I'm glad Harman didn't get the job. Hastings will point out just how ineffective the Democrats are.

someone should also ask hastings why he's got a staff assistant that may or may not be his girlfriend who makes more than his LD and almost as much as his chief of staff. see his legistorm entry, if anyone is curious.

Culture of corruption, Act II.

http://www.legistorm.com/member/Hon_Alcee_Hastings/272/5.html

Jones:

She obviously is very "skilled" assisting with his staff.

My new theory is that just like Rove did not expect to lose, the Democrats did not expect to win. Being a useless minority party was easier, and rather than stressing out over governing, they'd rather be back in the minority. Or, quite simply, they are all a bunch of preaning idiots and we are fucked beyond hope.

Well, I can't fathom Pelosi's motivation in contemplating this move. But: she's batting .500, which isn't bad. Jack Murtha would be a much better choice for Majority Leader than Steny Hoyer. So I'm content to wait and see.

Is she THIS Patricia Williams?!

http://www.cocosheriff.org/wanted/williams_patricia_41306.htm

I think Pelosi resents the fact that Harman wasn't vocal enough in her opposition during the run-up to the war. You could say that about plenty of folks, though. I'm not sure that now is the time to be settling those scores, particularly since Harman has been pretty good at demonstrating the administration's alternately crass & incompetent behavior since .

Sorry, but what? Pelosi didn't have much at all to do with our win. She's batting nothing so far: this is basically a clean slate for her to introduce herself to the country. Personally, I think Murtha is enough of the patronage line of thinking. The Hastings corruption story just writes itself, and if she goes that route, it definitely WILL be placing personal allegiances over sense, party, and good strategy.

Pelosi ought to suck it up and appoint someone who will be good for the job. We just ran against George Bush. We DON'T need to emulate him by creating a court of loyal Pelosites. She's too big on herself as it is.

Harman's seem to have gotten better after facing a primary challenge: she didn't whine a la Liberman; she went out and got progressives to trust her. Plus she's been pretty tough on the Bush administration. Hastings, on the other hand, was impeached and convicted when he was a judge. Because of a personality clash, Pelosi's gonna pass over Harman for a pol with a history of corruption? Seems like an awful move to me.

no, that's not her. if i had a nexus account, i could look up and confirm what i think i remember, which is that patricia williams was also his lawyer during his impeachment hearings.

Jane Harman has bragged repeatedly about being "republican-lite." She has done a terrible job of oversight. I'm not a big Hastings supporter (or a Pelosi supporter for that matter...she has a terrible speaking style and comes off as a whiny shrew whenever she's on camera) but I can't say I'm upset that Harman is not going to continue. And I say that as someone in her district. Someone who has voted against her and will again.

Message: settling of scores is more important than your security.

There is what, a dozen effective Republican commercials there?

James Brown,

You've probably paid much closer attention to her positions than anyone else, so I can't argue with you about any of her Republican-lite bidness, but no Democrat has been in any position to do oversight, minorities that they've been.

Message: settling of scores is more important than your security.

Well, to be fair that is the exact translation of "e pluribus unum". Most people don't know that.

It is a very stupid mistake to change Harman out of the committee. If any committee called for having "institutional memory," particularly at this time it is this one.

Even though Hastings was on the committee, being the "ranking member" got you additional access. Harman is the only one to provide this insight.

Pelosi needs to get over the personal animosity, which I think stems from jealousy about Harman getting a lot of media attention. After all, prior to taking over the House, both women were likely looking to be rivals should a Senate seat come available.

Harman is a long time "Blue Dog." The new crop of freshman are heavily moderate and conservative.Harman could be a good leader of that group.

Then again, maybe Pelosi doesn't want that either.

If you say you want to do oversight, the media is going to expect you to do oversight. If the chair of one of your oversight committees is in any way unprepared, it's going to be noticed.

You know pretty much what you'll be getting with Jane Harman. If you don't get at least that much with Alcee Hastings this is a bad move, even without the ethical baggage.

Harman was pretty poor for a long time. It was hard to tell whether she was a Republican or Democrat. But in the last half year, she's gotten much better and much tougher on the administration. I agree with david mizner, a lot of the credit for that goes to her primary challenge. Harman decided that she really needed to represent the people who sent her to Congress, and I have no reason to think that she won't stay reformed.

Hastings, by contrast, is a hack. I would keep him as far from the levers of power as possible.

A terrible move by Pelosi, if that's what she's contemplating.

Blue Stater: NEITHER Murtha NOR Hoyer's a good Majoirty Leader.

Murtha as Majority Leader plus Byrd leading Senate Appropriations will have Appalachia flooded with pork.

James Brown is right on Harman. Good bye. BUT, Dems could do better than Hastings, indeed.

Harmon is horrible. THere is a reason she faced a serious primary challenge, and that is because she plays into the Harold Ford/Joe Lieberman Vichey Democrat game. She talks about how crazy the democrats are, except her, and cuddles up to the republicans. She will bad mouth democrats publically to show what a "smart sensible centrist" she is. Now that the dems are back in power, she suddenly finds religion.

She is a finger in the wind sell out who doesn't deserve a committee chairmanship. She did nothing as ranking minority member except collaoborate and provide political cover to republicans.

Ummm, Kevin, isn't Harman under federal investigation right now due to improper ties with AIPAC? Secondly, Harman used the Republican Lite thing to great advantage in her district. Prior to the 2000 census, and the redistricting, she was in a very purple leaning red district and basically bragged that she was really a Republican at heart. Sorry, but it seems that you now support Ms Republican Lite, and Mr. K-Street in Hoyer.

A critique one could make of you Kevin is that you are way too inside the beltway style even out in OC. You typically spout the DLC corporatist line. Not always, but often enough that it gets a bit depressing.

"A decision pregnant with personal animus." Unlike the decision to invade Iraq, for instance.

Harman needs a boot in the ass - she's been overtly much too comfortable with the junta.

Pork? Pffft. That's how Lieberman won his election. Bring on the new WPA. No one gives a fuck.

I'm a tad more concerned with the disppearance of Habeads Corpus and the cutting off of Comrade John Yoo at the neck.

Habeads Corpus. It's a Texas punk rock band.

The story on Hastings. It is more complicated than just impeachment. He was acquited in trial, but impeached by the House and convicted in the Senate. Fr

Senate Removes Hastings
By Ruth Marcus
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, October 21, 1989; Page A01

U.S. District Judge Alcee L. Hastings was convicted by the Senate yesterday of engaging in a "corrupt conspiracy" to extort a $150,000 bribe in a case before him, marking the first time a federal official has been impeached and removed from office for a crime he had been acquitted of by a jury.

In a solemn and tense session, the Senate voted 69 to 26 -- five votes more than needed for conviction -- to find Hastings guilty of the major charge against him and strip the 53-year-old jurist of his lifetime, $89,500-a-year position.

Hastings, Florida's first black federal trial judge, sat facing the senators as the lawmakers rose, one by one, to render their verdicts on the charge that he conspired with disbarred Washington lawyer William A. Borders Jr. to obtain the bribe.

