Frustrated by a lack of cooperation from the British government in his investigation of possible connection between the Lockerbie bomber's release and a lucrative oil drilling contract BP got with Libya, Sen. Bob Menendez is looking for whistleblowers.
Menendez will chair an upcoming Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing and is working alongside Frank Lautenberg on this.
Nearly 22 years ago Pan Am's Flight 103 was bombed out of the sky over Lockerbie, Scotland. All 243 passengers, 16 crew, were killed as parts of the 747 rained down on the little town known for its sheep. Eleven more were killed in Lockerbie. From NJ, 38 died.
The investigation - led by the local constabulary and FBI - took in 15,000 witness statements. It yielded 2 suspects, both Libyan - one acquitted, and Abdelbaset Ali al-Megrahi, Libyan intelligence officer and head of security for Libyan Arab Airlines. Only after long negotiations with Muammar al-Gaddafi, and sanctions against Libya, was al-Megrahi turned over. He was convicted of murder but served only 8 years.
Here's where access to info gets tight, and that's what the senators are working on. The bomber's true medical condition is of great controversy. Why didn't he get chemo in Scotland? is just one question. But there are more, including if/how BP stood to gain by the Lockerbie bomber's get out of jail free card, with a fat oil contract with Libya. Menendez is on an info hunt. Looking for whistleblowers on these questions:
Negotiations between BP & Libyan Government from 2003 on
Conversations between the UK Government & BP re: oil and natural gas exploration in Libya from 2003 on
Negotiations between UK & Libyan governments from 2003 on
Medical condition of al-Megrahi before/after release
Scottish medical community's view of al-Megrahi's diagnosis
Legal representation of al-Megrahi during appeals for interim liberation, prisoner release & compassionate release
Lautenberg's proposal is more modest. Called the Mr. Smith Bill (Lautenberg brought a cardboard image of Jimmy Stewart from the film to the hearing), the bill would allow the Senate majority leader to call an immediate cloture vote as long as there is no discussion occurring on the Senate floor and the deadline for amendments has passed. This would force filibusters to actually be conducted on the floor -- hence the "Mr. Smith" moniker -- if the opposition wants to take advantage of the two-day "ripening period" before the Senate can vote to end a filibuster...
Committee Chairman Chuck Schumer was enthusiastic about Lautenberg's plan, calling it "ingenious,"
Obviously when your "side" is in the minority the filibuster seems attractive, and both sides have made ample use of it, but there's really no argument that its routine use is a very recent invention, one that has no basis in the Constitution. One expert presented statistics that showed a remarkable change around the 1993-1995 Congress.
Unfortunately, it is pretty disturbing to see that one official believed Lautenberg's proposal was poorly written:
Rybicki had a point to make, and a persuasive one: the Lautenberg and Bennet proposals are too vague. For example, Lautenberg's proposal works by allowing the majority leader to "move the question" on cloture. Rybicki noted that there is no such motion in the Senate rules. It is clear enough what Lautenberg meant, but the bill as written would be hard to implement.
Frankly I can't help but worry that the proposal was never intended to go into effect and is nothing . On the other hand, there's a lot of negotiations ahead so perhaps it's silly to nitpick a proposal at this stage.
As the Governor still waits to either veto or sign legislation that would fund women's health services, the voices calling for action continue to grow louder. Today, Senator Lautenberg sent a letter to the Governor urging restoration of funding:
Eliminating the $7.5 million in funding for these services and withdrawing the Medicaid waiver to provide family planning services with a 90 percent federal match would reduce access to critical public health services and tum away millions of dollars in federal funding.
As you know, New Jersey has traditionally supported family planning health centers with state funding. Last year, these centers provided critical health care services, including breast exams, pap smears and HIV and other STD tests to 126,903 women and 9,461 men. Eliminating $7.5 million in state funding for these critical reproductive and preventive health services threatens the health of individuals and their families who rely on this care.
