Season's Greetings from the cartoonists

Only Romney and Paul make VA primary ballot

One last bit of politics before Christmas.

Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and Texas Gov. Rick Perry have failed to qualify for Virginia's March 6 Republican primary, a setback in their bids for the Republican presidential nomination.

The Republican Party of Virginia announced the developments Friday and early Saturday, saying that the two have failed to submit the required 10,000 signatures to get on the ballot.

That Gingrich and Perry failed to get on the ballot in this state that votes on Super Tuesday underscored the difficulty that first-time national candidates — many with smaller campaign operations and less money — have in preparing for the long haul of the campaign.

It also illustrates the advantage held by former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney. He's essentially been running for president for five years, and his team, smaller than in 2008 but larger than most of his 2012 opponents, has paid close attention to filing requirements in each state. He will appear on the Virginia ballot, along with Texas Rep. Ron Paul, who also has run a national campaign before.

The significance of this development shouldn't be understated.

As mentioned here previously, the GOP primaries are apportioning delegates by percentage instead of winner-take-all until April 1. So theoretically the fight for the nomination could go on well into the summer -- though I doubt all the way to the convention. It might be the case usually that this would drain resources from the frontrunner(s), but Romney can self-fund and Paul's Army isn't close to maxing out.

With Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, and Florida on the calendar in January and Nevada, Maine, Colorado, Minnesota, Arizona, and Michigan in February -- and Washington state on the Saturday before Super Tuesday -- those trailing a field that looks increasingly like it will be led by Romney and Paul appear to have few opportunities to break through.

Rick Perry, Newt Gingrich, Michele Bachmann, Rick Santorum, and Jon Huntsman have very narrow paths to victory left to them, and not just for the most obvious reasons (Reason #1. They're freaks and morons). A deck that once appeared stacked to the advantage of second-tier candidates now looks like it's against them.

Perry is particularly disadvantaged by the moving of the Texas primary from March to April due to the Texas attorney general's legal machinations. He would win it handily in either month, but April (even with him winning all the delegates) is probably too late to help him.

Barring anything more shocking than Dr. No being an embarrassingly obvious bigot, I see this as a two-horse race. How long do the Teas stay lined up with Paul -- or pull out and start clamoring for a third-party challenge -- is the last question left to answer.

The House Republican cave-in and Keystone XL

Part of the payroll tax cut extension deal (that the House GOP came to their senses on last night) is that Obama must fast-track the decision on the tar sands pipeline. It would be on the same deadline -- 60 days -- as the tax cut extension itself. The good news is that this gives the president a golden opportunity to kill Keystone XL. For now, and perhaps for good.

Which may be exactly what the GOP wants: a bat to beat Obama with in 2012 over the economy. But that apparently isn't going to work, either.

House Republicans keep trying to give President Obama a political black eye by wielding the 36-inch diameter Keystone XL pipeline as a cudgel just before Christmas.

Instead, they could end up severely maiming only themselves if they persist with end-of-year legislative theatrics at what some are referring to as the "Capitol Hill Playhouse" this week.

"It's quite a sandbox, isn't it?" Pat Parenteau, a Vermont Law School professor who specializes in Congress and environmental issues, told InsideClimate News. "I think their strategy has backfired and that they've roped themselves with this political gambit. This idea that you have to keep introducing ideology into every issue, that will be their undoing." [...]

This angle developed last week on 'Countdown', but the House GOP's Epic Fail Follies drowned it out.