The outcome of the proceeding -- eight years after Hastings was first accused and five years after a jury found him not guilty -- was unclear until nearly the end of the first roll call. Both the chairman, Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.), and the vice chairman, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), of the 12-member panel that heard the evidence in the case voted for acquittal. The 12 members of the panel voted 7 to 5 for conviction.

When he left the Senate after the vote on the second article of impeachment, Hastings, besieged by reporters on the Capitol steps, said, "I have no choice but to accept their judgment." But, he said, "I'm in thorough disagreement with their decision and that's all."

He said his conviction violates the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy. And he criticized the process under which only 12 of the 100 senators heard the witnesses against him. Hastings also announced his plans to open a private law practice and to run as a Democratic candidate for governor of Florida next year.

"My momma had a man," Hastings, who was named to the bench by President Jimmy Carter in 1979, said of his plans to remain in the public eye. "She did not have anybody that was afraid of the system."

The Senate, in two hours of roll calls, voted on 11 of the 17 articles of impeachment. It convicted Hastings of eight of the 11 articles, finding that he engaged in the bribery conspiracy and repeatedly lied under oath at his trial and forged letters in order to win acquittal.

Hastings was acquitted on one of the perjury charges and an umbrella count that accused him of "bringing disrepute on the federal courts" through his actions. He was unanimously cleared, by 95 to 0, of a separate charge of leaking confidential information from a wiretap that he had authorized as a judge. The Senate did not vote on six of the 17 articles because it had already decided to remove Hastings from office.

Four senators did not vote yesterday because they were members of the House when it voted 413 to 3 in August 1988 to impeach Hastings. Sen. Pete Wilson (R-Calif.) was not present. Under the Constitution, conviction required the votes of two-thirds of the senators present, or at least 64 in this case.

Shortly after noon yesterday, Senate President Pro Tempore Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.) announced the result. With Hastings convicted of eight high crimes and misdemeanors, Byrd said, "it is therefore ordered and adjudged that said Alcee L. Hastings be and he is hereby removed from office."

The vote on Hastings did not break down along ideological, regional, or other identifiable lines.

The 26 senators -- 21 Democrats and five Republicans -- who voted to acquit him of the major charge included some of the Senate's most conservative members -- William L. Armstrong (R-Colo.) and Orrin G. Hatch (R-Utah) -- and some of its most liberal -- Howard M. Metzenbaum (D-Ohio) and Alan Cranston (D-Calif.).

Sen. Warren B. Rudman (R-N.H.), a former prosecutor on the trial committee, voted for conviction and Specter, another former prosecutor on the panel, voted to acquit.

Hastings is the sixth federal official, all judges, impeached by the House and removed from office after conviction by the Senate. The case proved a particularly anguishing decision for the senators, who deliberated behind closed doors for 7 1/2 hours Thursday, because of the circumstantial nature of the evidence, the earlier jury verdict to acquit and the charges of racism.

In an eloquent plea for acquittal on the floor Wednesday, Hastings said that he did not think race was a factor in the case, and Rep. John Conyers Jr. (D-Mich.), a member of the House prosecution team, agreed. However, a number of Hastings supporters have cast the case in those terms.

The Senate found that Hastings had arranged with Borders, his close friend and a prominent Washington lawyer, to solicit a bribe from an FBI undercover agent posing as one of two brothers who were defendants in a racketeering case before Hastings. In return for the $150,000 -- $25,000 of which was given to Borders as a down payment -- Hastings was to sentence the Romano brothers to probation rather than prison and to return $845,000 in forfeited property.

There was circumstantial evidence that Hastings was part of the scheme, including a pattern of telephone calls between Hastings and Borders at key junctures in the Romano case, Borders's successful promise to an FBI agent to have Hastings turn up for dinner at the Fontainebleau Hotel at a specified time and a key, cryptic telephone conversation between Borders and Hastings that prosecutors contended was a coded discussion of the bribe arrangements.

But Hastings's lawyers argued that these actions, while seemingly suspicious, had other, innocuous explanations, and portrayed Hastings as the innocent victim of a scam perpetrated by Borders. There was no direct evidence of Hastings's participation in the conspiracy because the Federal Bureau of Investigation arrested Borders before money could be traced to Hastings.

Borders, who was convicted of the bribery conspiracy charges in a separate trial in 1982, refused to testify -- despite a grant of immunity -- before the grand jury or the House and Senate panels. He was jailed on contempt charges from Aug. 22 until yesterday for refusing to testify before the Senate committee.

Some senators said after the verdict that they found the evidence insufficient and were troubled by the earlier jury acquittal, while others took the opposite view. Senators could choose whatever standard of proof -- beyond a reasonable doubt, clear and convincing, or another measure -- they deemed appropriate.

"The facts simply led me to the inference that Judge Hastings quite clearly was involved in a scheme with Bill Borders," said Sen. Slade Gorton (R-Wash.), a member of the trial panel.

But committee Chairman Bingaman said that "the evidence, although furnishing grounds for investigation and trial, does not provide a sound basis upon which I can vote for conviction."

© Copyright 1989 The Washington Post

I'd like to see Harman out of there; she has been an apologist for misconduct by those she's charged with overseeing.

Kenneth Baer thinks that Harman is "eminently qualified" because she's a full-fledged member of the Washington Consensus, who can be counted on not to rock the boat. To me, that's a reason for saying that she is not qualified to conduct oversight.

The DLC is trying to win the internal battle for leadership of the Democrats by accusing their opponents of corruption, e.g. in Hoyer vs Murtha, as if the idea that Hoyer, Mr. K Street, is less ethically compromised than Murtha passes the laugh test (it does not). Also, Hastings was acquitted of trying to solicit a bribe, and was impeached after being acquitted. I don't know enough about that case to assess guilt.

Harman has all the wrong instincts on civil liberties. Anyone who liked the wiretap bill is not to be trusted as our tripwire on the committee.

Hastings is really smart. And he's great on civil liberties. Did I mention he's really smart?

And he's been on the committee a while, which answers the 'institutional memory' issue. AS for whatever extra access Harmon may have had -- what good did it do us?

Here is a Glenn Greenwald post that gives a glimpse into how irritating Harmon can be on matters of national security, such as the illiegal wiretappings.

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/05/helpful-democrats-run-to-bushs-rescue.html

I like Harman, and think the Democrats will suffer for the shabby way she's being treated. I mostly like what I've seen and heard from Pelosi so far, but this Harman business strikes me as very unwise.

My guess is that Pelosi is facing a LOT of pressure on this from the Black Congressional Caucus.

She had to go over their heads to remove William Jefferson from his posts after the Feds found 90,000 in his freezer. She did it anyway and with dispatch and it really sent a powerful message in contrast to the GOP and their continual stance of ignoring the rotting smell in the room from more and more of their corrupt members.

