Thank you

No news here. I just wanted to thank everybody for making this one of the best and most entertaining courses I've ever taken.

-Daniel Crowley

Pitneyisms

As the year winds down, I thought I'd publish a some of the Pitney quotations I've collected over the course of the semester. The following are listed in chronological order.

In Alaska, you have to carry votes across the tundra

Everybody in North Dakota knows each other so its kinda hard to get away with fraud.

Bush was less popular than athlete's foot

W ran for the House once, got his butt kicked, but that was when he was drinking so he probably doesn't remember it.

If you have a picture of Trent Lott on your wall, label it 'Don't be like this.'

Sunny Bono ended up being a good congressman...until he skied into a tree.

The etymologists have found a unique breed of cockroach found only in the FOB. I am not making that up.

If you're a prosecutor that's pretty cool, because you can indict a ham sandwich.

The fact that we show up is purely out of a sense of duty. If we were rational actors, we'd give you a one page exam, give you all A's and all go out drinking.

I don't live in Armenia, but I live in the Glendale area, which is basically the same thing.

I wonder if Bunning goes out drinking with Burris.

Here's a nice little factoid, if there's ever an awkward pause in conversation you can drop this in: the screenwriter of Mr. Smith Goes to Washington was a card-carrying communist.

Those of you who have ever dealt with a mechanic or body shop know that it is basically the secular version of purgatory.

Chris Dodd if not toast, is very warm bread.

Actually, Moynihan made more sense when he was drunk than when he was sober.

I can keep doing this till I'm senile, and then it will take years for people to notice anyways.



Maybe Captain Picard knows the answer to that question...75 years from now.

You may cover your ears...we are up shit's creek without a paddle.

And the guy who was supposed to assassinate Andrew Johnson just got drunk.

Johnson was hammered on inauguration day.

The faculty have no incentive not to come to class drunk.

I'm worse than a civil servant.

Let me put it this way, the Pomona class is a very worthy opponent.

Summing Up

Barack Obama on Supreme Court nominations and the separation of powers:



Continuity of Congress

Filling Senate Vacancies:

Getting Carried Away

U.S. Secretary of State apologizes to Afghan President for the killing of up to 120 civilians by american bombs.

FYI

The 2 (re)organization resolutions are S Res 130 and S Res 131.

S Res 130 was introduced by Reid for the Democrats and S Res 131 was introduced by McConnell to appoint minority members to committees.

The text of the legislation is not on THOMAS yet, but should be up in a day or two (or so the website says)

Dems Strip Specter of Seniority

As reported by the Washington Post:

The Senate last night stripped Sen. Arlen Specter (Pa.) of his seniority on committees, a week after the 29-year veteran of the chamber quit the Republican Party to join the Democrats.

In announcing his move across the aisle last week, Specter asserted that Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) had assured him he would retain his seniority in the Senate and on the five committees on which he serves. Specter's tenure ranked him ahead of all but seven Democrats.

Instead, though, on a voice vote last night, the Senate approved a resolution that made Specter the most junior Democrat on four committees for the remainder of this Congress. (He will rank second from last on the fifth, the Special Committee on Aging.) Reid himself read the resolution on the Senate floor, underscoring the reversal... (Read more here)

Specter Gets the Short End of the Stick

Tying together several news threads we've been following this semester, Democratic leadership reneged on their previously agreed deal that Sen. Specter would receive seniority as if he had been elected as a Democrat. Evidently, Specter said he would not support Al Franken's claims in Minnesota, said he might vote against current health care proposals and has generally made himself unwelcome in his new party. Democrat fears that Specter might lose reelection or even his Democratic primary also factored into the changed deal.

Specter Will Be Junior Democrat on Committees

Despite promises from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) that Sen. Arlen Specter (Pa.) would retain his seniority after switching parties, Specter will be put at the end of the seniority line on all his committees but one under a resolution approved on the floor late Tuesday.

Under the modified organizing resolution, Specter will not keep his committee seniority on any of the five committees that he serves on and will be the junior Democrat on all but one — the chamber’s Special Committee on Aging. On that committee, he will be next to last in seniority.

As a result, Specter — who as a Republican was ranking member on the Judiciary Committee and a senior member of the Appropriations Committee, as well as ranking member of the panel’s Subcommittee on Labor, Health and Human Services, and Education — will now rank behind all the other Democrats, at least until the end of this Congress.

According to a senior Democratic aide, it remains unclear whether Specter — who will still retain his seniority in the Senate outside of the committees — will see a boost in his committee seniority should he be re-elected for the next session. The status of his seniority for the next Congress will be determined once the 112th Congress convenes in 2011, the aide said.

Democrats said that while unrelated, Specter’s comments to the New York Times Magazine this weekend indicating he would support former Sen. Norm Coleman’s (R-Minn.) disputed re-election bid against Al Franken have angered many Democrats.

“Sen. Specter better watch comments like these. They won’t help him in the caucus,” a Democratic leadership aide said, adding that the comments have “caused a lot of heartburn in the caucus.”