive. Extending county payments is crucial to Oregon and other states across the nation that have relied on timber revenues that are no longer available. Our bill was a responsible one. It would have extended payments for four years and was fully paid for, with no cost to taxpayers. It is a sad day when Republicans vote to protect big oil companies, which are reaping record profits, at the expense of schools, teachers and firefighters. Clackamas County alone stands to lose $12.5 million in funding that is critical to its public and ecological health.
The blowup between DeFazio and Walden on the House floor has been fairly well discussed at BlueOregon, and while I'm still trying to hear why DeFazio promised he'd fund it (as Republicans claim) without the oil lease money, and then presented a bill with that exact provision. He knew it was a dealbreaker in the current Senate anyway, so if he wanted it to pass I don't know why he'd pick this source (although I definitely favor the money sink of oil leases be restructured).
That of course will come and go, but what folks may not forget is the way Walden went apey in apparent defense of the oil companies. Which is pretty brave at $4.19 a gallon, but it's also 'ucking stupid. And DeFazio also gets his shots in:
Though Walden said he's still willing to work with DeFazio, the relationship is strained.
"This trail of broken promises and broken process has led us to the first fracture of this effort I can recall," Walden said. "And for what good? So somebody can say you're for big oil and against teachers and kids? Give me a break."
DeFazio said he was dumbstruck by Walden's strenuous objections, noting that Walden co-sponsored the bill and earlier this year urged DeFazio to lobby Democratic leaders to bring it to the floor.
"Was he pushing us to bring the bill to the floor so he could oppose it? Or did someone come down like a ton of bricks on him in the interim?" DeFazio said in an interview.
I vote bricks. I think the payments might be dead until President Obama is sworn in, unfortunately.
I have made no secret of my frustration with Jeff Merkley's endless parsing and couched language, but at least what he's doing makes rational sense: he doesn't want to run left on one set of principles, and then be seen as changing those principles for the general election he assumes he'll be in. If he mushmouths his way through the primary and gets away with it, he won't be accused of flipping or pandering (well, who am I kidding, this is Gordon Smith he'd be facing...but that's the theory anyway).
Republicans don't bother weaseling in a lot of cases, because that's too much work trying to spin nonsense into something politically useful. Instead, they just say or do two completely oppositional things--and pretend against all attacks that they are actually reconcilable to anyone but the profoundly gullible. Or they'll simply gloss over the irony of preaching for things they themselves have shown to be incapable of.
Smith supported the invasion and largely voted with the Bush administration and fellow Republican backers in Congress until he broke from his party and president in a December 2006 Senate floor speech. Since then, he has taken a number of positions that aligned with those of congressional Democrats. Smith has said he wants to bring home U.S. troops "safely, swiftly and with honor," Hammond said. And he has supported timetables for withdrawal and called for a small U.S. military presence in Iraq to fight terrorists, but not to serve as a police force there as they have in the current "troop surge" mission.
"He is already advocating for a lot of things that are here," said Hammond, adding that while Smith did not explicitly endorse it, "the plan is headed in the right direction."
Hammond also said Smith helped shape it through his discussions with some of the plan's authors.
So if Smith helped shape the plan, then surely he'd endorse it, right? Not quite. You see, that would actually involve breaking from his party on something when it matters. I'm going to follow up on this shortly.
The NRCC has called this plan the same old liberal politics, Freedom's Watch dubs this surrender, and yet Gordon Smith is claiming authorship.
I'm a fan of Steve Novick in Oregon, but Jeff Merkley is a good candidate as well. That Gordon Smith is literally arguing he authored a plan to remove all troops from Iraq without endorsing that plan should give you a sense for how precarious the Republican position really is.
By the way, didja notice who Stoller says he's a fan of? I've oh so subtly highlighted it for you.
(I loves me some wave energy...! - promoted by torridjoe)
OSU needs funds for a wave energy research project on the Oregon coast:
“OSU’s College of Engineering is seeking $3 million from the U.S. Department of Energy to build the national wave energy research center, where the engineers hope to test not only their own designs but those of other researchers and commercial developers.”
We knew it might happen, but it was an occasion to call attention to both the millions of children without affordable access to health care, and the ridiculously pound-foolish GOP strategy to fund the dickens out of the war but complain about a tax on cigarettes to help children. This issue was popular across the ideological spectrum, and Walden deserved to be highlighted as one voting against it.
So who called specifically on Walden--the only member of the Oregon delegation to vote against SCHIP and override the veto, including Gordon Smith--to change his vote? (If you're interested, you can read a proxy for his lame and frankly hypocritical justifications on the bill.)
Few people do as much to provide the numbers and analytical backing for the Oregon progressive movement as Chuck Sheketoff of the Oregon Center for Public Policy (OCPP). But as an activist he's also not afraid to put the conclusions from those analyses into practice, and advocate for the policies in the real political world.
The pressure at home is having an effect on wavering Republicans who voted against the President on SCHIP and are now being asked to override a veto. Greg Walden is neither wavering nor did he actually vote for SCHIP in the first place, but he is surely cognizant of the impact it's having in other districts, even safe GOP districts for other members. It's a popular program, and it just plain old looks bad not to support it.
Will Greg Walden side with moderate Republicans, help thousands of uninsured children in his district, and vote to override the President’s veto? Or will Greg Walden turn his back on those children and stick with the President?
