On Bipartisanship
Ben Smith at Politico captures the state of play as well as anyone at this stage: ... "bipartisanship" is as much a brand as any conceivable Washington reality. These House…
SB 20 — Reapportionment of the General Assembly
Kudos to are due to Senator Blevins and Representative Kowalko and all of the co-sponsors of this bill to create an The Redistricting Commission for the State of Delaware — an independent commission to supervise the reapportionment of the GA after the next census. Really, this approach to reapportionment is all kinds of steps in the right direction.
This bill takes the work of redistricting out of the political hands of the Legislature and asks this commission to redraw the maps. The GA approves the maps by majority vote, with the Governor approving. In the event there is no agreement on the reapportionment by September 30 of the year the new census data is available from the US Government, there is a provision to hand the task off to the Chancellor of the State of Delaware and a Superior Court Judge, whose work product is binding when complete.
The Commission has eleven members — 10 appointed by GA leadership and the non-voting Chair of the Commission is selected and voted on by the appointed Commission. Each county and the City of Wilmington have to be represented. They are required to operate openly — they have the maintain a website, conduct all meetings in public, and be subject to FOIA. In addition, they may not be elected officials, party officials, may not be a lobbiest, may not run for office in the election following reapportionment and may not be recently retired from the legislature.
Wingnut Talking Points Smackdown — The Recovery Program
This edition outsourced to Tommywonk. Read the whole thing, but here is an interesting bit: Left out of that argument is the question of how we got to the largest…
A Real CBO Report on the Stimulus!
Just don't tell these guys. And, as Think Progress notes, even the so-called intellectuals in the conservative room don't know that there is a real report. According to this, AEI…
And the Media Gets Played By the GOP Again
Remember that recent CBO report that media types and Republicans have been breathlessly citing as an analysis as to why the stimulus package won't work? Well, it turns out that…
I Want Some TARP
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yGfQk9XXm24[/youtube] Liberalgeek will be leading the Delaware Premiere of the singing of this little ditty at the Food Bank tomorrow. Make sure you know the lines AND the dance! (kidding,…
Science Blogging! – Origin of the Species Edition
John Whithead, a London-based evolutionary biologist is blogging On The Origin of Species chapter by chapter. Remember it is Darwin Year -- he would have been 200 years old this…
Americans Want Infrastructure Spending
Frank Luntz, of all people, positively gushes over the results of a new poll he's run about the concerns of Americans on infrastructure spending: Consider this: A near unanimous 94%…
HB 1 Open Government Update
This bill was voted out of the House Administration Committee on Wednesday with 3 On the Merits votes. The NJ expands on the discussions, with Speaker Gilligan making it clear…
Breaking: Lisa Diller for 5th NCCo District Rep!
Heard earlier this evening that Lisa Diller was selected to run for this office in its Special Election. Unstable Isotope confirms this, and notes that there was a decent amount…
SB 7 Eminent Domain Bill Update
Quick update on the status of this bill: It was reported out of the Small Business Committee in the Senate with 1 Favorable, 3 On Its Merits (What is the…
Why EFCA Matters
T.A. Frank wrote a very informative article in the recent issue of the Washington Monthly that details the story of trying to organize a union at a Rite Aid distribution…
Newark, DE First to Use Cars to Power Grid
This is very cool -- one of the many challenges to making the electrical grid more efficient is figuring out a way to store electricity. The current grid does not,…