Morning News - Senate Conservation Edition
Let’s start with who thinks they are a U.S. senator, who wants to be a U.S. senator, and who wants to be a governor.
The Minnesota State Canvassing Board has declared Al Franken the winner of the hotly contested Senate race with Norm Coleman after the Minnesota Supreme Court rejected Coleman’s third lawsuit to include more than 600 previously improperly rejected absentee ballots in the recount. A final lawsuits is expected from the Coleman camp within a week. Yesterday The Wall Street Journal had a convincing editorial demonstrating the lopsided decisions against Coleman throughout the recount. Harry Reid will not try to seat Franken today in light of the expected litigation from Coleman.
Meanwhile, Roland Burris will head to the Senate expecting to take his place as the junior senator from Illinois. The Secretary of the Senate yesterday rejected his certification because it was not signed by Illinois’ Secretary of State. Harry Reid said the Senate will refuse to seat him and has the legal authority to deny him the appointment. Thoughts and more thoughts from Chicago papers.
Though there are reports that New York Governor David Paterson has all but decided that he will appoint Caroline Kennedy to Clinton’s seat, the results of a new poll shows the public solidly behind Andrew Cuomo – by 20 points.
Now on to aspiring governors … former eBay CEO Meg Whitman is seriously considering a run for California governor, perhaps setting up a marquee race against Sen. Diane Feinstein. Whitman has resigned her positions on various boards of directors. Terry McAuliffe will run for governor of Virginia. And Tennessee Rep. Zach Wamp announced he is entering his state's 2010 gubernatorial race.
A step reduction in prescription-drug spending drove the growth in health-care spending to its lowest rate in nearly a decade in 2007, just 6.1%. However, costs continued to swallow an ever-bigger portion of U.S. gross domestic product and family budgets, according to a new federal study.
and...a Washington Post editorial dubs George W. Bush the "conservation president" for protecting more ocean habitat (333,000 square miles) than any of his predecessors. Opposite the editorial Vikki Spruill, president and chief executive of Ocean Conservancy, comments:
Today, President Bush will begin for the ocean what President Theodore Roosevelt did when he created the National Park System. The administration is announcing plans to create a national monument that will protect 195,000 square nautical miles of the Pacific Ocean -- bigger than the size of California and almost 50 percent larger than all U.S. national parks combined. Sweeping areas of the ocean's most pristine treasures, including spectacular corals and the deepest canyon in the world, will be protected by law and given the chance to become stronger.
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