| May 29, 2009 | -
President Barack Obama nominated Sonia Sotomayor, a Bronx-born, divorced, childless, diabetic, Hispanic federal judge on the U.S Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, to replace Justice David Souter on the Supreme Court. Analysts studying Sotomayor's decisions were unable to determine whether she would uphold Roe v. Wade, or whether she was distinctly pro- or anti-business, but much was made of a 2001 speech at the University of California at Berkeley in which she expressed hopes that a “wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life.” During the speech she also expressed fondness for “platos de arroz, gandoles y pernil,” a dish made with rice, beans, and pork. “Her word choice in 2001 was poor,” offered White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs, but many Republicans were unconvinced. “The comments she made about the quality of her decisions being better than those of a white male—I mean, we need to go further into her record to see whether this is a trend,” said Senator John Cornyn (R., Tex.), one of 98 non-Hispanic senators, who was considered for the Supreme Court in 2005 but not appointed. Newt Gingrich, who in 2007 spoke out against bilingual education by suggesting that students should “learn the language of prosperity, not the language of living in a ghetto,” criticized Sotomayor via Twitter. “White man racist nominee would be forced to withdraw,” tweeted Gingrich. “Latina woman racist should also withdraw.”
| Source 1:
The New York Times
Source 2:
The New York Times
Source 3:
The New York Times
Source 4:
The Guardian
Source 5:
The Washington Post
Source 6:
The Los Angeles Times
Source 7:
Fox News
Source 8:
The White House
Source 9:
The New York Times
Source 10:
FJC.gov
Source 11:
Wikipedia.org
Source 12:
Leading the news
|
| December 13, 2008 | -
Illinois Governor Milorad “Rod” Blagojevich was arrested for what U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald called a “political corruption crime spree.” The evidence included wiretap recordings in which Blagojevich, who has the power to name President-elect Barack Obama's successor in the Senate, talks about trading the Senate seat for “something real good” and refers to Obama as “that motherfucker.” “Our Milorad was framed,” said Dragan Blagojevic, reportedly a cousin, who invited the governor back to his ancestral native village of Veliki Krcmari, in Serbia. “He can have a cow,” he added, “or a pig or two.”
| Source 1:
Chicago Tribune
Source 2:
Chicago Tribune
Source 3:
TPM
Source 4:
NYT
Source 5:
Politico
Source 6:
NYT
Source 7:
Chicago Tribune
Source 8:
Chicago Tribune
Source 9:
WP
Source 10:
Chicago Tribune
Source 11:
NYT
Source 12:
Chicago Tribune
Source 13:
Blic via Javno
Source 14:
Radio Free Europe
Source 15:
Chicago Tribune
Source 16:
Southtown Star
Source 17:
AP via Google
|
| December 12, 2008 | -
Republican
senators killed a plan to loan $14 billion to American automakers, and the White House said it would consider other options to save the industry and as many as three million auto-related jobs, such as diverting some of the $700 billion reserved for bailing out the finance industry.
| Source 1:
WSJ
Source 2:
NYT
Source 3:
AP via Yahoo
Source 4:
NPR
Source 5:
Kalamazoo Gazette
Source 6:
AP via Yahoo
|
| October 21, 2008 | -
Alaska
Senator Ted Stevens was found guilty on charges that he lied about receiving $250,000 in gifts. Stevens testified that the items were not gifts, merely things he was holding onto for friends. “We have lots of things in our house that don't belong to us,” he said.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| October 2, 2008 | - The U.S. Senate and House of Representatives passed the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008. The legislation, which originated as a three-page proposal by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and grew to 451 pages after House and Senate negotiations, established the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) to grant the Secretary of the Treasury up to $700 billion to buy troubled assets owned by financial institutions, to allow the Treasury to limit executive compensation and “golden parachutes” at those institutions, and to establish an oversight board to monitor the Treasury. The act also provides wooden arrow manufacturers an exemption from excise tax. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi rushed the legislation to President George W. Bush, who signed it and promised that the United States would maintain “a leading role in the global economy.” “If I were dictator,” said Senator John McCain, who voted for the act, “which I always aspire to be, I would write it a little bit differently.” McCain also suggested the act be vetoed because it included so much pork. “No matter what the stakes are,” he said, “you've got to stop this.”
