It's Friday, so it's payday for untold millions of Americans. And for millions of them, their paycheck will come with the first raise they've gotten in a decade. Because this is the week when the Democratically-sponsored minimum wage hike goes into effect.
The first of three yearly raises, the minimum wage goes from $5.15 an hour to $5.85 an hour this week. That is a 70 cent an hour raise, or roughly 14%. Next year, another raise of 70 cents to $6.55, and then the last in two years, to $7.25. Overall, this is almost a 41% raise for those paid the least in our country. While 70 cents doesn't sound like much, when is the last three-year period when you got a 40% raise? It's even more impressive if you look at yearly figures for a full-time worker: from $10,712 to $15,080.
Congressional Democrats are putting even more pressure on the Bush White House this week, on many investigative fronts. Subpoenas are flying, contempt citations are voted out of committee, and the Senate is considering opening a perjury investigation because Attorney General Alberto Gonzales continues make statements to them which are easily proved wrong. Most Republicans, though, are continuing to try to paint the whole process as "a partisan political witch hunt." My guess is that while they may put up a good front now, the closer we get to the 2008 election, the more nervous the party as a whole is going to be about the prospect of defending the Bush White House throughout the campaign.
This is an experiment in multimedia. If the above video player doesn't work, you can access this video at the YouTube site.
While I am admittedly a slave to the written word, I have (twice) in the past suggested scripts for campaign commercials. The first of these was more fun to come up with, and had more vivid imagery in my opinion; but the second one may have proved to be more effectual as a campaign strategy, if it had actually been used.
It seems that events have conspired to make this "new features" week (or perhaps "multimedia" week) on ChrisWeigant.com.
To kick this off, I am featuring our very first original political cartoon. I was emailed a few cartoons by a blog reader, and will be running a few of them over the coming days as an experiment. Please feel free to post your comments to let me and the artist know what you think.
I've included the short bio the artist wrote for himself after the cartoon. He's a guy that draws these for fun, and he sent them to me to see if I could use them. I must admit, having original political cartoons on my site is an intriguing idea to me, so we'll see how it goes for a while.
The first of these could have been drawn right after Bush took office, or it could have been used during the recent White House spin job on the Libby commutation. In other words, it has kind of a timeless quality to it.
Anyway, here's the debut cartoon from Charles W. Cunningham:
Yesterday, on Fox News Sunday, an interesting idea was proposed: how about having a debate for the spouses of the presidential candidates? How about a Democratic spouses debate, and a Republican spouses debate?
Now, normally my motto is "I watch Fox News so you don't have to," but I have to admit the idea is an intriguing one. Spouses on the left and right have recently been making news sniping at each other anyways, so let's put them on a stage with each other and let the fur fly!
The idea intrigues me for two reasons -- first, I think it'd be great television and would actually get higher ratings than the candidate debates; and second, because the mainstream media would suddenly discover that Dennis Kucinich's wife is the hottest campaign spouse on the Democratic side.
George Bush's White House has leaked a story (anonymously, of course) to the Washington Post which is truly stunning, and which should concern any citizen who values checks and balances in American government. They are asserting that Emperor Bush has a power usually thought of as "imperial" or "monarchical" -- the power to do anything he wants, then define it as "Executive Privilege," and thereby completely ignore Congress and the Judicial Branch.
President George Bush was visiting a small business which makes waterproof computer equipment for medical use, when he had some problems typing. From the AP story:
"During the tour, Bush typed on a white keyboard immersed in a pan of water. He wrote: 'G Tro N was the first president.' Clifton Broumand, company president, joked that Bush, who apparently was trying to write 'George Washington was the first president,' might want to practice his typing."
In other news from "G Tro N," D.C., FEMA appears to have been taken over by laywers who care more about protecting the agency's rear end than about U.S. citizens' health.
As I write this, the United States Senate is many hours into a remarkable all-night session debating how to end the Iraq war. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid has called this marathon session to highlight the Republicans' obstructionism on putting together a reasonable plan to end the slaughter of U.S. troops in Iraq. Republicans, of course, decried the all-nighter as merely a political stunt.
They're right. It is just a political stunt. But it's a doozy!
Just a quick note today to roundly condemn the actions of three unbelievably intolerant protesters in the Senate Gallery.
Last Friday, at Harry Reid's invitation, Hindu Chaplain Rajan Zed became the first of his religion to offer the daily prayer to open the Senate. From the public gallery came bigoted comments from three people who objected to his presence.
