The Democrats Race To Fill Four Senate Seats

There are several Senate seats that still need to be filled by dedicated public servants as America starts its New Year.

In Minnesota, Democrat Al Franken has just moved ahead of Norm Coleman by several hundred votes and is about to win the recount of a very close election.

The result of the recount will overturn a victory of several hundred votes on election night by his opponent, incumbent Republican Senator,Norm Coleman. The recount tally has actually turned into a contest between the two candidates legal teams.

In fact, legal issues abound in this race. There are hundreds of missing ballots which will be counted as voting for Franken. There were disqualified absentee ballots that favor Franken that are now being counted while there were disqualified absentee ballots that may favor Coleman that are not.

The final recount vote totals may show that Al Franken won the Minnesota Senate seat but this whole election mess is going to end up in court. Minnesota's Governor Tim Pawlenty will not seat Franken until all the legal issues are resolved and any attempt by Franken to seat himself will create a Senate Republican filibuster.

Of course, the ultimate question concerns political accountability for this election mess in Minnesota? How could there be missing ballots and disqualified ballots that should have been counted?

Meanwhile, in New York, controversy surrounds Hillary Clinton's former Senate seat. Governor Patterson is under pressure from Democratic insiders to appoint Caroline Kennedy to the Senate until the next election is held in 2010. Various newspapers have opined that Patterson should select Kennedy since that may bring to the polls more Democrat voters and help him with his own re-election in two years.

It makes you wonder what ever happened to the importance of qualifications. Caroline Kennedy's resume shows no real background for consideration for a seat in the United States Senate. The fact is that she has never held public office, has little private sector background, won't release her financial history, and has not been able to articulate a political opinion on many of the major issues facing New York voters.

Another controversial Senate appointment features Barack Obama's former Senate seat. Recently indicted Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich has just appointed former Illinois Atty. Gen. Roland Burris to the U.S. Senate.

Senate Democratic Majority Leader, Harry Reid has vowed to block the Burris appointment because it was made by the disgraced Illinois Governor. This battle may end up in the Supreme Court and since he has yet been convicted of anything, Blagojevich may eventually prevail.

Unfortunately, the politics of the appointment has nothing to do with the preferences of the voter, since Roland Burris is no stranger to losing real political elections, in Illinois.

Burris failed in three primary bids for governor in 1994, 1998 and 2002. He failed in campaigns for Chicago mayor in 1995 and for U.S. senator in 1984. He has not even held a statewide office in the last fourteen years.

In Delaware, Joe Biden is set to accept the Vice Presidency while still holding on to his Senate Seat. This political oddity is necessary so Biden's former chief of staff, Ted Kaufman, can recieve a Senate appointment to serve for just two years, after which point he will not seek to retain the seat. This will mean that Kaufman can keep the seat warm until 2010 so there will be no incumbent to run against Joe Biden's son, Beau.

The Democrats race to fill four Senate seats involves corruption, lawyers, patronage, power and political expediency. All these political appointments have little to do with the intent of real voters. If this dubious political patronage continues, the United States Senate will soon need to change its name to the United States House Of Lords.

A Windfall Of Failure In Domestic Energy Policy

Last May, with the price of a barrel of oil well over $100 and the American consumer furious at the price of a gallon of gas at the pump, Congress was looking for political cover.

Of course, the problem was not the absence of a congressional energy policy. No, it was the domestic oil companies that were really gauging the consumer and keeping prices high that was to blame.

As a result, the Senate Judiciary Committee would summon the top executives from the petroleum industry for a Congressional inquisition. As these executives would correctly pointed out to our astute public servants, the fact is that foreign companies and governments control the overwhelming majority of the world's oil. In fact most of the price Americans pay at the pump is the cost paid by the American oil company to acquire crude oil from someone else.

In addition, it was apparent from the hearings that if anyone is "gouging" consumers through the high price of gasoline, it is federal and state governments, not American oil companies. On average, 15% percent of the cost of gasoline at the pump goes for taxes, while only 4% represents oil company profits.

Despite these facts, Barack Obama campaigned for the Presidency on the populist message that oil company profits were too high. He promised to "make oil companies like Exxon pay a tax on their windfall profits, and use the money to help families pay for their skyrocketing energy costs and other bills." The plan was to provide a $500 per person emergency energy rebate from the windfall profits of big oil.

However, the margin of profit for oil companies never did show a profit windfall. In fact, the 8.3 percent profit margin in the gas and oil industry was pretty small in comparison with the 14.5 percent profit margin enjoyed by the electronics and appliance industry, the 18.4 percent margin for big pharma, or the 19.1 percent margin for alcohol and tobacco.

Now, just six months after the Congressional energy windfall profit tax hearings last May, the price of a barrel of oil is in sharp decline. It has already lost two thirds of its value and the bottom in the price of a barrel of crude oil is still hard to find. As a result, President-elect Barack Obama is going to break another campaign promise. There will be no windfall profit tax on big oil or consumer energy rebate plan in 2009.

The real truth is that there has not been a domestic energy policy in the United States for decades. The current domestic energy policy is only based on the hope that other countries will produce enough oil so that the price in America will not get too high.

This is because there are Congressional limitations in exploring additional domestic supply. According to the Department of the Interior, 62 percent of all on-shore federal lands are off limits to oil and gas developments, with restrictions applying to 92 percent of all federal lands. Meanwhile, alternative energy solutions are still more than a decade away.

So, eventually, the price of American energy will rise and the Senate Judiciary Committee will again call hearings for political cover. Once again they will summon all the top oil executives to assess the blame. We should remember that its just a cynical, political game in which there is no Congressional shame.