The Senator continued and focused on the impact of the Medicare waiver for a federal match:
In addition to this budget cut, I understand that you have withdrawn the state's application for a Medicaid waiver that would allow NJ to expand Medicaid coverage for family planning services for 70,000 New Jerseyans who do not qualify for Medicaid or NJ FamilyCare. If approved, the waiver would provide health screenings and contraceptive counseling and supplies to men and women between 18 and 49 with incomes below 200 percent of the federal poverty level (FPL). As you are aware, the federal government pays for 90 percent of the cost of family planning services provided under such waivers. Accordingly, a contribution or$1 million from the state towards family planning services would receive $9 million in federal matching funds. The legislation now before you would require New Jersey to access these critical federal funds. In the current fiscal climate where severe budget cuts to education, health and other key programs are being made, maximizing federal funding is both fiscally responsible and critical for the continued provision of these and other basic services.
So we're giving up a 9 to 1 match for what? How will that help things? We're already short money and people will still need care and services. If this was really about the money as the Governor is trying to say, this wouldn't be the course of action they'd be taking because they're costing much more than they will ever save.
The approval-disapproval numbers for the sample of 801 New Jersey adults:
Obama 52-42
Lautenberg 45-31
Menendez 37-31
Own Congressman 54-28
We all know most Representatives are re-elected, but somehow I'm still surprised. 66% of the sample is "dissatisfied with the way things are currently going in Washington," yet they like their own Congressman. Perhaps there is something to be said for the way district boundaries are drawn? In any case, this suggests to me that the NJ3 race is the only one to be competitive. Most New Jersey adults (51%) think it doesn't make any difference who controls Congress, with the parties splitting the remainder equally. That's the disillusionment that the Republicans sought with their "Party of No" strategy in the Senate thanks to the super-majority rules.
A comment on Bob Menendez: He just isn't as well known. Not only his overall disapprove, but the subgroups of Democrats, Independents, and Republicans have virtually identical "disapproval ratings" as Lautenberg does. His missing approval numbers are in the volunteered "Don't Know" category, at least in this poll, and at the end of the 2012 those voters who like the very same acts by Obama and Lautenberg will vote for Menendez. You may recall that other pollsters recently found Menendez at a net plus 7 (50-43, Rasmussen) and minus 5 (38-43, Quinnipiac.) But look at how pollsters can differ: Rasmussen's automated poll of "likely voters," which (I think) pushes voters for a second choice, has only 7% "don't know" but Monmouth's poll of adults, with presumably no pushing from the human operators, has 32%. Lots of people don't vote! The pollster also has numbers showing there's not much support for the recall effort.
The headline for the energy poll was the offshore oil drilling:
Just 31% of Garden State residents are in favor of drilling for oil or gas off the New Jersey coast, while 63% are opposed. This marks a turnaround from two years ago, when a majority of 56% favored this energy option compared to only 36% who opposed it.
By comparison, support for both wind and nuclear energy remains basically unchanged. Fully 8-in-10 residents support the placement of energy-generating windmills off the New Jersey coast (80% today, compared to 82% in 2008) and just under 4-in-10 support building another nuclear power plant in the state (37% today, compared to 41% in 2008).
Pollster Patrick Murray observes that the coastal counties give the same numbers as the inland ones.
As for this Salem County resident, I think the interesting number is that 58% statewide oppose a new nuclear power plant.
When asked "which of the following do you think should be the more important priority for U.S. energy policy - keeping energy prices low or protecting the environment?", 28% go for low prices and 55% for the environment. 15% volunteer "both" despite not being given it as a choice. New Jersey is not Sarah Palin country.
More heat on corporate BP is coming from both our Senators Frank Lautenberg and Bob Menendez & NY Senators Schumer and Gillibrand, who are now demanding the release of all documents related to BP's role in the suspicious early release from British prison of the man who bombed Pan Am Flight 103 out of the sky in 1988.