| Source 1:
New York Times
Source 2:
ABC News
Source 3:
New York Times
Source 4:
Think Progress
Source 5:
Think Progress
|
| March 18, 2008 | - Marvin Richardson, an organic strawberry farmer in Idaho who is challenging Senator Larry Craig for his Senate seat, had his name legally changed to Pro-Life.
| Source:
CBS News
|
| February 5, 2008 | - In testimony before the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, CIA Director Michael Hayden confirmed that agency interrogators tortured three detainees, waterboarding each man sometime between 2002 and 2003. When asked during a House Judiciary Committee hearing whether, based on Hayden's disclosures, the Justice Department would now begin a criminal investigation, Attorney General Michael Mukasey said no, because “that would put in question not only that opinion, but also any other opinion from the Justice Department.” Mukasey also reversed a ban instituted by John Ashcroft that prevented DOJ Pride, a gay advocacy group, from using email, bulletin boards, and meeting rooms at the Justice Department.
| Source 1:
Washington Post
Source 2:
Talking Points Memo
Source 3:
Washington Post
|
| October 18, 2007 | - The Senate Intelligence Committee agreed to grant retroactive immunity to phone companies that provided the government with subscribers' phone and e-mail records.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| October 18, 2007 | - The Senate Intelligence Committee agreed to grant retroactive immunity to phone companies that provided the government with subscribers' phone and e-mail records.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| September 20, 2007 | - The Senate failed to pass a bill restoring habeas corpus to military detainees but voted to denounce MoveOn.org. Senators Joseph Lieberman and Jon Kyl filed an amendment to the 2008 Defense Authorization Bill to classify Iran's Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization.
| Source 1:
The Huffington Post via Yahoo! News
Source 2:
AP
Source 3:
The New York Times
|
| July 18, 2007 | - Despite an all-night debate, Democratic
senators failed to invoke cloture and bring to vote a measure requiring the majority of U.S. troops to be withdrawn from Iraq.
| Source:
Time
|
| July 13, 2007 | - The Senate voted to double the bounty on Osama bin Laden to $50 million.
| Source:
BBC
|
| July 12, 2007 | - A Hindu prayer at the opening of a U.S. Senate hearing was interrupted by three angry Christians.
| Source:
Reuters via ABC
|
| July 9, 2007 | - The phone number of Senator David Vitter (R., La.), an advocate of family values and of Rudolph Giuliani, was found on the client list of Deborah Jeane Palfrey, who is accused of running a Washington, D.C., area prostitution ring.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| June 15, 2007 | - Piles of human feces were found in the Senate. “There was,” said a staffer, “so much of it.”
| Source:
The Raw Story
|
| May 17, 2007 | -
Senate
Democrats called for a vote of no confidence in Gonzales, and Senator Charles Schumer called the Attorney General a puppet.
| Source:
The New York Times
|
| May 9, 2007 | - The Senate passed a bill that would lift a 1975 ban on the sale of baby turtles, but would require safety pamphlets warning children about the risks.
| Source:
US News
|
| April 20, 2007 | - Attorney General Alberto Gonzales testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding the firing of federal prosecutors; Senator Jeff Sessions (R., Ala.) told Gonzales his ability to lead was in question, and Senator Tom Coburn (R., Okla.) asked Gonzales to resign. One prominent Republican said the hearing was like “clubbing a baby seal.”
| Source 1:
New York Times
Source 2:
Raw Story
|
| April 20, 2007 | -
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid declared that the United States has lost the war in Iraq.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| March 1, 2007 | -
Senator Joe Biden (D., Del.) boasted that as president he would pull U.S. troops out of Iraq and send them to “take out the janjaweed” in Darfur, which he mistakenly placed in Somalia, not Sudan, where visiting Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad signed a cooperative agreement on the environment and said, “Zionists are the true manifestation of Satan.”
| Source 1:
PrezVid
Source 2:
Deutsche Presse-Agentur
|
| February 2, 2007 | -
Delaware
Senator Joseph Biden praised Illinois Senator Barack Obama. “I mean, you got the first mainstream African American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy,” said Biden. “I mean, that's a storybook, man.”
| Source:
salon.com
|
| January 26, 2007 | -
Army Lt. Gen. David Petraeus, an expert on counterinsurgency, replaced Army Gen. George Casey as U.S. commander of troops in Iraq, and the Senate Foreign Relations Committee passed a non-binding resolution opposing President Bush's plan to increase the number of troops. Republican Senator John Warner of Virginia expressed hope that “wherever possible, the Iraqis should bear the brunt of the sectarian violence.”
