This weekend, Congresswoman Maxine Waters stood in front of a room full of constituents and activists and did something extraordinary – she declared war on fellow Congress Member Henry Waxman.

Addressing a meeting of the Westchester Democratic club on Saturday, Waters told the packed room that Waxman secretly circulated a letter from the Los Angeles Chamber of Commerce in support of expanding Los Angeles’ International Airport to Congressional colleagues only a day after telling Waters he had not yet made up his mind about the issue. Waters accused Waxman of forming an “unholy alliance” with the Chamber and the construction trades to expand Los Angeles International Airport – a move that some experts believe would create region-wide traffic gridlock.

Waters, who represents the communities directly surrounding LAX supports modernizing, but not expanding, the airport.

I was on hand to record Waters’ remarks. Watch it: http://vimeo.com/62625350

The Chamber is promoting a plan which could expand capacity at LAX by up to 14 million passengers a year, and is advocating moving the North runway several hundred feet, a move some experts say would force the closure of parts of Lincoln and Sepulveda Blvds for at least 2 years, and perhaps even permanently.

Such closures would force thousands of cars onto other surface streets and nearby freeways, creating a near constant “carmageddon” scenario as traffic backed up onto the 405, 105 and 10 freeways, potentially affecting commuters as far away as Orange County, the Valley and Downtown Los Angeles.

The move is also backed by many of Los Angeles’ biggest labor unions, who see expansion as a job-creating engine for the region. Airport opponents say a multi-billion dollar plan to modernize the airport without moving the runway would create just as many jobs.

In a highly unusual move that signaled just how seriously Waters took Waxman’s end-run, Waters very publicly threatened to take the fight to the Congressman’s own district, calling into question Waxman’s motives for being the bag man for an “unholy alliance between organized labor and the Chamber of Commerce”

“Now I can’t say this is why Mr. Waxman is doing what he’s doing,” said Waters.  “But these are the two places they go for money – the Chamber…..and organized labor. And so some of these elected officials don’t feel they can be independent and fight. They say, ‘Hey, you know, this is too difficult, after all, they’ve come together on this issue’.”

Waters then encouraged her constituents  in the room to reach out to their counterparts in Waxman’s district.

“I want you to find all the community activists in his district and ask them to join with us. I want them to call him and tell him to get his nose out of Westchester’s business. He’s thinking, ‘Well, it’s not my district, so I don’t have to worry about my constituents on this issue. I can do what ever I want.'”

“But we have to turn that around. Get busy. I will remind him, every day, that we’re after him.”, Waters said, smiling.

Waters strategy, though unusually pointed and public, might be effective. Last November, Henry Waxman faced the fight of his life when he suddenly found himself representing the beach cities on either side of LAX due to redistricting.  Rather than cruise to victory virtually unopposed, as he had nearly every year since he was first elected to Congress in 1975 to represent constituents in Beverly Hills and Santa Monica, the 17-term Congressman narrowly fended off Manhattan Beach resident Bill Bloomfield.

Rep. Barbara Lee [D-CA9], proved she has a backbone when in 2001 she stood up against war and became the only member of congress to vote “No” on the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Terrorists (AUMF), and she was oh so right.

Now, Barbara has again taken the lead in trying to stop the insane decision to expand and escalate the war in Afghanistan. Her bill, H.R. 3699 “To prohibit any increase in the number of members of the United States Armed Forces serving in Afghanistan,” has been referred to the House Armed Services Committee. Link: http://www.govtrack.us/congres…  

Cosponsors:

Yvette Clarke [D-NY11]  Emanuel Cleaver [D-MO5]   Steve Cohen [D-TN9]

John Conyers [D-MI14]   Donna Edwards [D-MD4]     Keith Ellison [D-MN5]

Bob Filner [D-CA51]  Alan Grayson [D-FL8]  Raul Grijalva [D-AZ7]

Maurice Hinchey [D-NY22]  Michael Honda [D-CA15]  Sheila Jackson-Lee [D-TX18] Dennis Kucinich [D-OH10]  John Lewis [D-GA5]      James McDermott [D-WA7]

James McGovern [D-MA3]    Jerrold Nadler [D-NY8]  Fortney Stark [D-CA13] Edolphus Towns [D-NY10]  Nydia Velázquez [D-NY12]Maxine Waters [D-CA35]

Diane Watson [D-CA33]    Lynn Woolsey [D-CA6]

As you can see, MOST of our 53 California representatives have NOT signed onto the bill. No Waxman. No Berman. No Sherman. No Schiff. Just those heroes in bold above are on this short list. CONTACT your representative to ask that they co-sponsor and support this important legislation to take back the war powers as in our constitution. And thank those who have signed on.

