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I’m supposed to review and post these blog entries in a timely manner, but sometimes my brain wanders off somewhere and it doesn’t get done. My apologies to you, our readers, and to the esteemed James Wilson, author of the report that follows. I’ll try to do better. Honest. — Perry Willis (Defective Blog Editor)::::::Welcome to the Sept 18-24 edition of Last Week in Congress.::::::Members of Congress don’t want to be in Washington right now. They want to go home to prepare for the November elections. That’s why Congress had a 3-day work week, spending Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday ramming bills through so they could a) boast that they “accomplished a lot” and b) spend Friday campaigning.
MEDIA ANNOUNCEMENTS
Date: Thursday, October 5, 2006
Time: 2:00 PM Eastern, 1:00 PM Central
1:00 PM Mountain, Noon Pacific
Guest: Jim Babka, President, DownsizeDC.org
Length: 1 hour
Host: Jerry Hughes
Show: The Jerry Hughes Show
Topic: Warrantless spying and Tribunals/Torture
Internet: www.cilamerica.com
Click on the CIL|On Demand button, right side of page. You’ll need Winamp or Windows Media Player.
On 15 Stations:
KXCL 1140 AM Liberty, MO,
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KNAK 540 AM Delta, UT,
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—————
In addition, we’ve been contacted to appear on the The John McMullen Show on Sirius Satellite Radio at 10:15 PM Eastern (9:15 PM Central, 8:15 PM Mountain, and 7:15 PM Pacific) to discuss the Read the Bills Act. The show’s niche is the Gay, Lesbian, Bi-sexual, and Transgender community. The request came in over night and has not yet been confirmed so we have no further details as of the time of this message. Here’s the show link. As far as we know this show is not available on the web.
Thank you for being a DC Downsizer,
Jim Babka
President
DownsizeDC.org, Inc.
Congress passed a lot of legislation at the last minute before adjourning. We highly doubt they read any of it.
There was no waiting period to give them time to read the bills, even if they had wanted to know what they were passing.
Bad stuff was inserted and combined with completely unrelated material. Most in Congress had no idea what they were voting for, and we are only just now learning the details of much of it. Here’s one example . . .
As promised, here’s a report on what we accomplished in September. It was one of our best months ever!
First, we won two battles with Congress . . .
* We passed the Transparency Act
* We stopped Congress from passing a “Spying on Americans Act” (our more accurate name for the bill)
Both of these achievements were significant for
Downsize DC Conference Call – October 1, 2006
Today’s Downsizer-Dispatch . . .:::
Three quick items today . . .:::
* “Gun Owners of America” leader on Jim Babka’s radio show today:::* September extended by fraudulent act of Congress:::* Help promote Downsize DC partner “Free Talk Live”:::
We succeeded! Congress left town without legalizing President Bush’s warrantless spying on Americans. ::::::The spying continues of course, because laws only apply to you and me, and not the President. But at least Congress didn’t compound the problem. ::::::Yet.::::::It remains to be seen how the coming election will impact this issue. Will we have divided government? Will the Republicans be humbled, even if they retain control of Congress? Either outcome could save us. Otherwise . . .::::::The trouble has only begun. ::::::We’ll be revisiting this issue. In the meantime, savor this success. Thank you for making it possible. ::::::Liberals, conservatives, and libertarians worked together to make this happen. It shows the potential of making common cause to defend shared values. It points the way to a better future in which we transcend the rigged partisan game of divide-and-conquer, and unite the Downsizer Consensus for an unrelenting assault on a tiny and vulnerable Congress. ::::::In the meantime, September draws to a close. We are only $1,243 short of funding for our September bills. We are a grassroots organization supported by grassroots contributions. Is there 1 person out of the 23,346 people on this list (another record!) who could make a credit card contribution to cover this amount? You can do so here.::::::Can 13 of the 23,346 make $100 contributions?:::Can 26 do $50:::Can 52 do $25:::Can 104 do $12.50:::Can 208 do $6.25::::::You can contribute to pay for September here.::::::Thank you to everyone for an excellent month. I’ll have a report for you about everything we achieved in a few days. ::::::Jim Babka:::President:::DownsizeDC.org, Inc. :::::: ::::::
I have an awful lot to tell you in today’s message. Some of it is good news, and some of it is bad. We’ve asked you to read a lot in the last ten days. Congress makes a DC Downsizer’s job much more difficult before they leave on recess. Frankly, I can’t wait until they get out of town.
Let’s start with the most important item — good news. Our monthly budget need is down to only $2,203. The amount needed is now less than 10cents per subscriber. But only a small percentage of subscribers will respond, which is why we need YOU to consider a generous contribution. (If you’ve already contributed or pledged this month, thank you.)
It’s possible that one person reading this message could make the contribution that covers this entire amount. You know who you are. We need you now.
“You can’t save the world, if you can’t pay the rent,” said Morton Blackwell. That’s why we begin today’s message with an appeal. We’ve paid the rent — the situation is not that dire. But we can’t afford to begin deficit spending with holidays right around the corner. Please, make a generous donation or monthly pledge today.
Do you DIGG “Read the Bills?”
The world is changing fast. One of the Top 500 visited sites on the web is called Digg — as in, “I really digged that story.” Users promote news or commentary (Digg) or they supress others (bury). If you’ve never heard of it before, welcome to the club.
Our friends at FreeTalkLive have set up a Digg page of their own. It’s called FreeMarketDiggers and can be found here: http://digg.freetalklive.com/
One of the first items they posted was our Read the Bills Act. And it received enough “Diggs” to get promoted. At one point, it was even on Diggs main page! As I write this, it’s on page 2 of Political News pages. The closer to the lead our entry is, the more people will hear about Read the Bills and visit our site. We want that, right?
Your efforts are working. We may kill the warrantless spying bill. Democrats are developing some backbone. Conservative Republicans are fighting the bill too. Yesterday, we were asked to help a Republican Congressman to increase GOP defections in the House (it’s not who you might think). The bottom line . . .
Things have changed dramatically in the last 24 hours. The spying bill has become something of a hot potato. The House and Senate can’t agree on a final version. It’s possible no vote will be held before adjournment in either the House OR the Senate. That would exceed our expectations. Yesterday AM, things looked bleak for us. We were holding on to some hope we could use a procedure, such as a filibuster, to stop a vote from happening in the Senate. But stopping that vote from happening in both wings of Congress? Amazing!
The post-election landscape will change. We could have
Another episode of Jim Babka’s radio show, sponsored by DownsizeDC.org, Gun Owners of America, and the Marijuana Policy Project.