Monday morning digest: girls with guns edition

Along with the effervescent DJ Danielson, we attended the Becky Lourey Roast yesterday in St. Paul, which was probably the huggiest roast in Minnesota political history. Speakers kept saying that roasting Lourey was like trying to roast Mother Teresa. Dane Smith of Growth and Justice got off some good shots, though, riffing off Lourey's exhaustive energy and dead aim at hundreds of yards with a .30-06 rifle.  Jim Robins, an old college chum, caught Lourey's hug for former Rochester state senator Sheila Kiscaden, who had just shared some entertaining tales about Lourey's advice on raising teenagers. Lourey and her husband Gene raised 12 children.

The Grand Forks Herald's Minnesota Politics Notebook shares information about Congressman Walz's internet safety toolkit for parents. 

In the Winona Daily News'  letters section, Southeast Minnesota Central Labor Council president Russell Hess writes in about Workers rights and human rights.  The beginning:

It’s International Human Rights week, the 59th anniversary of the signing of the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights.

This year, the U.S. must face a hard fact: America’s workers rank lower on measure after measure than workers in many other industrialized nations, according to a new study by the London School of Economics.

We have less paid leave, less vacation and we work even more hours than workers in Japan. Instead of setting the standards, we are falling behind. . . .

Such close scrutiny of our lives as working Americans might be what causes the GOP to search for fear-driven distractions. There's a good example in today's WDN opinion section.

A letter writer at the Winona Daily News takes issue with Walz's support of the Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act and worries that Walz might seek separate tribal status for Norwegian-Americans (scary thought indeed). After reading up on the Akaka Bill, we conclude that the local Republicans are looking for something that sticks to the wall--anything, really-- to distract voters in the First.  Letter author John Adams is a former State Vice Chair of the Minnesota Republican Party and treasurer of Steve Drazkowski's recent state house campaign in the 28B election. 

Over at the loyal opposition's web site, MN GOP Chair Ron Carey takes exception to a roll call vote (1136) in the House, saying that Walz is betraying middle class Americans by not voting for a "clean AMT patch." 

What Carey doesn't mention that the bill up for discussion was the energy bill  ( H.R. 6).  We read this passage about the House GOP gambit in the  Congressional  Record (page H14267; 110th Congress); Rep. Welch of Vermont is speaking:

There are two arguments that I heard in the course of this debate. One was about process and procedure. I happen to believe that process and procedure is important. It's important not in its own right; it's important for what it can do to help us in this body create better legislation. But process can be abused. It can be abused when the goal is not to make a better bill; it's to obstruct the passage of any bill. And the choice that had to be made by leadership on this side, particularly in view of the decision in the other body to refuse to go to conference, was whether to accept that use of process that obstructed consideration of energy legislation this country needs or to move ahead. They made the right choice.

   Second, this legislation, a thousand pages, as Mr. Diaz-Balart and others mentioned, they had some fun holding up the bill. Mr. Speaker, the vast majority of that 1,000 pages contains provisions that have been considered in many cases passed by this House of Representatives. What this bill is is a compilation of the work that many people in this body have been doing for years. What's different is that it is actually coming to the House floor for a vote.

Substantively, this legislation does turn the page on energy policy. I showed a picture in the beginning. It's a metaphor really for the energy policy that we have had in this country for generations. It's the American administration hand in hand with OPEC leadership, OPEC countries, pursuing a policy of drill-and-drill, consume-and-consume, export our dollars and import their oil.

   If we turn the page, we are going to have a new picture. We are going to have a picture of the American Congress and the American administration hand in hand with American farmers who are driving their tractors, creating energy alternatives. It is going to be a picture of the American Congress with young engineers who are creating better, more efficient appliances. It is going to be a picture of the American Congress and American families who are driving to and from their soccer games, to and from work, to and from day care in safe vehicles, manufactured by American workers, that get 40 percent higher mileage, saving that family $1,000.

   We know, we know that this is a hat trick. If we change our energy policy and we act like a confident Nation, not a dependent Nation, we can protect the planet, reverse global warming. We can create good jobs and keep American dollars at home, and we can increase our national security by reducing our dependence on regimes that have no particular interest in the security of the United States but whose primary interest is in the dollars from American consumers and American businesses.

   I urge a ``yes'' vote on the previous question and on the rule. 