The senators wrote to BP Chair Carl-Henric Svanberg in London & Tony Hayward, BP's BP America's CEO and stateside apologist in the Deepwater Horizon spill, which has now spewed out 215 million gallons of oil into the Gulf of Mexico over 86 days, according to this count.
Both public and private communications are what the senators want as they try to unravel reports that the doctors' report urging the Lockerbie bomber get early compassionate release from prison was cooked to smooth the way for a huge oil drilling deal between BP and Libya. Convicted bomber Abdelbaset Ali Mohmet Al Megrahi came home to a hero's welcome in Libya. And he is still alive nearly a year after doctors said he had 3 months to live. The senators are calling for a State Department probe, and Lautenberg is also requesting an investigation and hearing by the Senate Committee on Foreign Relations.
Jump with me for the full text of the senators letter:
Sen. Frank Lautenberg was on CNN yesterday about possible corporate wrongdoing by British Petroleum (BP) in the early release of the Lockerbie bomber. Was the British decision to release him early - when doctors said he had just weeks to live - a dirty deal that British Petroleum was involved in? Frank Lautenberg says the doctors' report was fabricated, that the real reason he was released was to smooth the way for a $20 billion dollar deepwater oil drilling deal British Petroleum (BP) now has with the nation of Libya. On that day in 1988 when plane parts, fire, and bodies rained down on Lockerbie, Scotland, 270 people died, 189 from America, 33 from New Jersey.
Renewable energy developers need incentives to utilize these undervalued assets to benefit their businesses. Senator Lautenberg from NJ has introduced the Cleanfields Act, co-sponsored by Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH). The Cleanfields Act will give utilities a non-monetary incentive to use brownfields for renewable energy development by invoking the Renewable Electricity Standard (RES - still pending in Congress), to help utilities better meet their commitments to the RES by choosing brownfields to locate their generation facilities.
Putting renewable energy on contaminated lands is a great idea all around. Communities near brownfields often suffer health effects from proximity to toxins, they bring down real estate values, and they cause other economic harm to neighborhoods. In addition, we need to get renewable energy on the grid as quickly as possible to begin to repair the damage caused by fossil fuel. Siting renewables on disturbed lands causes less conflicts than siting it in pristine areas that may have resource conflicts. Putting clean energy in the places that need and want it most is an exciting and real way to bring low-income communities into close contact with the clean energy economy.
The DEP says they oversee some 23,000 contaminated sites with an estimated 10,000 of those as potential brownfield sites. They do say there could be many more potential brownfields that exist in the State that are not yet before the Department for review. It's amazing that they don't really even know how large the problem is that needs to be dealt with.
The Record's Herb Jackson reports that U.S. Senator Frank Lautenberg has been selected to replace the late Robert Byrd as chair of the Appropriation Committee's Subcommittee on Homeland Security.
In assuming the chairmanship, Lautenberg joins the ranks of the College of Cardinals, the powerful group of subcommittee heads who control spending measures in both the House and Senate. At 86, he is the oldest member of the upper house.
Let's start with the recent Supreme's ruling on "honest services". I'm not a lawyer and can't pass any legal judgment on what this ruling actually means for many of the NJ pols caught in the web created by this federal law. But apparently, this past Friday was Joe Ferriero's birthday and some Bergen County "worker bees" thought the court ruling was a great gift for their Chairman. Hence Mr. Ferriero's "Wall" on his facebook page which is available for anyone to see - even if you're not a "friend" to the former Democratic Chair. A few Ferriero minions, and current employees took time to wish "their Chairman" a happy birthday and to celebrate their joy and implicit hope that he will soon be back! They were almost giddy in their excitement. Folks like a former Freeholder, a relative of a County Prosecutor, a young employee slated for future promotion, etc. How disappointing. The legality of Mr. Ferriero's situation will soon be sorted by the judicial system. But why do so many think that the kind of behavior evidenced by Mr. Ferriero should be celebrated? He and Dennis Oury hid their ownership of a grant consulting company hired by several Bergen communities over which they had an undue influence. Actions which caused embarrassment (and legal expenses) to some of the elected officials in those towns and certainly to our party. A cause for celebration? Certainly for him on a personal basis, but for government and for our party....certainly not!
