Top ten Political Sex scandals for 2011

It’s that time of the year again to take a look at the year in review. The following list is the top ten Political Sex scandals for 2011. The list is in no particular order, and the list includes both republicans and democrats.

1.    Herman Cain, a presidential candidate for 2012 had to suspend his run for the presidential nomination after he was accused of sexual harassment by several women, including Sharon Bialek, Karen Kraushaar, and Ginger White. Donna Donella also reported possible inappropriate behavior.

2.    Former Senator John Ensign (R-NV), resigned from the Senate this past May 2, 2011, the day before the Senate Ethics Committee was to charge him for an improper affair with his best friend’s wife and $96,000 dollars in hush money.

3.    Former Congressman Anthony Weiner (D-NY), admitted to sending sexually suggestive photos of himself to several women through his Twitter account. He resigned on June 16 2011.

4.    Former Congressman Chris Lee (R-NY), resigned hours after a news report that the married Congressman had sent a shirtless picture of himself flexing his muscles to a woman via Craigslist, along with sexually suggestive emails.

5.    Former Congressman David Wu (D-OR), resigned August 3, 2011, from the House of Representatives after being accused of making unwanted sexual advances toward a fundraiser's daughter became public.

6.    Allison Meyers, a former RNC administrator was fired for her role in allowing $52,000 to be spent for a fund raiser at Club Voyeur which included bondage and topless dancers.

7.    Former Republican Governor of California Arnold Schwarzenegger separated from his wife Maria Shriver, after she learned he had fathered a child more than a decade ago, before his first run for office with a member of their household staff who worked for the family for 20 years.

8.    Current Senator David Vitter (R-LA), who admitted to the press of having sexual encounters with prostitutes back in 2007, was reelected in 2010 and continues to serve in the US Senate.

9.    Former state Senator Randy Hopper (R-WI), while claiming to still live with his wife, was actually living outside the district he represents with a much younger 25-year-old mistress. In early 2011, the mistress was hired by a conservative lobbyist firm and given a state employee's job at rate of pay much higher than the previous person doing the job. Hopper lost his state Senate seat in recall elections held earlier this year in Wisconsin.

10. Indiana House of Representatives Phillip Hinkle (R-IN) arranged to pay Kameryn Gibson a teenage boy, up to $140 for “for a really good time.” The paper published emails between Hinkle and Gibson detailing a plan for them to meet at a downtown Indianapolis hotel. The Star reported that Hinkle exposed himself when the pair met in person. Hinkle suggested to 6News that his actions were "stupid," but that he did not break the law. "I don't know what was going through my mind," he said. "I don't know why I did what I did." August 2011.

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Senator Reid sends letter to Speaker Boehner on payroll tax cuts

Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH)

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) sent a letter to House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) urging him to recall House members back to congress and pass the Senate Bill that was past with bipartisan support this past Saturday by a vote of 89-10.

The deal worked out in the Senate between Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) had the full approval of Speaker Boehner. Reid said in his letter, “As you requested when we met last Wednesday, Senator McConnell and I worked together to find this common ground.

After yesterdays decision by Speaker Boehner to NOT hold an up or down vote on the bipartisan Senate Bill that he had originally agreed to, the House voted to reconcile their demands in a conference with the Senate. Then Speaker Boehner and the House adjourned and they all went home for their Christmas break knowing that in just 11 days (now 10 days), that taxes will be raised on 160 million Americans.

In Senator Reid’s letter to Speaker Boehner, Reid says the democrats will sit down with the republicans to work out a yearlong deal, but because time is short, the House needs to first pass the Senate Bill that extends the payroll tax cuts

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s letter to Speaker Boehner:

Dear Speaker Boehner,

Our respective chambers have been seeking for weeks to negotiate a year-long extension of the payroll tax cut for middle-class families, as well as unemployment benefits and Medicare payments for physicians.

You and I agree that this should be our goal. But as these weeks have made clear, there remain differences between our parties over how to fund and implement these programs that will take longer then a few days to reconcile.

Recognizing this reality, eighty-nine Republican and Democratic senators came together to agree to a short-term extension of these programs. As you requested when we met last Wednesday, Senator McConnell and I worked together to find this common ground. Once the House of Representatives acts on this immediate extension, we will be able to sit down and complete negotiations on a longer extension. But because we have a responsibility to assure middle-class families that their taxes will not go up while we work out our differences, we must pass this immediate extension first.

As the Senate vote made clear, there is no reason for this to be a partisan issue. I am fully confident that we can work out our differences and find common ground on a year-long extension. But in the meantime, families should not have to worry that they will wake up to a tax increase on January 1, 2012.

To provide middle-class families the certainty they deserve, I urge you to reconvene the House to act on the Senate’s bipartisan compromise as soon as possible.

Sincerely, Senator Harry Reid

If nothing is passed by midnight December 31, 2011, taxes will go up on January 1, 2012, and it will be the fault of the House of Representatives which is controlled by the Republican Party. And no matter how Speaker Boehner tries to spin this, it will be his party that 160 million Americans will blame for their taxes being raised.

Cross posted at Examiner.com

Senate Republicans today voted to raise taxes on 160 million Americans

Earlier today, the Senate held a cloture vote on a bill to extend the payroll tax cuts to 160 million Americans and assess a new tax on income over $1 million to help pay for it. On January 1, 2012 working families will see their taxes go UP by as much as $1000.00, if the payroll tax holiday is not extended. The final vote was 50-48.

