Wayward Boehner

Bob Schieffer's take:

When the big congressional bribery scandal broke and it looked like the chief briber, Jack Abramoff, was going to name names, members of Congress raced to call for reform.

House Speaker Dennis Hastert called for banning all congressional travel, gifts and meals paid for by others. Amen, cried Democrats and Republicans alike.

But then the Dubai port deal caught the public's attention and reform slid off the front burner and now right off the stove.

John Boehner, the Republican's new majority leader said, whoa, the Speaker has gone too far with this reform stuff. Friday we found out why.

The Center for Public Integrity said if you add up the days Boehner spent over the past five years on trips paid for by others, it comes to six full months AND he took 45 trips on corporate jets.

Be assured that Boehner would tell you what they all tell you. These gifts had NO effect on how he voted. But here's my question, Mr. Boehner: Do you really believe anyone would buy you a plane ticket -- or even a bus ticket -- if you were not in Congress? Do you really believe they would keep laying out all that money if they didn't think they were getting something in return?

Congress is drowning in a sea of corruption but has become so used to it, members can't see what they've done wrong.

Here's what I see from the shoreline. People are fed up. If Congress doesn't clean up this mess, a lot of them are going to get beat. But even then, I wonder if they'll understand why.

Cause $84 billion isn't enough

In the past, Marilyn Musgrave has sided with Big Oil to give them tax breaks and giveaways. In fact, that's the plank in GOP's basically one-plank platform (the rest is bunting). But the leadership has to keep a majority, so it's "sop throwing" time. So the U.S. House just passed a price-gouging bill with teeth. Passed overwhelmingly, in fact, with 349 in favor. Looks like only 34 Reps. voted against it.

Marilyn Musgrave was one of those 34. Talk about out of touch. Does she even give a damn?

A Paccione press release jumps on Marilyn's vote:

As gasoline prices at the pump continue to spike towards $3.00 per gallon, and as her Colorado constituents continue voicing their concerns, is Marilyn Musgrave going to fulfill her promise in her 2005 Congressional "Acheivement" Report to work for "lower gas prices for all Americans"?

Not today.

Given the opportunity to vote on a popular bill against price gouging by oil companies, Musgrave was one of 34 Republicans who voted yesterday on the side of Big Oil (H.R. 5253, Roll Call #115, 5/3/2006). While the Federal Energy Price Protection Act passed the U.S. House by a bipartisan vote of 389-34, without explanation, Marilyn Musgrave voted to protect Big Oil's windfall profits. Exxon just reported $8.4 billion in quarterly revenues.

"What could possess Marilyn to thumb her nose at Coloradans like this?" asked State Representative and congressional candidate Angie Paccione.

Did you see she's tweaking Marilyn on the "Acheivement Report"? Hilarious.

Problems? Easy solution

AMERICAblog thinks the DNC has a gay problem. Who cares? It's about winning races. Take down Marilyn Musgrave, and you have taken the fight to the heart of the Holy Homophobes!

You know what to do.

Kicking it up a knotch

SoapBlox Colorado reports that the Paccione Project is beginning.

Gas pump politics: From your wallet to their pockets

Checkin' out the Auction House page on Marilyn Musgrave. It really makes you think. I mean, if the Republican Party is just an extension of the oil industry - if you think the GOP ain't lookin' out for its interests, you haven't been paying attention - are we supposed to feel more secure when the "security" party has a vested interest in oil dependence?

• Rep. Musgrave voted against cracking down on the oil and gas industries price gouging.
• Rep. Musgrave voted for the GOP energy bill that gave billions to oil, gas and nuclear industries.
• Big oil and gas industries have given Rep. Musgrave $114,350. Any surprise?

And that doesn't count the "leadership" money she's been taking, and you know who's funding the leadership, don't you?

Angie Paccione weighs in:

Americans are too smart to be duped like this. We know hypocrisy when we see it, and this is hypocrisy in its most blatant form. Had the people in charge of Washington, D.C. actually cared about us normal folks driving to work, to the store, to pick our kids up from school, they would have reined in these highway robbers a long time ago. But time and again they let them run wild, in exchange for millions of dollars in campaign contributions -- $141 million in contributions to the Republican Party since 1990, and $56,000 to Marilyn Musgrave in the last three election cycles.

Worse yet, that money is coming from our wallets.

It's easy for the holier-than-thou to justify cutting into your savings while enriching polluters and dictatorships. They're holier than you are, after all.

Congresswoman Lovejoy at work

Okay, so she at least she doesn't call it a holocaust, but you have to get a load of Marilyn Musgrave's Mrs. Lovejoy approach to politics.

So last year, Congress was debating some sensible public support of stem cell research. In a bill that took into account some reasonable objections to using taxpayer dollars to fund any old thing, Rep. Diane DeGette sponsored legislation that made it okay to fund stem cell research so long as it only used embryos that were going to be discarded anyway. If excess embryos parents produced for in vitro fertilization are going to be discarded, why not help improve the lives of Americans suffering terribly from Alzeihmer's, Parkinson's, and spinal injuries?

That's not too hard to understand . . . unless you're Marilyn Musgrave:

Mr. Speaker, I recently had a granddaughter born. I looked at that little baby, and I was in love with her when I went to ultrasound and we saw her, even before she was born. When I saw the little snowflake children, I thought about their humanness. I thought about what joy they brought to their families. I thought about little children that needed to be comforted when they were hurt, little children that wanted to be put to bed at night with a kiss and a story, their wonderful humanness, and I thought about what the American people think of babies and how we cherish them. When I see these little children, I know their intrinsic value; and how we treat people, in whatever form of development, depends on how we perceive them.

The embryo is a human being at an early stage of development. When we talk to many who have great knowledge about this, and I appreciate the doctors in our presence, we should never spend the American taxpayers' dollars to take the life of an innocent human being.

As I look at this bill, I know it is very complex; but we need to always support human life.

It's not hard to read.