The Golden Monkeyfist Awards are up. Monkeyfister his own self points out:

These awards are given to recognize smaller, unsung bloggers who are giving their all to stop the lies of the Right Wing Machine-- thus the graphic of the fist choking the Flying "Morans!" Monkey in mid-flight. These people are DOING IT-- Locally, on a small scale, within their communities, no budget, and one-on-one. And they are succeeding. This is my way of recognizing them, and their efforts.

The great thing about these awards is they are for small blogs and are nominated BY those who write small blogs. Congratulations to Blue Girl, Red State (no relation), winner of The True Golden Monkeyfist: for most exemplifying the spirit of living in a state, in a district where there is no Democratic Representation. And you might just recognize the winner of The Au Peer Award, voted by the bloggers themselves as best of the best. Congratulations, Driftglass. And congratulations to Monkeyfister for holding a 2007 award ceremony which completely avoided an embarrassing number by anyone named Britney.

Happy New Year from all of us at Crooks and Liars.

Open Thread below, and don't forget the New Year's Resolution Open Thread here....

Following up on an item from yesterday, Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa), easily among the top five looniest members of the chamber, successfully forced a resolution onto the House floor, putting the House on record stating that Christmas and Christians are important. Last night, as expected, it passed easily.

As it turns out, not everyone was impressed with King’s spiteful stunt. When the Christmas-is-important measure came up last night, nine Democrats voted against it. Moreover, 10 voted “present” — including one Republican — which is exactly how King voted on the Ramadan and Diwali resolutions.

King is more than a little peeved, and went on quite a tirade on Fox News this afternoon. (video available at ThinkProgress)

“I recognized that we’re a Christian nation founded on Christian principles, and we’re coming up to Christmastime…. It’s time we stood up and said so, and said to the rest of America, Be who you are and be confident. And let’s worship Christ and let’s celebrate Christmas for the right reasons.”

I found it interesting that King kept talking about “we” during his diatribe — “we” have to stand up, “we” should worship Christ, “we” have to celebrate Christmas. Who is “we”? Americans? Fox News viewers?

Today on the floor of the United States House of Representatives:

Open Thread below.

House Democrats on Tuesday narrowly managed to avert a bruising debate on a proposal to impeach Dick Cheney after Republicans, in a surprise maneuver, voted in favor of taking up the measure.
Republicans, changing course midway through a vote, tried to force Democrats into a debate on the resolution sponsored by longshot presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich...read on

The "Battered Spouse Syndrome" has hit the Congressional Democrats. Again.

House Minority Leader John "Cry Baby" Boehner got the vay-puhs (can't you see him clutching his pearls in horror?) from Rep. Pete Stark's harsh words after the SCHIP vote last week...what delicate sensibilities the minority party has! My gosh, it's almost as if Rep. Stark was heartless enough to be glib about the lives of our troops in harm's way. So naturally, because we can't have mean words or insinuations that our President isn't a Very Serious Person, Boehner introduced a privileged resolution to censure Pete Stark.

Chairman Bennie Thompson moved to table the resolution (which basically meant that they weren't going to consider it; all these ridiculous parliamentary procedures give me a headache) and the resolution was tabled with a vote of 196-173.

Howie at DWT:

You might be interested in knowing that 5 Democrats voted with the Republicans on condemning Rep Stark and another 8-- all reactionaries-- voted "Present," refusing to come to Stark's defense. You can probably guess the names of the disgraceful 13 Democrats. Howie has the list here.

Despite the tabling of the resolution, an apparently chastened Stark did formally apologize:

(thanks to TPM for vid)

The Lieberman/Kyl Amendment has passed by an unbelievable 76-22 vote. Roll Call here

Biden's Iraq Partitioning Amendment passed by a vote of 75-23. I'll put up Roll Calls as they become available.

And the House of Representatives, evidently eager to show that they are as spineless and easily cowered as the Senate, voted to condemn MoveOn for the Gen. Betrayus ad, 341-79. Roll Call here.

MoveOn's response to the House vote here.

UPDATE: Kudos to a Democrat who gets it.  Tom Allen

"I respect General Petraeus and honor all of our troops. They have done a phenomenal job and done everything that we have asked of them. General Petraeus is a soldier who simply takes orders from the Commander-in-Chief, President Bush.

