The Hill is reporting that both Representatives Giffords and Mitchell are vying to be jumped into the Blue Dog Coalition, a select group of centrist Democrats who main focus is budgetary discipline and whose membership is currently capped at 47 lawmakers. This is, I hope, a mainly positive development. I strongly support most of what the Blue Dogs are trying to accomplish. Balanced budgets, hunting down and killing pork, pay-as-you-go budgeting, requiring auditability for all federal agencies, a rainy day fund like we have in Arizona and 44 other states, and accountability for votes on budget matters are all good-government measures that all Democrats should support.
More controversial is the BDC’s support for a balanced budget amendment requiring balanced budgets except in case of war or emergency. Me, I think amending the Constitution is almost always a bad idea; especially when it is just a arbitrary gesture aiming to force politicians to do the right thing. My guess is that once such an amendment passed, we would always be in a state of war or emergency from that day forward. I think it’s just a simple-minded fix for a complex and systemic problem in the structure of the budget process. I don’t like simple-minded fixes for complex problems. In any case, both Giffords and Mitchell should tell people which of the BDC’s goals they support, and especially if they support a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution.
But the BDC’s mission doesn’t really stop with fiscal responsibility, and that is where our newest Representatives’ aspirations to join the BDC could be of concern. The BDC is also famous for it’s members’ rather warm support for the special pleadings of some industries. I am all for promoting a good and fair business environment, but sometimes the BDC goes way beyond just good business sense. For instance BDC members overwhelmingly supported 2005’s bankruptcy ‘reform’ act, which made it much harder for poor and middle class folks to discharge their debts. The 2005 bankruptcy act is considered by most in the Democratic party to be one of the worst excesses of the GOP domination of the federal government for the past 6 years, and one of the most harmful laws to hit consumers in the past century. The credit card companies and banks where throwing money left and right to get it passed, and BDC members were happy to oblige, even penning a breath-takingly mendacious letter of support for the bill to then-Speaker Hastert.
Again, one would hope that Giffords and/or Mitchell, upon their ascension to the BDC would make clear that they repudiate that portion of the BDC’s anti-consumer, rabidly special-interest-pandering legacy.
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I hope Rep. Giffords will stay out of the Blue Dogs. Many of them have too often favored industry over protecting public health and the environment.
Giffords needs to continue to appeal to Independents, many of whom are liberal but don’t want to be a Dem. She should not try too hard to win over staunch Republicans, they will not support her no matter what. Most moderate R’s already support Giffords.
How do you like being told that 22 million Illegal Mexican Nationals and 100 million of there family members have a right to your and my Social Security, Medicade, Medicare, Hospitals and schools and WE are the problem Not them!!??
I have paid into Social Security since 1963 and Illegal Mexican Nationals now are entitled to SSA before Iam; and Iam the problem says Bush and Kennedy-McCain??!!
Is this why on May 9th,2007 with no one picking up on this President Bush signed an order giving him the sole power to build internment camps anywhere in the United States including on Indian Reservations, power to take any business, power to take anyones home, power to declare Marshall Law with No act of Congress over everything making him the Hugo Chavez of North America???
Take a look at the El Campo contracts when she ran it an see who she did business on the corporate side and how much they gave to her campaign.
Its all about money to her folks!
As a Progressive Democrat who helped elect Harry Mitchell into office, I find this news disturbing on so many levels.
For much the same reason why I’m not going to vote for Clinton in ’08, I don’t think I see myself supporting Harry Mitchell then either. If I will not compromise to Republican values and beliefs, nor should my representatives yeild to such centric views as the DLC and Blue Dog Democrats. I understand that Progressives are a minority but I will not fold on a cause greater than conservatives can fathom, we got where we are now by being Progressive. If Mitchell becomes a Blue Dog, I will support him by virtue of being a Democrat but he will have lost my trust and if ever a better candidate runs, my support lays with them.
If issues such as impeachment become an issue and Mithcell fails to back it, I will protest, I don’t feel the need to do so now.
I can understand the view that yes, Arizona is a Red state, and yes, perhaps we need to lean centrist in order to turn Blue and bring the Progressives to a majority but I believe that that should happen at the state and local levels first. Maybe I’m wrong on that one, maybe we need that thought from the top down or another way of rationalizing the motives of our representatives, either way, Progressivism is a Movement that will not faulter, I will not faulter and I’m going to make damn sure that Mithcell knows it.
I will indeed hope that Ms. Giffords tenure as a sitting member of the House of Representatives is a one-term affair.
And I am a staunch Democrat.
She sold us out to the Bush Administration just so she can get the credentials to join the Blue Dogs. Congrats Gabby, you and Harry Mitchell have solidified a progressive movement against your re-election campaign. You guys have shown no backbone to make the REAL change we need in D.C. All both of you have done is to take $10,000 of the AzDP’s money for your next election and sell our ideals out to the Republicans.
If impeachment ever becomes an issue, I sincerly doubt you will back the measure. You don’t have the spine to do such a thing.