Free Republic

Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), who is likely next year to face the first real election battle of his 30-year Senate career, lashed out against media reports suggesting that his wife's lucrative positions on the boards of four health-care companies could be inappropriate. "It's offensive to my wife that you'd be even talking about it," Dodd complained on "Fox News Sunday" yesterday. Dodd, who is a key player in President Obama's health-care reform efforts, said there is "no reason" for his wife to step down and claimed she is a victim of sexism. "We don't hear these questions being raised about...

Officials voice no support for health benefits tax Obama is pressing for an overhaul that includes a government option WASHINGTON - Lawmakers and administration officials on Sunday distanced themselves from the idea of taxing health benefits to help pay President Barack Obama's health care overhaul and bickered over whether government insurance would strengthen the market. The debate over a government insurance plan has broken mainly along party lines. But Democrats and Republicans appearing on Sunday's TV news programs either rejected or offered no support for raising revenues on some people through a tax on health benefits. Obama has not supported...

The Talk Shows Sunday, June 14th, 2009 Guests to be interviewed today on major television talk shows: FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): Sens. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., and Charles Grassley, R-Iowa; Thomas Donohue, president and CEO of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Vice President Joe Biden.FACE THE NATION (CBS): Sens. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and Dick Durbin, D-Ill.THIS WEEK (ABC): Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius; former Gov. Mitt Romney, R-Mass.STATE OF THE UNION (CNN): Sebelius; Sens. Ben Nelson, D-Neb., Kent Conrad, D-N.D., and Susan Collins, R-Maine; Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind.

Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) seems to at tract friends who, in turn, attract scrutiny from the Securities and Exchange Commission. Thursday, the SEC hit subprime-mortgage giant Countrywide Financial's ex-CEO Angelo Mozilo with a fraud suit for allegedly deceiving investors on the true condition of the company. He was also charged with insider trading. In 2003, Dodd's role on the Banking Committee got him dubbed a "Friend of Angelo" by Countrywide -- and thus eligible for two sweetheart $800,000 loans. The Senate Ethics Committee is -- at a glacial pace -- investigating the circumstances behind Dodd's Countrywide-refinanced mortgages....

In 2007, not long after he announced he was taking a year off from the Senate to run for president and move to Iowa, Democratic Sen. Christopher Dodd won the endorsement of the International Association of Fire Fighters. "I am honored that America's firefighters have put their trust in my leadership," he said. In March 2008, after his campaign had gone up in flames, the union still stood by their man and made him an honorary member. At the ceremony, you could hear Sen. Dodd's buttons pop: "For three decades, I've been proud to tell firefighters, 'I've got your back.'...

Angelo Mozilo, former boss of Countrywide Financial, has been charged with civil fraud and insider trading by the Securities and Exchange Commission. He is the highest profile executive to face charges relating to the US sub-prime mortgage crisis in 2007. --snip-- Mr Mozilo has denied doing anything wrong. Two other former executives have also been charged with civil fraud. --snip -- The SEC published extracts from e-mails sent by Mr Mozilo. "The bottom line is that we are flying blind on how these loans will perform in a stressed environment of higher unemployment, reduced values and slowing home sales," he...

Room S-211 is not on the Capitol tour. It is a small, ornate chamber, with the look and feel of the late Grant administration. There are two tables, covered in white cloth, one for Republicans, one for Democrats. The room has been the scene of much Senate history, high and low. It was here that Lyndon Johnson twisted arms for civil rights (the room is named after LBJ) and here that Bobby Baker, the secretary of the Senate in the early 1960s, informed President Kennedy that he had received the best oral sex ever from a call girl named Ellen...

We are bombarded daily by Obamaites claiming that this problem or that problem was inherited by them, as they try to blame Bush for all their miscues, and whenever it is pointed out that the housing and credit crash was mainly the result of THEIR policies, they howl and point fingers. Yes there was greed and fraud and insufficient regulation involved in this calamity that has affected all of us, but the main blame for the existence of sub-prime mortgages falls squarely in the laps of liberal Democrats, as this video makes clear:

In another controversial bill, the Senate Democrats voted early Friday morning to remove Republican Gov. M. Jodi Rell's power to appoint a U.S. Senator in case of a vacancy. Instead, there would be a special election if one of the two U.S. Senators - currently Christopher J. Dodd and Joseph I. Lieberman - stepped down from office before the six-year term ended. The Senate voted, 21 to 12, on strict party lines with three members absent at about 2:10 a.m. Friday on the underlying amendment regarding the vacancy. The bill would apply to whomever is in the gubernatorial chair. But...