| Source:
USA Today
|
| January 12, 2007 | -
Senator Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D., Del.) asserted that the authority Congress granted the Bush Administration to invade Iraq did not extend to invading Iran or Syria. “I just want to set that marker,” he said.
| Source:
Slate
|
| January 11, 2007 | -
Senator Christopher J. Dodd (D., Conn.) announced his candidacy for president.
| Source:
Houston Chronicle
|
| January 8, 2007 | -
Senator
Hillary Clinton said that “we want to be able to continue to export democracy, but we want to deliver it in digestible packages.”
| Source:
The New Yorker
|
| December 17, 2006 | - It was revealed that Senator
Bill Frist's
AIDS charity had paid almost a half-million dollars in consulting fees to Frist's political friends.
| Source:
CBS News
|
| December 15, 2006 | -
Senator Trent Lott (R., Miss.), represented by anti-tobacco lawyer Richard "Dickie" Scruggs, was suing his insurance company after it refused to pay for the loss of his home during Hurricane Katrina.
| Source:
The Sun Herald
|
| December 8, 2006 | - Robert Gates was approved by the Senate to replace Donald Rumsfeld as the new secretary of defense; senators described themselves as “very pleased,” “very impressed,” “very enthusiastic,” “very grateful,” and “very happy” with the confirmation. Rumsfeld gave an emotional farewell speech to Pentagon employees, and had to wipe his nose.
| Source 1:
Washington Post
Source 2:
Washington Post
Source 3:
New York Times
|
| December 8, 2006 | - President George W. Bush blamed John Bolton's departure from the U.N. on the “shallow politics” of the Senate, and Kofi Annan, who will leave the U.N. on December 31 after completing his second five-year term as secretary general, said that he and Bolton were “both graduating together.”
| Source 1:
Washington Post
Source 2:
New York Times
|
| December 7, 2006 | - Harry Reid, the new Senate majority leader, gave outgoing Republican leader Bill Frist a big bear hug.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| November 19, 2006 | -
Senator Trent Lott was elected Minority Whip.
| Source:
The Washington Post
|
| November 12, 2006 | -
Democratic
senators made it clear that they would not confirm John Bolton (who was installed as U.N. ambassador via recess appointment) to his position in 2007.
| Source:
ABC News
|
| October 25, 2006 | -
President Bush called Nancy Pelosi a “secret admirer” of tax cuts.
| Source:
New York Post
|
| October 23, 2006 | - John Spencer, a candidate for the U.S. Senate from New York, denied he had ever called Hillary Clinton ugly.
| Source:
Breitbart.com
|
| September 28, 2006 | -
Senator Trent Lott of Mississippi told reporters that it's hard for Americans to understand “what's wrong” with Iraqis. “Why do they hate the Israelis and despise their right to exist? Why do they hate each other? Why do Sunnis kill Shiites? How do they tell the difference?”
| Source:
CNN
|
| September 25, 2006 | -
Senator George Allen of Virginia denied allegations that he had once stuffed a deer's head into a mailbox belonging to an African-American family.
| Source:
Salon
|
| September 20, 2006 | -
Virginia
Senator George Allen acknowledged his Jewish ancestry.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| September 7, 2006 | - Joseph Lieberman returned to the Senate for the first time since losing the Connecticut
Democratic primary, and Senator Susan Collins (R., Maine) offered to buy him a dog.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| August 31, 2006 | -
Montana
Senator Conrad Burns said that terrorists “drive taxi cabs in the daytime and kill by night.”
| Source:
AP via Breitbart
|
| August 26, 2006 | - Katherine Harris, a candidate for the U.S. Senate in Florida, told a Baptist newspaper that “if you're not electing Christians, then in essence you are going to legislate sin.”
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| August 24, 2006 | - In Kenya, U.S. Senator
Barack Obama agreed to be tested for HIV.
| Source:
ABC News
|
| August 21, 2006 | -
Virginia
Senator George Allen called an Indian-American man with a mullet a “macaca.”
