Nancy Pelosi

The National Book Awards tried to glam things up, with mixed results. 

Narciso Rodriguez told us about Michelle Obama's controversial Election Night dress at the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund Awards. 

We caught up with the MisShapes at Christian Siriano's birthday party at Citrine. 

At the re-dedication of the Bridge Formerly Known as Triborough, we discovered that Nancy Pelosi isn't one for frivolous questions (but Martha Stewart is!). 

We faced the new media reality and took advantage of the complimentary burgers at Tina Brown's Daily Beast launch party in the Meatpacking District. 

We also learned about Out magazine's recession-proof readership and searched in vain for James Franco at the annual "Out 100" celebration. (We found him a few days later at a screening of Milk.)

Henry Waxman’s bid to oust John Dingell from his perch atop the House Energy and Commerce Committee succeeded on Thursday, with the chamber’s Democratic caucus voting 137-122 to hand him the gavel.

The verdict will have an immediate and significant impact on energy, environmental and health care policy, all of which should loom large in Barack Obama’s first-year agenda, pushing a major power center within the House sharply to the left and into alignment with Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s governing vision.

There is also fear among some House veterans, particularly members of the Congressional Black Caucus, that Waxman’s triumph – the first successful bid to depose a Democratic chairman in 23 years, and the first time it’s even been tried since 1996 – will embolden more members to challenge the seniority system that, until now, has guaranteed committee chairmanships to members with the most tenure.  read more »

an election year when the Republican Party and the president are unpopular, and Washington itself has become shorthand for things gone wrong, Representative Randy Kuhl of Rochester is falling back on his state legislature experience, and casting himself a folksy local.

"It's all been about local issues," said Kuhl campaign manager Justin Stokes. "And I think the biggest contrast that we have here is that Congressman Kuhl is a lifelong resident here." Kuhl was born in the town were he now lives, Hammondsport. He also represented the area in the State Assembly for six years, and the State Senate for 17 years, before he was elected to Congress in 2004.  read more »

Wednesday evening at Pier 60, the dedication of the Robert F. Kennedy Bridge (formerly known as the Triborough!) attracted a long list of high-profile guests—Sarah Jessica Parker, Carl Bernstein, Matt Dillon, not to mention gaggles of politicians and Kennedys. And Archbishop Desmond Tutu! The Daily Transom wondered what kinds of Manhattan landmarks this sort of crowd would like to be named after them.

"A dog park!" replied actress Glenn Close, who during the dinner would be reading alongside Matthew Broderick and Harry Belafonte from Ariel Dorfman's play Speak Truth to Power: Voices From Beyond the Dark. "Or maybe a theater, that would be nice. Or the Empire State Building! But I guess that should actually be named after a guy."  read more »

The full Democratic Caucus of the U.S. House just voted and it is now official: Henry Waxman has successfully pushed John Dingell aside as chairman of the powerful Energy and Commerce Committee.

This marks the first time in 23 years that a sitting Democratic chairman has been deposed. Waxman, 69, targeted Dingell because of the 82-year-old Michigander's unwillingness to pursue stringent fuel economy standards and supposed obeisance to Detroit. The incoming Obama administration's energy and climate change (and health care) agendas will flow directly through Energy and Commerce.

Known as the "Dean of the House," Dingell, 82, has held his seat since 1955 (before that, it belonged to his father for 22 years) and in three months will become the chamber's longest-serving member ever.  read more »

The first round of a rare committee chairmanship fight in the U.S. House is over, with Henry Waxman, who is seeking to grab the powerful Energy and Commerce gavel from John Dingell, winning a vote of the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee, 25-22.

The outcome is hardly final, and Dingell will now appeal the matter to the full Democratic caucus, which will probably vote tomorrow.  read more »

Waxman's initial victory, however, is noteworthy because the Steering and Policy Committee, which makes formal recommendations to the whole caucus on committee assignments, is packed with Speaker Nancy Pelosi's loyalists. Pelosi has been publicly neutral in the Waxman-Dingell contest, but there are

Officially, Nancy Pelosi isn’t taking sides in the heated fight between John Dingell and Henry Waxman for the chairmanship of the mighty House Energy and Commerce Committee -- a panel that will play a pivotal role in shaping energy, climate change, and health care policy during the next administration.

