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February 13, 2012
Binyamin Rose: Back to the Bunker: How a life-risking act by a Christian family during the Holocaust saved a family and built a thriving community a world away
Menachem Wecker: Business Schools Teach Real Estate Despite Troubled Housing Market
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Lisa M. Krieger: Man with defibrillator demands access to his own heart's information
David G. Savage: Why activists may not be in a hurry to have High Court rule on alternative marriage
February 9, 2012
Laura McMullen: 10 Least Expensive Public Schools for Out-of-State Students
Kimberly Palmer: How to actually enjoy -- relaxing, financially -- your vacation
February 8, 2012
Warren Richey: Why momentous Prop. 8 ruling might not satisfy gay-rights groups
Menachem Wecker: Though Controversial, LL.M.'s Can Lead to Specialized Legal Jobs
The Kosher Gourmet byDana Velden: Going to the bother of making soup? You know it better be good. This CREAM OF TOMATO SOUP certainly is! And it's a cinch to make, too (Includes techinques and serving secrets)
February 7, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney, Jr.: Caught off-guard? President's Super Bowl interview with Matt Lauer gives those who need a reason not to vote for him, a darn good one
Suzanne Bohan: Leaping lizards! Tiny reptiles advancing robot design
February 6, 2012
Jonathan Tobin: Iran Threatens Israel With Destruction, But the New York Times Doesn't Hear It
Jeffrey Fleishman: In newly democratic Egypt, tens of democracy activists jailed, to stand trial; their groups are 'threatening the stability of the homeland'
Julie Deardorff : Researchers say antioxidants may not be that effective and could do more harm than good
Mark Clayton: How did Anonymous hackers eavesdrop on FBI and Scotland Yard?
February 3, 2012
Edmund Sanders : Israeli official says Iran is creating missile that could reach East Coast of US
Victoria Kim: Immigrant-smuggling ring used black drivers to avoid racial profiling
February 2, 2012
Jim Carney: Wrong number call may have saved her life
Reza Kahlili : Ex-CIA spy in Iran's Revolutionary Guard: What Obama doesn't grasp about striking deals with Tehran
Tina Susman: For woodchuck rescuer, every day is Groundhog Day
February 1, 2012
Brian Bennett: US officials see increasing threat of domestic attack from Iran
Emily Brandon: How to Take Advantage of New 401(k) Fee Disclosures
January 31, 2012
January 30, 2012
Paul Richter and Ramin Mostaghim: Misreading Teheran's limits -- deadly and economically devastating as they may be -- is a risk administration, Europe seem willing to take
Suzanne Bohan: Warning: Nap-deprived tots missing more than sleep, study finds
Meg Handley: Banks Revamping Rewards Programs to Woo Customers
January 27, 2012
Caroline B. Glick: Obama: Of course I intend to prevent a nuclear holocaust . . . in a few months
Yochonon Donn: In liberal New York City, fervently-Orthodox Jews may soon be getting a district to call their own
Jeannine Stein: An inflated ego and thinking you're 'all that' doesn't just make others sick of you, it can make you ill
Katy Hopkins: New budget rules may affect how much money you get for college
January 26, 2012
Ed Koch: To the New York Times, calling for the murder of Jews by those capable of having their incitement taken seriously isn't news
Jeannine Stein: Mental illness struck one in five U.S. adults in 2010: Report
January 25, 2012
Richard Simon: House passes two bills endorsing the use of religious symbols at military memorials
Fred Weir: Putin: Multiethnic Russia cannot survive as a US-style 'melting pot'; must find its own way
Susan Johnston: 5 Sneaky Coupon Strategies Consumers Should Watch Out For
January 24, 2012
Carol Clark: The price of your soul: How your brain decides whether to 'sell out'
Caroline B. Glick: America lost most in 'Arab Spring'. Sadly, many voters still don't grasp the extent
Warren Richey: Drug criminal scores win in GPS ruling from conservative-leaning high court
Erika Bolstad: Black conservatives gather to talk about gaining strength
January 23, 2012
Melissa Dribben: Jewish voters to play a key role in Florida's Republican primary
Jordan Rau: In quest to grow, Catholic hospital system will announce this morning its break from church
Ali Safi: U.S. envoy gives Taliban terms for peace talks
January 19, 2012
January 18, 2012
January 17, 2012
Frank J. Gaffney Jr.: No-kidding red lines: U.S. response to an Iranian nuke may be bluster, but Israel's won't be
David G. Savage: They sued their principals after slandering them online --- now the cases are headed to the Supreme Court
David Francis: Where to Invest in 2012: With stocks expected to rebound, opportunity abounds for investors
January 13, 2012
Ben Lynfield: Israeli lawmakers move to annex Jewish Judea, one museum at a time
Alexia Elejalde-Ruiz: Thriving through touch: Gentle massage helps older people with low mobility improve in mind and body
January 12, 2012
Warren Richey: Landmark Supreme Court ruling a 'resounding win' for religious groups
Warren Richey: Supreme Court says no to new rule on eyewitness testimony
John Fauber : Statins found to raise diabetes risk in postmenopausal women
Katy Hopkins : Consider This Before You Pay for an Online Degree
The Kosher Gourmet by Joseph Erdos: This mushroom and barley soup has an intense -- almost nutty -- flavor that mixes robust with Middle East. It has creaminess without cream
January 11, 2012
Shari Roan: Millions of atrial fibrillation sufferers at risk for devastating, but preventable, stroke
Tom Hussain: Pakistan -- recipient of more than $21 billion in civilian and military aid -- speeds pursuit of Iranian pipeline, defying US
