Centerfield

Link.

In the rift between Congress and the Justice Department, Americans side overwhelmingly with law enforcement: Regardless of precedent and the separation of powers, 86 percent say the FBI should be allowed to search a Congress member's office if it has a warrant.

That view is broadly bipartisan, this ABC News poll finds, ranging from 78 percent among Democrats to 94 percent of Republicans.

The issue erupted last week, after the FBI searched the offices of Rep. William Jefferson, D-La., in a corruption investigation. Congress leaders objected, and George W. Bush put a 45-day hold on the seized documents to allow for negotiations.

The odds of an unusually large turnover in Congress this year continues to grow. I sense that the mood is more anti-incumbent than anything, but there is probably enough anti-Republican-ism to make a change in control in the House a decent possibility.

Posted by: Todd Pearson at June 2, 2006 12:04 PM

A very scary statistic, Todd.

Unchecked politicians are a danger to this country. Isn't that what the President is, though.

The danger, here, is that just because the President doesn't have a long list of votes to be tied to and judged on, and has more power to prevent compromises his constituents don't approve of, that he represents the people better than Congress.

I must confess I didn't see this coming, because I know the value of checks and balances. I just didn't realize the degree to which this country does NOT. This attitude is upsetting.

Now we have people saying, "what's wrong with wire-tapping if you have nothing to hide?" And now we've the got the Executive trampling through Congress. Look, Rep. Jefferson is going down one way or the other, but the way in which this is being handled is sending up red flags. Denny Hastert isn't defending Jefferson, but Bush, if he's good at anything, he's good at, "simplifying," arguments such as these.

"Jefferson's a bad guys, so you get him." Just like, "Sadaam Hussein is a bad guy, so you get him."

Having believed for years the propaganda of the GOP about being a party of freedom and limited governent, I have been under the misconception that Republican partisans knew what I did about our system of government and the need for balance.

Turns out, most of them many would just as soon get rid of Congress as cleanse it and that the Presidency is the TRUE representative of the party.

I still have hope that events can show people the error of their ways, but I've been forewarned.

Posted by: Cavalier829 at June 2, 2006 12:33 PM

Now, THAT was a Freudian slip, but how apt:

"the Presidency is the TRUE representative of the party."

I meant to say, "of the people."

Posted by: Cavalier829 at June 2, 2006 12:38 PM

Found out how much the GOP has spent so far in next week's election for their congressional "safe" seat in San Diego. Remember this is where there's a lot of military and military retirees.

$3.9 million.

That apparently includes 2.5 million for negative TV ads, radio ads and negative phone calls and $90K to find out from polls how negative they should be.

This does not look good for the GOP in general.
San Diego is supposd to be a sure lock. Even a close loss for the Democrat will cause a lot of worry in the White House and the RNC.

Maybe we might end up with that fabled checks and balances after all.

Posted by: Marcus at June 2, 2006 04:32 PM

then again MoveOn did a poll of its membership in trying to narrow it's message to 3 things.
There were 10 choices offered. At the bottom of the vote tally was balancing the budget, garnering 1/3 the votes that providing single payer or euro style health care had.

ugh! Still it's a good sign that a significant number of people like me put it at the top of the list. And that's still better than the GOP congress.

Now giiven that health care is a huge budget item and a drag on our economy taking care of health care could help out the budget significantly. As an example most California school systems are financially trapped with high health care costs. At some point I feel like one of 3 things could happen next. The whole system collapses to the point where less than 25% of Americans are insured and that bodes ill for a lot of municipalities; the government actually steps in and sets up a more competitive price structure (guaranteed not to happen with the GOP in charge and only marginally possible with Democrats - they feed from the same tit; or a whole new integrated setup is formed by as coalition of some business, labor and health interests - basically a more powerful Kaiser health plan, avertically integrated system. Most likely will be a hybrid of the latter 2.

Posted by: Marcus at June 2, 2006 07:48 PM

Tully,
I've got it ---- almost all centrists believe in Evolution! Now there's a start of a centrist criteria......

And it is not pro war.......

Posted by: maxtrue at June 2, 2006 10:45 PM

yeah but are you a punctuated equilibriumist?

Posted by: Marcus at June 3, 2006 01:49 PM

I have been accused of being a conservative saltationist. Yeah, I'm PE too, with a healthy does of fast-acting modularism to calm those ID blues.

Posted by: maxtrue at June 3, 2006 06:27 PM

The MSM informs America that Kansan Minister Preaches Doom and Hatred.

While millions of Kansans say "Duh." :->

Posted by: Blue Jean at June 4, 2006 01:10 AM

Moderates and centrists are often portrayed as "squishy" and as being unable to form a cogent (let alone principled) set of policies. Is is therefore helpful to moderates to form a new political pressure group -- it is a stretch to call Unity a polical party -- which is explicity squishy and almost entirely devoid of concrete policy positions? Discuss.

Posted by: Simon at June 4, 2006 01:17 AM

Well, if Biden represents centrist views, his words on Meet the Press this morning is quiet depressing. I wonder what Bobby has to say about Biden's dire opinion concerning Afghanistan and his Murtha-like stance on Iraq.

I also wonder how one calls something a "centristcoalition" without much care for any criteria of "centrism".

My gut tells me centrists and moderates are hardly "squishy". As I said, a shared belief in evolution may be a start. At this point "free masons" seem less squishy.

Posted by: maxtrue at June 4, 2006 11:28 AM

typos.....long night.....

Well, if Biden represents centrist views, his words on Meet the Press this morning are quite depressing. I wonder what Bobby has to say about Biden's dire opinion concerning Afghanistan and his creep towards a Murtha-like stance on Iraq.

I also wonder how one calls something a "centristcoalition" without much care for any criteria of "centrism".

My gut tells me centrists and moderates are hardly "squishy". As I said, a shared belief in evolution may be a start. At this point "free masons" seem less squishy

Also... please explain why .ru is objectionable content....anyone?

Posted by: maxtrue at June 4, 2006 11:56 AM

Also... please explain why .ru is objectionable content....anyone?

Probably due to the massive number of porn sites located in, and massive amount of spam originating in Russia. Just a guess.

Posted by: Tully at June 4, 2006 07:33 PM

> Probably due to the massive number of porn sites located in, and massive amount of spam originating in Russia. Just a guess.

Well, the massive amount of spam, anyway. There were a zillion different URLs ending in .ru, and I gave up and just banned the whole nation.

Posted by: Jon Kay at June 5, 2006 12:34 AM

Just a note: the guy responsible for the original Russian mass-spamming organization was brutally and bloodily murdered a year or two back in his apartment. No suspects have been named or charged to date. One would almost think the suspect pool was too large....

Posted by: Tully at June 7, 2006 04:52 PM