More News To Make You Feel Sick. Family planning funds! I assume that by now most of you know that the Governor removed every penny of the $7.5 million dollars used to provide health services to uninsured and underinsured women in our state. Outrageous! Along with several of my democratic women colleagues in both the Assembly and the Senate, we've been fighting to get these dollars restored. Look back to Thursday's Assembly Budget Committee hearing on our supplemental bill. Assemblywoman Linda Stender and I appeared along with several advocates and professionals from the family planning centers. There sat Assemblyman and Republican State Chair, Jay Webber! In response to testimony on how many unintended pregnancies are avoided through services provided by these agencies, (yep, that means birth control) Republican State Chair Jay Webber went on to say how offended he was about reducing the cost of children who could have been been born had these families not avoided pregnancy. Children important to our future. This is the second decade of the 21st Century and I was sitting there in my "mature" years arguing about uninsured women's right to practice birth control! An issue that was fought and won early in the last century. Outrageous indeed!! In watching the clip of my "exchange" with the Republican State Chair, my anger is evident, but not nearly as evident as what I felt. Where are the good Republican women (and some of the great guys who sit alongside them)? They must speak out against moving women back to a time when they had so little control over their reproductive lives. This is not about abortion. It is about access to birth control.
And then there was the clip of the Governor on 101.5 being questioned by Eric Scott about women's health services as he protested several times "this has nothing to do with mammograms" or with women's health. HIV testing, breast exams, birth control, pap smears, pre-natal exams, and pregnancy counseling has nothing to do with women's health? How insulting. He went on to argue that he supposed these funds were "not important" or they would have been reinstated. What crass treatment of the women of New Jersey. We will be fighting this today during our Senate and Assembly sessions. I am confident we will have the necessary votes to move the bill. However, without the help of Republican women, we will not have the votes to override a possible veto by the Governor. The bill makes it clear that the money cannot and will not be used for abortion services, and it provides a clear funding source without addition to the bottom line of the budget. Maybe the Governor will hear from enough women across the state so he will join us in recognizing that these programs are not Democrat or Republican, Conservative or Liberal programs. They are about Women's Health!
And so today is the time when we stand up for our core ideals and vote on a Republican constructed budget which cuts taxes for millionaires and increases taxes for low income workers in New Jersey. A budget which makes New Jersey one of only 5 or 6 states that does not fund family planning centers. A budget which cuts school and municipal aide by hundreds of millions of dollars, increases the cost of commuting on our buses and rails, does away with senior property tax rebates, and increases a myriad of fees. Enough to make all of us sick.
One bright spot of the week was Saturday night's elegant Garden State Equality Dinner. Great to watch Senators Nia Gill, Ray Lesniak and former Senator Bill Baroni being inducted into the Garden State Hall of Fame. Even sweeter joining Senator Frank Lautenberg on stage as he received the "Loretta Weinberg Lifetime Achievement Award" (that was a shameless commercial) and announced to the 600 folks in the audience that the Docs said his cancer was in remission. Hooray, and may he continue his outstanding service for many more years to come!
Senator Frank Lautenberg spoke at last night's Garden State Equality Legends Dinner. While he looked fantastic from the video, the news he delivered that he has overcome his battle with Lymphoma was even better: (h/t to Juan Melli for the video)
As oil still flows into the Gulf with no end in sight, the President is planning to go on the offensive this week in prime time:
President Obama will give BP an ultimatum this week: show me the money, or else.
Obama will deliver a prime-time speech on Tuesday and face down BP executives on Wednesday to show them, and his legion of critics, that me means business.
White House officials said they want BP to hand over billions of dollars into an escrow account run by an independent third-party panel.
The aim is to guarantee a mountain of claims left behind by the endless stream of oil gushing in the Gulf of Mexico will be paid.
