Nailing Cheney and the Energy Bill
I agree with Kevin Drum on the Energy bill and I know John McCain will make plenty of hay about this in the Senate.
Entries for November 19th, 2003
Pryor Says Alabama Won’t Recognize Gay Marriage
Mac has the appropriate assessment of Bill Pryor’s statement yesterday on gay marriage. If Massachusetts says they are married, Alabama does not have a choice in whether they recognize that or not. (That’s different from a “civil union”, like Vermont has)
Advice for Governor-elect Haley Barbour
Dr. Harvey H. (”Hardy”) Jackson has some advice for Governor-elect Haley Barbour of Mississippi,
Now I am not rightly sure that an Alabamian should be giving advice to someone from Mississippi, especially if that someone is the governor-elect. But since he, like me, has spent most of his career outside that state, I think my take on Mississippi might at least give Haley Barbour something to consider as he prepares to assume the highest office they’ve got over there. ’Course, having just come through a campaign where a candidate for Lt. Gov. dared her opponent to sign an affidavit swearing she had never had an abortion and where the incumbent’s ex-wife showed up at the gubernatorial debate and plopped herself down on the front row – just to remind everyone of the scandal that made her “the former first lady” — Mr. Barbour must have an inkling of what he has gotten himself into.
And as he considers this, he should keep in mind the words of my Mississippi cousin Benny who, when asked his opinion of the field of candidates, replied “we ain’t voting for none of ‘em, but we’re voting against a few.”The ones Benny and his buddies vote against are the ones they figure to fiddle, to mess with things. So Mr. Barbour better not do that. And if the urge to do it anyway becomes so great that he feels like he might, he should remember the story of the Mississippi Black Market Tax.
What’s the Mississippi Black Market Tax? Read Dr. Jackson’s column to find out.
Wednesday Column
By Kristopher
Wednesday (Prattville) Progress:
We don’t have much high political theater in the US Senate anymore. The days of one man standing against 99 are all but over. This realization hit me between the eyes during what became a 40-hour marathon last week. In many ways the Senators were trying to invoke those old images, but failed. Instead, their own attempt appeared almost farcical.
Yet, watching and listening to the speakers, I found myself admiring the
passion of many of them, which only confirms that I am a diehard
political junkie (as if you haven’t figured that out). Certainly, there was the
predictable repetition of party line arguments along with the usual partisan
sniping. The Republicans continued to talk about how “unprecedented”
filibustering judicial nominations is. The Democrats continued to talk about
the many Clinton nominations that were prevented from even coming to the floor by the Republicans and how this was no different.
Yet, through this air of predictability there were tiny moments of truth that emerged. Senator Orrin Hatch (R-UT) noted, “Now, the issues we are highlighting tonight could not be more fundamental to our country,
to democracy, to the rule of law: separation of powers. All are at stake in this ongoing debate. Among the constitutional Framers’ conceptual breakthroughs was that the judicial branch would receive equal status to that of the executive and legislative branches. An independent judiciary is the thread that binds the country together and ensures law and order. It is important. It is indispensable to the survival of a civilized society.”
Senator Hatch was not the only person to cite the Constitution or our founding
principles. It was a popular touchstone for many of the speakers. Naturally,
opposing parties had different takes on what the most pertinent provisions of our governing documents were, but both sides reveled in their importance.
However, the speakers did not focus solely on documents. Senator Evan
Bayh (D-IN) chose to make a connection between the 39-hour debate and the
disinterest we see in the electorate, “What has happened to our democracy?
What has happened when 20 percent, 36 percent or a bare majority feel invested enough in the cause of shaping their own destiny to take the time to participate in our elections…We need to get back to the business at hand, putting before the American people an agenda of hope and opportunity so we can once again reenlist them in the cause of making this the greatest democracy known to man. That, at the end of the day, is what has brought us here.”
Here is not just the floor of the Senate. Here is Alabama. Here is Prattville. We are at a point in history where government at all levels and the people they answer to must make a choice.
Moore Owes State $7,000
Acting Chief Justice Gorman Houston held a press conference yesterday to officially announce the replacement of the top two men at the Administrative Office of the Courts. He also intimated that Roy Moore owes the state money,
Acting Supreme Court Chief Justice Gorman Houston said Moore will be hit with the $7,000 tab for special handling of the 5,280-pound block of granite.During a Tuesday morning news conference, Houston said Moore has not yet paid the amount it cost to remove the monument.
Of course, Moore contends he didn’t order the monument removed, so he does not owe anything. He completely ignores the fact that he was the one who moved it in and created the issue in the first place.
140th Anniversary of Gettysburg Address
Abraham Lincoln delivered the following address on November 19, 1863,
THE GETTYSBURG ADDRESS:Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this
continent a new nation, conceived in liberty and dedicated to the
proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in
a great civil war, testing whether that nation or any nation so
conceived and so dedicated can long endure. We are met on a great
battlefield of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of
that field as a final resting-place for those who here gave their
lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and
proper that we should do this. But in a larger sense, we cannot
dedicate, we cannot consecrate, we cannot hallow this ground.
The brave men, living and dead who struggled here have consecrated
it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will
little note nor long remember what we say here, but it can never
forget what they did here. It is for us the living rather to be
dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here
have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here
dedicated to the great task remaining before us–that from these
honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which
they gave the last full measure of devotion–that we here highly
resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain, that this
nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom, and that
government of the people, by the people, for the people shall
not perish from the earth.