Don’t believe her. Pelosi’s record suggests strongly that she won’t remain neutral in a critical fight like this, and furthermore, that she’ll take the occasion to help one of Congress’ most prominent liberals topple, once and for all, an entrenched nemesis.

Democrats on Capitol Hill still remember Pelosi’s avowed neutrality in a party leadership race three years ago -- followed by her sudden, last-minute muscling on behalf of a candidate, Connecticut’s John Larson, who had been dismissed as a hopeless also-ran.  read more »

WASHINGTON – Anticipating large gains on Election Day, some Democrats are beginning to ponder how to maintain their majority in the House of Representatives heading into the future.

And there is increasing buzz that a fifty-year-old, fourth term congressman from Long Island might be at least part of the answer.  read more »

WASHINGTON - With a reshuffling of House leadership just around the corner, Queens Democratic leader Joe Crowley is making it clear to his party’s leadership he is not interested in serving as chief of the Democratic House campaign arm.

A senior Crowley aide said today that the congressman has informed Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee executive director Brian Wolff that he would not  read more »

The failure to pass bailout legislation reflected a political system as bereft of confidence as the financial markets. President George W. Bush and Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson had no credibility to match the arrogance of their initial demand for absolute power in distributing $700 billion of public assistance (the old synonym for welfare). Many Republicans in Congress lacked the intellectual fortitude to cope with the spectacular collapse of their ideology.

So the rescue of capitalism once more becomes the sole responsibility of the Democrats.

Much can be said about the Democratic Congressional leadership’s fumbling and fearfulness, which have hobbled them ever since they recaptured the majority.  read more »

John Catsimatidis, the Clinton donor and Gristedes founder who is now planning to run for mayor as a Republican, blames Democrats, naturally, for the failure of the federal bailout legislation.

"Nancy Pelosi should have known about it before she brought it for a vote," Catsimatidis told me in an email. 

 

The Presidential nominating conventions are now approaching, first the Democrats' and then the Republicans'. The President hangs out at the Olympics, stomps his feet over the Russian invasion of Georgia and then makes another pass at gutting the Endangered Species Act by reducing the time and scientific analysis needed to assess the environmental impact of federal projects. The energy and climate issue have provided some environmental content to this campaign, but the folks running the country still don't see the stake we have in environmental sustainability.

What does an extinct frog have to do with human well-being? What does the environment have to do with economic wealth? Can't our technology solve any environmental problem we make? The short answer, as we learned nearly half a century ago from Rachael Carson and Barry Commoner, is that everything is connected to everything else.  read more »

The Democrats are supposed to own the issue of energy, if only because they've mastered the art of tarring Republicans as the party of Big Oil. It's a caricature that the G.O.P., with its mocking scorn for conservation, addiction to corporate tax cuts and unkickable habit of nominating oil men for national office, has done nothing to refute.

Of course, the Democrats are also (supposedly) the masters of the blown political save, experts at devising new and ever more elaborate means of snatching electoral defeat from the jaws of victory. So it's only fitting that now, just as energy assumes unprecedented prominence in a presidential campaign, they've gone and adopted a maddeningly incomprehensible message that threatens to forfeit the powerful emotional advantage they've enjoyed on the subject for decades.  read more »

AUSTIN, Texas—By Sunday morning, most of the speakers and bloggers attending the Netroots Nation convention had gone home. In preparation for the convention's final key note—a plenary on "eco-equality"—volunteers in the convention center's gaping main exhibit hall distributed leaflets against various outrages ("No Forced Vaccination" or "Put Impeachment Back on the Table.") Ed Madej, a digital cartographer who blogs on the Daily Kos under the name Ed in Montana, sat alone at one of the tables blanketed with such fliers, checking weather maps on his laptop for any possible disturbances on his way home to Helena.

 

Under jumbo screens featuring freeze-framed poses of panelists talking about "marketing and monetizing your blog" or taking "online engagement to offline activism," or Howard Dean lecturing in an open-collared shirt and tan jacket, Madej offered his own impression of this year's convention.  read more »

Andrew Delbanco, the distinguished critic and biographer of Melville, gives Barack Obama two thumbs up in The New Republic (www.tnr.com), explicitly allowing his favorable literary judgment on Mr. Obama’s two books to shade into a political endorsement ("this man—to my ear, at least—is the real deal"). It’s a strange, leapfrogging idea, to think that a politician’s prose opens a window into his heart. "It is hard for any writer," says Mr. Delbanco, "no matter how selective his memory or guarded his words, to conceal himself in his writing. I suspect (I’ve never met him) that the weaknesses and strengths of Obama’s writing reflect those of his character—a virtuosity that tempts him to be pleased with himself and impatient with others, but also an awareness of human complexity.  read more »

Adolfo Carrion will host Barack Obama and John McCain at a national conference of Latino elected officials meeting in Washington, D.C., on Saturday, June 28.

