2008 US Presidential Election.

When New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson speaks about embracing diversity, the American dream, and serving others, he speaks from unparalleled experience.

Born November 15, 1947 in Pasadena, California to an American father and Mexican mother, Governor Richardson grew up in Mexico City before moving to New England, where he attended high school and college. He has dedicated his life to public service, as a United States Congressman, Ambassador to the United Nations, Secretary of Energy, and now as Governor of New Mexico.

Bill Richardson was recently re-elected to a second term as Governor of New Mexico with the support of 69 percent of voters, representing the largest margin of victory for any Governor in state history. He was supported by Democrats, Republicans and Independents, winning in both urban and rural counties New Mexicans overwhelmingly endorsed Governor Richardson’s aggressive efforts to improve education, cut taxes, build a high-wage economy, expand health care access, invest in renewable energy and make New Mexico safer.

Bill Richardson’s fiscally responsible governing style has allowed New Mexico to tackle important priorities, while maintaining a balanced budget and the highest reserves in state history. He cut $230 million in bureaucratic waste, invested in new opportunities for New Mexico’s children and returned more than $1 billion dollars in taxes to working families.

As Secretary of Energy to President Bill Clinton, Bill Richardson implemented tough efficiency standards to save energy. And as Governor, he has made New Mexico the Clean Energy State by requiring utility companies to produce energy through renewable resources and reduce carbon emissions.

Before becoming Governor, Bill Richardson served in Congress for 15 years and helped President Clinton pass the economic plan that created millions of jobs and led America to its first balanced budget in 30 years.

Appointed by President Clinton as the Ambassador to the UN, Bill Richardson worked with world leaders to build alliances and help prevent the development of nuclear weapons in North Korea. Bill Richardson has been nominated four times for the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating the release of hostages, American servicemen and political prisoners in North Korea, Iraq, and Cuba. Governor Richardson recently negotiated a 60-day cease fire in war-torn Darfur following direct talks with rebel leaders and the President of Sudan.

As Chairman of the Democratic Governor’s Association, Governor Richardson raised more than $28 million for gubernatorial candidates and helped elect the first Democratic majority of governors since 1994. Governor Richardson also served as Chair of the Western Governors Association, Border Governor’s Conference and the 2004 Democratic National Convention.

Bill Richardson has been married to his high school sweetheart, Barbara, for 33 years. Richardson received a BA from Tufts in 1970 and a MA from Tuft’s Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy in 1971.

www.myspace.com/richardsonforpresident

Today I am announcing that I will form an exploratory committee to run for president.

And I want you to join me not just for the campaign but for a conversation about the future of our country — about the bold but practical changes we need to overcome six years of Bush administration failures.

I am going to take this conversation directly to the people of America, and I’m starting by inviting all of you to join me in a series of web chats over the next few days.

The stakes will be high when America chooses a new president in 2008.

As a senator, I will spend two years doing everything in my power to limit the damage George W. Bush can do. But only a new president will be able to undo Bush’s mistakes and restore our hope and optimism.

Only a new president can renew the promise of America — the idea that if you work hard you can count on the health care, education, and retirement security that you need to raise your family. These are the basic values of America that are under attack from this administration every day.

And only a new president can regain America’s position as a respected leader in the world.

I believe that change is coming November 4, 2008. And I am forming my exploratory committee because I believe that together we can bring the leadership that this country needs. I’m going to start this campaign with a national conversation about how we can work to get our country back on track.

This is a big election with some very big questions. How do we bring the war in Iraq to the right end? How can we make sure every American has access to adequate health care? How will we ensure our children inherit a clean environment and energy independence? How can we reduce the deficits that threaten Social Security and Medicare?

No matter where you live, no matter what your political views, I want you to be a part of this important conversation right at the start. So to begin, I’m going to spend the next several days answering your questions in a series of live video web discussions. Starting Monday, January 22, at 7 p.m. EST for three nights in a row, I’ll sit down to answer your questions about how we can work together for a better future. And you can participate live at my website. Sign up to join the conversation here.

I grew up in a middle-class family in the middle of America, where I learned that we could overcome every obstacle we face if we work together and stay true to our values.

I have worked on issues critical to our country almost all my life. I’ve fought for children for more than 30 years. In Arkansas, I pushed for education reform. As First Lady, I helped to expand health care coverage to millions of children and to pass legislation that dramatically increased adoptions. I also traveled to China to affirm that women’s rights are human rights.

And in the Senate, I have worked across party lines to get billions more for children’s health care, to stop the president’s plan to privatize Social Security, and to make sure the victims and heroes of 9/11 and our men and women in uniform receive the fair treatment they deserve. In 2006, I led the successful fight to make Plan B contraception available to women without a prescription.

