Hey, Did You Know Someone Is Challenging Durbin For Sentate -- Meet Dr. Steve Sauerberg!

I like what he has to say.

Having watched Durbin on the news for years now I would add that Durbin is probably the most partisan politician in Washington today. He will do anything to prevent solutions that do not advance his party's ambitions (and thus his own as the second ranking Democrat in the Senate) no matter how much harm is done to Americans.

There are not many people in the world that can make my stomach turn as the speak, but within a couple of minutes of Durbin blaming everything on George Bush I really have to fight back the acid burps!

Here Dr. Steve Sauerberg's YouTube channel and here is his Senate Campaign Site. In case you forget his name he made the site easy to remember, Dr. Steve For Senate. It is also a pretty good campaign site, even including a multimedia page that includes his YouTube videos.
DKK

Democrats Use Any Excuss To Block Judicial Appointments

The eight year campaign by Senate Democrats to prevent President Bush's judicial nominees from receiving up-or-down votes has been characterized by nearly every form of intellectual and factual dishonesty imaginable. At this late date, one wouldn't have expected any recently developed obstructionist arguments to stand out for cynicism.

Nonetheless, as this Examiner editorial notes, my two Senators (Barbara Mikulski and Benjamin Cardin) seem to have broken new ground.

These two are blocking a vote on Rod Rosenstein's nomination to the Circuit Court because he is doing too good a job as U.S. Attorney. Any excuse will do for the current Democratic Congress.
DKK
Powerline -- Maryland's Democratic Senators Embarrass Themselves

Loan Scandal Emerging -- Two Dem Senators In Sweetheart Deals

The New York Post reported:

Two influential US senators got "VIP" loans from a leading subprime mortgage lender that saved them tens of thousands of dollars, it was reported last night.

The Democratic pols, Chris Dodd of Connecticut and Kent Conrad of North Dakota, both received the highly favorable loans under the designation "Friend of Angelo," a reference to embattled Countrywide head Angelo Mozilo, Condé Nast Portfolio reported.

Dodd is chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, while Conrad is chairman of the Budget Committee and a member of the Finance Committee. The two senators refinanced properties through the VIP program in 2003 and 2004, the report said.

Others who received "FOA" loans include Alphonso Jackson, the secretary of Housing and Urban Development under President Bush who resigned in April, and Donna Shalala, who was secretary of Health and Human Services in the Clinton administration.

DKK
Gateway Pundit --2 Influential Democrat Senators Caught in Home Loan Scandal

Americans Want Solutions!

Even as the price of oil nearly doubled over the last year, the percentage of Americans pointing the finger of blame at oil companies fell, from 37% a year ago to 20%.

And 57% favor drilling in areas of the US that are currrently off limits.

Other factors measured, a drop in the percentage of Americans blaming high gas prices on the Iraq war, and single digit percentages blaming speculators (6%) and a weaker US dollar (4%). Those pointing to economic forces and supply vs. demand up from 10% to 15%.

Meanwhile Senate Democrats recommend imposing "a 25 percent tax on profits over what would be determined "reasonable"

DKK
Ace of Spades HQ -- Dave in Texas -- Gallup: Fewer Americans Blame Oil Companies, More Americans Say Drill

Democrat Solution -- Old Failed Policies -- Punish Success, Raise Prices

Senate Republicans blocked a proposal Tuesday to tax the windfall profits of the largest oil companies, despite pleas by Democratic leaders to use the measure to address America's anger over $4 a gallon gasoline.

The Democratic energy package would have imposed a tax on any "unreasonable" profits of the five largest U.S. oil companies and given the federal government more power to address oil market speculation that the bill's supporters argue has added to the crude oil price surge.

(...) "The American people are clamoring for relief at the pump," said Sen. Pete Domenici, R-N.M., but if taxes are increased on the oil companies "they will get exactly what they don't want. The bill will raise taxes, increase imports."

Associated Press

Raising taxes sure does seem to be the default position of the Democrats isn't it!

Taxing away your freedom doesn't leave you very free does it.

Corporations aren't evil and taxes on corporations are taxes on us -- either via higher prices, lower employment, or lower investment returns. Corporations don't pay.

Here is the strange thing -- and I've heard O'Reilly repeat it often -- why don't the oil companies all lower the price and give us a break?

Well, for a few reasons. In many states it is actually illegal for gas to be sold below a certain margin, undercutting competitors.

If one company lowered their price then others would follow and they would be accused of colluding illegally.

If the price of the company suffered at all, the company, the CEO, and everyone else involved would be sued and possibly held criminally responsible for any loss investors suffered.

Making money doing something legal and moral should be admired and praised, not demonized! Especially when we have made it as hard to do business as any business out there.
DKK

Democrats Vote To Raise Gas Prices -- Putting Party Over The People!

You'd think this would be oil shale's moment.

You'd think with gas prices topping $4 and consumers crying uncle, Congress would be moving fast to spur development of a domestic oil resource so vast - 800 billion barrels of recoverable oil shale in Colorado, Utah and Wyoming alone - it could eventually rival the oil fields of Saudi Arabia.

You'd think politicians would be tripping over themselves to arrange photo-ops with Harold Vinegar (whom I profiled in Fortune last November), the brilliant, Brooklyn-born chief scientist at Royal Dutch Shell whose research cracked the code on how to efficiently and cleanly convert oil shale - a rock-like fossil fuel known to geologists as kerogen - into light crude oil.

You'd think all of this, but you'd be wrong.

Last month, the U.S. Senate's Appropriations Committee voted 15-14 to kill a bill that would have ended a one-year moratorium on enacting rules for oil shale development on federal lands (which is where the best oil shale is located). Most maddening of all - at least to someone like myself not steeped in the wacky ways of Washington - the swing vote on the appropriations committee, U.S. Sen. Mary Landrieu, D-La., voted with the majority even though she actually opposes the moratorium.

"Sen. Salazar asked me to vote no. I did so at his request," Landrieu told The Rocky Mountain News. A Landrieu staffer contacted by Fortune doesn't dispute this, but notes that Landrieu did propose a compromise which Republicans rejected.

This is just disgusting -- when will the Republicans put the pressure on them that we all have on our pocketbooks! If they don't push this and get exploration here they will find themselves looking for jobs come November -- it is already being spun as the President's fault.

DKK

Fortune Magazine -- The Politics Of Oil Shale

Senate Democrats Break Their Promise -- Republicans Keep Theirs

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell used the element of surprise today to follow through on a promise he's made to fellow conservatives for quite some time. Either the Democrats were going to give President Bush's judicial nominees, especially ones for the Appellate Court level, the same treatment given to previous administrations, or things were going to start moving very slowly in the Senate. Harry Reid's most recent broken deal with McConnell was to confirm three of Bush's nominees by the Memorial Day recess. It didn't happen.

Today, just before 1PM in the East, Harry Reid took to the floor for the purpose of substituting a 491-page amendment by Barbara Boxer on the Climate Change bill currently being discussed. The clerk read the title of the bill, which is customary. Senator Reid asked that the reading of the bill be ended so time could be divvied out and the matter discussed on the floor, which is again very customary. Mitch McConnell then objected to the suspension of the reading of the bill, much to Reid's surprise and amazement. (Video at link)

All day the Democrats tried to get the reading of the bill waived and all day the Republicans objected. Later in the day Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) asked Harry Reid about the promise and why he had been given word the deal was off.

The Democrats treatment of Republican judicial nominees has been disgraceful.
DKK
Hugh Hewitt -- Judicial Nominations Day Of Reckoning Comes To The Senate