Days after the Deepwater Horizon exploded and sunk, the first official estimate of the oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico was 200 barrels a day. It then changed to 1,000 barrels, and then 5,000. Now, scientists are talking about 20,000 barrels a day, or 30,000, or 40,000, or even 50,000.
To put that into perspective, thats up to an Exxon Valdez every 10 days. The magnitude of this disaster is far from being known, but it's larger than ever seen. This may be a dumb question, but until you know the size of the problem, how can you even begin to estimate the cost of the solution?
To require a plan for the safe, orderly, and expeditious redeployment of the United States Armed Forces from Afghanistan.
The vote failed 18-80 with both Frank Lautenberg and Bob Menendez voting for limitless war, or if you prefer, trusting the President and our generals. In a rational world the 80 Senators would not complain about the deficit ever again, but we know it's quite the opposite in the world we've got. I'm with Booman, I don't have any confidence. It seems even McChrystal acknowledges failure but no one will ever consider the "off ramps" (...though see this discussion of what the general said.) Call me conservative, but just because talented, hard-working people in the government want to do something doesn't mean it will work. Don't mistake me, I certainly hope I'm wrong.
Senators Lautenberg and Menendez both praised the decision but called for more:
"President Obama took an important step today to halt the most imminent environmental threat to the Atlantic coast. However, the danger will remain until drilling in the Atlantic is taken off the table altogether," Lautenberg said. "BP's oil catastrophe in the Gulf is a wake-up call for our nation. Giving Big Oil more access to our nation's waters will only lead to more pollution, more lost jobs, and more damage to our economy. We need a permanent ban on drilling in the Atlantic, tightened regulations, and a real push to find clean energy alternatives to oil."
"Small businesses preparing for the beach season have no doubt wondered how they would survive if oil started washing up on the Jersey Shore," said Menendez. "We can all breathe easier that our shore will not be put at risk from a nearby oil rig in the foreseeable future. The Jersey Shore is part of our lives, and for many New Jersey families, it is the source of their livelihoods. This action will protect us in the near term, but we ultimately need to go a number of steps further and ensure that the East Coast will never be subject to oil rigs. Now is the time to put our muscle behind finally transitioning from the fossil fuels of the past to the clean, limitless energy sources of the future."
My sense of the President's remarks in the press conference today was that he expressed more skepticism about oil drilling than he had earlier, but still argues that more oil will be needed until we move to other energy sources. He doesn't want to admit that he made a mistake by co-opting Sarah Palin's policy. Judge for yourself -- here is a portion of his answer to a question during his transcript of the news conference:
I mean, we're still years off and some technological breakthroughs away from being able to operate on purely a clean-energy grid.
During that time, we're going to be using oil. And to the extent that we're using oil, it makes sense for us to develop our oil and natural gas resources here in the United States and not simply rely on imports.
That's important for our economy. That's important for economic growth. So the overall framework -- which is to say, domestic oil production should be part of our overall energy mix -- I think continues to be the right one. Where I was wrong was in my belief that the oil companies had their act together when it came to worst- case scenarios.
On the other hand, I used another eighth of a tank of gas today. Individually it may not matter but as a whole New Jersey used a lot of gas today and will again tomorrow.
On the floor of the US Senate, right now, Sen. Menendez is laying out a case to eliminate any cap on the amount of economic damages that oil companies would have to pay for spills they've caused. He is due shortly to be joined by Senator Frank Lautenberg and Sen. Bill Nelson.
The Democrats' proposed legislation, called the Big Oil Bailout Prevention Act, is a revision of earlier legislation from Menendez which would have raised the cap from $75 million to $10 billion. This jacks up the heat on British Petroleum, although as expected it has already been objected to on the other side of the aisle, as there was opposition to Menendez' earlier proposal of the $10 billion cap. President Obama has not so far named a figure to raise the cap to, though they have discussed raising it.
The final vote today was 60-40 (yesterday it was 57-42). Next up is a final vote on passage, which is expected to take place within days.
