Its 12 Hours To Exam Time, Do You Know Where Your Students Are?

In the library trying to eek out some last minute bloggin! Special Elections!? Mississippi?! Democrats are trying to hold on to a southern seat in this special election set for next Tuesday. Can the Republican's link incumbent Travis Chider to the godless democrat demigods John Kerry and Barak Obama? The electoral history shows that Chiders is looking a little marginal and could be thrown out with the rest of the bums. If the Republicans can exploit this link it may stop the perceived hemorrhaging in the house they've been taking since 2006. The strategy worked slightly in last week's Louisiana congressional election, but Dem. Don Cazayoux still won the traditionally conservative seat. In other news, who's ready to do some quadratic utility function on multi-preferential congressional voting behavior tomorrow at 7:30am?!

Also, when will Barak Obama be added to electronic spell checkers???

Another Housing Thing

According to the New York Times, it seems that many of the reasons that Congress hasn't passed a bill to put a stop to predatory lending can be traced to one Republican senator: Richard C. Shelby. Of course, he says that the fact that his legislation favors the banks who gave him a $5 million dollar loan is just him doing his duty and has nothing to do with his Congressional duties. He states that he just believes in the free market's, saying that it will work, "but not without some pain."

Funny how one man can affect the lives of so many people. Unfortuneately, the Democrats seem to need him to get things done. Senator Dodd stated, "'..Once he makes the deal, it happens.'"

House Scandal

Rep. Vito Fossella (R-NY) was arrested last week for drunk driving. Many members of Congress have been supportive, despite the fact that Fossella's political future in the House is uncertain. Its encouraging to members of Congress reaching out to a fellow representative and showing support despite the cirsumstances. Fossella has been in the House since 1997, but who know what this could do to his political career.

Fiscal Pressures Lead Some States to Free Inmates Early

The idea of releasing inmates on the fact that it could save money somewhat aggrevates my mind. To know that these criminals are being released and not serving the full sentence they are given is mind boggling. What if these criminals that are released convict another crime? They are back in the same place they were before, which is using the same amount of money. To me, being released early seems more like a slap on the hand than anything else.

Voting Rights in the Supreme Court

Interesting piece from Slate.com about the recent Supreme Court decision upholding an Indiana voter ID law...which the author sees as potentially in violation of poll-tax requirements forbidden by the 24th Amendment. I'm not going to claim to have personally reviewed the decision itself or anything, but the Court apparently didn't address the 24th at all, thus "utterly failed to address the most obviously relevant provision of the constitutional text". And that's kind of weird I think.

Louisiana Special Election

The Democrats picked up another seat in the House over the weekend, winning one of the two special elections for vacated GOP seats in Lousiana (a Republican held onto the other seat). Apparently there is another seat in Mississippi vacated by a Republican that will be up next weekend. Democrats and Obama focused on the win as a sign that the party's fractured presidential campaign season has not weakened their electoral strength overall.

Farm Bill

According to the Journal Sentinel, apparently the Farm Bill is merely another bill that looks like it will fix something, but has no real improvements. Apparently other members of Congress who represented the big growers of commodities such as corn, wheat, and sugar. So it looks like this bill that promised to help poor farmers and end the privileges to big ones will mostly promote the status quo. Oh, and it allegedly does nothing about the high cost of grain due to the ethanol craze. So more of the same: poor eating habits, the high cost of food, and small family farms will feel the pain.

House Judiciary: Bringin' The Heat

The Democratically controlled House Judiciary Committee is threatening to subpoena White House strategist Karl Rove. This is nothing out of the ordinary, but what is curious to me is that the article states that the committee is also in the process of suing the former Bush Chief of Staff, Josh Bolten, over his role in the firings of US Attorneys last year. I didn't know that they could do that...

Ethanol, not so good...

It has been known for a while that the use of ethanol in cars is far less efficient than gasoline. Engines need to burn more ethanol to produce the same amount of power as gasoline. Congress has just realized this and is moving to cut back subsidies. The subsidies were originally given so that as consumers we could rely on the production of alternate fuels and not the Middle East. Sounds like a good idea, unfortunately it did not work out so well. Food and fuel prices continue to climb. So congress is now looking for other solutions. The subsidy cuts are planned to be added to the Farm Bill that has yet to pass.