Now Alcee is pushing his seniority and demanding the spot and denying him would mean Pelosi would have to go to the mat twice with the Caucus, NOT something she wants to do right now. It's not easy being leader in times like these. Now that we've won, it will be harder to enforce party discipline. She did it well when that discipline was essential to party coherence and survival. Now that she has options, competing forces are going to be trying to have things their own way.

Interesting times ahead......

Democrats can win elections thanks to the lying media, but can't actually govern. Nothing new; '94-'00 saw Ignorant Hick Bill Clinton take credit for the hard work of a republican congress. All he had to do was show up on time for speeches and keep Slick Willy in his pants, and he couldn't even do that.

Michael Froomkin,

How does Hastings's position differ from Harman's, wrt the war & its implementation? I ask because I have absolutely no idea. I've never seen him interviewed, and I haven't read anything about his committee work. The only thing I know about him is that business of the scandal. What was his vote on the resolution granting the president authority to go to war?

I think its spurious that people criticize Harman for not providing oversight. The problem was that House Dems were not allowed any mechanism to conduct real oversight. In matters of intel, the information necessary for oversight is not readily available. On a lot of things, House Dems wouldn't find out until it was in the Times or Post. There really was little Dems could do.

In a nutshell, if you criticize House Dems for lack of oversight than you haven't been paying much attention the past several years. That does not excuse them for other things.

Withholding overall judgment on the wisdom of choosing Hastings over Harman....

... If one is to note Hastings' less-than-perfect past, is it not relevant to reference the fact that Harman is under investigation for conspiring illegally with AIPAC to secure the chairmanship?

The optics of backing Hastings over the eminently qualified Harman are horrendous..

What the hell! I have read this description 'optics' twice in two days.

Why can't they just say that it doesn't look good?

I don't know if Hastings is guilty of anything. Certainly, there was bad judgment, but if we start removing judges for that, we'd lose more than half of them, including most of Bush's appointees (think Edith Jones or most of the fifth circuit, for that matter). And I don't mean divergent legal standards--something that conservative can argue with liberals about--I mean just bad judgment.

There might have been FBI entrapment and it makes little sense that, with the trial still ongoing, they would have arrested Borders before "money could be traced to Hastings." It sounds like they had little if anything on Hastings, which is why they lost the trial.

On the other hand, irrespectively of the possible entrapment, Hastings did something that a judge should not have. What's puzzling in this is that he was acquitted by the Senate of the most sensible charge--bringing ill repute--while being convicted on other charges. It would almost make sense for the Senate to go the other way and censure him while keeping him on the bench. But that did not happen.

Hastings got his payback in getting elected. That's fine. Bob Ney stayed in office as long as he could--and he's been convicted. But there are two issues to consider here. First, does it make sense to elevate the No. 2 over the No. 1 just to please the Black Caucus. Second, does it make sense to elevate someone convicted for bribery (although not under criminal standards) to the chair of the Intelligence Comm?

Having said this, Harman has her own problems. AIPAC is a group the Left radicals love to hate. And Harman is certainly connected to it. This gives the Black Caucus another weapon--and given the number of anti-Semites there, they are not going to sit on it.

Overall, I would have preferred Harman, since she has been at most accused and of a relatively minor violation compared to Hastings's. But something else bothers me.

How could Dems bring in Mollohan, Murtha and Harman OR Hastings as committee chairmen given the nature of the last elections? Then we have Murtha and Hoyer contesting for the Majority leadership position--two ultra-porkers in the House and the worst on the Dem side. If this is what it takes to rise and persevere in the Dem leadership, we've got problems. Not the GOP-size problems, but still, ethics is an issue.

If they figure all this to be resolved by '08, I hope they are right. If not, it's going to be another blodbath.

For the trolls' benefit--I may complain about ethics issues on the Dem side, but they are not even in the same league as the bribery-ridden GOP House leadership, including virtually all Repubes on the House Intelligence Comm. One former chair is in jail, another soon to be. DeLay is already selling his furniture to pay for his legal expenses--not enough, he's going to see bars for a while.

American Hawk would be right, if he wasn't so wrong. About everything. Always.

Harman is "in bed" with AIPAC and is being investigated accordingly (has a date been announced in the trail of the AIPAC 2?).

How could she have provided oversight on pre-War WMD when she would have to oppose the NeoConservative position (pro-Israel) on Iraq? (She did not!?).

Ditch her and give someone fresh a chance.

It seems odd that most of the Anti-AIPAC legislators are African American (remember C. McKinney and what happened to her?. Even if you did not agree with her bizarre behaviour, you must admit that she got "Wacked" by AIPAC two elections ago (this time around she shot herself in the foot).

Over 23,000 injured and dead deserve a true inquiry into the lies that led to this war. Harman can not provide this since she was part of the gang that led us into the war.

No clue about the charges and countercharges or the reasoning behind all these moves, but Harman was portrayed as knowledgeable and "serious" on national security. Getting rid of her will likely support the opposite story line in the media

the thing about hastings is, he's also the president of the parliamentary assembly of the OSCE. and a reasonably suspected bribe-taker who has a friend on the house payroll for a ridiculous sum of money. so he's in touch with europe's most powerful and wealthiest security structures, he's got bad judgment when it comes to, well, issues of bribery, and he certainly has a lot to explain about his current house payroll. is this a man you want in charge of secrets? consider how easily this guy could be leveraged by a foreign government!

Wasnt Harman one of the few members of the Dems who was briefed on the wiretapping scheme? As I recall I think she is one of 4. Now, Daschle filed a letter voicing his objection (which may or may not have been enough).

But my recollection is that Harman didnt even object to it. That isnt oversight.

I wouldnt doubt it if this is the sole reason given. and it should probably be enough.

and the AIPAC thing...

was impeached and convicted when he was a judge…. david mizner at 6:11 PM "
Not completely accurate. Hastings was a Florida federal judge who was indicted for extortion and bribery and was found not guilty by a jury. A judicial panel then recommended his removal from the bench, which, for a federal judge means impeachment in the House and trial in the Senate. Hastings was convicted by the Senate in 1989 and removed from the bench, whereupon he ran for Congress and won.
Hastings filed suit in federal court claiming that his impeachment trial was invalid because he was tried by a Senate committee, not in front of the full Senate, and that he had been acquitted in a criminal trial. Judge Stanley Sporkin ruled in favor of Hastings, remanding the case back to the Senate, but stayed his ruling pending the outcome of an appeal to the Supreme Court in a similar case regarding Judge Walter Nixon, who had also been impeached and removed.
Sporkin found some "crucial distinctions"[2] between Nixon's case and Hastings', specifically, that Nixon had been convicted criminally, and that Hastings was not found guilty by two-thirds of the committee who actually "tried" his impeachment in the Senate. He further added that Hastings had a right to trial by the full Senate.
The Supreme Court, however, ruled that the federal courts have no jurisdiction over Senate impeachment matters, and Sporkin's ruling was vacated, and Hastings' conviction and removal were upheld.

