END TO A WILD WEEK…FINALLY!

Unless Rand Paul opens his yap more to sink further, or Richard Blumenthal has more lame explanations or excuses for his history of documented lying about his military service in Vietnam, it should be quieter today. I guess a highlight for today is to see if and how much the stock market can recoup after yesterday’s collapse.

Some highlights from this week include another Democratic win in a special election for a vacant House seat. That’s four in a row for the Dems. I’m still waiting for the Republican groundswell to form! A Democrat defeated a sitting Senator, who for over the past 40 years has been a staunch Republican until last year. Both Democratic candidates for the Senate seat in Kentucky out-polled media darling and idiot Rand Paul. Bill Halter caught incumbant fence-sitter Blanche Lincoln to force a run-off in three weeks in Arkansas. Early forecasts are for a Halter victory June 8th. Senator Mitch McChinless(R-KY) proved he has no political capital left in his own state. Look for him to finally be defeated on his next election.

Possibly the biggest story is the Senate passing a Wall Street and Banking reform bill. A month ago, I predicted in this venue, that Wall Street reform would be strike two against the Republicans in Congress prior to this falls elections. It passed the Senate yesterday with a “super majority” thus stopping the ability for McHinless to filibuster yet another bill. Four Republicans crossed over to vote in favor. The two Maine Senators, Scott Brown, the new Republican Senator from Massachusetts, and Chicken Little Chuck Grassley from Iowa. Grassley is polling so horribly in Iowa, his Democratic opponent for the fall is leading him, that he is backing away from his former “Party of No” antics. The voters of Iowa have figured out they are paying their Republican Senator for doing nothing and it will cost him his job in November. As the Republican party with a very wounded chairman, Michael Steele, a splinter group led by Newtie G., and a growing rift between the party and the tea-baggers, my prediction of no major gains in Congress for the Republicans this fall is coming clear. I have said they are “rudderless” and have been counting on the leadership and direction from Rush Limbaugh and the Fox News Network, for over a year now. I believe Newtie is the only one smart enough to see this but, he has so much baggage himself, he can’t go far as a party leader before the skeletons start floating out of his closet.

Another conservative “family values” Republican went down in flames this week. Representative Mark Souder(R-IN), admitted boinking his married staffer while promoting “family values” and “abstinence before marriage” virtues. I guess since he and his staffer that were pounding on the side are both married, that means it’s okay for then to partake in the pleasures of the flesh! Yippee!, score yet another one for the hypocrites on the right! As my sister and Ed Schultz would say, “folks, you can’t make this stuff up”!

Another gem I unveiled in this column last month was the culpability of former Veep Dick Cheeney in the legal, moral, environmental, and fatal energy disasters of the past few months. Pundits Chris Matthews and Ed Schultz, after reading my story, have begun to go after this (tongue in cheek). Does this relieve Interior Secretary Salazar of responsibility? Not completely. The energy policy in for the United States was put in place at the secret White House meetings with Energy Czar Cheeney and the CEO’s of the energy producers and suppliers and his pals at Haliburton. This was an obvious case of the fox watching the hen-house. The mine explosion and the oil spill are direct results of the energy policy of the country. Lax or no regulation, fines and punishments being ignored or appealed for an eternity are the ingredients of a greedy industry allowed to go unchecked by the government. Salazar, who was in the Senate when Cheeney pulled this scam off, should have known better. His first mission as Secretary of the Interior should have been to start working immediately with Congress to overturn the crooked bullshit Cheeney set up. He knew about it and should have acted more promptly. He needs to dismantle the MMS as the oversight arm because it is so badly tainted by Cheeney, Haliburton, and the big energy companies. You know Cheeney knows he is guilty because the once roaring mouth from the right has been strangely silent since the mine explosion. You have probably also notice that daughter Liz Cheeney, the “evil one”, is no longer talking. I think Fox News has figured out how toxic she is now because the one time regular on all of their hate spewing shows is hardly ever on anymore. I wonder whats going on?

The new “Conscience of the United States Senate”, Al Franken(D-MN), introduced a very important bill yesterday to deal with excessive bullying of gay youth. Apparently, to now, there has really been nothing in place regarding this issue. This is a great “feel good” piece of legislation that is very much in need. Minnesota senior Senator Amy Klobachar(D), finally signed on as a co-sponsor. I’ve noticed that already some republicans in the Senate are already opposing the bill as “unnecessary”. They believe the laws already deal with this. Ask the LBGT kids that are harassed and bullied daily how they feel about the effectiveness of the current laws.

Things are starting to work in the direction that I have been talking about for months. The Democrats have a lot of great accomplishments to hang their hats on in the past eighteen months, and if presented and sold to the voters properly, they will prevail in November. That’s my look at the week, have a great weekend and thank you so much for the read.
Cam Obert