The Right State

Are we seeing the resurgence of Southern Democrats in Congress? There was a time when conservative Democrats were seen as the swing votes in the House. During the Kennedy and Johnson administrations, they were instrumental in passing conservative legislation. After the 1994 election, they became known as the Blue Dog Democrats. They sided with the Democrats on some issues and Republicans on fiscal, security, and social issues. (Wikopedia has great deal more on the history of the Blue Dogs) For the last few years, no one has paid much attention to what these conservative Democrats had to say, that is until this last election.

For a dozen years, the Democratic conservatives known as Blue Dogs have been baying at the moon, ignored by Republicans and tolerated by their more liberal Democratic colleagues. Now, these House lawmakers say that is about to change.

Republicans “did not lose their seats to liberal Democrats” in last weeks elections, said Rep. Mike Ross, D-Ark. “Republicans lost their seats to Blue Dog Democrats.”

“We’ll have a lot to say about what passes and what doesn’t” when the 110th Congress convenes in January with Democrats in control for the first time in 12 years, said Ross, new communications director for the caucus.

With the addition of nine newly elected freshmen, the Blue Dogs claim 44 members, nearly 20 percent of the incoming Democratic majority. They will be led by Rep. Allen Boyd, D-Fla., and include Rep. Collin Peterson, D-Minn., in line to become the next Agriculture Committee chairman.

The newly anointed future Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, is one who is not taking the votes of the Blue Dogs for granted. As a California liberal, Pelosi will need the group of conservative Democrats to accomplish her agenda. Unfortunately for her, most of this group are from the South and happen to be much more conservative than their northern and western brethren. Issues like raising taxes, open ended spending, and support for gay marriage is not likely to pass muster with this group. You can be sure Republicans are eyeing this new group as well.

“Leader Pelosi looks forward to working with the Blue Dogs in the 110th Congress,” said Jennifer Crider, Pelosi’s spokeswoman. “They are important voices in our diverse caucus.”

Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., who is running for the position of Republican leader in the next Congress, listed cooperation with the Blue Dogs as part of his platform.

If there is to be any kind of bipartisanship from Congress, it may well depend on to which side the Blue Dogs throw their support. As I posted a couple of days after the election, the Republican loss was not a mandate for Democrats or their agenda. Rather the election was a mandate for change. Where Republicans were voted out, conservative Democrats were voted in. This new freshman class of lawmakers is fairly conservative which makes Pelosi’s job of passing some of her more progressive pieces of legislation a lot more difficult.

Once again history repeats itself and conservative Democrats are the swing votes in Congress, only this time they are called Blue Dogs.

Hat tip: Captain’s Quarters

Tags: Democrats, Politics by Chuck
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What is the US to do with Iran?  We have a two fold problem with the Iranians: continued interference in Iraq and their insistence on building a nuclear program.  The Iranians have been thumbing their collective noses at the world community for years.

In Iraq, using proxies, the Iranians are arming terrorists for the purpose of killing American and British troops is well documented.  Even more alarming is Tehran’s insidious link with Osama bin Laden’s terrorist group by trying to move al-Queda in a direction that is beneficial to them and harmful to the west.

But intelligence officials have been most alarmed by reports from Iran that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is trying to persuade al-Qa’eda to promote a pro-Iranian activist to a senior position within its leadership.

The Iranians want Saif al-Adel, a 46-year-old former colonel in Egypt’s special forces, to be the organisation’s number three.

Al-Adel was formerly bin Laden’s head of security, and was named on the FBI’s 22 most wanted list after September 11 for his alleged involvement in terror attacks against US targets in Somalia and Africa in the 1990s. He has been living in a Revolutionary Guard guest house in Teheran since fleeing from Afghanistan in late 2001.

Alarm over al-Qa’eda deepened yesterday with a Foreign Office warning that the group was determined to acquire the technology to carry out a nuclear attack on the West.

A senior Foreign Office official said that the terrorists were trawling the world for the materials and know-how to mount an attack using nuclear, chemical or biological weapons.

Then there is Tehran’s threat to finish its nuclear program.  Despite warnings from the UN not to continue their enrichment process, Iran has rejected all efforts to defuse the situation.

“The Iranian nation is about to take its final step in the nuclear issue,” the official IRNA news agency quoted Ahmadinejad as saying.

The president has previously said Iran would celebrate its nuclear achievements by the end of the Iranian year, which falls in March 2007.

Iran now operates two experimental chains of 164 centrifuges, which can be used to make fuel for power plants or material for warheads

They continue to insist their collection of centrifuges is for peaceful nuclear energy, but the IAEA document many problems with the Iranian nuclear program, like providing access to records and explaining how they acquired highly enriched uranium.

In its latest report on the Iranian nuclear program, the International Atomic Energy Agency, based in Vienna, said Tehran is moving ahead with its efforts to purify uranium while refusing to answer basic questions about its atomic program.

For instance, the report said Iran has failed to provide full access to records needed to confirm its claims in June of having enriched uranium to a level of 5 percent, which is suitable for reactors.

The report also said inspectors have made no progress in resolving the origin of previously discovered traces of highly enriched uranium, which can fuel atomic bombs. In September, the agency disclosed the discovery of the particles on a container from a waste storage site at Karaj, not far from Tehran, but withheld judgment about where the material came from and whether it could be linked to a secret nuclear-weapons program.

Finally, the report said inspectors recently have found traces of yet another unexplained particle — plutonium — on samples from containers at Karaj and is assessing a response from Tehran about its origin. Plutonium, like uranium, can fuel nuclear weapons.  (emphasis added by TRS)

The US can do nothing diplomatically including the placing of sanctions on the rogue regime without the help of the other members of the UN Security Council.  Both Russia and China have been reluctant to provide more than meaningless words.  The problems Iran is giving the rest of the world abounds.  Iran continues to supply the terrorists in Iraq who are killing American soldiers.  Iran is also believed to be trying to acquire nuclear weapons.  And they are providing a safe haven for terrorists and al-Qaeda including two of Osama bin Laden’s sons.

During the Cold War, the struggle between United States and the USSR never came to direct war, although a couple of smaller skirmishes took place (Korea and Vietnam).  The US maintained a wary attitude towards the Soviet Block nations and took steps to block their attempts to spread communism around the world.  This became known as the ‘Domino theory.’  The US took solace in the fact that we stopped communism without having to go to war with the Soviets.  In the same way, we have a struggle against radical Islam in the world today.  While not actively admitting it, the US has engaged in several skirmishes with the Iranians—Iraq, Afghanistan, and the US embassy in Tehran.  We have been at war with them for some time, just not directly.  Iran is one of the countries who is actively supporting and financing much of the terrorist activity in the world today.  With Tehran’s insistence on its ‘peaceful’ nuclear ambitions, the US must be ready for a new Cold War, this time against Iran. A rogue regime with ties to terrorists and has nuclear ambitions is something the US just can not abide by.  They must be stopped, otherwise we may lose a lot more than 3000 as we did on 9/11.

Those who have the time, there is a long but very interesting post on BlackFive in which Subsunk responds to a letter, most likely from an Iranian.  It is a very enlightening post in which Subsunk defines why Iran is not being honest about its enrichment program.  Well worth reading.

Tags: Terrorism, Iran by Chuck
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