If the Congressional Black Caucus wants him, that's fine with me. They have 40 seats and deserve a chair or two.
Jane Harman does have close ties to AIPAC and its Bush administration supporters

This is such a non-issue that it isn't even funny. Now that the Democrats actually have the opportunity to put people in charge of things, this is what the media wants to do? Nitpick and attack the choices that are out there?

Didn't we just get rid of the Delay/Cunningham/Ney/Foley/Hayworth Congress? And Hastings is supposed to be worse than any of those clowns? How about this-if Hastings actually does a shitty job, fire him. See, that's a huge difference between a Democratic Congress and a Republican Congress. If Hastings can't do the job, fire him. The Republicans? They live and breathe the Peter Principle and reward failure and craven greed.

Please. Wake me when there's a real issue.

Hastings and Harman are both tainted and have ZERO national security experience. (I don't like the "I read policy papers and books" credentialing that is accepted practice on matters of national security.) Pelosi should appoint Robert "Bud" Cramer (AL), a former army tank officer or Leonard Boswell (IA), a retired army LtCol, who was an artillery officer and aviator. I know they are relatively unknown, but at least they have military experience and are not tainted by probity (Hastings) or perfidy (Harman) concerns. Hastings had a crook's reputation before being elected to congress as a result of his impeachment (House) and conviction (Senate). And the only thing positive I can say about Hastings regarding his tax-payer financed relationship to his female staffer, is at least he's not running around claiming to be against heterosexuality whilst engaging in it--the opposite of anti-gay marriage homo David Drier (R-CA) who is financing his gay relationship with public funds. (Drier's chief-of-staff and, ahem, "roommate" is(or was)the highest paid staffer in congress. As for Harman, her support of the war ( boosted by Likudite types such as Wolfowitz, Feith and Kristol)and closeness to American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) makes her suspect in my eyes.

ABSCAM-MURTHA FOR MAJORITY LEADER; BRIBED-THEN-IMPEACHED HASTINGS AS INTELLIGENCE CHAIR.

PELOSI'S REALLY FIXED THE ETHICS PROBLEM, ER, UH, NOT.

Can you say in '08: President: Four more; Congress: two and out.

TOH

Is there a downside to her work I'm not familiar with?

When it comes to raking in the cash of special interests, she kicks the shit outta Hastings:

CAREER PROFILE (SINCE 1989)
Jane Harman
1989-2006 Total Receipts: $10,323,528
1989-2006 Total Spent: $10,024,171
Debts: $0
Date of last report: October 18, 2006

CAREER PROFILE (SINCE 1989)
Alcee L. Hastings
1989-2006 Total Receipts: $3,124,260
1989-2006 Total Spent: $3,099,103
Debts: $0
Date of last report: October 18, 2006

JANE HARMAN: CAREER PROFILE (SINCE 1989)
Top Industries
1 Lawyers/Law Firms $693,246
2 Women's Issues $512,293
3 TV/Movies/Music $415,461
4 Securities & Investment $356,950
5 Real Estate $351,647
6 Defense Electronics $282,999
7 Pro-Israel $276,938
8 Defense Aerospace $264,134
9 Retired $213,758
10 Industrial Unions $212,382

ALCEE L. HASTINGS: CAREER PROFILE (SINCE 1989)
Top Industries
1 Lawyers/Law Firms $371,845
2 Crop Production & Basic Processing $157,010
3 Public Sector Unions $144,090
4 Transportation Unions $120,700
5 Industrial Unions $118,500
6 Health Professionals $106,800
7 Pro-Israel $106,200
8 Real Estate $99,200
9 Retired $89,365
10 Misc Business $84,825

JANE HARMAN: CAREER PROFILE (SINCE 1989)
Top Contributors
1 EMILY's List $158,123
2 Northrop Grumman $154,749
3 Jones, Day et al $130,500
4 Boeing Co $107,499
5 General Motors $82,650
6 Lockheed Martin $72,350
7 Carpenters & Joiners Union $61,000
8 Walt Disney Co $53,750
9 Loral Space & Communications $52,750
10 Human Rights Campaign $52,525

LCEE L. HASTINGS: CAREER PROFILE (SINCE 1989)
Top Contributors
1 Machinists/Aerospace Workers Union $44,500
1 Teamsters Union $44,500
3 American Fedn of St/Cnty/Munic Employees $43,000
4 BellSouth Corp $41,000
5 Flo-Sun Inc $37,600
6 Laborers Union $36,500
7 Intl Brotherhood of Electrical Workers $30,500
8 National Assn of Realtors $29,600
9 National Education Assn $29,500
10 Service Employees International Union $29,000

>>>© Copyright 1989 The Washington Post

Posted by: exhuming mccarthy on November 14, 2006

Ditto on the beyond fair use of stealing work. Links are much better in any case for scrollibility (though not in this case, I don't think, being 1989, in which case it's theft - again)

Defense: Harman vs Hasting

Harman: $282,999 + $264,134
HASTINGS: $0

Hastings is not beholden to the defense industries which on the one side of their mouth suck on the teats of the American govt with ferocity and on the other side deride `big government'.

All American politics is flavored by one deliberately ignored fact:

That GW Bush is a JEW.

Till you realize this, you don't know nothin about US politics.

Here are 30 or so pictures of GW Bush, and cohorts, having fun with rabbis, etc,....

Bush is a Jew.

http://linux.coconia.net/politics/bush-jews.htm
http://linux.coconia.net/politics/bush-jews-pix.htm (just the photos)

I like those photos of Bush wearing a Yarmulke (skullcap),... and praying at the Wailing Wall,...

I like Jane Harman, but Nancy Pelosi is calling the shots, and that's the way that goes. As for this conservocrud remark:

>>> Culture of corruption, Act II.

What makes it corruption, Jeffery? It's an exercise of power which, I realize, after the last 12 years of a Republican-controlled House, conservatives simply assume is accompanied by payola. But there's no payola here, and there's no nepotism and no cronyism. There is simply preference. And that alone ain't corruption.

Fascinating thread. I know very little about Hastings, but I'm finding out fast.

I can't forgive Harman for her disgusting lack of oversight, though--she was a HUGE Bush enabler mere months ago, before three ghosts visited her in the night and she woke up a changed woman.

For what it's worth, during an online chat yesterday, Washington Post reporter Shailagh Murray had this to say about Pelosi's possible choice of Hastings:

Shailagh Murray: She will not select Hastings. He can't do intel and keep his seat on rules, and he won't want to give up rules. My understanding is that she is looking at Silvetre Reyes of Texas for the intel job.

I hope Murray's sources are accurate.

six years of presidency and that is what you come up with as a bad thing
Posted by: USPolitics on November 14, 2006 at 7:46 PM | PERMALINK

eww
you are gross

Wow, it didn't take long for the anti-Semitic wing of the Democrat party to come out of hiding. Usually it's a bit more veiled. The next two years is going to be fun!

Oh my god that going to pass over that female clone of joe lieberman for a nigger!

Oh my god that bitch pelosi is going to pass over that female clone of lieberman for a nigger.