Some Democratic officials, like Representative Nydia Velazquez, have said Obama has a problem connecting with Latino voters, and argued McCain's immigration policy is viewed so positively among Latinos that some may decide to vote Republican.

In a public statement, Carrion, who is president of the National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials, said, "Latino voters are going to play a decisive role in the general election and the community is ready to hear both candidates make their case."

Also attending the four-day event are Bill Richardson, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.

A Kos commenter notices that Ted Kennedy, among other leading Democrats, is denounced in strong terms in this post from a Clinton supporter on Hillary Clinton’s campaign web site.

The notice, posted earlier in the month for a demonstration at D.N.C. headquarters when the Rules and Bylaws Committee meets over the fate of the Florida and Michigan delegates, includes this line:  read more »

As reported, Hillary Clinton is calling for George W. Bush to boycott the opening ceremonies of the Olympic Games in Beijing this summer.

Nancy Pelosi, who has taken an active role in the fight over remaining uncommitted superdelegates, made the same public demand earlier this month.

The statement just released by the Clinton campaign:  read more »

A reader sends over a letter, dated today, from some of Hillary Clinton’s top fund-raisers to Nancy Pelosi. They’re responding to Pelosi’s recent comments in an ABC News interview advocating the Obama campaign’s line on superdelegates, which is that superdelegates ought to follow the lead of the pledged delegates. (If they do, Obama wins.)

The fund-raisers note, in a passively menacing way, that they are “strong supporters” of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, before urging Pelosi to “clarify [her] position on superdelegates and reflect … a more open view to the optional independent actions of each of the delegates at the National Convention in August.”

The letter is signed by Marc Aronchick, Clarence Avant, Susie Tompkins Buell, Sim Farar, Robert Johnson, Chris Korge, Marc and Cathy Lasry, Hassan Nemazee, Alan and Susan Patricoff, JB Pritzker, Amy Rao, Lynn Forester de Rothschild, Haim Saban, Bernard Schwartz, Stanley Shuman, Jay and Tracy Snyder and Maureen White and Steve Rattner.

UPDATE: The Obama campaign responds after the jump.  read more »

Whatever her official posture, Nancy Pelosi is not neutral in the Democratic primary.

Typically, for instance, someone who is neutral wouldn’t say that victory by one of the candidates would be “harmful.” That’s essentially how Pelosi, the supposedly impartial House Speaker, has characterized the prospective nomination of Hillary Clinton.

“If the votes of the superdelegates overturn what happens in the elections, it would be harmful to the Democratic Party,” Pelosi said in an interview for ABC’s “This Week” that was taped late last week.  read more »

Gullible voters keen to treat the onset of the 2008 primary season as a hale sign of life in the American democratic system had best avert their gaze from Capitol Hill this week. For as Congress winds down the year’s business with earmark-laden appropriations bills and unsightly cave-ins to Bush prerogative after Bush prerogative, the governing metaphor is not the campaign scene’s notorious horse race—something that, for all its by-the-numbers familiarity, at least connotes forward motion.  read more »

Last evening, as the writers' strike got into full swing and late-night talk shows halted production, one comedian found a venue for his work. Stephen Colbert was tapped to introduce House Speaker Nancy Pelosi at Glamour's Women of the Year awards, where she received special recognition from the Conde Nast title. So for one night, the only people watching Mr. Colbert were in the packed Avery Fisher Hall at Lincoln Center. To read the text of Mr. Colbert's introduction--in which he displays a suspiciously comprehensive knowledge of current women's fashion--click through to the jump.  read more »

The last two times Democrats enjoyed untrammeled dominance in Washington, the consequences for the party were catastrophic. But there's hope if the fates align in 2008.  read more »

It can often to seem to rank-and-file Democrats as if the Republicans are still in charge of Congress: Nearly a year after their party picked up 31 House and six Senate seats, the war in Iraq still rages, with tens of thousands of more troops deployed now than then. This failure to force even a beginning to the end of the war accounts for the painfully poor poll standing of the Democratic-led Congress, with the party faithful even more restless and frustrated than independent voters.  read more »

During her visit to City Hall today, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said she supports re-opening the federal victim’s compensation fund to pay for health care costs of rescue workers affected by 9/11. She did not say which specific bill she supports. Ultimately, she said, the plan has to be “sustainable.”