Republicans, who fight tooth and nail to lower taxes on the wealthy, aka the 1 percent, showed no problems with voting to raise taxes on everyone else. 

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) released the following statement after today’s vote:

“Republicans showed yet again that they are more interested in passing tax cuts for millionaires than tax cuts for the middle class. Senate Republicans rejected two proposals to give middle-class families a tax cut.  And House Republican leaders had to entice their members into supporting their proposal by weighing it down with a laundry list of policies whose sole purpose are scoring points against President Obama.

“House Republicans’ bill is a partisan joke that has no chance of passing the Senate, but middle-class families facing a thousand-dollar tax hike on January 1st are not laughing. Instead of playing political games, Congress should work to find common ground. In the days ahead, I intend to do exactly that.”

And yesterday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said that the Senate and the President will not be taking any Christmas vacation until the payroll tax cuts for working Americans are extended.

"We are not going to go home to vacations," Reid said in a news conference on Capitol Hill. "Does this mean embarrassing Republicans, humiliating them? Probably -- as it should."

Two things are certain, 1) Republicans don’t care about working Americans, and 2) the Democrats will cave and compromise to another hostage taking by republicans as they did last Christmas to pass the unemployment extensions in exchange for two more years of the Bush tax cuts for the rich. The same tax cuts that have added more than 2 trillion dollars to our deficit and created no jobs.

The Grover Norquist anti tax pledge that republicans have signed out of fear that they will be replaced, and who find it so easy to put this pledge ahead of their Constitutional Oath, have been told by Grover Norquist that it’s OK for them to raise taxes on working Americans.

Norquist Tells GOP That Raising Taxes On The Middle Class Doesn’t Count As A Tax Increase

Republicans who place this pledge and many others that they sign before they even get to Washington, and then take their Oath of Office, should declare those pledges void, or resign. At least in a republic that holds it democratic values to such high standards they should.

But this is the United States of American, where standards are now so low; our founding fathers would have trouble recognizing it.

Today, republicans continued their War against Working Americans.

Republicans put their Founding Funders ahead of the American people

Government regulations create jobs and save lives

 

The republican mantra that “regulations kill jobs” is deceiving, unless you are talking about new hires at mortuaries that will be needed as people die from dirty drinking water, lung disease from breathing polluted air, or eating food contaminated with mercury. 

Republicans and their right wing propaganda outlets such as Fox “News”, say that thousands of regulations prevent jobs from being created, even though CEO’s say that that is NOT true, and as economists, including republican economists, show data that refutes the GOP’s misinformation.

 Mike Morris, the CEO at American Electric Power said, “We have to hire plumbers, electricians, painters, folks who do that kind of work when you retrofit a plant. Jobs are created in the process — no question about that.”

 

A report by the independent Political Economy Research Institute (PERI), at the University of Massachusetts, estimates that more than 250,000 jobs will be created through installation of new equipment at existing power plants and construction of new clean energy facilities.

The data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics show that regulations are having virtually no impact on job losses. In 2010, only 0.3% of job losses occurred because of government regulation.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) made a statement today on the Senate floor;

 

Republican economist says GOP spreads the falsehood because it has no plan to create jobs.

Bruce Bartlett, an advisor to President Ronald Reagan ​and a Treasury official under President George H.W. Bush, is a trusted, conservative voice on economics. He offered these strong words on the regulation monster under Big Business’ bed:

“No hard evidence is offered for this claim; it is simply asserted as self-evident and repeated endlessly throughout the conservative echo chamber… In my opinion, regulatory uncertainty is a canard invented by Republicans that allows them to use current economic problems to pursue an agenda supported by the business community year in and year out. In other words, it is a simple case of political opportunism, not a serious effort to deal with high unemployment.”

 

But why use regulations proven to protect the health of every man, woman and child in this nation as a scapegoat? What are the origins of the myth?

I believe – as Bartlett does – that Republicans are attacking regulation because they don’t have a plan to create jobs and turn our economy around.

While Democrats have been pushing time-tested remedies for a flagging economy, such as infrastructure investments or middle-class tax cuts, our Republican colleagues have been peddling a cure-all tonic of deregulation.

Bartlett says, “People are increasingly concerned about unemployment, but Republicans have nothing to offer them.”

They’ve offered up the specter of overreaching government regulation to distract from the fact that they haven’t offered a single idea for how to put America back to work.

And they use the argument to justify rolling back everything from clear air and water safeguards to Wall Street and health insurance industry reforms.

What’s more, they’ve spread the tall tale that removing these regulations and letting Big Business do exactly as it pleases will not only prevent job losses, but actually create new jobs.

Bartlett called that logical leap “nonsense.”

“It's just made up,” he said. So, let’s talk fact, not fiction.

*****

Republicans want to kill new financial regulations that were put in place to help prevent another economic collapse that financial institutions caused in 2008. Republicans want to kill the EPA regulations that require some of the oldest coal power plants to upgrade their facilities so they pollute less. 

Republicans want to give free rein to some of the biggest polluters in our country and free rein to financial institutions that have destroyed our economy. And Republicans fought to kill or marginalize the new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau that will help all Americans from being ripped off by banks.  

The Republican Party works against American families and against you. Republicans put their own jobs and their Founding Funders ahead of the American people and the United States.

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