There fixed it

Choosing Hastings would be a big mistake, similar to Clinton's gays in the military fiasco. Hastings may be a fine person, or he may be a lying crook, but either way it doesn't make any difference. His appointment will be used by the Noise Machine to bash Democrats on one of the issues were they are currently well ahead of the Republicans. We don't need that now. Maybe after the Dems have had a few months to prove what they can do. But not now. Not as one of the first actions of the new Democratic congress.

aa

I don't know whether Hastings is the man, but I don't want to put another important committee chairmanship in the hands of a hawk's hawk like Harman. That's the lie-down-and-get-whipped Democratic Party of yore. We were right on Iraq, we have a better view of the world and how to stay safe and powerful in it, and we should not fear to chair security-related committees with persons who have a smarter and less testosterone-driven (or testosterone-imitation-driven, as the case may be) outlook on security matters.

Yes, the "optics" of going over Harman's head are bad, but we should just take the short-term hit--it will be a tiny one because this is inside baseball stuff--and move forward with governance our Party believes in.

Hastings and Harman are both of them tainted goods: Hastings personally and Harman professionally. Pelosi will have her staff looking for excuses not to promote Hastings and will give the job to Silvestre Reyes. She won't need an excuse to fire Harman because she's already got one: Harman's time on the committee is up. And the press will congratulate itself for having helped narrowly avert a horrible crisis. The Congressional Black Caucus will get some other chair or other kind of tradeoff, the newly Democratic House will still have its rainbow leadership, and everybody will be happy.

Boy, Democrats really have forgotten what it's like to run things if this gets people in a tizzy.

Congrats on the election.
Good luck with the impeached judge running a committee.
That won't be an easy enough target for the next election cycle.
Could you please give the Republicans a pedophile to target?

Thanks.

Follow the money. I'm a liberal democrat. I make no apologies for that fact. I would rather have someone who took union money than someone who took defense industry money.

As for all those folks who have their own extra-special secret someone to recommend: This ain't Burger King. You're not going to get it your way.

If you want random representative X to be the next chair of the intel committee, get elected, win the house for the Dems, then choose yourself. In the meantime STFU. Pick the (limited number of) issues you REALLY care about and see if Pelosi delivers. Then make your decision.

Sorry Inigo, I heard the pedophiles are all caucusing with the Republicans. Along with the wife-beaters.

If KD desn't scrub your comment,klyde,let me tll you how gross that is.And ignorant.

Hastings has been in Congress since 1990(?) with nothing untoward averred. Tough crowd if all there is gainst is a 20 year old acquittal.

Now now, Adam. Foley wasn't technically a pedophile. The age of consent in DC is 16. He wasn't IM-ing anyone younger than that. That we know of.

Steve >"...I hope Murray's sources are accurate."

Ya know that DOES sound like something a very savvy political type (Grandma Speaker) would do to flush out the real competition (the rats in ones own woodwork) and to work a deal that satisfies the largest number of people. Even a score (Harman gone), let personal ego work (Hastings declines so as to stay on Rules) and end up with a good solid team.

Defying the conventional "wisdom" to keep things unsettled & thereby complicate counterattack strategy.

Nice !

No matter what, we`ll see change...

"For to win one hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is the acme of skill" - Sun Tzu

Impeach: Has anyone searched his (Foley's) House computer? I'm sure one could think of a reason. I would be curious to see what lurks in the internet cache.

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Someone has to hack off Pat Roberts balls with a rusty blunt old lawnmower blade - so its probably best if a man does it. Jane might Harm-them, get it. Harm -em!

Now for some background :

"Congressman Silvestre Reyes, now in his fifth term, became the first Hispanic to represent the 16th District of Texas in the U.S. House of Representatives in 1996.

The 16th District of Texas includes the City of El Paso and surrounding communities and lies within the El Paso County boundary. It is located at the westernmost tip of Texas along the Rio Grande River and across from El Paso’s sister city of Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua, Mexico. El Paso and Ciudad Juárez comprise the largest border community in the United States.

After serving his country in Vietnam, Reyes decided to devote his life to public service. In 1969, he began his career with the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in the U.S. Border Patrol. After serving as an agent..."

Hmmm, could be a lot worse IMO & might be REAL interesting

"There is nothing more difficult to take in hand, more perilous to conduct, or more uncertain in its success, than to take the lead in the introduction of a new order of things." - Niccoló Machiavelli

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Wow, it didn't take long for the anti-Semitic wing of the Democrat party to come out of hiding.

Now, if you seriously believed that everything posted here, on a forum wide open to everyone from Chinese spammers, to white supremacists, to average Dems, to jingo-douchebags like yourself, is a reflection of the beliefs of the Democratic Party, then you're just a simple-minded fool. Of course you don't believe that, though. So, you're just a dick.

I don't care if Hastings gets the position, but Harman needs to go. Posts that say she couldn't do oversight because she was shut out by the repiglicans are hogwash. The facts about Iraq's pitiful army, lack of WMD, overt hostility to Al Qaeda, etc. were well known by anyone who had Net access or knew of Scott Ritter. On the Intel committee she would have had access to the state dept analysis of how bad the aftermath of an invasion would be, but she said nothing. There is no excuse for supporting the invasion as the ranking member of the intelligence community. The Wash post inuendo about personal animosity between Harman and Pelosi is just an ugly rumor.

Beyond_Left

Pale Rider
Didn't we just get rid of the Delay/Cunningham/Ney/Foley/Hayworth Congress? And Hastings is supposed to be worse than any of those clowns? How about this-if Hastings actually does a shitty job, fire him.

How about he would never, ever in a million years get a security clearance, much less a top secret one, with his background? Why does he want to be in intel? Let him run some committee where corruption doesn't impact our nation's security quite so directly.

Harman's tenure is up. It's a select committee, without seniority, and she's served the maximum time one is allowed to serve.
Why are people making a federal case out of this? Is it 'cos he Black?

I think I heard Lawrence O'Donnell say that Pelosi will skip over Hastings and choose a Hispanic.

Now, if you seriously believed that everything posted here, on a forum wide open to everyone from Chinese spammers, to white supremacists, to average Dems, to jingo-douchebags like yourself, is a reflection of the beliefs of the Democratic Party, then you're just a simple-minded fool. Of course you don't believe that, though. So, you're just a dick.

A perfectly constructed and calibrated post! Bwa!

Why are people making a federal case out of this? Is it 'cos he Black?

He was a federal judge who was impeached and convicted for accepting bribes.

I think I heard Lawrence O'Donnell say that Pelosi will skip over Hastings and choose a Jew.

Kevin, is this the troll flypaper thread?

Rahm's decision to allow Clyburn to take the number three slot opened the way for Pelosi to appoint Silvestre Reyes as chair of House Intelligence.

This has been widely reported, yet your post ignored these facts.

Red State Mike >"...How about he would never, ever in a million years get a security clearance, much less a top secret one, with his background? Why does he want to be in intel?..."

He is already on the committee...

