Del.icio.us Links

links for 2009-12-15

  • Governor Charlie Crist and former state House Speaker Marco Rubio are now tied in the 2010 race for the Republican Senate nomination in Florida.

    A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely GOP Primary voters finds Crist and Rubio each with 43% of the vote. Five percent (5%) prefer another candidate, and nine percent (9%) are undecided.

  • Independent Connecticut Sen. Joe Lieberman says he expects to support the Democrats' health care legislation as long as any government-run insurance plan stays out of the bill.

    Lieberman has been a question mark on the health care legislation for months. To win him over, Senate leaders said late Monday they were backing away from a Medicare expansion Lieberman opposed. They already had dropped a full-blown government insurance program.

    Lieberman told reporters Tuesday that if the Medicare expansion and government insurance plan are gone, "I'm going to be in a position where I can say what I've wanted to say all along: that I'm ready to vote for health care reform."

  • Establishing a joint fundraising committee does not legally bind the candidate and the NRSC in any way. The NRSC can, and has offered to, set up a joint committee with multiple candidates in the same race. In fact, in some ways, setting up a joint committee is better for the NRSC than for the candidate — if an individual has maxed out to a candidate, their check to the joint committee will be directed to the NRSC, thanks to personal contribution limits.

    The NRSC is not bound by any of the agreements to spend the money in certain states, either. The party has also set up joint accounts with Sens. Richard Burr (R-NC), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Tom Coburn (R-OK), Chuck Grassley (R-IA) and David Vitter (R-LA). Murkowski and Coburn are unlikely to face serious opposition next year, while Grassley and Vitter are running far ahead of their rivals.

    (tags: NRSC)
  • A top Pentagon official said Monday that a US missile defense drill will simulate an Iranian attack, a departure from the usual scenario of a North Korean attack, according to Reuters.
    "Previously, we have been testing the GMD system against a North Korean-type scenario. This next test … is more of a head-on shot like you would use defending against an Iranian shot into the United States. So that's the first time that we're now testing in a different scenario," Lt. Gen. Patrick O'Reilly, head of the US Missile Defense Agency said at the Reuters Aerospace and Defense Summit in Washington.

    According to O'Reilly, an Iranian attack would be more challenging than a North Korean attack because a missile fired from Iran would reach the US "more head on than from the side," and therefore relatively faster.

    During the test, expected to cost about $150 million scheduled for January, the US would fire an interceptor missile from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California at a mock-Iranian missil

  • In his speech, Mr Gore told the conference: “These figures are fresh. Some of the models suggest to Dr [Wieslav] Maslowski that there is a 75 per cent chance that the entire north polar ice cap, during the summer months, could be completely ice-free within five to seven years.”
  • “A day after Sen. Joe Lieberman said he won’t vote for the Democratic health reform bill as currently written, a progressive public policy blog is trying to oust his wife Hadassah as global ambassador for the Susan G. Komen for the Cure breast cancer group.

    “And Firedoglake is hoping to enlist Hollywood stars that work with the group.

    “Firedoglake contends that Hadassah Lieberman’s ties to the pharmaceutical industry — she once did public relations for a firm that handled Pharma clients and subsequent consulting for some drugmakers — should disqualify her.

    “Among the stars it is contacting: Ellen DeGeneres, Christie Brinkley, Andie MacDowell, Christie Brinkley, Cynthia Nixon, Ellen DeGeneres, James Woods, Jennifer Tilly, Marcia Cross, Mimi Rogers and Neil Patrick Harris.”
    ++++++++
    Yeah – way to make friends and influence Senators – Good job!