Democratic scandal round-up

UPDATE III: Daschle is out.

UPDATE II: And the hits keep coming,

Tom Daschle backed the patron who paid him a million-dollar salary and supplied him with a free car and driver for a job inside the Obama administration, two Democrats said Monday.

Leo Hindery, whose InterMedia Partners employed the former Senate majority leader, had been mentioned as a possible secretary of commerce or U.S. trade representative.

“Tom was pushing for him,” said one Democratic source.

To Obama’s credit,

Obama’s aides rejected Daschle’s suggestion that a top job go to Hindery, for whose private equity fund Daschle had served as a rainmaker and adviser.

UPDATE: And another one bites the dust

Nancy Killefer, who failed for a year and a half to pay employment taxes on household help, has withdrawn her candidacy to be the first chief performance officer for the federal government, the White House said Tuesday.

Killefer was the second major Obama administration nominee to withdraw and the third to have tax problems complicate their nomination after President Barack Obama announced their selection.

And Michelle Malkin has another tax problem for Daschle.

We’re gonna need a scorecard pretty soon.

Amanda Carpenter has a collection which includes the recent newsmakers, Daschle, Geithner and Rangel and reminds us the Al Franken still has some tax problems.

Franken, who is still fighting incumbent GOP Sen. Norm Coleman for Minnesota’s Senate seat, failed to pay at least $70,000 in taxes to 17 states prior to running for office.

Michelle Malkin reports on the White House’s opinion on Daschle’s troubles. If only the Democrats had been as understanding the last eight years.

Via TheHill.com Here’s what Gibbs said

It’s a serious mistake, but laying that mistake next to a three-decade career in public service, the president believes that Sen. Daschle is still the best suited to shepherd healthcare reform through Congress and get something to the president’s desk that will save the American people money and make the quality of healthcare better.

Can you imagine this being said about a Republican? Yeah, me either.

And now via the Instapundit and The Corner, we hear that Chris Dodd is refinancing his mortgage.

Sen. Dodd, whose committee has oversight over the mortgage and banking industries, faced heavy criticism in his home state for not releasing details of his mortgages when the controversy erupted last year.

Sen. Dodd said Monday he received a $275,000 30-year, adjustable rate loan at 4.5% interest for his East Haddam home. The Washington home was financed with a 30-year adjustable loan of $506,000 with a 4.25% rate.

The terms of the mortgages are under investigation by the Senate Ethics Committee.

The TaxProf has more on Daschle than you will want to read (H/t Instapundit).

Waukesha Carnival – Palinsanity edition

Well, it’s been far too long since my last round-up of Waukesha-related bloggings, so here, finally, is edition 38. So let’s get started.

The buzz was over the Republican National Convention and John McCain’s inspired pick of Sarah Palin as his vice presidential candidate.

Fox Head is one of many conservatives who are excited about the ticket after being “Eh!” about McCain. The difference? Sarah Palin, of course.

Dean Culver at Common Sense Waukesha calls it The Libs New Low! but the Right does it too.

Dan Diebert comments on a Waukesha “hate crime” against Obama. Darryl Enriquez covered it also, but he works for the Journal Sentinel so is not allowed to be funny.

Cindy Kilkenny at Fairly Conservative hit blog paydirt with two posts on Anne Kilkenny (no relation).

Tim at The Other Side of My Mouth, said we should declare wild speculations of her family and her daughter’s pregnancy to be off limits–one of the few on the left (Obama was another, to his credit also) to do so.

Kyle Prast from Practically Speaking and a friend went to see McCain/Palin at Cedarburg.

Scott Feldstein had a thoughtful review of McCain’s acceptance speech.

Troy Fullerton at Rendevous with Destiny has a crush on Sarah.

Silent e shared a cartoon from Michael Ramirez that says it all for some Republicans.

For those who believe the Republicans didn’t deal with the issues in their acceptance speeches, Spring City Chronicle posts a relevant part of Gov. Palin’s speech.

And we all know football season is here. Bryon Houlgrave gives us two posts with pictures from area high school games.

Within Wisconsin, Dad29 quoting from Patrick McIlheran reminds us that the minimum mark-up law is not dead.

The Daily Scoff tackles the Government Accountability Board.

James Wigderson looks at some state campaign financing.

Hungry? MommaBlogger at Homemaker’s Guide to the Galaxy baked you a pie. Now, go get a snack. You’ll need one.