I have spent a lifetime opening opportunities for tens of millions who are working hard to raise a family: new immigrants, families living in poverty, people who have no health care or face an uncertain retirement.

The promise of America is that all of us will have access to opportunity, and I want to run a 2008 campaign that renews that promise, a campaign built on a lifetime record of results.

I have never been afraid to stand up for what I believe in or to face down the Republican machine. After nearly $70 million spent against my campaigns in New York and two landslide wins, I can say I know how Washington Republicans think, how they operate, and how to beat them.

I need you to be a part of this campaign, and I hope you’ll start by joining me in this national conversation.

As we campaign to win the White House, we will make history and remake our future. We can only break barriers if we dare to confront them, and if we have the determined and committed support of others.

This campaign is our moment, our chance to stand up for the principles and values that we cherish; to bring new ideas, energy, and leadership to a uniquely challenging time. It’s our chance to say “we can” and “we will.”

Let’s go to work. America’s future is calling us.

January 17, 2007

Early Wednesday evening, the House passed the College Student Relief Act of 2007, a bill which would reduce the interest rate on subsidized federal Stafford Loans from 6.8 to 3.4 percent over a five-year period. The bill, sponsored by House Committee on Education and Labor Chairman George Miller (D-Calif.), passed by a vote of 356-71. With its passage, the Democratic-led House successfully passed five of its six “first 100 hours” initiatives.

The bill gradually decreases the rate on subsidized federal loans until 2011, when it hits a temporary low of 3.4 percent for a six-month period. Once that period is up, the rate will revert to 6.8 percent unless future legislation dictates otherwise. U.S. PIRG, the federation of nonprofit state Public Interest Research Groups, has estimated that the bill would save the average four-year college student starting school in 2007 with subsidized Stafford Loans about $2,280 over the life of his or her loans. While Chairman Miller applauded the bill’s passage, he said that he hopes Congress will act on additional legislation concerning student financial aid. He supports an increase in the maximum federal Pell Grant from $4,050 to $5,100, as well as an examination of university efforts to control rising tuition rates.

Some opponents of the bill have argued that it fails to make college education more accessible, for borrowers will not see changes until they have already completed college. In addition, the Bush administration has released a statement in opposition to the bill, arguing that it may actually encourage students to take on additional debt. It states, “Student debt loads have soared in recent years, and it is not clear that encouraging more loans is a wise course.” Unlike the administration’s response to House legislation expanding stem cell research and allowing the government to negotiate drug prices for those enrolled in the Medicare benefit, the statement did not include a veto threat.

Before the bill reaches the president’s desk, it must first be approved by the Senate. There, Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) has introduced a similar version of the legislation. Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.), chairman of the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, however, plans to pursue a broader bill which would halve interest rates on more than just Stafford loans, raise the Pell Grant limit to $5,100, cap federal student loan payments at 15 percent of a borrower’s discretionary income, forgive student debt for those engaged in public service careers, and encourage schools to use the government’s Direct Loan Program.

Congresspedia has created a page on student financial aid legislation. Check it for updates or edit it yourself if you have more information.

Source: http://www.sourcewatch.org

Democratic Response of Senator Jim Webb to the President’s State of the Union Address

Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Tuesday, January 23, 2007
Good evening.
I’m Senator Jim Webb, from Virginia, where this year we will celebrate the 400th anniversary of the settlement of Jamestown – an event that marked the first step in the long journey that has made us the greatest and most prosperous nation on earth.
It would not be possible in this short amount of time to actually rebut the President’s message, nor would it be useful. Let me simply say that we in the Democratic Party hope that this administration is serious about improving education and healthcare for all Americans, and addressing such domestic priorities as restoring the vitality of New Orleans.
Further, this is the seventh time the President has mentioned energy independence in his state of the union message, but for the first time this exchange is taking place in a Congress led by the Democratic Party. We are looking for affirmative solutions that will strengthen our nation by freeing us from our dependence on foreign oil, and spurring a wave of entrepreneurial growth in the form of alternate energy programs. We look forward to working with the President and his party to bring about these changes.
There are two areas where our respective parties have largely stood in contradiction, and I want to take a few minutes to address them tonight. The first relates to how we see the health of our economy – how we measure it, and how we ensure that its benefits are properly shared among all Americans. The second regards our foreign policy – how we might bring the war in Iraq to a proper conclusion that will also allow us to continue to fight the war against international terrorism, and to address other strategic concerns that our country faces around the world.
When one looks at the health of our economy, it’s almost as if we are living in two different countries. Some say that things have never been better. The stock market is at an all-time high, and so are corporate profits. But these benefits are not being fairly shared. When I graduated from college, the average corporate CEO made 20 times what the average worker did; today, it’s nearly 400 times. In other words, it takes the average worker more than a year to make the money that his or her boss makes in one day.
Wages and salaries for our workers are at all-time lows as a percentage of national wealth, even though the productivity of American workers is the highest in the world. Medical costs have skyrocketed. College tuition rates are off the charts. Our manufacturing base is being dismantled and sent overseas. Good American jobs are being sent along with them.
In short, the middle class of this country, our historic backbone and our best hope for a strong society in the future, is losing its place at the table. Our workers know this, through painful experience. Our white-collar professionals are beginning to understand it, as their jobs start disappearing also. And they expect, rightly, that in this age of globalization, their government has a duty to insist that their concerns be dealt with fairly in the international marketplace.
In the early days of our republic, President Andrew Jackson established an important principle of American-style democracy – that we should measure the health of our society not at its apex, but at its base. Not with the numbers that come out of Wall Street, but with the living conditions that exist on Main Street. We must recapture that spirit today.
And under the leadership of the new Democratic Congress, we are on our way to doing so. The House just passed a minimum wage increase, the first in ten years, and the Senate will soon follow. We’ve introduced a broad legislative package designed to regain the trust of the American people. We’ve established a tone of cooperation and consensus that extends beyond party lines. We’re working to get the right things done, for the right people and for the right reasons.
With respect to foreign policy, this country has patiently endured a mismanaged war for nearly four years. Many, including myself, warned even before the war began that it was unnecessary, that it would take our energy and attention away from the larger war against terrorism, and that invading and occupying Iraq would leave us strategically vulnerable in the most violent and turbulent corner of the world.
I want to share with all of you a picture that I have carried with me for more than 50 years. This is my father, when he was a young Air Force captain, flying cargo planes during the Berlin Airlift. He sent us the picture from Germany, as we waited for him, back here at home. When I was a small boy, I used to take the picture to bed with me every night, because for more than three years my father was deployed, unable to live with us full-time, serving overseas or in bases where there was no family housing. I still keep it, to remind me of the sacrifices that my mother and others had to make, over and over again, as my father gladly served our country. I was proud to follow in his footsteps, serving as a Marine in Vietnam. My brother did as well, serving as a Marine helicopter pilot. My son has joined the tradition, now serving as an infantry Marine in Iraq.
Like so many other Americans, today and throughout our history, we serve and have served, not for political reasons, but because we love our country. On the political issues – those matters of war and peace, and in some cases of life and death – we trusted the judgment of our national leaders. We hoped that they would be right, that they would measure with accuracy the value of our lives against the enormity of the national interest that might call upon us to go into harm’s way.
We owed them our loyalty, as Americans, and we gave it. But they owed us – sound judgment, clear thinking, concern for our welfare, a guarantee that the threat to our country was equal to the price we might be called upon to pay in defending it.
The President took us into this war recklessly. He disregarded warnings from the national security adviser during the first Gulf War, the chief of staff of the army, two former commanding generals of the Central Command, whose jurisdiction includes Iraq, the director of operations on the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and many, many others with great integrity and long experience in national security affairs. We are now, as a nation, held hostage to the predictable – and predicted – disarray that has followed.
The war’s costs to our nation have been staggering. Financially. The damage to our reputation around the world. The lost opportunities to defeat the forces of international terrorism. And especially the precious blood of our citizens who have stepped forward to serve.
The majority of the nation no longer supports the way this war is being fought; nor does the majority of our military. We need a new direction. Not one step back from the war against international terrorism. Not a precipitous withdrawal that ignores the possibility of further chaos. But an immediate shift toward strong regionally-based diplomacy, a policy that takes our soldiers off the streets of Iraq’s cities, and a formula that will in short order allow our combat forces to leave Iraq.
On both of these vital issues, our economy and our national security, it falls upon those of us in elected office to take action.
Regarding the economic imbalance in our country, I am reminded of the situation President Theodore Roosevelt faced in the early days of the 20th century. America was then, as now, drifting apart along class lines. The so-called robber barons were unapologetically raking in a huge percentage of the national wealth. The dispossessed workers at the bottom were threatening revolt.
Roosevelt spoke strongly against these divisions. He told his fellow Republicans that they must set themselves “as resolutely against improper corporate influence on the one hand as against demagogy and mob rule on the other.” And he did something about it.
As I look at Iraq, I recall the words of former general and soon-to-be President Dwight Eisenhower during the dark days of the Korean War, which had fallen into a bloody stalemate. “When comes the end?” asked the General who had commanded our forces in Europe during World War Two. And as soon as he became President, he brought the Korean War to an end.
These Presidents took the right kind of action, for the benefit of the American people and for the health of our relations around the world. Tonight we are calling on this President to take similar action, in both areas. If he does, we will join him. If he does not, we will be showing him the way.
Thank you for listening. And God bless America.

http://webb.senate.gov

Representative Mike Pence

Mike Pence, U.S. congressman from Indiana, chairman of the Republican Study Committee. There are already at least four websites up hoping to recruit Mike Pence into the 2008 race.