(skip to the 2:20 mark if you don't need the background, current at the time of this video just to last week, with the Senate's passage of the payroll tax bill)

More on the scam that is Keystone XL with respect to jobs, where the refined oil is going, how it will raise oil prices on the world market AND avoid paying US taxes (bold emphasis is mine):

One of the most important facts that is missing in the national debate surrounding the proposed Keystone XL tar sands pipeline is this – Keystone XL will not bring any more oil into the United State for decades to come. Canada doesn’t have nearly enough oil to fill existing pipelines going to the United States. However, existing Canadian oil pipelines all go to the Midwest, where the only buyer for their crude is the United States. Keystone XL would divert Canadian oil from refineries in the Midwest to the Gulf Coast where it can be refined and exported. Many of these refineries are in free trade zones where they may be exported to the international buyers without paying U.S. taxes. And that is exactly what Valero, one of the largest potential buyers of Keystone XL's oil, has told its investors it will do. The idea that Keystone XL will improve U.S. oil supply is a documented scam being played on the American people by Big Oil and its friends in Washington DC.

Canada's excess pipeline capacity is well known. In a Department of Energy report evaluating Keystone XL's impacts on U.S. energy supply over the next twenty years, the agency found that it will take decades for Canada to produce enough oil to fill existing pipelines. On page 90, the report concludes that the United States will import the same amount of crude from Canada through 2030 whether or not Keystone XL is built.

From Canada's perspective, the problem with existing pipelines is they all end in the U.S. Midwest and only allow one buyer - the United States. As Canada's Natural Resources Minister Joe Oliver recently said, "we export 97 percent of our energy to the U.S. and we would like to diversify that." However, the Canadian government has put the breaks on the two pipeline proposals to export tar sands through its provinces due to the need to take more time to listen to its own public's concerns about water and safety. Keystone XL would be Canada’s first step in diversifying its energy market. The pipeline would divert large volumes of Canadian oil from the Midwest to the Gulf Coast, where it would be available for the first time to buyers on the world market. To sweeten the deal, many of the refineries on the Gulf Coast happen to be located in foreign trade zones, where they can export Canadian oil to the world market without paying U.S. taxes.

Oil Change International investigated this issue in a report that found the Keystone XL pipeline was part of a larger strategy to sell increasing volumes of Canadian crude on the international diesel market.When Canadian regulators at the National Energy Board (NEB) considered the Keystone XL proposal in 2008, they asked TransCanada to justify another pipeline when there was already so much spare capacity. TransCanada conceded that Keystone XL would take oil from existing pipelines, increasing shipping costs. However, TransCanada argued that this cost would be more than offset as shifting Canadian oil from the Midwest to the Gulf would increase the price that Americans paid for Canadian oil by $3.9 billion.

So let's review: Keystone XL will raise oil prices, dodge paying taxes, create only a handful of temporary construction jobs and further destroy the environment. What's not to like (if you're a Republican)? If Obama can't win this debate with the GOP in the court of public opinion... well, he deserves to lose.

For the first time in a long time, I am hopeful that Keystone XL is not going to happen.

Look! The GOP finally found some voter fraud!

Unfortunately, they found it in the Indiana Secretary of State's office. Who happens to be a Republican.

Separately, (IN SOS Charlie) White still faces seven criminal felony charges, including three of them for voter fraud, related to the fact that he did not live at the address where he was registered to vote in the 2010 election. As he was not a properly registered Indiana voter, he was not eligible to be a candidate on the ballot, Rosenberg has ruled. Moreover, at the time of his election, White was a member of the Fishers Town Council --- a town in which he no longer lived since separating from his wife and moving out of her house, where he remained registered to vote, several years earlier. Democrats charge he retained his registration at the house so that he could continue to collect his salary as a Council Member.

Since divorcing his wife White had remarried and purchased a condominium in a different town, but claimed the reason he stayed registered at his former wife's house was because he had hoped to move back some day. The Indiana Recount Commission accepted that explanation. The Marion County Circuit judge, apparently, did not.

Earlier this week, in the criminal case, White also received bad news. according to the Indiana Star, "A Hamilton County judge Monday denied a motion by White to dismiss his felony charges, which were filed against him earlier this year. His criminal trial is scheduled to begin Jan. 30. Felons are ineligible to serve as Secretary of State." Merry Christmas, Mr. White.

And to all (Republicans who believe in the mythological Demon of Democratic voter fraud), a good night.