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| August 19, 2006 | -
Republicans were, in general, neglecting their party's candidate in favor of Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, who said that Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld should resign.
| Source:
The New York Times
|
| August 15, 2006 | -
Senator
Barack Obama called the Iraq war “dumb.”
| Source:
Harrisburg Daily Register
|
| August 8, 2006 | -
Connecticut Senator Joseph Lieberman lost the Democratic
Senate primary election to anti-Iraq-war candidate Ned Lamont. Lieberman then announced that he would run as an independent candidate, and that “Team Connecticut” would “surge forward to victory.” Vice President Dick Cheney said that Lamont's victory was encouraging to “Al Qaeda types.”
| Source:
Chicago Sun-Times
|
| August 3, 2006 | -
Senator
Hillary Clinton called on Donald Rumsfeld to resign.
| Source:
allheadlinenews.com via Google News
|
| August 1, 2006 | - Corporal Phillip E. Baucus, 28, nephew of U.S. Senator
Max Baucus, was killed in action in Iraq.
| Source:
Bloomberg via Google News
|
| August 1, 2006 | - The Senate Permanent Investigations subcommittee reported that law enforcement agencies were powerless to prevent the super-rich from cheating on their taxes.
| Source:
NY Times
|
| July 29, 2006 | -
Senators Hillary Clinton and John McCain held a vodka-drinking
contest.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| July 25, 2006 | - In Maryland one U.S. Senate candidate said he did not knowingly pay for 20 heroin addicts to come to his campaign rally, while another was arrested for raping his 19-year-old mail-order bride.
| Source:
Washington Times
|
| July 8, 2006 | - It was reported that Senator
Orrin Hatch intervened to get a record producer out of a Dubai jail after he was sentenced to four years for possession of cocaine.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| June 22, 2006 | -
Senator Rick Santorum insisted the United States had in fact discovered weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, and Senator John McCain said the U.S. had two options there: “Withdraw and fail, or commit and succeed.”
| Source:
The New York Times
|
| June 21, 2006 | - The U.S. Senate voted for the ninth consecutive year to keep the minimum wage at $5.15 per hour.
| Source:
The New York Times
|
| June 8, 2006 | - The Senate failed to pass a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage.
| Source:
Globe and Mail
|
| May 30, 2006 | -
Senator John Warner called for hearings into the killings of more than 20 civilians in Haditha by U.S. Marines in 2005.
| Source:
The Australian
|
| May 24, 2006 | -
Senator Bill Frist helped give a gorilla a root canal.
| Source:
The Washington Post
|
| May 18, 2006 | - The Senate passed a bill that would make English the national language.
| Source:
The Senate
|
| March 21, 2006 | - A group of U.S. senators visited China to push for an increased valuation of the yuan; without such a change the Senate plans to vote for tariffs on Chinese imports. "We would like to get an idea from our Chinese hosts," said Senator Charles Schumer (D., N.Y.), "what the future is going to be like."
| Source:
BBC News
|
| March 8, 2006 | - The House passed legislation that, if approved in the Senate, will make it far more difficult for states to put warning labels on food; under the new rules all warnings will be approved by the Food and Drug Administration. "What's wrong," asked Representative Henry Waxman (D., Calif.), "with our system of federalism?"
| Source:
Canada.com
|
| March 2, 2006 | - The Senate renewed the Patriot Act and sent it to the House; the House is expected to pass the legislation soon.
| Source:
MSNBC
|
| February 11, 2006 | - Former FEMA director Michael Brown told a Senate committee that the White House knew about the flooding of New Orleans immediately after the the levees were breached, even though President Bush has said he didn't know about the flooding until the following day.
| Source:
ABC AM
|
| January 30, 2006 | -
Senator Joseph Biden (D., Del.) said Hamas would have to change its stripes.
| Source:
The Los Angeles Times
|
| January 29, 2006 | - The White House refused to release photographs of President Bush with lobbyist Jack Abramoff, despite requests from Senate and House
Republicans.
| Source:
Reuters
|
| January 27, 2006 | -
Massachusetts Junior Senator
John Kerry, in Switzerland for the Davos economic forum, called for a filibuster to stop the nomination of Samuel Alito Jr. to the Supreme Court.
| Source:
The Salt Lake Tribune
|
| January 24, 2006 | - A Senate committee investigating the government response to Hurricane Katrina criticized the Bush Administration for ignoring the findings of a hurricane-preparedness exercise called "Hurricane Pam," which had warned that New Orleans would be flooded. "It is apparent that a more appropriate name for Pam should have been 'Cassandra,'" said Senator Susan Collins (R., Maine).
| Source:
USA Today
|
| January 17, 2006 | -
New York
Senator
Hillary Clinton said that Republicans were running the House of Representatives "like a plantation." Republicans disagreed with Clinton, and Al Sharpton complained that she was stealing his material.