Or maybe you want to try one of these weird foods given to us by Dan at Skeptics Anonymous and Eat Wisconsin. They’ve eaten more on the list than I have (I don’t even know what some of them are!) but two that neither have eaten, I have–whole insects, if you count larvae, and snake. Which reminds me of the old line, “I like cats–they taste like chicken!”

Locally, Jeff at Five Points labels Weekend in Waukesha a great success. I would agree.

Lisa from Sequentially Speaking shares that Neptune Comics is moving to the Westbrook Shopping Center on Moreland (Kohl’s).

James Rowan does his usual criticism of sprawl. But I did learn a new phrase–bread and circuses.

In other political posts, Sen. Mary Lasich (aide Kevin Fischer?) tells us the federal government wants to regulate our lawn mowers.

Josh at Blog Waukesha tried to educate a tax-increaser on economics, but couldn’t seem to get through to him.

Finally, Hurricane Gustav caused Tom Gehl to recall Miss Molly.

That concludes this edition. You can always submit a post (even if it isn’t yours) to the next edition by using this convenient form. Or you can e-mail the link to me at thoughtfulconservative [at] yahoo [dot] com. Past posts can be found here.

John Edwards

First off, I am back, finally. Wireless was not as easy to get nor did I have the time I thought I would have to blog all summer. But regular scheduling should resume.

Now to the topic at hand. No doubt my conservative friends will beat up John Edwards over his affair. He deserves it. As he himself says,

If you want to beat me up – feel free. You cannot beat me up more than I have already beaten up myself. I have been stripped bare it can’t be any worse than he beat up himself.

Is he a hypocrite? Yes. But I believe we all are in some way. The magnitude comes from the public visibility of the hypocrite. I believe John Edwards is still dedicated to what he has professed, just as I believe those conservatives the Left has delighted in beating up are still dedicated to what they believe.

As most politicians (you would think they would learn after a while), he tried to stonewall and deny. It’s natural, but most folks don’t like it a public figure does so.

John Edwards will probably never run for president again. He won’t be Attorney General, nor head a special commission. That’s the penalty for, from all appearances, a slip-up. It’s not the first time it’s happened; it won’t be the last.

Questions still remain about the father of the lady’s baby and money paid to her. I would hope that Edwards finally came clean in his ABC interview. Time will tell.

Finally, I would hope my left leaning friends will show the same compassion toward a right leaning figure who has an affair revealed, as they have rightly shown to John Edwards and his family.

Mankind doesn’t always get it right. May we be more understanding of those who try to make a change (even if we don’t agree with them), especially when they fall.

Republican Dream Ticket?

I don’t think it would be as dreamy as Mr. Lowe thinks.

But it is funny, in a Republican sort of way.

Edwards’ endorsement, Florida and Michigan

As was most likely the hope all along, it appears as though it won’t make any difference to the Democratic nomination process.

With John Edwards endorsing Obama for president, his delegates could now be free to vote for Obama as well as gaining more super delegates.

The Clinton campaign is still pushing for the delegates to be counted, but the advantage is no longer as great as it was.

Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton insists that counting Florida could still help her net the party’s presidential nomination, but that net has developed some holes.

Sen. John Edwards’ endorsement this week of Sen. Barack Obama for the Democratic presidential nomination puts 13 Florida delegates in play, assuming the state’s delegation is eventually seated at the party’s convention.

It will make it easier to compromise on an agreement to count delegates.

The only advantage left to Clinton is, if the delegates from FL and MI are fully counted, it

would increase the number of delegates needed to win to 2,210. That would buy her more time.

Edwards endorsement doesn’t give Obama the nomination, but it is one more nail in the Clinton campaign coffin.

Democrats outnumber Republicans in Pinellas County

From the St. Petersburg Times, it appears the county I grew up in has changing politics.

Pinellas County has turned blue, at least when it comes to voter registration in this GOP stronghold.

For the first time in more than two decades, figures from the Supervisor of Elections Office Friday showed registered Democrats outnumbering Republicans, 233,240 to 233,181.

The last time Democrats had the edge, according to records from the supervisor’s office, was in 1984. A decade ago, Republicans enjoyed a 30,000-voter advantage.

When my mom and dad moved there in 1963, they could only register as Democrats.

The reasons?

• National discontent with the GOP.
• Pinellas is becoming younger and more diverse

But what do voter registrations really tell us?

[R]egistration figures only tell part of the story. There are more Democrats in Florida than Republicans, yet the GOP controls nearly all levers [sic] of state government.

I guess we’ll see what happens. In Florida and nationwide.