   The material previously referred to by Mr. Lincoln Diaz-Balart of Florida is as follows: 

Amendment to H. Res. 846 Offered By Mr. Lincoln Diaz-Balart of Florida

Strike all after the resolved clause and insert:   

   ``That upon adoption of this resolution, the bill (H.R. 6) to reduce our Nation's dependency on foreign oil by investing in clean, renewable, and alternative energy resources, promoting new emerging energy technologies, developing greater efficiency, and creating a Strategic Energy Efficiency and Renewables Reserve to invest in alternative energy, and for other purposes, with Senate amendments thereto, shall be considered to have been taken from the Speaker's table. A single motion that the Mouse concur in each of the Senate amendments with the respective amendment specified in section 2 of this resolution shall be considered as pending in the House without intervention of any point of order. The Senate amendments and the motion shall be considered as read. The motion shall be debatable for one hour equally divided and controlled by the Majority Leader and the Minority Leader or their designees. The previous question shall be considered as ordered on the motion to final adoption without intervening motion or demand for division of the question.

   ``Sec. 2. The amendments referred to in section I are as follows:   

   ``In lieu of the. matter proposed to be inserted for the text of the bill, H.R. 6, insert the following:   

   SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE.

   This Act may be cited as the `Stealth Tax Relief Extension Act of 2007'.   

   SECTION 2. EXTENSION OF ALTERNATIVE MINIMUM TAX RELIEF FOR NONREFUNDABLE PERSONAL CREDITS.

In Genera.--Paragraph (2) of section 26(a) (relating to special rule for taxable years 2000 through 2006) is amended-- 

   (1) by striking ``or 2006'' and inserting ``2006, or 2007'', and   

   (2) by striking ``2006'' in the heading thereof and inserting ``2007''.   

   (b) Effective Date.--The amendments made by this section shall apply to taxable years beginning after December 31, 2006.   

   SECTION 3. EXTENSION OF INCREASED ALTERNATIVE MINIMUM TAX EXEMPTION AMOUNT.

   (a) In General.--Paragraph (1) of section 55(d) (relating to exemption amount) is amended-- 

   (1) by striking ``($62,550 in the case of taxable years beginning in 2006)'' in subparagraph (A) and inserting ``($66,250 in the case of taxable year's beginning in 2007)'', and

   (2) by striking ``($42,500 in the case of taxable years beginning in 2006)'' in subparagraph (B) and inserting; ``(44,350 in the case of taxable years beginning in 2007)''.

   (b) Effective Date.--The amendments made by this section shall apply to taxable years beginning after December 31, 2006.''   

   ``In lieu of the matter proposed to be inserted for the title of the bill, H.R. 6, insert the following: ``To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to provide individuals relief from the alternative minimum tax.''.''

In short, the Republicans in the House were trying to scuttle the Energy Bill--and the months of work that went into producing the historic legislation--while producing a vote on an unrelated matter, solely to generate "gotcha" press releases like this one.

We'll  be curious to see if any the righty bloggers who reproduce the press release even bothered to read the Congressional Record to discover the context for the vote, or if they are just dreaming of getting Mark Brunswick's job at the Strib.

House Democrats have tried to produce a fiscally responsible patch that sticks to PAYGO rules. Today's Los Angeles Times business section has an explanation of the issue.  It concludes:

Democrats and Republicans are hung up in a debate about whether to replace the $50 billion the federal government would not collect from the AMT next year if the law is changed.

The House Democratic plan offsets the $50-billion cost by raising the tax rate on some investment fund managers and partners in private equity firms, many of whom make millions of dollars but pay only a 15% tax rate on much of their income, which they classify as capital gains. If they were subject to the standard income tax, they would pay a 35% rate, like other high-income Americans.

But Republicans have fiercely resisted raising taxes on anyone to recoup the cost of shielding taxpayers from the AMT. And facing a filibuster from Senate Republicans, Senate Democrats agreed Thursday to patch the AMT without raising revenue elsewhere.

What happens next?

The bill returns to the House, where Democratic leaders are considering other ways to raise at least some revenue to offset the lost $50 billion. If they do that, the bill will have to return to the Senate, where it is expected to face GOP opposition.

The White House, which once said an AMT fix should be paid for, has also indicated that President Bush will not support any measure that includes a tax increase.

Walz voted for fiscal responsibility--and to keep the Energy bill on track. (We's still hoping DJ--who understands process and procedure better than we do--will write this one up).   All roll call votes for the Congress are found here.

In the netroots, Dump Bachmann revives Bachmann's teleconferences and "hard work", a Blue Man post from this summer in which Walz's work ethic and open meeting schedule is contrasted with that of Representative Bachmann. Over at Open Left, Paul Rosenberg includes MN-01 in a Democracy Corps action plan write-up: A Movement-Building Strategy-Part 3: Getting Organized. A  Walz quote is included  in: Obama: Congress's Failure To Pass Hate Crimes ...