I met a constituent of Jane Harman

[question everything]

We visited SoCal on Thanksgiving and I had some interesting conversation with someone who has been very active with the Democratic party. I asked him why Pelosi was so much against Harman and his reply was Harman's support for the war (which I thought was pretty much universal then). He then added that Harman became closely associated with the military... but that this helped bring jobs, and keep jobs in her district.

Then he said that during the recent primaries she was opposed by an anti-war person but, he added, it was clear that had the challenger won, that seat would have now been a Republican one and, for his, this was the bottom line, the one that counted.

And I think that we've had similar discussions on DU: do we accept 'DINOs' who, while not passing the DU litmus tests still provide us with the majority and with the chairs of all the committees and the agenda, or do we stick with the "pure" (at least on that one issue that is important to individuals, and not necessarily the same for each) even if we end up losing, again?

[rpannier]

1. It's a good question

Majority first.
Everything else second.

As we've seen for the last 6 years, you get nothing when you aren't running the show.

[MadMaddie]

2. You know that's a good question....for me it's do they pass the

common sense test....if they continually sided with * then they did more harm against the Dems and Americans...the question is will they side with the Dem majority....

[Greeby]

3. Marcy Winograd lose to a Republican? Pfftt!

She got 36% against Harman when she was practically unknown. If she runs again in 08, Harman is probably gonna lose.
And now we have a majority, we can afford to dump some DINOs in this next set of House elections

[Julien Sorel]

5. So we "dump" some seats, in exchange for what?

The pleasure of seeing cretins like Harman run out of office? It might feel good, but a seat in the House feels better -- at least it does if you care about maintaining a majority. It's thoughtlessly arrogant attitudes like these that cost the Republicans their majority; ours hasn't even been sworn in yet and we're already beginning to act and think as stupidly as they did.

[DoYouEverWonder]

14. I think a lot of DINOS

will be heading for the hills in 2008.

I don't care what party someone belongs to when it comes to corruption.

[liberalpragmatist]

4. Harman's fine as a rep

I just don't think she should be intelligence chair.

[question everything]

7. Whatever happen to her assistant who was barred from the committee

right before the elections because, supposedly, he leaked something?

It appeared as an elections scheme but I don't remember hearing more about this.

[Cleita]

6. I think a good part of Jane Harmon's constituency is

Vandenburg AFB. If she's sort of swaying that military away from the hardcore neo-cons it might be okay for us. There have been things that Harmon has been okay with IMHO. I'd say better a DINO than a puke when necessary.

[jaysunb]

8. Vandenburg is much further North of the district

The military alluded to are the folks like Rayethon ,Lockheed , TRW and many others that are located in the South Bay of Los Angeles County, and in her district.

The bit about a Republican beating Marcie Winogard is very plausable. Harmons district has some very wealthy republicans who held the seat after redistricting, and some very hard core blue collar folks as well. ( lots of the aforementioned defense contractor employees.)

[Cleita]

10. Oh Duh. I must have her mixed up with someone else.

I thought she was pretty much Santa Barbara.

[nini]

9. She is heavily involved in the aerospace industires

and therefore the air force guys around here.

She's been known for that. She runs as a Dem because the rest of her area(which I am part of) is heavily Democratic. She gets the best of both worlds here.


The Dems here would never vote Republican and the defense contractor types are happy with her.


I agree - better a DINO than the (R) after their name.

[Hepburn]

13. I live in her district...

Vandenberg is not in the district.

[OzarkDem]

11. Its a key committee

Its important to have the right person leading it, since the Iraq War and terrorism are such big issues.

Harman can still serve her constituency and party in some other capacity.

[lumberjack_jeff]

12. Democrats representing military districts get some slack from me.

My own Norm Dicks has some military cred, and he needs it with six(?) military bases in his district. His support for the Iraq war was predicated on bad information.

[LiviaOlivia]

15. Harman is one of biggest Vichy dems

~snip~

In February of this year, Harman went on Meet the Press and -- echoing the sentiments of the GOP Senate and House Committee Chairmen, Pat Roberts and Pete Hoekstra -- she again emphasized, proudly, her "support" for the President's NSA warrantless eavesdropping program ("The briefings were about the operational details of the program. I support the program, I’ve never flinched from that"). Worse, while defending the President's lawbreaking, she heaped blame on The New York Times for reporting on the Leader's illegal conduct, saying: ". . . the leak to The New York Times that triggered things—and by the way, I deplore that leak" and:

This is not a covert action program, this is a very valuable foreign collection program, and I’m—I think it is tragic that a lot of our capability is now across the pages of the newspapers.

All of that led her to declare how receptive she was to a criminal investigation into the Times for reporting this story:

If the press was part of the process of delivering classified information, I think there have to be some limits on press immunity. . . . Well, it’s not clear it was a whistleblower. You have to prove that first. No. The answer is if it’s protected under the whistleblower statute, then it’s protected. Goss in his op-ed said he was trying to protect whistleblowers, but these were despicable people going around the process.

So Harman has a history of defending the administration's illegal intelligence activities. She was among the most gullible and/or deceitful when it came to disseminating the administration's most extreme (and most inaccurate) intelligence claims to "justify" the invasion of Iraq. She supports the administration's efforts to criminally investigate, if not prosecute, journalists who reveal illegal intelligence activities on the part of the President (including illegal activities about which Harman knew but said nothing).

~snip~

http://glenngreenwald.blogspot.com/2006/11/medias-sudden-intense-interest-in.html

Fuck her.

[Ignacio Upton]

16. Yes, but keep them off of certain committees

In the Senate, for example, Bob Casey should not be allowed on the Judiciary Committee because he is anti-choice. But he should be allowed on committees relating to things like economic policy.