After today's vote, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said there are "a couple of amendments that are germane post-cloture, but there the ones that we have to figure out a way to get resolved."
I'll confess my sympathies are with Senators Cantwell and Feingold who voted no over various loopholes and gaps in the legislation. I sure hope this is strong enough because I have my doubts.
Even if every senator still running manages to get re-elected, and polls say that is unlikely, Senator Lautenberg will be more senior than half the Senate next January. That's only with credit for taking office in 2003.
"It is outrageous that Mr. Buchanan is using Elena Kagan's religion as kindling to enflame opposition to her nomination to the Supreme Court," stated Lautenberg. "Elena Kagan was chosen by President Obama because of her ability and knowledge, and Mr. Buchanan's comments undermine her significant legal achievements. It sounds like Mr. Buchanan longs for the days when religious quotas kept people out of high-ranking positions in government."
Maybe it's just me, but I didn't think about what her religion was when she was nominated. I was more concerned with where she stood on the issues. And where were Buchanan's objections when the court was majority catholic?
In the Senate, there are two hearings today on oil drilling and the massive Gulf of Mexico spill. More on the hearings here & here. Sen. Bob Menendez, as a member of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee questioned BP this morning at a 10 am hearing, and he summed up what he heard this morning:
It's like a bit of a Texas two step. Yes, we're responsible, but BP says Transocean, Transocean says Halliburton.
Here's Menendez, this morning:
Menendez is also testifying today at the Senate Environment Committee. Frank Lautenberg's opening remarks in that hearing are printed below, and you can watch part of the hearing on C-SPAN.
Lautenberg (prepared remarks):
Testifying before us today are the worldwide leaders in offshore oil drilling: BP, Halliburton and Transocean. These are the companies involved in the spill that is devastating the Gulf Coast of the United States.
Ultimately, what this spill shows is that offshore oil drilling simply cannot be done safely. If these three companies can't get it right, no one can. The bottom line is that if you drill in the ocean, oil will spill in the ocean. And all it takes is one major spill to destroy a coastline.
The Deepwater Horizon case shows us that no rig is 'too big to spill.' In fact, there was a similar major spill off the coast of Australia just last year. Halliburton did the cementing on that rig, and has been blamed for the 10,000 square mile oil spill that ensued.
Halliburton cemented its first offshore oil rig off the coast of Louisiana in 1938. Now, even after 72 years, they still haven't got it right. That's because oil drilling is a 19th Century answer to a 21st Century problem. It is inherently dangerous, inherently dirty and inherently destructive to our environment.
People on the terror watch list are able to get guns and Senator Lautenberg wants to put a stop to it. Lautenberg appeared on MSNBC yesterday to talk about the problem and said that we had over 1200 applications from people on the terrorism watch list in the last six years and 90% were approved. Here is the interview, where the host is just stunned by that statistic:But despite Lautenberg's push, good ole Senator Lindsay Graham is ready and willing to stand in the way:
Sen. Lindsey Graham argued at a Senate Homeland Security Committee hearing Wednesday that measures giving the federal government the power to deny sales to people on the U.S. terrorism watch list would violate the Second Amendment of law-abiding U.S. citizens.
Graham described the bill as an instrument of those who would ban guns altogether. "We're talking about a constitutional right here," he said, explaining that he could not support a bill that would force "innocent Americans" to "pay the cost of going to court to get their gun rights back."
Graham wasn't nearly as concerned about rights when he launched into a disquisition on the treatment of American citizens accused of terrorism. "I am all into national security," he said. "I want them to stop reading these guys Miranda rights."
Graham does make a good point in the fact that there are people who shouldn't be on the list. But that just means they should fix the problem with the list. What good is having a watch list if it isn't worth the paper it's printed on? That doesn't mean you shouldn't try to fix the list and close the loophole at the same time. Obviously they'll have to strike a balance, but not looking at what appears to be some glaring problems doesn't seem to be a solution either.