“I believe we must address the issue. Again, there are several proposals on the table. But what we want to do is bring them together and take the smartest approach to it. We want to have an approach that is sustainable.”

A spokesman for Bloomberg said the mayor and the speaker also discussed the Tiahrt Amendment, which the mayor says stymies law enforcement from tracking illegal guns. The spokesman, Stu Loeser, declined to elaborate on what, if any agreements, were reached on that issue.

Christine Quinn and the City Council will unveil on September 18th the Council’s federal agenda, where these and other issues will be revisited.

Nancy Pelosi helped raise a cool $300,000 for the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee last night at the Upper East Side home of Dennis and Karen Mehiel, according to one of the guests, Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney.

In addition to Maloney, who I ran into at a Women for Hillary event this morning at the Hilton, the guest list of elected Democrats included representatives Steve Israel, Nydia Velazquez and Chris Van Hollen.

The House Speaker may have handed the government a license to crush.  read more »

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is coming to New York on June 3 for a fund-raiser at the suburban home of Dennis Mehiel, according to a Democratic source.

Mehiel, a successful businessman from Westchester, has been a major source of Democratic money in the state for years.

He also ran for lieutenant governor on a ticket with Carl McCall in 2002 and was New York chair of the Kerry-Edwards campaign in 2004.

The outcry from Congressional Democrats was justifiably loud when conservative members resorted to p  read more »

Later today, Representative Joe Crowley of Queens will be reappointed as chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee's Business Council, the fund-raising arm that reaches into the deep pockets of business leaders nationwide.

Crowley's fund-raising prowess was cited in the recent past by Charlie Rangel earlier as a reason to give him a seat on the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee.

It seems he still has the touch.

UPDATE: Crowley will also perform with his Bruce Springsteen tribute band in DC tonight. Details after the jump.  read more »

-- Azi Paybarah

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi just approved a waiver that will allow Joe Crowley to sit on the Foreign Relations Committee in addition to the the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, something he might otherwise have had to give up.

Normally, Ways and Means is one of the committee assignments that requires the assignee to give up seats on all other committees. (The others include Energy and Commerce, Financial Services, Appropriations and Rules.)

"I am grateful to Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Democratic Steering Chair Rosa L. DeLauro for this opportunity to serve on the Committee on Foreign Affairs," Crowley said in a public statement.

Seems like whatever lingering resentment Pelosi may have had about Crowley opposing her unsuccessful candidate for House Majority Leader are over with.

-- Azi Paybarah

Rep. Anthony Weiner will take the gavel from House Speaker Nancy Pelosi tomorow when the House debates the anti-war resolution.

Its a nice perk for the congressman who backed Pelosi's preferred, but losing, candidate in the race for House Majority Leader.

It's also a happening at a convenient time for Weiner to get himself in front of the cameras -- just as likely 2009 candidates Adolfo Carrion and Christine Quinn are making high-profile speeches of their own.

Not that we're keeping track or anything.

-- Azi Paybarah

Starting January 18, a new book by a Sept. 11th survivor about how to end partisanship in politics will be available for free download over here.

You can check out several chapters of the book, Roadmap to Non partisanship, by Vijay Duggal, who said he sent word of his book to Nancy Pelosi and a other congressional leaders.

How good it is, I'm not sure. But non-partisan is a nice ideal to reach for, and free isn't too high a price, is it?

-- Azi Paybarah

True to her word, newly elected Rep. Kirsten Gillibrand has followed up on a pre-election pledge to make her daily schedule public. This is, needless to say, a highly unusual practice in Washington.

The first one is here.

* Breakfast honoring Rep. Ike Skelton, Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee.

* Congressional Open House with constituents visiting from the district.

* Floor Votes (See Congressional Record)

* Ceremonial Swearing-In with Speaker Pelosi

* Reception for constituents

* Rep. Gillibrand had no scheduled meetings with registered lobbyists.