"...Congressman Hastings is a member of the powerful House Rules Committee and is a senior Member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI). On the HPSCI, Hastings is the Ranking Democratic Member of the Subcommittee on Terrorism and Homeland Security. The Terrorism Subcommittee is the primary committee in Congress which has direct oversight of the programs and activities of the intelligence community that relate to U.S. homeland security and to counterterrorism, including capabilities, resources, policies and procedures..."

"The future will be a struggle between huge competing systems of psychopathology." - J. G. Ballard

How about he would never, ever in a million years get a security clearance, much less a top secret one, with his background? Why does he want to be in intel? Let him run some committee where corruption doesn't impact our nation's security quite so directly.

It's not clear whether they would or wouldn't clear him for the information that he would have access to. There are quite a few politicians from both sides of the aisle that probably should not be cleared--oh, and among government advisers who are privy to the most sensitive information, I cannot figure out why Karl Rove comes to mind (seriously-I don't know why)

Last time I checked, the Republican Party doesn't have a say in who gets to be what committee chairman because they lost the election. And you, Mr. Main Stream Media out there-thanks for beating that tired old drum about how "The Democrats don't have a plan" and
"The Democrats don't have any ideas." You were such a big help.

The standard should be, if a chairman does a bad job, fire that chairman and get someone else. Until then, too bad if the media or the other side doesn't like it. The Democrats get to run the show now. Don't like what they do? I suspect they'll get voted out.

daC -

Thanks. Obviously, he has been cleared already.

I don't trust Harmon. After her passive, even timid, approach to the NSA wiretap scandal I have no confidence in her willingness to stand up to the President. It's almost like he has something on her.

I know he's on the committee, and the voters in his district hired him for the job of congressman, not the democratic party. I voted democrat in this past election for Casey over Santorum, and for a state rep too. I did it partly because of the corruption. Putting Hastings in charge sends me and others like me (and there are others, else the repubs would still be in charge) the WRONG message. I get a say in who runs what because I'm a voter. And putting bribe-taking cheats on top committee positions tells me I voted wrong.

To be clear, what I meant be not getting a clearance is a normal person would not get one with that record.

Mike

You voted Democratic? Wow!!! who knew?

Hastings was impeached by the house and convicted by the senate. He was acquited on the criminal charges. He was then elected to the house and has served in the house since. I would imagine that as number two democrat on the intelligence committee he has been cleared in spades. Remember for the last dozen years the Republicans have controlled the house, so I doubt they didn't have a full chance to purge all the bad Democratic apples.

To be clear, what I meant be not getting a clearance is a normal person would not get one with that record.

You're right; but there's also another standard that has been overlooked.

Hastings was elected to Congress, despite his ethical lapses. And again and again and just recently, elected again.

The voters will throw him out of office if he doesn't do the job; I hope Pelosi fires him if he screws up.

What's also true is that Pelosi's worst critics aren't going to be found in the wingnut crowd, the Republican Party where wingnuttia and conservatism don't always intersect, and the media. They're gonna be found on the left. There isn't going to be anymore of this blind allegiance to someone because they're from the same party. There better be oversight and there better be acountability, or Pelosi will get fired, too.

I believe Jane Harman is an HIV-poisitve syphillitic hermaphrodite with Hepatitis B and shingles.

Now go back and read over all these comments once again, and you will understand why so many Republicans believe that the Democratic majority in Congress will be short-lived.

Hastings was elected to Congress, despite his ethical lapses. And again and again and just recently, elected again.

The voters will throw him out of office if he doesn't do the job...

Not likely. Hastings has one of the safest seats for a Democrat in Congress; a beautiful gerrymander that takes in nearly every black resident of South Florida from Liberty City to Belle Glade.

I would love to see Harman taken off the Intelligence Committee. Intelligence, like many of the house committees that concern defense and military issues, is a "captive" committee. The members usually have long histories of insider relations and generally perform the same role as the politburo did for Brezhnev.

The intelligence services will not permit a real watchdog to chair a committee like that. Pelosi will have to pick some one that the intelligence services trust. That would rule out Hastings.

Harman is just not the kind of congressperson who any of us would look to as a leader. She is horrible on TV. She has the typical Democratic inability to say anything intelligible to the average viewer, or anything that isn't rife with equivocation.

I specifically recall an MTP appearance where she was asked to defend John Kerry. Everytim Timmeh and the Republican (I think it was Safire) savaged Kerry with some bullshit allegation (e.g., Kerry voted to gut the intelligence services), Harman's response was to shrug and say that she wasn't really familiar with Kerry's votes.

I have absolutely hated her ever since. I do not want to see her as a regular on the talking head shows representing "the Democrats." We cannot count on her.

Either way, I'm all for changing things up. Neither Hoyer nor Harmann did us any good back in 2002 and 2003 when Bush was getting us into the Iraq War. Pelosi shouldn't emulate Bush by rewarding their failures with keeping their leadership positions. Replacing Hoyer and Harmann are exactly the right things to do, not only to show that she's going to get the US out of the godforsaken disaster that Iraq has become, but that she's not going to wait around for another two years to do it.
,

I am going with Harmon. I looked up the bio of Hastings, I remember Harman talking now and then, she is smart and impressive.

I do not begrudge any early support she gave to the Iraq war, remember, before Rummy took over, even the Iraqis welcomed the invasion.

On last Sunday's McLaughlin Group, Lawrence O'Donnell's "Prediction" was that if Pelosi chose Hastings, the Dems would lose the house in two years.

Pretty strong words I thought.

1) Shoot the trolls!

2) I am tired of anti-Semitic bullshit on this thread. For some reason, it attracted the trolls both from the extreme Left and from the Right--fascist all.

FYI: AIPAC = pro-Israel; Neocon not= pro-Israel

It is quite annoying when some Nazi muffin keeps posting the myth that Neocons are pro-Israel Jews. Yes, there is a number of Jews in the Neocon crowd, but by focusing on them you're ignoring all the major players.

More importantly, the Neocon cabal, with its HQ in the White House pushed for invasion of Iraq over the direct objections of Israel. Israeli intelligence focused on Iran all along and thought making a mess of Iraq would be a bad idea. The claim that invasion of Iraq was either Israeli idea or somehow benefitted Israel is a lie.

Harman's connection to AIPAC has nothing to do with Neocons. Her cozyness with the defense industry (note Grumman, Boeing, Lockheed) is more troubling. But one should consider what came first--being the ranked member on the intelligence committee or the defense industry money? Would it not make sense for the Big D to donate to the people who are responsible for their bread-and-butter projects? Does that necessarily make them beholden?

This certainly was the case for Duke Cunningham, Lewis, etc., but their bribery came from minor players who angled to split Pentagon overhead with the Repubes over relatively minor projects (a few mil here and there). These were fly-by-nighters, not the Big D. Grumman, Boeing and Lockheed are going to run a scam, they are not going to buy congressmen. They can do far better by getting favorable procurement officers.

So, the bottom line is, I would not be ready to claim off the top that Harman is tainted by the Big D. If she's been too cozy with AIPAC, she should be barred from chairmanship.

