David Vitter is Facing Conservative Calls for His Resignation–Plus Ethics Charges
Posted: June 22, 2011 Filed under: Politics as Usual, Psychopaths in charge, Republican politics, U.S. Politics | Tags: Anthony Weiner, bribery, CREW, David Vitter, ethics, karma, Melanie Sloan, sex scandals 8 Comments
David "Diapers" Vitter
It’s a little late but still well deserved. Louisiana Senator David Vitter suddenly has a higher profile because of the way Anthony Weiner was unceremoniously hustled out of the House of Representatives. Now a conservative Christian Group is calling on Vitter to resign, and an ethics group has accused him of bribery.
The president of the Christian conservative Family Policy Network sent Sen. David Vitter, R-La., a letter Monday (June 20) calling on him to follow the lead of former Rep. Anthony Weiner, D-N.Y., and resign rather than leave Republicans and conservatives open to charges of hypocrisy.
Vitter admitted to a “serious sin” in 2007 after his phone number was found in the 2001 client records of a D.C. madam, when he was a member of the House.
Weiner resigned after first lying about and then admitting to “inappropriate” online communication with various women.
“There are a lot of people that I think are committing outright hypocrisy and are forced to do so as long as he (Vitter) remains in office,” said Joe Glover, the president of the Family Policy Network, based in Forest, Va. “I don’t think the senator should put those folks in the untenable position of having to pragmatically defend his presence in the Senate.”
In addition, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has filed a complaint with the Senate Ethics Committee, alleging that Vitter tried to “bribe” Ken Salazar, Obama’s Interior Secretary.
The complaint, filed by Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), cites a letter that Vitter wrote to Salazar last month. In the letter Vitter said he would continue to oppose increasing Salazar’s paycheck by $19,600 until the secretary issued permits for new exploratory deepwater wells in the Gulf of Mexico.
In a five-page letter to committee Chairwoman Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) and Vice Chairman Sen. Johnny Isakson (R-Ga.), CREW’s executive director Melanie Sloan detailed the allegation of Vitter’s “quid pro quo” and recommended that the committee refer matters to the Justice Department if they found the senator guilty of wrongdoing.
“Our country’s criminal laws apply to everyone, including senators,” said Sloan in the letter. “There is no exception to the bribery law allowing a senator to influence a department secretary’s official acts by withholding compensation.”
I believe that, and I know you believe that too. I guess we’ll have to wait and see if the Senates agrees with us.
Karma works in mysterious ways.
What’s a voter to do?
Posted: November 1, 2010 Filed under: Elections, New Orleans | Tags: Caroline Fayard, Cedric Richmond, Charlie Melancon, David Vitter, midterm elections 2010 52 Comments
This year seems to be just one bad choice after another for mid term voting. I have a blue dawg Democrat–Charlie Melancon–running for Senate that appalled me last week by saying this was a “Christian nation” and that he hoped it remained so in the televised debate with David Vitter. David Vitter came off as more reasonable with his answer and I thought that was an impossibility. I closed my check book on that one and am looking at the Green Party Candidate now. What a Hobson’s choice!
I can’t vote for the Democratic Congressman for reasons I wrote about earlier. So, that’s almost a Sophie’s choice. I wanted to like you Cedric, but you’ve just had too many ethics lapses that they’ve caught you on! That makes me wonder what lurks uncaught.
Bostonboomer linked this morning to a post over at Corrente by Valhalla on how the Democratic Party is no longer the beneficiary of a gender gap. No wonder. With this odd assortment of blue dawgs, Jane-Crow-adherents-of-Stupakistan, and fall-in-line to pass anything cowards, where’s a vote to go these days?
I cannot divorce my vote from the issues or the fact I live in New Orleans which is still reeling from Hurricane Katrina and now the BP oil spill and a horrid governor. I do not believe that putting in whacko tea party candidates is going to do one’s state or municipality any good during a tough recovery. I also think if a critical mass go with Speaker of the House Agent Orange–Snookie of the Radical Right Prudes–we’re going to lose ground in a big way. This election season is the original rock and a hard place. I only hope and pray for a few years of gridlock at this rate!
Anway, I just wanted to let you know that we’ll have live links and live blogging tomorrow so you can bring you voices, votes, and on-the-ground poll stories to every one here. Again, we’re a sharing place so I expect they’ll be an assortment of choices and varying levels of anger and disappointment.
Maybe one of us will have a few bright spots in an otherwise bleak elections season. I have one candidate that I’m strongly voting for and that’s Caroline Fayard who is running for Lt. Governor. I’d like a liberal woman in there to offset the horrible Bobby Jindal whose policy has been like the thing from Honey Island Swamp. She’s worth rooting for.
Every thing else appears to be choice-gone-bad.
Louisiana Senator Vitter Declares War on Canadian Users of Viagra
Posted: August 21, 2009 Filed under: Global Financial Crisis, New Orleans | Tags: Big Pharma, Canadian drugs, David Vitter Comments Off on Louisiana Senator Vitter Declares War on Canadian Users of Viagra
Okay, that headline is way misleading, but it’s Friday and I’m in a wrascally mood. Actually, what Republican Senator David (the Diaper) Vitter is suggesting is that we overwhelm the Canadian Prescription Drug Market via re-importation to drive prices up there and prices down here. It’s a strategy to break a system where Big Pharma gets to practice price discrimination which is basically charging different prices to different markets. TPM posted this Vitter explanation on YouTube.
Vitter’s economics seem like they might just work — or maybe not. Canada and other countries negotiate lower prices with the drug companies, who then demand exorbitant profits from U.S. consumers and our relatively free market. Arguably, by overwhelming other countries with American demand, their systems would break down. The next step here, is that Vitter believes this will cause prices to go up for everyone else, and down for us. (But we’d be curious what health care economists would say).
As Vitter told his questioner, who is apparently an Obama supporter: “I don’t support price controls, but I actually think re-importation would cause that system, as well as these varying prices, to collapse. That make sense?”
Of course, this is assuming the drug companies wouldn’t take advantage of their inelastic demand curves by just jacking up prices for everyone. And really, this whole scheme to destroy other countries’ social welfare programs for American benefit isn’t mighty neighborly of Vitter, is it?
It’s just so fiendish, it make actually work! But sheesh, aren’t there easier ways to take care of this like making some legislation here in the U.S. that lets Medicare bargain for its subscriber’s benefits or a public health option that could do the same? Why crash the Canadian system when just a little law writing could force the same result? We have laws that outlaw price discrimination! We could do something novel and let the Justice Department go after them with our antitrust laws! But, Senator Vitter, why pick on the poor Canadians, isn’t just living up there in the middle of ice fields and glaciers enough punishment as it is?
Please Digg!!! Share!!! Tweet!!!
Add to: Facebook | Digg | Del.icio.us | Stumbleupon | Reddit | Blinklist | Twitter | Technorati | Furl | Newsvine
peej
Carissa
bostonboomer
dakinikat
ecocatwoman
mablue2
Mama Lopez
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
Recent Comments