| Source:
The Duluth News Tribune
|
| January 15, 2006 | -
U.S. senators insisted that attacking Iran must remain an option.
| Source:
Boston.com
|
| January 12, 2006 | - The U.S. Senate made Supreme Court nominee Samuel Alito's wife cry.
| Source:
NBC11.com
|
| December 22, 2005 | - The Senate, with Dick Cheney casting the deciding vote, cut $40 billion in funding for foster care, child support, and student loans.
| Source:
Democracy Now!
|
| December 18, 2005 | -
Senator
Harry Reid said the current U.S. Congress was “the most corrupt in history.”
| Source:
Reuters
|
| December 16, 2005 | - The Senate voted not to extend portions of the Patriot Act. “It is time,” said Senator
Patrick Leahy, “to have some checks and balances in this country.”
| Source:
AP
|
| December 11, 2005 | - Former Senator Eugene McCarthy died.
| Source:
The New York Times
|
| December 4, 2005 | -
Senator John McCain said that he didn't think “the ethics committees are working very well.”
| Source:
Bloomberg.com
|
| November 19, 2005 | - The Senate refused to consider a Democratic resolution to honor Bruce Springsteen.
| Source:
Common Dreams
|
| November 17, 2005 | - A White House document showed that executives from large oil firms met with Vice President Dick Cheney's energy task force in 2001; the document was released a week after representatives from those firms testified before a Senate committee that they had not met with the task force.
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| November 2, 2005 | -
Senator Harry Reid and Representative Nancy Pelosi called for Karl Rove to be stripped of his security clearance.
| Source:
KHON2/Fox News
|
| November 1, 2005 | -
Democratic leaders called for a closed session on the Senate floor, which they used to force the creation of a bipartisan committee; the committee will report on the ongoing Congressional investigation (which the Democratic leadership believes is being purposefully delayed) into the Bush Administration's misuse of intelligence to justify the war in Iraq. “They have no convictions,” Senator Bill Frist said of the Democrats. “They have no principles. They have no ideas.”
| Source:
CNN.com
|
| October 24, 2005 | - It was reported that in 2003 Senator
Bill Frist was told (in writing) that a significant amount of HCA, Inc., stock had been added to his blind trust; two weeks later he said he did not believe that he owned any stock in HCA. "I have no control," said Frist. "He could have been more exact," explained Frist's spokesman.
| Source:
The Washington Post
|
| October 6, 2005 | - The U.S. Senate passed a $440 billion defense-spending bill; the bill includes an amendment that places limits on the torture of military prisoners. President George W. Bush promised to veto the bill if it was passed containing the amendment.
| Source:
USNews.com
|
| September 14, 2005 | -
Senator Robert Byrd called on the Bush Administration to withdraw from Iraq. "We cannot continue to commit billions in Iraq," he said, "when our own people are so much in need."
| Source:
Democracy Now!
|
| August 20, 2005 | - Peter Schoomaker, the Army's top general, revealed that the United States was developing a plan to keep at least 100,000 soldiers in Iraq through 2009. Senator Chuck Hagel (R., Nebr.) called the plan "complete folly." "It would further destabilize the Middle East," he said. "It would give Iran more influence, it would hurt Israel, it would put our allies over there in Saudi Arabia and Jordan in a terrible position."
| Source 1:
AP
Source 2:
AP
|
| August 12, 2005 | - Jeanine F. Pirro, the wife of Republican fund-raiser and convicted tax evader Albert J. Pirro, Jr., announced that she would run against New York
Senator
Hillary Clinton in 2006.
| Source:
Newsday
|
| August 1, 2005 | - The Senate went into recess, and George W. Bush appointed John Bolton to be ambassador to the United Nations.
| Source:
The New York Times
|
| July 28, 2005 | - The U.S. House of Representatives voted down CAFTA, the Central American Free Trade Agreement, even though it was already approved by the Senate. House leaders then held the vote open for forty-seven minutes until they had changed enough Republican votes to approve the agreement.
| Source:
Democracy Now
|
| July 28, 2005 | - The Boy Scout National Jamboree was held at Fort A.P. Hill, Virginia. The Senate passed the Support Our Scouts Act of 2005, guaranteeing the Boy Scouts the right to use federal land whether the organization discriminates against atheists and gays or not. The Senate also noted that holding the Jamboree on a military base gave U.S. soldiers the opportunity to practice the “preparation, logistics, and leadership” needed in combat. At the Jamboree four scout leaders were electrocuted while setting up a tent, and three hundred people were treated for heat-related symptoms. In California, a scoutmaster and a thirteen-year-old scout were killed by lightning.