Hastings is a headache no matter how you slice it. The Black Caucus has threatened to throw a stink if he's not selected. I doubt this will stop Pelosi--what are they going to do? Caucus with the Southern Republicans? They don't scare anybody, especially when they try extortion. Persuation would work so much better, particularly if it were well reasoned.

Perhaps the other reports are right and the chair will go to someone else. That won't placate BC--their demand is Hastings, not "not Harman". It also will not resolve other headaches--Mollohan and Murtha are up for committee chairmanships, as well as Murtha and Hoyer contesting for the Majority Leader. None of these four should be given the light of day, given their record with shadowy supporters (Mollohan), excessive earmarking (Murtha) and connections to lobbyists (Hoyer)--all things why Repubes got dumped. Interestingly, Repubes got wise (finally!) and dumped Lewis, who will no longer be ranking member on the committee. It's a day late and a dollar short (or a few million short, if Lewis is anything as efficient as the Dukester), but at least it's done. Mollohan, as well as a dozen Republicans (only half of whom are still in Congress) are still under investigations. Murtha is being investigated as well, but that one's half-hearted since the allegations are not as juicy.

Pelosi is making a big mistake by promoting ethically tainted senior congressmen. If she nixed both Harman and Hastings, she'd be showing some strategic acumen that is long-term, for a change.

buck turgidson "2) I am tired of anti-JEWISH bullshit on this thread."

Really, are you? What anti-JEWISH bullshit? Do you mean this:

Bush is a JEW.

Here are 30 or so pictures of GW Bush, and cohorts, having fun with rabbis, etc,....

Bush is a Jew.

http://linux.coconia.net/politics/bush-jews.htm
http://linux.coconia.net/politics/bush-jews-pix.htm (just the photos)

I like those photos of Bush wearing a Yarmulke (skullcap),... and praying at the Wailing Wall,...

This cannot be anti-JEWISH bullshit. It can only be true or false.

Unless you can argue otherwise, the photos strongly indicate that Bush is a religious Jew.

Unless you can argue otherwise, the photos strongly indicate that Bush is a religious Jew.
Posted by: BushAReligiousJew

Bush also wears cowboy costumes. Does that mean he can rope a calf?

Noisy bigot guy:

Is this what keeps you up at night? That Bush is a religious Jew??

Retard.

IMPRESSIONS: HARMAN was truly competent (last two years I saw)-I like her because it should not be a true partisan position- Hastings could be intersting- he is very well spoken - so I like the Californian- HOWEVER-the impeachments shots are below the belt-I am still waiting on evidence impugning his integrity and sorry, "associations" does not cut it.

Can anyone supply evidence for Harmon's expressing outrage about the doings of the past six years"?

IMPRESSIONS: HARMAN was truly competent (last two years I saw)-I like her because it should not be a true partisan position- Hastings could be intersting- he is very well spoken - so I like the Californian- HOWEVER-the impeachments shots are below the belt-I am still waiting on evidence impugning his integrity and sorry, "associations" does not cut it.

Pelosi is making a big mistake by promoting ethically tainted senior congressmen.

Your gibberish shows that beyond a doubt you have no clue how the actual world of politics functions beyond some cartoon based images inside your head

Harman was responsible for the release of much of the information that Repubes would have preferred to have kept under wraps--not classified material, mind you, just reports and other info that was slated for release. The big one was the Duke Cunningham report that she pushed out the door just before the elections, much to the dismay of Duncan Hunter.

Harmon's time on the committee has expired. She has served the limit of 8 years and was schedule to lose her spot on the intel committee. Harmon and AIPAC decided to get together to pressure Pelosi to allow her to remain on the committee. This may or may not have been illegal but there is an FBI investigation of Harmon. Harmon blew the pre invasion intel, kept mum on the secret spying program and only this year found religion due to a primary challenge. She is in the pocket of the defense/aerospace industry. Keeping her on the committee requires Pelosi to change the rules.

The best call politically as well as operationally is Reyes.

I think you're missing the point of 1) the election, and 2) the role of Democrats on committees when the Republican majority refuses to perform their Constitutionally required job of oversight.

Up until very recently (like the last month), Harman has been in lock-step with this White House on the war in Iraq. Yes, she is in bed with AIPAC, and she supports a foreign policy that arrogantly believes that America has the right to do whatever we damned well please to other nations. Preemptively strike at our whim. Sometimes when I'm listening to Harman, I swear she's a throwback to the 1960s, ghting to keep us in Viet Nam.

Harman made George W. Bush's and Dick Cheney's lives one hell of a lot easier by carrying the administration's water on Iraq.

This election was a denunciation of America's foreign policy. The American people have been kept in the dark for decades about what we've been doing around the world clandestinely that has led to people strapping bombs on their bodies and taking themselves out along with everyone around them.

September 11th got our attention, and we're realizing, slowly, that we are responsible for what our elected officials are doing to others in our names. That's what's going to be changing in the coming years - Americans are waking up to the fact that who we are isn't who we've thought we are in the eyes of the rest of the world. Just listen to today's Hardball, Matthews's interview of Duncan Hunter. Hunter actually compared (and defended) our staying in Iraq to U.S. involvement in El Salvador, and Matthews agreed with him! It doesn't get more shameful, being an American, than that.

That's the real war we're going to be fighting in the U.S., and it just may be that that is what those new prisons that Bush-Cheney got KBR to build here in the U.S. I can't think of any other reason for Public Law 109-364, aka "John Warner Authorization Act of 2007" (H.R. 5122)(2), signed by Bush 10/17/06 in a "private Oval Office ceremony.

Remember, it's Duncan Hunter who got the post of inspector general for Iraq reconstruction eliminated in the conference bill. But Matthews didn't take this opportunity to ask Hunter about that.

There are some dark days ahead for us, and not because of threats from Al Qaeda or Osama Bin Laden. Threats from our own "homegrown" despots. The "Jane Harmans" in our party, who are only too eager to "work in a bipartisan fashion" with the fascist neocons in the Executive branch have to be moved to the side, to make room for those Democrats who are ready, willing and able to protect and defend the Constitution of the U.S., from all threats, foreign and domestic.

Question -- why was there an impeachment after exoneration by jury? Who led the impeachment effot in the House?

Is the Hastings appointment possibly payback for the support the Congressional Black Caucus gave to Clinton during his impeachment?

Has the head of the intelligence committee ever been a minority?

This is a big, big mistake. What is Pelosi thinking? Is she so petty that she would let an impeached judge chair an important committee? Hastings is...unimpressive. Bad start for the new Speaker.

Wow. I expected a counteratttack by the Mellon-Scaife Radical Counter-Blogging Project after the election, but must admit I did not anticipate a s#1t storm this bad. Are any of the high-quality commenters here anymore? Did it only take one week of unrelenting Radical trolling to shut this speakers' corner down?

Kevin - much as it pains me you may have to consider going to registration for comments.

Cranky

Pelosi should bypass Hastings - Hell, the Pubs threw seniority out the window when it suited them.