Here’s the link to the committee: http://www.govtrack.us/congres…  The Democratic Chair is Rep. Ike Skelton [D-MO4] with the ranking Republican member Rep. Howard McKeon [R-CA25] (Santa Clarita and east), Rep. Duncan Hunter [R-CA52], and the TWO DEMOCRATS from CA:

Rep. Susan Davis [D-CA53] (San Diego) and Rep. Loretta Sanchez [D-CA47] (Garden Grove-Santa Ana).

Please CONTACT these people on the committee right away and ask that this bill be brought to a vote immediately. With the impending announcement coming from Obama, there is no time to lose.////

Laura Richardson has been playing with fire since the day she moved up from Long Beach to Sacramento, and her rapid rise to DC powered by her playing with mortgage debt always caused suspicion. For her part, Rep. Maxine Waters’ troubles are a bit less clear, and honestly, less convincing.  From the LA Times:

The House Ethics Committee announced Thursday that it had voted unanimously to establish panels to investigate whether Southern California congresswomen Maxine Waters and Laura Richardson had violated the law or broken House rules.

In its statement, the committee said it was looking into whether Richardson had received a “gift” or “preferential treatment” from Washington Mutual after her Sacramento house was sold at a foreclosure auction, only to have the lender take it back and return the two-story house to her. It also said it was investigating whether the Long Beach Democrat failed to list real estate, liabilities and income on her financial disclosure forms.

*** *** ***

Massachusetts-based OneUnited Bank received $12 million in bailout funds three months after Waters (D-Los Angeles) helped arrange a meeting between the bank and other minority-owned financial institutions and the Treasury Department. Waters is a senior member of the congressional committee overseeing banking. Waters’ husband, Sidney Williams, served on the bank board until early last year and held investments in the bank worth at least $350,000, according to the congresswoman’s financial disclosure report.

Now whatever you can say about Rep. Waters, you cannot deny that her excuse on this one, that she has a long history of advocating for minority banks, was true.  She’s had her run-ins on ethics before, but she’s no John Doolittle squirreling money away.  Nearly every bank received bailout funds, and the $12 million hardly seems like a number that is out of proportion with the size of the bank.  But, in the end, this inquiry is probably for the best for everybody. Best to just air it all out and move past this rather than just hiding it away.

As for Ms. Richardson, well, there is a lot of bad looking circumstantial evidence out there. At a time when foreclosures are an all too common story, she was able to get her house back in a somewhat mysterious fashion. I’ll be very interested to see what happens with this story, and I’ll certainly be following to see if there is a serious primary challenger.

A new initiative organized by Howie Klein, Jane Hamsher, fellow Calitician Dante Atkins and myself to verbally and financially reward Congressmembers who pledge to vote down any healthcare bill that does not include the public option is catching fire today.  The objective is to use carrots as well as sticks to achieve progressive goals.  As I said in the diary kicking off this intiative at DailyKos:

Human beings are psychologically predictable creatures, much like Pavlov’s famous canine.  We do respond well to punishment, but we respond just as well if not better to positive reinforcement.  Do nothing but beat a dog with a stick, and the dog is likelier to be aggressive than lovingly loyal.  Do nothing but scream at a child, and the child will eventually fail to respond to her abusive parent.  Senators and Representatives, no matter how elevated, are still just people: the rules of psychological conditioning still apply.  If all we can do is scream at people who don’t do what we want, eventually no one will listen to us at all.

Utilizing Jane Hamsher’s signatory list, Howie Klein set up an ActBlue page called They Took the Pledge.  Spurred on by Jane Hamsher’s post, my dkos diary, Dante’s dkos diary, and Howie Klein’s efforts at Blue America PAC, the online effort has raised over $60,000 since this morning, becoming ActBlue’s top fundraising page.  And the media has begun to take note, with stories on CBS Online, Politico, and The Plum Line.