A Quinnipiac poll shows embattled Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) would be ousted if elections took place today. Repub Cong Rob Simmons wins over 30-year Dodd 45-39....two months ago Dodd lagged 50-34%. That poll was conducted soon after Dodd wrote legislation that let AIG pay millions in executive bonuses while receiving tax dollars to stay afloat.

How in hell did we get where we are right now? Lots of people are asking themselves that question as the greatest nation in the history of the world teeters on the precipice. The precipice of what? The precipice of a nightmare of collectivism and government control of our lives. I thought it might be useful to look at how Obama and the hate-America left are accomplishing what they really want more than anything- the comeuppance of America.

Sen. Chris Dodd (D., Conn.) has a primary challenger, a former donor. I was ready to dismiss the challenger, Merrick Alpert, as a no-name, but he has a fairly impressive résumé — Air Force officer who served in Bosnia, advance work for Vice President Gore, started a medical software company. ...

Papa Possum'sNew World Nursery Rhymes Political Poetry for Traitorous Times Come The Next Cold MorningSenator who? Oh right, him. Once every six years or so     right in the mid of fall people queue in freezing lines     to heed their civic call. Folks here in Connecticut     again see something odd, a name there on the ballot,     long-lost Senator Dodd...

Connecticut Resistance is holding a "Done With Dodd" Rally tomorrow Dodd's Hartford office, 12:05 sharp. Check out their web sit for more info. http://www.ctresistance.com

Remember back in March when Congress had the brilliant idea to retroactively tax bonuses paid out by bailed out insurer American International Group (AIG)? The House voted 328 to 93 for the 90-percent tax on the $165 million in bonuses, but it later died in the Senate. Steve Moore, a member of The Wall Street Journal's editorial board, explained on CNBC's May 13 "Street Signs" that the punitive retroactive tax was just a distraction to divert attention away from the culpability of Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., and Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., for the current financial crisis. "Remember, Barney Frank was...

After virtually every disaster created by Beltway politicians you can hear the sound of feet scurrying for cover in Washington, see fingers pointing in every direction away from Washington, and watch all sorts of scapegoats hauled up before Congressional committees to be denounced on television for the disasters created by members of the committee who are lecturing them. The word repeated endlessly in these political charades is "deregulation." The idea is that it was a lack of government supervision which allowed "greed" in the private sector to lead the nation into crises that only our Beltway saviors can solve. What...

When Attacking, Dodd Says Leave Wife AloneUpdated 12:45 PM EDT, Mon, May 11, 2009 We all know that politics leading up to the 2010 Senate race is going to be vicious. U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd is at his most vulnerable as election season nears, but his latest political fight is not for his seat - right now. It’s over his wife’s credentials after a Republican state leader attacked them last week. In an opinion-editorial in the Hartford Courant Sunday, Senator Dodd admitted to making mistakes and said he has been open and honest about them, but said this attack went...

GOP Has Eyes Fixed on DoddBy: Scott Benjamin 05/08/2009 State Republican Party Chairman Chris Healy said during an appearance in New Milford this week that U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd (D-East Haddam) is in more political trouble in his 2010 re-election race than U.S. Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-Stamford) was in 2006 when he lost the Democratic primary and had to win a fourth term running as an independent. "It relates to his personal conduct and issues of ethics," he said of Mr. Dodd, who has had to respond in recent months to charges that he and his wife, Jackie, received favoritism...

U.S. Sen. Christopher Dodd has long had a reputation as a politician of limited means — a reputation underscored, for good or bad, by recent disclosures about his dependence on friends to finance his homes. The reputation could prove difficult to sustain as Dodd begins what political operatives predict might be the toughest campaign of his 35-year congressional career — considering the dramatic uptick in his wife's income since they married. Since the low-profile family wedding on a rise above the Connecticut River in 1999, Jackie M. Clegg Dodd's income has quadrupled to the mid-six-figure range. All of the increase...

Via Moe Lane. No, he’s not saying that waterboarding terrorists is as evil as genocide, but he does seem to be saying that both are sufficiently evil as to require prosecution. I’d be curious to know how and where he draws the line on prosecutorial discretion, then: When is something so “evil” that we must proceed to trial, damn the policy consequences? David Shribman wonders: