This week, despite all of the success in Kentucky, its largest and most progressive city overwhelmingly voted against a small occupational tax increase to overhaul its antiquated libraries and bring them up to comparable city standard.

The plan was a plan that showed vision, and it showed dreaming big.  It was also a bipartisan plan, supported by Democratic Mayor (for life) Jerry Abramson, but also by Republican Councilwoman Ellen Call, and Greater Louisville, Inc., the chamber of commerce.

Everything was smooth sailing on this plan, and then the attack came:

or, Deconstructing Alan, Another take on the Greenspan testimony.

Interesting in his recent testimony, Greenspan combined Medicare and Social Security and together they were the biggest crisis.  Everyone knows that the healthcare issue will swamp the social security issue in the short term.  Greenspan, by combining the two could tell the truth, that there was a crisis, and still appear to toe the Bush Administration line.  He also reminded Congress that the continued budget deficits cannot continue.

Pt I: Why Liberalism Represents the True Vision of America

   On the base of the Statue of Liberty, is a poem by Emma Lazarus, in which the Statue is called the Mother of Exiles.  As we close our borders, and declare ourselves what President Bush terms the ownership society, let us never forget that what made us what we are was the "responsibility society", and our ability to open our borders to other nation's tired, poor, huddled masses yearning to breathe free.  Yes, we even took the "wretched refuse of your teeming shore," which I am sure would have offended the likes of today's Pat Buchanan and others dreaming of a closed border, and the criminalization of even the children of illegal immigrants who have paid their share of taxes, and done their share of work to build this country.

In the Kentucky Constitution there is a 6 year residency requirement.  There is also an official procedure for protesting the eligibility of a candidate.  Virginia Woodward, Democrat, Louisville, filed a motion before the November 2 election after she heard that Ms. Seum Stephenson, Republican, New Albany, Indiana, had lived in Indiana for most of the time since 1997, when she move to southern Indiana to attend IUS for in-state tuition.  Seum Stephenson beat Woodward by 1,000 votes in blue collar southern Metro Louisville.  She was ruled ineligible by a judge.

Today Seum Stephenson was seated as the State Senator by the Republican-controlled Senate, overriding the Kentucky Constitution, the Judge who declared her ineligible, and even a Senate subcommittee who recommended the post to Woodward.  A Republican Senator who had proposed a special election be held is resigning his seat in protest.  I'll edit this later with some links, but information is available on changeforkentucky.com and DFA.

I am usually for any expansion, reinforcement, or protection of the civil liberties provided in the Bill of Rights are a philosophical absolute.  Senator Dodd's proposal to protect journalists from ever having to reveal their sources may be crossing a line that should clearly be drawn.  Clearly, a conservative reading this will come to the conclusion that my desire to protect Valerie Plame is just my liberal bias speaking.  However, I think there is a distinction between types of leaks.

There are laws on the books to protect whistleblowers, and they are good laws.  Even if the action of the whistleblower is technically a violation of their employment contract, or the law, they should be protected from punishment for revealing greater transgressions within an organization.  We can protect the integrity of whistleblower protections, and in general protect the rights of journalists to protect their confidential sources without giving in to those who attempted a smear campaign against the Ambassador Wilson and his wife.

Keep Byrd quiet for a little bit. The greatest news in the world is the series of proposals that have streamed forth from the White House in the last few days. Were these campaign promises he was "mandated" to act upon?

So the next two years are to be filled with pushes for constitutional amendments for the line-item veto and guest worker / legalized illegal immigrant programs?> Plus confirmation hearings where we get to see Gonzales' torture recommendation memos!! Plus Alaskan republicans joining us to fight against drilling? I am starting to feel better already. He's swinging their "big tent" back and forth violently. I don't seriously see any pure tax-cut debates at this point, although we may see a vote to extend the previous tax cuts out a few more years.

Have you seen the email that is titled, "Bet you stand up and say HELL YEAH! after you read this."  An undecided voter at the office said, "I agree with most of these things, does that make me a Republican", so I realized I needed to answer each of the points.  It's my mantra that we haven't said "These are the values of a liberal" loudly enough.  

Middle America hears a lot of the highlighted points in the original email and agrees with them completely, because they never hear our half.  The email is italicized, my response is in bold

Okay, the Senators better get with the program and act like the obstructionists we needed them to be in the first half of this Presidential term.  We saw what Bush did with the contested 2000 election: don't expect a seeker of common ground now.  Bush doesn't get a grace period.  We need Kerry, Kennedy, and whoever is left to spend two years grinding Washington to a halt, until we can get help on the way.

We offered the Republicans a pleasant bow-out gracefully repeat of 1992, and they turned us down.  Instead, they get 1972.  A bad war.  Administration scandals getting ready cause a head or two to roll.

Daschle is gone, and it is good.  This isn't time for loyal opposition.  I smell dirty tricks, and I am fired up.  We need a plan, a "Contract for the Children", in 2006.