Glenn Thrush lets us know that Ellen Tauscher is leaving California's 10th Congressional District to be the Undersecretary of State for Arms Control and International Security under Hillary Clinton. That sounds like a pretty important job, and I hope she doesn't screw it up. However, I'll be happy to have her out of the House, where she was a lot less liberal than her district would support. You don't want people from Northern California districts where Obama won with 64.7% of the vote to be vice-chairing the DLC and claiming membership in the Blue Dog coalition. You especially don't want them writing favors for banking interests into mortgage cramdown bills.
In her defense, she's a pretty good social liberal, and she introduced some legislation to end Don't Ask Don't Tell. But plenty of Democrats will be willing to introduce bills like that. Being rid of an influential banking industry shill is a worthwhile trade, and I look forward to the special election for her replacement.
2 comments:
finding a pretty good social liberal who does the bidding of big business in the Democratic caucus isn't very difficult. They must outnumber economic progressives at least 4:1
She was the first person I ever voted for, way back in 1996. She was notable for not securing pork for the bay area (like not getting roads or transit money), while simultaneously not authoring any bills had passed the house. *sigh *
As a Yellow dog, though, I was going to vote for her no matter what. And now I can ask my friends (who still live there...) to vote for an effective dem...
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