NDN Blog

That was Senator Schumer's response to former Chief of Staff to Attorney General Alberto Gonzalez Kyle Sampson's testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee today.  At the heart of his testimony was the statement: “I don’t think the attorney general’s statement that he was not involved in any discussions about U.S. attorney removals is accurate...”

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The 85,000 H1B visas for high-skill foreign workers are expected to go quickly, when INS starts accepting applications Saturday.  Bill Gates was on the Hill a few weeks ago, complaining that there are not enough visas available.  11,000,000 undocumented workers in this country might agree with Gates that there is a lack of visas in this country for hard-workers looking to provide for their families.  Dealing with H1B visas separately seems pretty illogical.  The whole immigration system is broken, the whole system needs to be fixed.  Read more about NDN's work on immigration reform here. 

Robert Gates is bringing a new realism to the Defense Department, sharing what should be blindingly obvious, that we have to engage Iran, in his first speech since replacing Donald Rumsfeld earlier this year.  From the WAPO:

In his first domestic public speech since taking office in December, Gates laid out a pragmatic approach to foreign policy -- one that emphasizes using diplomacy to overcome disagreements with Turkey, Iran and other nations regarding Iraq.

Gates, who had advocated dialogue with Iran before becoming defense secretary, said "the regional talks recently held in Baghdad were a good start toward improved cooperation, and our government is open to higher-level exchanges."

Too bad he wasn't there in 2003 when the Bush Administration passed on the opportunity to negotiate a grand bargain with Iran, that could have included support for terrorism, WMD, recognition of the state of Israel, the sovereignty of Iraq, etc.

CAP and SEIU brought all the major Democratic Presidential candidates together to talk health care last weekend.  The Republicans were invited too, but they took a pass on the forum.  Watching video from the event it is clear that there is a consensus that we can't go on the way we have been and have to come up with a plan to control costs and make sure every American has access to quality health care.

Fascinating in-depth article in the NYT today on the alleged flow of Iranian weapons to Shiite militias in Iraq.  The whole article is worth reading for a reminder of how complicated the situation is and how little foresight went into the planning of this war.  Especially worth noting is the final quote of the article, where ISG Co-Chair Lee Hamilton renews the call for engaging Iran:

“The fact that Iran may be supplying lethal equipment is all the more reason to deal with them,” Lee H. Hamilton, a co-chairman of the panel, said in an interview. “We do think it fortifies the case for engaging Iran.”

We've written before about the burgeoning scandal coming out of the White House regarding use of private email accounts by senior White House staff, as a way to hide damning corresspondance.  Now Rep. Henry Waxman (D-CA), Chair of the Government Oversight and Reform is ordering the White House not to destroy the accounts or their contents because initial investigations "have uncovered evidence that White House staff have used nongovernmental e-mail accounts to conduct official business." 

If members of the Executive Branch are using private email accounts to do official work, it could amount to violation of the Presidential Records Act - 95% of Karl Rove's email traffic is reported to be conducted through non-.gov email accounts owned by the RNC.  And, if they claim that the traffic on those accounts isn't part of their official work, then they will have a hard time arguing for any kind of executive privilege.  Maybe this time Rove et al have been a little too sneaky for their own good.

See, not all foreign policy has to be based on aircraft carriers and ivory tower war gaming at AEI.  Treasury and State are running an effective campaign to get banks to deny credit to the Iranian institutions that fund terrorists.

The financial squeeze has seriously crimped Tehran's ability to finance petroleum industry projects and to pay for imports. It has also limited Iran's use of the international financial system to help fund allies and extremist militias in the Middle East, say U.S. officials and economists who track Iran.

In the Senate, Chris Dodd is making his displeasure known, on the subject of lax oversight of sub prime mortgages, which offer tantalizingly low initial payments, followed by sudden increases.  These loans, issued willy-nilly during over the past few years, are leading to a spike in delinquency and foreclosures, and nowhere are the effects being felt stronger than in immigrant communities.  Today's WAPO article is a good way to learn more about the expanding and very negative economic phenomenon, but NDN readers will also find the metric they use interesting: calls to a Spanish language radio talk show.

Tysons Corner mortgage broker Jose Luis Semidey, who has a popular Spanish-language real estate talk show on Radio Universal, is being deluged with calls from desperate homeowners who are falling behind on their mortgages. The calls started in late 2005 and have steadily risen; he now receives 40 to 50 calls a day from throughout the area.

"I see more coming," Semidey said.

NDN works with Spanish language radio stations, shows and personalities across the country to help them engage their listeners in the comprehensive immigration reform debate, and other issues that impact their communities.  Click here to learn more about NDN's innovative ad campaigns on Spanish language radio.

You know 2008 can't be too far away when you see the byline "North Conway, N.H." in the New York Times.  But the paper of record isn't there to talk Presidential politics.  Instead, they're looking at the War in Iraq and what it means for Senators up for reelection in 2008.  Senators like John Sununu are finding even in the safe Republican ground of New Hampshire there are plenty of people with a keen interest in what the Senate is going to do with the Iraq War supplemental funding bill, and the broader issue of the role of American troops in Iraq, four years after Saddam Hussein was overthrown.

On Monday, the Senate resumes its protracted struggle to forge an Iraq strategy. Mr. Sununu and a handful of Republicans — including those facing re-election next year and those who have expressed unhappiness with President Bush’s conduct of the war but are uncomfortable with the idea of setting a date for withdrawal — find themselves searching for balance as they juggle three tasks: responding to the frustrations of their constituents, resisting the demands of antiwar Democrats and not entirely abandoning the White House. 

Read what NDN has been saying about finding a better way forward in the Middle East.

J. Stephen Griles was the second highest ranking official in the Interior Department for President Bush's entire first term, where he used his position to do the bidding of his former bosses (he was an oil industry lobbyist before joining the administration) in the energy industry.  He's pleading guilty to obstruction of justice charges related to the Abramoff scandal.  Learn more from CREW, TPM Muckraker and the AP.