| Source 1:
CNN.com
Source 2:
SWNebr.net
Source 3:
WBOC16
Source 4:
Thomas.loc.gov
|
| July 27, 2005 | - A study found that 43 percent of the House and Senate members who have left public office since 1998 are registered lobbyists.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| June 27, 2005 | - A group of U.S. senators visited Guantánamo Bay and said that prisoners there were being treated humanely. Prisoners “even have air-conditioning,” said Senator Jim Bunning of Kentucky, “and semi-private showers.”
| Source:
The New York Times
|
| June 19, 2005 | - The Senate apologized for not making lynching a federal crime, although eight senators, including Trent Lott, did not take part in the voice vote or the signing of an apology.
| Source:
The New York Times
|
| May 11, 2005 | - The Senate approved $82 billion in emergency funding for the warin Iraq.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| May 7, 2005 | -
Nevada
Senator Harry Reid said Bush was a loser.
| Source:
The Washington Post
|
| April 25, 2005 | -
Senator
Bill Frist of Tennessee asked Christian conservatives to help him end filibusters.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| April 8, 2005 | -
Republicans held a conference to discuss ways to reform the federal judiciary, which they say has “run amok.” Senator Tom Coburn's chief of staff said that “mass impeachment” of judges might be necessary, and Tom DeLay, who is under investigation for illegal fundraising, gave a pre-recorded speech entitled “Confronting the Judicial War on Faith.”
| Source:
New York Times
|
| March 20, 2005 | - The U.S. Senate subpoenaed Terri Schiavo, a woman who has been in a persistent vegetative state since 1991, to testify before the Health, Education, and Labor Committee. The subpoena was intended to make it impossible for Schiavo to be taken off the feeding tube that allows her to survive; the order, however, was defied by a Florida judge, and the feeding tube was removed. Schiavo then began to die of dehydration. The House and Senate held emergency sessions in order to pass a bill that would transfer the case from state court to federal court. The bill was then signed by President George W. Bush, who had flown in from his ranch in Crawford, Texas, for the occasion.
| Source:
Wikipedia
|
| March 16, 2005 | - The Senate passed a resolution that will permit drilling for oil in Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.
| Source:
The New York Times
|
| February 26, 2005 | - The financial records of 1.2 million federal employees were stolen from or lost by the Bank of America; Senator Pat Leahy's credit-card number was among the missing.
| Source:
BBC News
|
| February 22, 2005 | -
Senator
John McCain called for permanent U.S. military bases in Afghanistan.
| Source:
The Guardian
|
| February 3, 2005 | -
Alberto Gonzales was confirmed as attorney general, and Senator Arlen Specter described him as a man who had made it "up from the bootstraps without even boots." Another senator dismissed accusations of Gonzales's condoning torture as "exaggerated."
| Source:
New York Times
|
| July 15, 2004 | - The Senate killed a proposal for a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage, and
| Source:
New York Times
|
| July 10, 2004 | - The Senate Intelligence Committee released a scathing report on the CIA's unfounded, unjustified, and unreasonable claims about Iraq's purported weapons of mass destruction; the report was oddly silent, however, about the Bush Administration's well-documented and apparently successful campaign to intimidate the CIA into coming up with justifications for the President's fraudulent case for the invasion.
| Source:
New York Times
|
| June 22, 2004 | - It was reported that the Rev. Sun Myung Moon was crowned in the Senate office building after announcing that he is the "savior, Messiah, Returning Lord and True Parent." Several lawmakers from both major parties were present, including Rep. Danny Davis, who wore white gloves as he placed the crown on Moon's head.
| Source:
The Hill
|
| March 25, 2004 | - The Senate passed a bill making it a crime to harm a fetus while committing a violent crime.
| Source:
Associated Press
|
| January 22, 2004 | - Republican staff members of the Senate Judiciary Committee were still under investigation for improperly infiltrating
Democratic computers and reading strategy memos, which were then leaked to the press. Several computers, including a server from Senator Bill Frist's office, have been confiscated by the Senate's Sergeant-at-Arms.
| Source:
Boston Globe
|
| July 17, 2003 | -
CIA director George Tenet testified before the Senate Intelligence Committee and again took responsibility for President Bush's false claim that Iraq tried to buy uranium from Niger, but he admitted that he didn't know the claim, which he successfully removed from at least one of the president's previous speeches, would be included in the State of the Union address.