George Pataki, former Governor of New York

George Pataki, New York’s former governor did not seek a fourth term as Governor in 2006. Pataki has held meetings with his advisors and has quietly indicated to Republican leaders that he’s very interested in the Republican nomination. Pataki’s unfavorability rating was slightly higher than his favorable rating when he decided not to seek reelection, leading some to speculate that his decision was to avoid being defeated by Democratic Nominee and his successor Eliot Spitzer. Because Pataki is not as well known nationally as former New York Mayor and current presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani, and due to his moderate views on some social issues, he may have conflicts winning the nomination.

Senator Chuck Hagel

Chuck Hagel, born October 4, 1946 in Nebraska, US Senator from that state. According to NPR Hagel is considering a Presidential campaign in 2008. There are a number of Draft Hagel blogs online in addition to multiple groups. However, despite being a fairly conservative Republican, he will face challenges from some elements of the party faithful due to his criticism of President Bush over the war in Iraq. It is widely thought that Senator Hagel will have trouble emerging from the shadow of John McCain, as they are both outspoken Vietnam veterans. The two friends differ on many issue positions, though, with Hagel being more traditionally conservative. He is the former CEO of the USO and Election Systems & Software, a leading manufacturer of electronic voting machines.

Newt Gingrich, former Speaker of the House

Newt Gingrich, born June 17, 1943 in Pennsylvania, former Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives and former U.S. Representative from Georgia. According to the Associated Press, “The former House speaker who led Republicans to power a decade ago said he soon will visit Iowa and New Hampshire to promote his book, try to influence public policy and keep his political options alive.” The AP reported him as saying “Anything seems possible,” including a White House race. Gingrich first explicitly suggested he may run in 2008 on October 13, 2005, saying “There are circumstances where I will run”, elaborating that such circumstances would be if no other candidate champions the major platform ideas that Gingrich advocates.

Tommy Thompson, former Governor of Wisconsin

Tom Tancredo, born December 20, 1945 in Colorado, U.S. Representative from that state and leading advocate for immigration reform. The Associated Press reported on June 12, 2005 that he was considering running. Tancredo is considered to be a long shot by many observers but has a dedicated grassroots following among paleoconservatives. He has visited early Presidential primary states such as new New Hampshire, Michigan and Iowa to begin building popular support and has polled favorably amongst grassroots Republicans. Tancredo announed on January 16, 2007 that he was forming an exploratory committee.

Mitt Romney, former Governor of Massachusetts

Mitt Romney, born March 12, 1947 in Michigan is the former Governor of Massachusetts. Romney did not seek a second term as Governor and has made numerous trips to primary states such as South Carolina, Michigan, and New Hampshire during recent years. Romney is running on his record as co-founder of Bain Capital, the CEO of the 2002 Winter Olympics, and as Governor of Massachusetts. Romney also worked with Massachusetts Democrats to pass a healthcare plan for all citizens of Massachusetts, which to require individuals to purchase private, market-based insurance plans to have healthcare. Although he ran as a moderate for the office of Governor of Massachusetts and during his failed Senate bid in 1994, he supported more conservative positions as his term progressed. He requested the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court put a measure amending the Massachusetts Constitution to ban gay marriage on the 2008 ballot.

Romney filed paperwork forming an exploratory on January 3, 2007, the day he left the governor’s office.

On January 9, Romney raised $6.5 million in his first fundraiser, beating both Giuliani and McCain’s fundraising efforts ($1 and $2 million respectively). Many political commentators, including Bill O’Reilly have said on several occasions that Romney is the most likely candidate to win the Republican primary and the 2008 Presidential Election.

Romney has already received major endorsements, including that of former Speaker of the House, Dennis Hastert.

Representative Ron Paul

Ron Paul, born August 20, 1935 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, U.S. Representative from Texas. On January 11, 2007, Paul filed papers to form an exploratory committee for a presidential run in 2008. This will increase his fundraising opportunities until his presumed eventual anouncement. This first step of running for the Republican nomination is significant because he is not running as a Libertarian like he did nearly two decades ago.

Paul has the distinction of being opposed to the Iraq War and the interventionist nature of US foreign policy. He is one of 7 Republican congressman who voted against Iraq War authorization in 2003. He has also opposed George W. Bush and the majority of Republican congressmen on many other issues, including the PATRIOT Act. His maverick record on these issues means he may draw support from some surprising circles, including antiwar activists and paleoconservatives.