Very little coverage in much of the media....

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McCain/Palin 2008
"We make war that we may live in peace"
"Peace is the highest aspiration of the American People. We will negotiate for it, sacrifice for it, we will never surrender for it, now or ever."
"Keep that faith,keep your courage,stick together, stay strong,do not yield,do not flinch,stand up,we're Americans,we'll never surrender they will"
http://members.cox.net/neddy/bobhope_kerfuffles.wmv
http://youtube.com/watch?v=RnfflRNpwKA
http://youtube.com/watch?v=j-QYIP7o2-A

Gee, even Fox news missed it. From that I conclude that Fox news is part of the liberal news media

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Es ist nichts schrecklicher als eine tätige Unwissenheit.

Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

Yep. Note the line: "Can you guess how many stories the San Francisco Chronicle, and their partners in the old line liberal media, have written about the ethics scandal involving Senator Dianne Feinstein, which reportedly forced her to resign from the Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee (MILCON)?"

Except that by the time she resigned, there was no possibility of a conflict of interest. So the speculation that she was "forced to resign" because of scandal is nonsense.

They're mad because she approved war spending -- any war spending. Again, all they can point to is that her husband's companies won some of the contracts approved by her subcommittee. I still do not see how she could have used her position to steer money to him.

This is the alternative weekly that has been reporting on the issue. Notice how everything comes back to them?

Note again this fact:

The Pentagon draws up its wish-list of projects. Congress then decides which to fund. So at best she could have voted to approve projects that she thought her husband's company might be bidding for. But the bidding itself was open and not controlled by her.

Should she recuse herself from any vote that her husband's companies might have an interest in? To be totally pristine, yes. But I think that's going way beyond what's necessary. As long as she recused herself from votes on projects where her husband's firms already had won the contract, she's fine.

The article cites examples of Feinstein questioning defense officials about projects, some of which later -- sometimes *much* later -- went to her husband's firms. That's not particularly compelling.

Some of the examples are frankly silly. Feinstein asks about "beddown" facilities. *Two years* later, URS gets a whopping $42 million for such a facility as part of a *multibillion dollar* contract to refurbish Hickam Air Base.

Similarly, the Pentagon asked for money to reinforce barracks roofs in Iraq against mortar rounds. Several months later, Perini gets a $185 million contract to do some of the work. Where's the conflict? Is anyone arguing that the project wasn't needed?

The most interesting example involves "task orders", in which her husband's firms had open-ended contracts and Congress kept pouring money into them. If Feinstein voted on those task orders, she was wrong. But the article does not make that claim.

The best they come up with is this:

The senator could have chosen to serve on a subcommittee where she had no potential conflict of interests at all.

That's thin gruel.

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Man up.

Wow. You amaze me, Raytri. That's like saying that one Senator--because there's 100 of them----has a vote that doesn't count for anything and they can do anything they want to do. Bottom line is that she was one of a handful of Senators that approved Project X that benefitted her husband and therefore her as well.

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"This is a time for a national imperative not to fail in Iraq." Condoleeza Rice, January 11, 2007

You're focusing on something that wasn't even my main point. The main reason a conflict is difficult to imagine is because for the most part Congress approves contracts, and *then* the contracts are put out for bid. The "one of a dozen" line was simply meant to put her overall influence in context.

Yes, except she had no way of knowing whether her husband's company would get the contracts when she approved the projects. On the few contracts where she would have, she should have recused herself.

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Man up.

Oh puhleeze!! So because there's 100 of them, Senators can hide their conflicts of interest better.

And generally the smoke is more prominent and noticeable when it's on the Republican side of the aisle, right?

NONE of which is ILLEGAL or a CRIME....right???? In fact, because there was no "there, there" regarding the reasons for firing them....the Dem leadership has skipped ahead to Reason #3: "incompetency."

AND how very nice for her that the media isn't putting it on the front pages everyday and trying their darnest to blow it all out of proportion!!

That's because you're looking at it through biased eyes that says those nasty Republicans MUST have done something wrong. Frankly, there was far more smoke in the e-mails of the Dems on the Judiciary Committee a few years ago, but it was glossed over. Calling Bush's nominees "nazi's----the NAACP writing Kennedy and telling him to "delay" a judicial nominee at least until a Minority Rights case gets decided---where it WAS delayed and the case was decided 5-4; and a Senator--John Edwards writing Leahy and telling him to delay nominees because it would hurt his contributors. THOSE are ALL things much, much, much worse than what we have here.
And you remember what those Dems said about it? They said...."while unseemly, nothing there was criminal." And nothing happened to them. No one had to step down or resign or anything. SAME thing should happen here. That is IF fairness is to prevail.

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"This is a time for a national imperative not to fail in Iraq." Condoleeza Rice, January 11, 2007

Jefferson. Molhollan. I rest my case.

We've been over this. It's tangential to this thread.

There are 534 other members of Congress, including hundreds of Republicans who are not being pilloried in the media.

I have, in fact, said much the opposite -- that all you've got right now are questions that need answers. Other than the lying to Congress, of course.

No there wasn't. I think you're trying to twist the questions over the White House e-mail systems to say it's about "discussing politics." It's not. It's about conducting party business on government gear, and vice versa. The two situations are not comparable, no matter how much you'd like them to be.

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Man up.

BTW, Raytri.....here's a question for you on this subject....speaking of conflicts of interest and fairness and all:

Do think Senator Chuck Shumer, who sits on this Judiciary Committe who is trying to get rid of one of Bush's top appointees ought to recuse himself? Considering Shumer is Chairman of the political organization, the DSCC? They've taken it down now....but recently there was a quote by Schumer that said....."the way to get rid of a Bush is by the roots." So, what do you think? Should Schumer recuse himself?

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"This is a time for a national imperative not to fail in Iraq." Condoleeza Rice, January 11, 2007

Recuse himself from what? The Justice investigation?

No. Relationships between the branches are *meant* to be political. If Schumer pushes the partisan angle too hard, he will be punished politically.

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Man up.

But where are those two now? Oh yeah....right STILL in their positions and with nothing going on in the Democrats talking points about them either. No investigations there, right???

Huh? So it doesn't matter that it's not a crime to replace Attorney's for ANY reason?

But none that I can think of who had such a conflict of interest and got NO mainstream press over it.

And we already know that lying isn't a problem....because Leahy and Schumer have told us that what they are doing isn't political. That's the biggest LIE ever.

Oh really? I thought it was at least partially about interfering with the judicial process and or cases. Isn't that one of the things the Dem leadership is now trying to prove happened?

If Kennedy and the Dem Judiciary members did, in fact, do what the NAACP asked them to do....and delayed that nomination until the Minority Rights case was decided 5-4.....that IS United States Senators in position of power interfering with the judicial system. Is it not?

And the real hypocrisy is that they blast Sen Dominici inquiring about a case. When they've done much worse.

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"This is a time for a national imperative not to fail in Iraq." Condoleeza Rice, January 11, 2007