Unfortunately the President and his Republican allies in Congress have continued to order General Petraeus and the rest of our troops to continue fighting. What we need is a plan to bring our troops home.

I voted against this resolution today because I believe it is the job of the Congress to bring our troops home, not legislate free speech."

The far-right Washington Times reports this morning that Republican demands for a resolution condemning MoveOn.org are being ignored.

Democratic congressional leaders and the party's presidential candidates yesterday refused to repudiate a liberal group's ad questioning Gen. David H. Petraeus' character.

Capitol Hill Democrats rejected a call for votes in both chambers to condemn the attack newspaper ad, run by MoveOn.org, saying Republicans are trying to take attention off what they call the president's failed Iraq policy.

Good. MoveOn is not the problem. If the right took coming up with a coherent Iraq policy half as seriously as they take some intemperate newspaper ad, the nation would be far better off.

Our man for Senate business, Bob Geiger, has the schedule of the Senate's comings and goings on. While all eyes will be whether or not Sara Taylor will actually appear before the Judiciary committee (I'll go out on a limb and say "no"), Bob noticed something on the agenda that should quiet all you naysayers that the Senate is working on the people's priorities (/snark):

Oh, and on Thursday, the Judiciary Committee will move on to the weighty subject of too many Americans not knowing the words to the national anthem and will consider S. Res. 236, "a resolution supporting the goals and ideals of the National Anthem Project, which has worked to restore America's voice by re-teaching Americans to sing the national anthem."

Hey, it's bipartisan -- having such unlikely fellow cosponsors as Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Trent Lott (R-MS) -- so I'm sure it's harmless enough.

But let's get this one out of the way quickly, OK?

Newsweek via MSNBC:

The Iraqi-born (Wafaa Bilaal is) 19 days into a grueling monthlong (art installation) project that sounds, at first blush, suspiciously gimmicky: until June 4, Bilal is living his entire life inside one room at Chicago's Flatfile Gallery, which anyone with a Web connection can log on to watch. Oh, and to shoot him. With "Domestic Tension" Bilal has turned his makeshift living quarters into a 24-hour-a-day war zone. Viewers can peep in on him anonymously at any time, and even chat with him online. On the installation's Web site, his audience can fight for control of the camera and pan it around the room. Since the camera is affixed to a rifle-sized paintball gun-and the Web site has a button that allows viewers to fire the gun-they also have the opportunity to shoot at him, or anything else in his room. Which they have done an astonishing 40,000 times in the project's first two and a half weeks.

Continue reading »

To fully appreciate the ideology of large parts of the Republican Party, one needs to look past Capitol Hill and consider what state GOP officials are up to. Take Utah, for example.

Several top Republican officials in Utah — including the lieutenant governor, the state attorney general, and U.S. Rep. Chris Cannon — gathered over the weekend for an annual GOP county convention where attendees debated a resolution on immigration. The debate didn't go well.

Don Larsen, chairman of legislative District 65 for the Utah County Republican Party, had submitted a resolution warning that Satan’s minions want to eliminate national borders and do away with sovereignty.

In a speech at the convention, Larsen told those gathered that illegal immigrants “hate American people” and “are determined to destroy this country, and there is nothing they won’t do.”

Illegal aliens are in control of the media, and working in tandem with Democrats, are trying to “destroy Christian America” and replace it with “a godless new world order — and that is not extremism, that is fact,” Larsen said. […]

Republican officials then allowed speakers to defend and refute the resolution. One speaker, who was identified as “Joe,” said illegal immigrants were Marxist and under the influence of the devil. Another, who declined to give her name to the Daily Herald, said illegal immigrants should not be allowed because “they are not going to become Republicans….”

Wow.

This is usually Nicole's beat, but CREW:

CREW just asked the Senate Ethics Committee to investigate Senator Pete Domenici (R-NM) for his role in the growing scandal surrounding the dismissal of David Iglesias, the U.S. Attorney from New Mexico.

Sen. Domenici has now admitted that he called Mr. Iglesias, stating “I asked Mr. Iglesias if he could tell me what was going on in that investigation and give me an idea of what time frame we were looking at.”

In a discussion of Senate Rule 43, the Senate Ethics Manual states that “[t]he general advice of the Ethics Committee concerning pending court actions is that Senate offices should refrain from intervening in such legal actions . . . until the matter has reached a resolution in the courts.”