I Don’t Hate America!

It was a matter of when, not if.

…for those of us somewhat grounded in reality anyway. From the AP story:

CLEVELAND — Democratic presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich is abandoning his second bid for the White House. In an interview with Cleveland’s Plain Dealer, the six-term congressman said he was quitting the race and would make a formal announcement on Friday.

“I will be announcing that I’m transiting out of the presidential campaign,” Kucinich said. “I’m making that announcement tomorrow about a new direction.”

“New direction?” Any predictions?

Last night I predicted John Edwards would be victorious in Iowa today.  What I largely disregarded was the 15 percent threshold required to advance past a first round of voting under the arcane procedures.

While Kucinich, Biden and Richardson’s support individually may not even hit the radar, on a second round of voting could crown Barack Obama victor.  Tuesday, Kucinich told his supporters to move to Obama if he is unable to make the 15% threshold in any precinct (in reality, nearly every precinct).

Today though, we learn the Iowa Independent reports that Bill Richardson will send his supporters to Obama as well. We went on to learn the same thing about Joe Biden.

Of course, everyone is essentially saying “move along; nothing to see here.”

Let’s see what happens; it should be fun!

Wow, it looks like a Steny Hoyer motion to table impeachment proceedings brought up by Dennis Kucinich will fail as Republicans are switching their votes to “nay.” Right now its 194-218.

The vote has been open much longer than 15 minutes.

Looks like the GOP wins another game of “gotcha.” Way to go Kucinich.

Developing…

[Update 1:] 170-242 for tabling. 164 Republicans voting nay, 7 Democrats voting nay. Vote board has been open an hour. Did anyone see this coming? Pelosi? Hoyer? Brilliant move by the GOP minority appears ready to force impeachment to proceed and shut down Congress.

Okay, slight exaggeration there maybe.

Again, well done Kucinich. You get what you want; after all, everyone has an election certificate i guess. I’m hearing deranged belly laughs on the House floor…weird. [/Update 1]

[Update 2]Finally the board is closed. 162-251, motion to table fails Shit is hitting the fan. Hoyer moving to refer to Judiciary. Kucinich made a parliamentary inquiry if the motion failed, would there then be an hour of floor debate? The chair remarked that there would. Tons of confusion. Hoyer moves the previous question (to end debate) on motion to refer. The ayes had it on a voice vote and now there will be a 15 minute roll call. [/Update 2]

[Update 3]According to Ed Epstein of Congressional Quarterly, during debate Rep. John Boehner, R-Ohio, House Minority Leader, instructed his members to switch to “nay” on the motion to table. He did this because if a motion to table or refer to committee a privileged resolution fails, one hour of debate is required, and, in Boehner’s opinion, that would “embarass the Democrats.” Congrats to the GOP on another victory in the game of “gotcha” that is House 2008. About five minutes left in the vote on the motion to call the previous question, which I believe only requires a majority to pass. [/Update 3]

[Update 4] 218-194, the motion for the previous question carries. Now we move on to a roll call vote on the motion to refer the Kucinich impeachment resolution to the Judiciary Committee. It’s just a five minute vote. If the Republicans behave the same way they did on the motion to table, it looks like we will have a vote on the impeachment of Vice President Dick Cheney today on the floor of the United States House of Representatives. Unreal. [/Update 4]

[Update 5] Well, for all that excitement, it looks like the Democratic leadership has gotten its members in line enough to refer the impeachment resolution to committee. The motion carries 218-194. This time around, only four or five Democrats voted nay. And with that, impeachment is off the table again. Now it looks like they are finally on to the override of Bush’s veto on the water projects bill. [/Update 5]