On the list are 13 deserving CA Legislators who could use your dollars and/or words of encouragement:

Judy Chu (CA-32)

Sam Farr (CA-17)

Bob Filner (CA-51)

Mike Honda (CA-15)

Barbara Lee (CA-09)

Grace Napolitano (CA-38)

Laura Richardson (CA-37)

Lucille Roybal-Allard (CA-34)

Linda Sanchez (CA-39)

Jackie Speier (CA-12)

Maxine Waters (CA-35)

Diane Watson (CA-33)

Lynn Woolsey (CA-06)

If you have the resources, please consider donations to our excellent California legislators.  For those who can’t chip in, DFA has a thank you action item to thank our healthcare heroes.

With an approach that uses more carrots and less sticks, hopefully we can encourage others in California and across the country to join these brave progressive leaders.

When the Administration announced an end to medical marijuana raids by the DEA, they abruptly took back the statement a few hours later.  There was a bit of confusion about the new policy.  Eric Holder put an end to that.

Attorney General Eric Holder signaled a change on medical marijuana policy Wednesday, saying federal agents will target marijuana distributors only when they violate both federal and state law.

That would be a departure from the policy of the Bush administration, which targeted medical marijuana dispensaries in California even if they complied with that state’s law.

“The policy is to go after those people who violate both federal and state law,” Holder said in a question-and-answer session with reporters at the Justice Department.

Good.  There is little justification to waste Justice Department resources harassing Californians and Americans in 12 other states engaging in perfectly legal activity.  Holder must follow the law but he also has discretion in setting priorities, and it’s good to see him recognize that arresting local businessmen and their patients makes no sense.  There remain questions about outstanding medical marijuana federal court cases with over two dozen dispensaries, and hopefully the solution will be to drop the charges.

In a related story, Maxine Waters wants to end mandatory minimum sentencing for federal drug offenses, and the bill has 15 co-sponsors.  The Bureau of Prisons budget has increased 25-fold since mandatory minimums were introduced.  Small drug cases belong in state courts, where offenders could be given treatment instead of jail.  Furthermore, these kind of drug cases disproportionately impact minority communities.

H.R. 1466, the Major Drug Trafficking Prosecution Act of 2009, seeks to repeal mandatory minimum sentences for drug offenders and to give courts the ability to determine sentences based on all the facts, not just drug weight. It would also refocus federal resources on major drug traffickers instead of low-level offenders. There is currently no companion bill in the Senate.

Sen. Boxer, your office phone is ringing.

There is a huge fight right now to fix the FISA bill, with a new one called “The RESTORE Act” (H.R. 3773).  Two big issues: 1) Will they include language that let’s the FBI issue blanket, rather than targeted warrants? 2) Will they give immunity to the phone companies who broke the law because Bush told them too?  The bill is up in the House and the final language is a moving target.  It is the crucial time to get in touch with people who might be persuaded to ensure good language goes to the floor for a vote.

Here is the latest from the ACLU:

The bill caves in to Bush’s fear-mongering in a major way: it does NOT required the government to get an individual warrant before wiretapping Americans’ phones and emails. Instead, it allows for program or basket “warrants,” which aren’t really warrants at all. They’re the modern-day equivalent of allowing government agents to sit in our living rooms, recording our personal conversations. Only they’re more frightening, because the government now has the capacity to monitor us remotely and without our knowledge, and to save the information in a secret database forever.

One good thing is that the bill doesn’t yet include immunity for telecom companies that broke the law by handing over Americans’ private communications to the government, but we’re hearing immunity could be added back to the bill at any time.

Here are a few folks I know need to hear from you.  Give them a ring.  It is much more effective than sending email, though you can do that too.

CA-29  Adam Schiff  Schiff  2022254176
CA-14  Anna Eshoo  Eshoo  2022258104
CA-27  Brad Sherman  Sherman 2022255911
CA-28  Howard Berman  Berman  2022254695
CA-39  Linda Sanchez  Sanchez 2022256676
CA-35  Maxine Waters  Waters  2022252201
CA-01  Mike Thompson  Thompson  2022253311
CA-08  Nancy Pelosi  Pelosi  2022254965
CA-16  Zoe Lofgren  Lofgren 2022253072

Woohoo! Jerry did it! Jerry McNerney has managed to become the most un-progressive Democrat of the entire California congressional delegation. For those keeping score at home, Jerry’s 82.45 was about a half point lower than the next CA Dem, Jim Costa, that progressive stalwart, at 82.97. And for all the talk of Harman changing her ways, she’s still worse than even Joe Baca, almost 7 points worse from a very safe Dem seat.