Help Greg Walden decide. Call his office toll free 800-828-0498.
Tell him that all of America’s children deserve health care and that he should vote to override the veto.
[THE VOTE IS CURRENTLY SCHEDULED FOR THURSDAY, OCTOBER 18...]
I was happy to see this LTTE in the Bend Bulletin, calling out Walden and the Bulletin on the SCHIP issue:
Not courageous
In a Sept. 30 editorial, Congressman Walden is praised by The Bulletin for his courage in voting against the bill reauthorizing and expanding SCHIP. Courage doesn't come to my mind for a vote denying additional health insurance coverage to the country's currently uninsured 8 million lower income children. Walden's "courage" is apparently based on his willingness to vote with the minority out of a concern over the additional cost of an expanded SCHIP ($35 billion) and the threat of substituting publicly subsidized insurance for private insurance. The concern about cost speaks more about priorities than courage when compared with the Republican administration's request for $190 billion to fund the 2008 war bill.
Further, voting against an attempt to improve access to health care through greater government involvement doesn't show courage. Rather, it demonstrates, at best, an indifference to securing adequate health care for everyone. Clearly, there are serious problems with our largely privatized health care system as evidenced by health costs nearly double that of every other industrialized country, while 47 million of our citizens don't have health insurance. Apparently, Walden and the editorial board agree with President Bush's statement: "I mean, people have access to health care in America. They can go to the emergency room." I don't call this position a courageous one. More like cruel and callous.
A $1.5 million dollar (and counting) ad campaign directed at the 22 districts where the GOP votes will have to come from to overturn Bush's veto of SCHIP was launched this week by the combined forces of AFL-CIO, AFSCME, SEIU, MoveOn.org Political Action, Americans United for Change, USAction, and TrueMajority Action.
The list of targets includes Oregon's own Greg Walden:
Of course, there are also five House Democrats who need to re-think their priorities, too. No word if Americans United for Change plans to go after them too, but they should.
When it comes to providing basic health care, Greg Walden thinks that Oregon's kids just aren't worth it. Thanks to George Bush and his blind follower Walden, at least 36,000 children in Oregon will go without healthcare.
As men like Bush and Walden block a move to fund children's healthcare, the lifespan in the continental U.S. drops below Puerto Rico and Bosnia.
(WASHINGTON, D.C.) - The annual cost of providing healthcare to 10 million children is equivalent to 41 days worth of funding for the war in Iraq. Congressman Greg Walden apparently believes funding the war in Iraq is a good investment of your tax money, but he thinks our children aren't quite worth it.
Rep. Greg Walden, R-Ore., will not vote to override President Bush's veto of a bill that reauthorizes and expands the State Children's Health Insurance Program.
The expansion, funded by an increase in the tobacco tax, passed the House and Senate last week. Two-thirds of the members in each chamber must vote to override a veto. Enough senators support the bill to override the veto.
The question for the bill's supporters are whether enough House members who voted against the bill will switch sides and vote to override the veto. Walden will not be among those representatives. Walden was the only member of the Oregon congressional delegation to vote against the bill.
Walden spokesman Andrew Whelan said today that Walden is "not going to flip his vote."
"He has some pretty serious concerns with the bill," Whelan said. In a statement after it passed the House last week, Walden said he feels strongly that Congress should reauthorize SCHIP, but this legislation "made dramatic and financially unsustainable changes to the current
program."
(An embarrassment of high quality diaries lately. This one by nation of laws does extensive work on Greg Walden's involvement in Salmongate, and discovers much the same thing that we have about Smith--he was knee deep in it, begging the White House to get involved...there are several good points made in this piece, keep the research coming. The quicksand is starting to pull at their feet, I think. - promoted by torridjoe)
LO has written so many in-depth pieces on the Klamath fish kill that I have to confess that I haven't been able to absorb all of the information they have presented. So I apologize in advance if this has already been covered.
Often times it is the case that I set out to write a post on something, and my research turns up a little nugget of information and I end up writing about something else. Today's nugget is an insightful, illuminating article by Chris Mooney (author of the Republican War on Science) focusing on Greg Walden's role in the events following the Klamath fish kill.
In what appears to parallel Dick Cheney's strategy as reported recently in the Washington Post, Walden attempted to create a legal framework permitting improper standards and otherwise bogus "science" to undermine the good, valid, objective, accurate work and professional judgment of federal agencies. For GOP political gain - of course! It's a shell game of Orwellian buzz-words and Luntz-speak, and Walden has the quick, nimble hands of a street-corner conman. (Note: I don't think this particular bill passed, however, Walden appears to continue to push similar legislation.)
It would not surprise me a bit if this "parallel" was no coincidence - if Walden worked directly under Cheney's orders when introducing this legislation, as part of a deliberate strategy.
I'm on a very limited pension, so making a financial contribution to a campaign fund means cutting back on something else in my tight budget. Sure, I understand that my volunteer time stuffing envelopes, canvassing precincts, etc., is a real contribution. But, in a PoliSci course I took long ago, the professor had scrawled in huge letters on the blackboard to greet us on our arrival to the first class section, "MONEY MAKES HISTORY HAPPEN." Much as I have wished (and tried) to prove his premise wrong, it remains truer than it should. So, I broke out my checkbook today. Here's why, for whom, and a shameless tin-cup-in-hand plea for you to join me.
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