However, Harmon showed her "intelligence?" on Crossfire in 04 - She was on with the typical Pub cheerleader for the war - Carville was tearing into him, when Harman piped up that, "but, Saddam wouldn't let the inspectors in"
Carville turned red, started coughing and yelled at her, "He did what?" She just sat there very quietly and wouldn't respond - The Pub loved it. Yeah, she carried Huge Gallons of water for Shrub - It would take thousands of pills of Lasix to reduce her Shrub water retention. She is very bloated.

Hastings has seniority on Harman. Harman is ranking member of the intelligence committee. Hastings is a leader of the black caucus. Harman is a potential political opponent. Hastings was impeached, but not of the serious charges, was not given a vote of the full Senate and was acquitted in a criminal trial. An interesting exercise in political calculus, but not clear cut either way.

To avert attention from their crookedness they will now do their utmost to get the US Army to surrender to Al-Quada.

Hey, that was Norman's line, you jerk. At least come up with your own material before you put this crap out there.

Democrats may feel there are reasons to be against Harmon but giving the chairmanship to Hastings is crazy.

If the Dems want to be taken seriously on national security (let alone ethics), then putting a judge impeached by the Senate for bribery in charge of overseeing our nation's intelligence services is an odd way to start.

FYI: AIPAC = pro-Israel;

True

Neocon not= pro-Israel

Er, wrong, at least insofar as by "Neocon" one is referring to the PNAC crowd that is the primary source of neoconservative influence on the present administration, which is openly very pro-Israel, not merely in the abstract sense of wanting what is good for Israel, but in the concrete sense of endorsing US material support for the most controversial actions and hardlines stances of the Israeli government when there is debate on the issue.

Kevin, why are you buying Kenny Baer's analysis of this move as motivated by personal animus between Pelosi and Harman? In September 2005 the Post had an article that previewed this Harman/Hastings dilemma, which is completely a result of seniority politics:

Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has told colleagues she plans to replace Harman with Rep. Alcee L. Hastings (D-Fla.) when the 110th Congress convenes in January 2007, assuming all three members are reelected next year. Hastings, the committee's next-most-senior Democrat, is African American, and the Congressional Black Caucus strongly backs his claim on the post. The CBC is an influential player in Pelosi's 202-member Democratic caucus, and its members are sensitive on this issue. They remember that black lawmaker Sanford Bishop (D-Ga.) lost his January 2003 bid to be the intelligence committee's ranking Democrat when Pelosi gave the post to Harman. Bishop and his allies said he had greater seniority, noting that Harman had quit the House in 1998 to run unsuccessfully for governor. But Democratic leaders, in persuading Harman to reclaim her seat in 2000, had restored her committee seniority.

Bishop was placated with a coveted spot on the Appropriations Committee, but black Democrats do not want to be passed over again.

"More importantly, the Neocon cabal, with its HQ in the White House pushed for invasion of Iraq over the direct objections of Israel. Israeli intelligence focused on Iran all along and thought making a mess of Iraq would be a bad idea. The claim that invasion of Iraq was either Israeli idea or somehow benefitted Israel is a lie."

Your statement is essentially true, but that proves just how arrogant those Jewish neocons are. I lived in NYC during 9/11 and I remember a poll conducted by the NY Times of Jews regarding invading Iraq and a large majority was opposed. I asked myself what those neocons would make of that. Would they consider the respondents self-haters, inveterate Democrats who refuse to support a Republican administration, what? Imagine, if the people who obstensibly care most about Israel's security (with the exception of evangelicals, who only see Jews and Israel as necessary so "Christians" can get into heaven--Jews are on their own, apparently)thought attacking Iraq was a bad idea, where did those Jewish neocons get off with their grandiose, ill-informed opinions? Syria, Iran and Saudi Arabia are more of a danger to Israel than Iraq was. But hose war-mongering Jewish noecon--who, by the way served in neither the U.S. or Israel's military) were bent on advancing their bellicose ideas. I HATE them because of their insolence, callousness and cowardice. They love war, stating with phony sobriety, thatit it is often necessary, but NO military service for them. Just powerful CIVILIAN positions that influence the levers of power. Or like Bill Kristol, penning or spouting intellectually dishonest arguments from the safety of the U.S. Even Israeli peaceniks whether they are politicians or activists served in their country's military. Here, in the U.S. we get David Brooks, Fredrick, Lawrence and Donald Kagan, Martin Peretz, Richard Perele and on and on. I don't think there is a minute of military service among them.

Of course we also have Dick Cheney, Chris Shays (a conscientious objector during 'Nam, but the bar was set, oh, sooo low for Iraq 2) and the entire House and Senate GOP leadership is also rife with combat avoiers and draft dodgers.

Oh, good point on Reyes. i forgot about him. He is a Vietnam vet (thus "real" national security experience)and ranked third on the Intel committee, so he'd be a good choice. I haven't heard of any ethical problems (though all members have some).

I don't care mouch about the optics of backing Harmon over Hastings; I care about the effectiveness of our intelligence agencies. At the moment, they suck.

Alcee Hastings is not the person to make them better. Of course, there's no way to tie some disaster to a particular House committee chariman.

Nevertheless, IMHO Hastings' appointment will probably lead his to weaker intelligence, which will lead to American deaths.

Hey, that was Norman's line, you jerk. At least come up with your own material before you put this crap out there.

Trolls plagiarizing parody trolls ... where will it all end?

Ugh, can't Pelosi bypass BOTH Harman and Hastings? Who's number three on the list?

I am only guessing, but I wonder, since both are from California, if Pelosi's bid to slap Harman down isn't a preemptive strike against a future primary opponent for governor or senate.

Just a thought.

Politically, having Hastings be the replacement for chair is just plain dumb, dumb, dumb. I know, I know, Hastings was aquitted by a jury, but that won't mean squat when Republicans start running campaign ads in the next cycle.

Self-important pundits who use "optics" when they mean "appearance" aren't impressing anyone but themselves. An actual journalist would investigate and report on the right wing smear of Hastings, rather than crying about how bad it makes us look.

Hastings has achieved a measure of redemption--and the reasons he was repeatedly targeted are highly suspect. Double jeapordy aside, a black federal judge from Georgia, appointed in 1979 . . . you do the math. Thurmond and Helms were what? 20 years from the end of the road?

PLUS -- Jane Harman is NO LESS corrupt than Hastings ever was. There's just NO difference between AIPAC and whatever Hastings was doing. DC just hangs the whole system around somebody's neck whenever they step outta line.

So spare me the mock shock and feigned outrage that Hastings is somehow more corrupt than Harman.

Jane Harman didn't lift a finger for accountability. She didn't do squat for the Constitution. She didn't join Russ Feingold on censure--and her seat was safe enough for her to do so. Jane Harman didn't do squat--and she had to know the intelligence was flimsy-to-nonexistent.

Pelosi knows the bigger risk is leaving Harman in place--because WHY after all, would Jane Harman start playing ball with the Democrats NOW???

THAT'S the question. Hastings at least wouldn't betray his own.