For all of you CA-45 fans, “moderate” Mary Bono came in with a stellar 4.42 Chips are Down score. So, for all the bluster of the SCHIP vote, she’s still dancing the same jig as the rest of her party.

On thing must be said, the Speaker has done an excellent job at preserving unity amongst the caucus. Whether that means she’s being too incremental and/or ineffective, or just laying down the law is the big question. The reason her approval rating, and the Congress in general, is down has a whole lot to do with the fact that little has changed on the Iraq front. So, would it be better to have a speaker who is more willing to take risks? Perhaps, but the impediment of the president always lingers over her head, veto pen in hand. So, whether the unity is really there, is an open question. Full data over the flip.

(I was working on a similar post, but I’ll still post my own, with all CA data and some other miscellany. – promoted by Brian Leubitz)

The problem with most scorecards is that they are written by lobbyists concerned with always getting the votes of potential supporters. Thus, there is an equal weighting while in the real world not all votes are equal. In fact, regardless of everything else, some votes are dealbreakers and when they show up on scorecards as one of 12 votes or something, it looks silly. However, Progressive Punch has a new “when the chips are down” scorecard. After the flip is the ratings of CA’s congressional delegation, in descending order.

Senate:

92.86 Boxer, Barbara
90.45 Feinstein, Dianne

House:

100.00 Pelosi, Nancy
98.43 Sánchez, Linda T.
97.49 Capps, Lois
97.18 Lee, Barbara
96.43 Richardson, Laura
96.24 Solis, Hilda L.
95.92 Woolsey, Lynn C.
95.91 Filner, Bob
95.30 Matsui, Doris O.
95.19 Becerra, Xavier
94.98 Farr, Sam
94.67 Honda, Michael M.
94.65 Lofgren, Zoe
94.03 Roybal-Allard, Lucille
93.42 Napolitano, Grace F.
93.42 Thompson, Mike
93.38 Eshoo, Anna G.
93.31 Waters, Maxine
93.20 Miller, George
93.10 Davis, Susan A.
93.10 Tauscher, Ellen O.
92.79 Sherman, Brad
92.45 Schiff, Adam B.
92.38 Berman, Howard L.
91.80 Watson, Diane E.
90.51 Lantos, Tom
90.28 Baca, Joe
90.19 Sanchez, Loretta
89.49 Waxman, Henry A.
87.74 Stark, Fortney Pete
84.86 Cardoza, Dennis A.
83.86 Harman, Jane
82.97 Costa, Jim
82.45 McNerney, Jerry

I’m guessing that at tonight’s Calitics’ Actblue Celebrations there will be a lot of discussion about the votes to condemn MoveOn. The CA delegation split 50-50 in the senate and 16 yea and 17 nay in the house — wedged successfully by the GOP in half. After the flip is the scorecard.

Senate
Yea
Diane Feinstein

Nay
Barbara Boxer

House
Yea
Joe Baca (CA-43)
Dennis Cardoza (CA-18)
Jim Costa (CA-20)
Susan Davis (CA-53)
Anna Eshoo (CA-14)
Sam Farr (CA-17)
Jane Harman (CA-36)
Tom Lantos (CA-12)
Jerry McNerney (CA-11)
Grace Napolitano (CA-38)
Laura Richardson (CA-37)
Lucille Roybal-Allard (CA-34)
Loretta Sanchez (CA-47)
Adam Schiff (CA-29)
Ellen Tauscher (CA-10)
Mike Thompson (CA-1)

Nay
Xavier Becerra (CA-31)
Howard Berman (CA-28)
Lois Capps (CA-23)
Bob Filner (CA-51)
Mike Honda (CA-15)
Barbara Lee (CA-9)
Zoe Lofgren (CA-16)
Doris Matsui (CA-5)
George Miller (CA-7)
Linda Sanchez (CA-39)
Brad Sherman (CA-27)
Hilda Solis (CA-32)
Pete Stark (CA-13)
Maxine Waters (CA-35)
Diane Watson (CA-33)
Henry Waxman (CA-30)
Lynn Woolsey (CA-6)