Gulf Coast Wage Cuts & Other Updates

The Gulf Coast Wage Cut is the frame for Bush's rescinding of the Davis-Bacon Wage Act of 1931. The Davis-Bacon Act required that workers employed in a project involving a government contract must be paid the local prevailing wage rate. For some reason, Republicans were afraid that labor unions would put their self-interest ahead of rebuilding the Gulf Coast. So Bush threw his buddies like Halliburton a bone and told them to have a party when he suspended Davis-Bacon.

Josh Marshall at TalkingPointsMemo.com reported today that Rep. Frank LoBiondo (R-NJ) is circulating a letter among House Republicans calling on the president to rescind the Wage Cut. Word has it that Rep. James Walsh (R-NY) may also be on board.

Also from Josh, HR 3763 is Rep. George Miller's bill to overturn President Bush's Gulf Coast Wage Cut. The bill currently has 171 Democratic co-sponsors but there are more Democrats who have not signed on. The list is here. Personally, I'm pretty surprised at some of the names that appear: Cynthia McKinney, Marty Meehan, Harold Ford, James Clyburn. Why wouldn't they oppose a wage cut?

Over at TPMCafe.com, Ellen Miller (Deputy Director of Campaign for America's Future and director of its Project for an Accountable Congress), explains why the indictment of David Safavian had Bob Ney's name all over it.

RawStory has Harry Reid's remarks opposing the confirmation of John Roberts as Chief Justice. In a show of support for Reid, Max Baucus (D-MT) announced today he will vote to confirm John Roberts. Baucus is a Democrat who cain't say no to Bush. The gutless wonder is being challenged by Jon Tester.

In today's episode of "As The White House Turns," Political Wire is reporting that Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney (R) may be brought in to oversee the Katrina recovery efforts. I guess Mitt knows as much as Karl does about construction.

Romney is among those named as a potential 2008 Republican nominee. That remains to be seen. During the 2002 governor's race, Romney stated he would honor a "moratorium" on abortion in which he would not attempt to change state abortion law. Although he told voters that he was personally opposed to abortion, he said he wanted to keep abortion "safe and legal in this country." In May, 2005, Romney claimed his stance had changed; he considered himself a "pro-life governor" who wished "the laws of our nation could reflect that view." Romney also said recently that perhaps mosques should be wiretapped for potential terrorist activity and that foreign students from "terrorist-sponsored states" might merit special scrutiny and surveillance.

Mitt Romney is an example of what happens when Democrats run poor campaigns.

The Rude One has some praise for the Big Dog.

Let's wrap things up with some comedy, courtesy of MediaMatters.org:

Sean Hannity pledged the maximum contribution of $4,200 to Jeanine Pirro, who is challenging Hillary Clinton, and asked his listeners to donate too. Sean's amnesia apparently kicked in, because he forgot the embarrassing incident of the missing page of Pirro's speech which left Pirro unable to continue speaking as she looked for it. Moral: When somebody else writes your speeches, read them first so if you lose a page, you won't look like an idiot.

Chris Matthews claimed that Democrats don't care about inflation, because they live with it and that only the Republicans are concerned about it. "Democrats live with inflation. Jimmy Carter had it. He didn't care that much." An odd statement coming from someone who worked in the Carter White House. Perhaps Matthews was out the day that Carter announced the appointment of Paul Volcker as Federal Reserve chairman, who ultimately achieved control of inflation.

Brit Hume says that Bush Senior never criticized Bill Clinton or his administration as Clinton did Bush Junior on ABC's This Week.

Bill O'Reilly is mad at MediaMatters for reporting his wish that Hurricane Katrina should have hit the UN building instead of New Orleans. Former Sen. Tim Wirth (D-CO), chairman of the United Nations Foundation, asked both Fox and O'Reilly to apologize. In an unsurprising move, O'Reilly did neither and instead attacked both MediaMatters and Wirth as "creepy" and "pinhead," respectively.

And last, remember the cool graphic designed by Kossack highacidity that Working Assets wanted to turn into a billboard? The image will be displayed on a mobile billboard outside of Grover Norquist's "Wednesday meeting" tomorrow at 8:45 a.m., 1920 L Street NW. (Not close enough for me to swing by and see.) Nordquist's landlord is a bit jumpy: "For the duration of the protest, the building will be "locked-down" as if it were after hours. All tenants will be required to use their access cards to enter the building, and access their floors. Furthermore, tenants will be required to escort all guests up to their suites." (Via Kos)

Sleep--refreshes like nothing else. I think I'll get some.