David G. Savage: High court signals it won't be loosening TV's 'indecency' rules
Stephen Ceasar: Oklahoma's Islamic law amendment can't go into effect, court rules
January 10, 2012
Reza Kahlili: From an ex-CIA spy: US must exploit new split in Iran's Revolutionary Guard
Karen Kaplan: Study: Nicotine replacement products ineffective when used in real-life situations
January 9, 2012
Michael Doyle: Put through legal hell over dream home, couple fought back hard --- all the way to Supreme Court
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Jewish World Review
Feb. 11, 2009
/ 17 Shevat 5769
GOP chair Steele owes his victory to Puerto Rico, other territories
By
Michael Barone
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http://www.JewishWorldReview.com |
An interesting sidelight on Michael Steele's election as Republican National Chairman. He owes his victory to the territories: the 15 votes cast for him from Puerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, the Northern Marianas and American Samoa put him over the top against South Carolina Republican Chairman Katon Dawson. The delegates from the territories, or many of them, have something in common with Steele, as a "person of color," but as Politico notes he has made commitments to support Republicans in elections there.
Not that they necessarily need such commitments. Luis Fortuņo, elected in 2004 as the Resident Commissioner from Puerto Rico (its non-voting member of the House of Representatives, and the only member of the House with a four-year term) was elected Governor of Puerto Rico this year. He's not the first member of the New Progressive Party (Spanish acronym PNP) elected governor, but he's the first PNP governor elected who identifies himself with the mainland Republican rather than the mainland Democratic party since Luis Ferre in 1968.
Is it fair that the territories hold such outsized influence in the election of a Republican national chairman? While Puerto Rico has nearly 4 million people, none of the other territories has a population nearly as large as a single mainland congressional district. But they are part of the United States, they contribute volunteers to the U.S. military (more proportionately than any state, Puerto Ricans will tell you at the drop of a hat) and they are also important to our national defense (in recent years the U.S. military base with the most ongoing construction is Andersen Air Force Base in Guam).
Anyway, there are precedents. As I remember in the 1972, 1976 and 1980 Democratic National Conventions, the territories played a disproportionate rolethrough the medium of San Francisco Congressman Phil Burton. Burton was an operatorand also the political ancestor of Speaker Nancy Pelosi: after he died in 1983 his wife Sala Burton was elected to fill his place, and on her deathbed in 1987 she told Burton's brother John, then formerly a Congressman and then a longtime state senator, that she wanted Nancy Pelosi elected to succeed her. By 1972 Phil Burton was a member of the Democratic National Committee's Interior and Insular Committee and Chairman of the Insular Subcommittee which had jurisdiction over the territories. The Democratic National Committee in those days (like the RNC, but not the DNC, today) consisted of one national committeeman and one national committeewoman from each state (plus the state chairman in the case of today's RNC). The credentials, rules and platform committees of the Democratic National Convention consisted of one member from each state and territory.
This gave huge power to Phil Burton. He started with the vote of California (which, with its huge population, was of course hugely underrepresented). Then, with his sway over the Insular Subcommittee and his huge force of personality, he cast the votes of the then five territoriesPuerto Rico, the U.S. Virgin Islands, Guam, American Samoa, the Canal Zone (in 1972 and 1976 anyway; after the ratification of the Panama Canal Treaty the Democrats transmogrified into Americans Abroad). So Burton had 6 votes on the 56-member committee (the District of Columbia was the 56th vote). I suspect that he cast them brusquely and openly on his own, without any consultation; perhaps a simple thumbs up or down. Perhaps he justified this as simply giving California it appropriate demographic weight. Or, more likely, he did it because he couldand because no one would stop him, and he thought it was in the right cause. It is recorded somewhere that when he was a California assemblyman and as chairman of a committee was recording one member as voting with him automatically, the man stomped out of the hearing and complained to Speaker Jesse Unruh. Unruh advised him to go back. "I hear he is still voting you." This may be one of those stories too good to check. For the definitive account, go to the late John Jacobs's biography of Burton, A Rage for Justice: The Passions and Politics of Phillip Burton. For those conservatives who find Nancy Pelosi a hard-edged and tough partisan, go through this thought exercise: imagine what it would be like if Phil Burton, who chain-smoked Pall Malls and drank tumbler glasses of vodka (I stayed up with him one night, and he seemed to get more lucid as I got groggier) had lived beyond his actual days (he died in 1983 at 57) and had, in January 2007, become Speaker of the House at age 80. Then you'd see what tough and hard-edged and partisan is really all about.
Does Michael Steele, who played the territorial card in something like the way Phil Burton did, have the same fiber? It might not be so bad for the Republican party if he does.
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