-- Azi Paybarah

Rep. Joe Crowley just got a seat on the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee, and is contemplating getting a waiver to keep his seat on the Internationals Relations Committee.

Quick, inside-baseball read: Crowley's good relationship with Steny Hoyer is helping him more than his lousy relationship with Nancy Pelosi is hurting him.

-- Azi Paybarah

UPDATE: Crowley just called to contest my characterization of his relationship with the incoming house speaker. "If it wasn't for Charlie Rangel and Nancy Pelosi, I wouldn't be on this committee: no if, ands or butts about it," he said.

As for the recent Democratic leadership race that essentially pitted his team against Pelosi's, Crowley said, "That's behind us."

Congressman Anthony Weiner just got onto the energy and commerce committee, one of five "exclusive" committees in the House, a DC reader called to say.

That means that Weiner will have to give up his seats on the judiciary and transportation committees unless he gets a waiver from Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who he sided with in the leadership fight.

Any idea how this might help (or hurt) Weiner's ability to deliver tangible benefits to New York by, say, 2009?

-- Azi Paybarah

When it comes to the field of Democratic Presidential hopefuls, Chris Dodd has clearly decided that  read more »

A good rule for understanding the U.S.  read more »

When it comes to the field of Democratic Presidential hopefuls, Chris Dodd has clearly decided that  read more »

It’s been barely a week since her fellow House Democrats officially picked Nancy Pelosi as the  read more »

It’s been barely a week since her fellow House Democrats officially picked Nancy Pelosi as their c  read more »

In today's Quinnipiac poll, 45 percent of voters said Condoleezza Rice is the most powerful woman in the country.

That's compared to 29 percent who said the same thing about Hillary Clinton, and 23 percent who said it about Nancy Pelosi.

Regardless of who voters support in a presidential race, 56-41percent said Hillary is qualified to be president.

Not directly related, but also interesting:

"American voters oppose by 52 - 45 percent laws allowing same-sex couples to form civil unions and oppose 63 - 34 percent allowing same-sex couples to marry."

-- Azi Paybarah

It was only after the midterm elections that the real campaigning began.

Below is a letter, dated November 15, from Charlie Rangel and Nita Lowey asking Nancy Pelosi to put Joe Crowley on the influential House Ways and Means Committee.

It's a position that provides access to business-minded constituents with lots of campaign cash to dole out to committee members. That's something, to judge by this recommendation, that's not lost on Rangel and Lowey.

"Joe has hosted events for candidates and Frontline Members in New York and contributed directly $275,000 to the DCCC and raised over $6.75 million in his role as Business Council Chair. Joe will continue to work in the 110th to support our Freshman and continue turning red seats blue."

The rest of the letter is over here [pdf].

-- Azi Paybarah

Charlie Rangel wants to bring back the draft.

The governor's appointee investigating the Alan Hevesi chauffeur scandal now has subpoena power.

Chauffeur scandals wouldn't happen if elected officialstook public transportation, like Mike Bloomberg.

Who's now worth about $20 billion.

Ben looks at Malcolm Smith's business practices.

Chris Smith wonders what's next for Chuck Schumer.

Next for Roberto Ramirez and other lobbyists who raised money for Eliot Spitzer: new offices in Albany.

The New Yorker looks at the effect of the Democratic victory on some of the White House's more aggressivemilitary options.

In between the pages of the New Yorker: a copy of Al Gore's movie.

Unlike Democrats, election results don't change Republicans, says Jonathan Chait in TNR [subscription]. "If Republicans win, it's because they were conservative. If they lose, it's because they weren't." That's not good, say the WSJ's editors [subscription].

Rudy Giuliani may get swift-boated by his New York City-based critics like Norm Siegel.

The Post looks at one of the friends of disgraced labor leader Brian McLaughlin.

Why did Nancy Pelosi get involved in the Murtha-Hoyer race for Majority Leader?

Time Magazine dispels six myths of the 2004 elections.

Newsweek looks at Bill and Hillary's battle plan in the wake of the midterm elections.

Howard Feinman looks at the divisions in the Democratic Party Nancy Pelosi has to manage.

And the Clintons' neighbor got shot.

-- Azi Paybarah

When soon-to-be House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced her support for John Murtha’s bid for House M  read more »