Tenet said that his staff should have told him about it.
| Source:
Washington Post
|
| December 11, 2001 | - Attorney General John Ashcroft testified before the Senate Judiciary Committee, which had summoned him to explain his dubious anti-terrorism tactics. “To those who scare peace-loving people with phantoms of lost liberty,” he said, “my message is this: your tactics only aid terrorists.” He also accused his critics of giving “ammunition to America's enemies.” The attorney general went on to defend his refusal to compromise the right of potential terrorists to keep and bear arms.
| |
| December 11, 2001 | - The Senate refused to consider a moratorium on human cloning.
| |
| November 13, 2001 | - House and Senate negotiators agreed to ban any United States cooperation with the International Criminal Court because of fears that Americans could be charged with war crimes.
| |
| October 30, 2001 | - Senator Russell Feingold cast the only dissenting vote in the Senate; he argued that the bill's language was too vague and would allow unconstitutional searches.
| |
| October 9, 2001 | -
Strom Thurmond collapsed on the floor of the Senate but refused to die.
| |
| September 4, 2001 | - Senator Fritz Hollings of South Carolina told a newspaper that Senator Strom Thurmond, his 98-year-old colleague, is no longer “mentally keen” but stays in the Senate because “the poor fellow doesn't have any place to go.” Hollings also remarked that the Senate makes an excellent nursing home.
| |
| June 26, 2001 | -
Communists in the Italian
senate protested the upcoming Group of 8 summit, which will be held in Genoa next month, by holding up little signs that read, “Let's throw the G-8 into the sea.” Afghanistan's Taliban agreed to let the World Food Program employ local women to survey food needs there even though this would seem to violate God's
Law.
| |
| June 12, 2001 | -
Senate
Majority Leader Tom Daschle, perhaps seeking to demonstrate the true grit of his party, promised that Democrats would not block President Bush's judicial nominees—unlike the Republicans, who blocked almost half the judges appointed by Bill Clinton.
“I don't believe in it,” Daschle said.
“We have to break the cycle.”
| |
| June 12, 2001 | -
Trent Lott, the outgoing Senate majority leader, wrote a memo to his Republican colleagues declaring war on the Democrats.
| |
| May 29, 2001 | - Senator James M. Jeffords of Vermont defected from the Republican Party, handing control of the Senate to the Democrats, who promptly voted to confirm Theodore B. Olson as solicitor general, suggesting that the White House cabal had little to fear after all.
| |
| May 8, 2001 | -
Alabama's
senate approved a bill that would allow video gambling machines to be installed at dog tracks.
| |
| April 17, 2001 | -
Alabama's
senate approved a constitutional amendment allowing the display of the Ten Commandments in public schools and state offices.
| |
| April 10, 2001 | - The United States Senate passed a budget plan that contained a $1.2 trillion tax cut.
| |
| April 3, 2001 | - The Senate passed a campaign-finance reform bill that banned soft money.
| |
| January 30, 2001 | - Fairfax County, Virginia, secured the approval of the state senate to require residents to sleep in their bedrooms.
| |
| January 16, 2001 | - Liberal political groups were attempting to rally Senate
Democrats to oppose the nomination of John Ashcroft to be attorney general of the United States, though few seriously believed that members of the Democrat Party were brave or principled enough to do what it would take to defeat the right-wing Christian extremist.
| |
| January 9, 2001 | -
Al Gore, president of the Senate, called for order.
| |
| January 9, 2001 | - An aide to President-designate George W. Bush said that Bush did not intend to send the treaty creating the International Criminal Court to the Senate for approval; aides said they would try to undo other last-minute actions by President Clinton as well.
| |
| November 14, 2000 | - A dead man was elected to the United States Senate.
| |
| September 26, 2000 | -
Clinton administration officials denied that contributors to Hillary Clinton's
Senate
campaign were given special invitations to sleep over at the White House; the Clinton campaign said that only about 1/4 of recent guests had given money.
| |
| September 26, 2000 | - The U.S. Senate
voted to lift restrictions on trade with China.
| |
| April 0, 2000 | -
Pennsylvania
Senator Arlen Specter rejoined the Democratic Party after more than 40 years as a Republican. “There's more than being reelected here,” he insisted. “There's the factor of principle.”
| Source:
Politico
|
