POLITICAL WIRE: Sen. Reid on McCain: ‘He’s a Flawed Candidate’
2:25 p.m. ET
Presidential politics hit the Senate floor full force late this morning.
On the Senate floor, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., ripped into GOP White House contender Sen. John McCain by name for what he said were delay tactics. The chamber was considering collective bargaining rights for state and local first responders when GOP leaders tried to force a couple votes.
“He’s a flawed candidate and he’s wrong on the war and he’s wrong on the economy,” Reid blasted. “But it’s too bad that he’s trying to interfere with what we’re trying to do here to do some serious legislating. … He’s being John McCain.”
The remarks were unusual in the generally more-collegial side of the Capitol.
The blow-up, which put the Senate basically in gridlock, was over a fight between Sen. Jim Webb, D-Va., and McCain. Webb’s bill would give education benefits to veterans sooner than the Defense Department wants; McCain’s bill, which he wrote with campaign supporter Sen. Lindsay Graham, is in line with DoD.
In a little bit of maneuvering, Graham introduced his bill, and then Sen. Mitch McConnell — the top Republican in the chamber — quickly scheduled a vote on it. Democrats, peeved, put the brakes on the floor action.
Sen. Dick Durbin, D-Ill., perhaps said it best: “This is about the presidential campaign.”
House GOP’s ‘Change’ Slogan Not First of Its Kind
12:37 p.m. ET
House Republicans, hoping to prevent a total landslide in the fall, were getting ready Wednesday to kick off their new policy initiatives. With it, a new slogan: “The Change You Deserve.”
Turns out, someone’s already taken it.
“The Change You Deserve,” one of the many attempts this year to corner the market for “change” is also a now-defunct slogan used by the Wyeth pharmaceutical company to market the antidepressant Effexor. Apparently after getting some heat from the Food and Drug Administration, Wyeth stripped the slogan from the product.
But House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer had a good time with the connection anyway, less than a day after congressional Democrats snagged a contested Mississippi seat out from underneath Republicans.
Speaking with reporters, The Maryland Democrat gleefully pointed out some of the drug’s side effects: Nausea, headache, drowsiness. Apply as needed to Republicans, no doubt.
In their own press conference, Republicans said Democrats have been ignoring American families too long. Rep. Kay Granger, R-Texas, explained the reinvigorated caucus this way.
“The Republican agenda: The Change You Deserve is directed at America’s families, … We’re talking about an agenda for working families in today’s world. And it’s not he family of yesterday, and it’s not the family that we hope tomorrow. It’s talking directly to people and where they live,” Granger said.
House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio didn’t mention the slogan Wednesday morning, but said the main roll-out later Wednesday would focus on fixing Washington.
“I think when you consider that Americans believe Washington’s broken, we have to show them how it can be fixed, and the fact that we’re committed to fixing Washington,” Boehner said.
– FOX News’ Trish Turner contributed to this report.
I find the slogan a little insulting … telling us what change we deserve when they provided no basis for change from politics as usual to begin with. Its one thing when a few members loose (lack) credibility, but after they en masse destroyed even the name Republican are now going to provide the change we deserve.(?) What is wrong with this picture? They certainly aren’t listening to fundraising feedback, which tells them what is wrong. Now they suddenly remember the family? Next they’ll be talking about pro-life — as if it has any meaning to them. They sneer as if to say, ‘We’ll give you the “change you deserve”‘.