Senate approves bill protecting gun businesses (Carl Hulse, NY Times)
The Senate agreed to shield gun manufacturers and dealers from liability lawsuits on Friday, as Congress broke for a monthlong recess after sending President Bush energy and transportation bills that had been years in the making.
Long sought by the gun lobby, the Senate measure – approved 65 to 31 – would prohibit lawsuits against gun makers and distributors for misuse of their products during the commission of a crime. Senate supporters said the plan was needed to protect the domestic firearms industry from a rash of lawsuits that threatened its economic future.
[snip]
The gun measure was just one of the significant pieces of legislation to advance as Congress cleared its plate for a fall that will initially be consumed, in the Senate at least, by consideration of a Supreme Court nominee. Before leaving, Senate Republicans and Democrats also agreed on the schedule for confirmation hearings.
Ending a long policy struggle, the Senate passed and sent to Mr. Bush a broad piece of energy legislation, fulfilling an early domestic policy goal of his administration.
After extinguishing one last policy flare-up, the House and Senate also gave final approval to a $286.4 billion highway measure stuffed with special projects for virtually every Congressional district in the nation. Congress also finished its first two spending bills of the year, delivering $1.5 billion in emergency money to cover a shortfall in spending on veterans’ health care.
And in an unexpected development, the Senate renewed its version of the antiterror USA Patriot Act.
It was a blistering pace compared to the usual level of legislative activity.
The Administration also won approval of CAFTA.
U.S. economic expansion shows steady strength (Bill Sing, LA Times)
The U.S. economy grew at a solid 3.4% annualized rate in the second quarter, the Commerce Department said Friday in a report suggesting that output and job creation would speed up as businesses replenished depleted inventories of goods.
The government’s initial estimate of growth in gross domestic product met economists’ expectations but fell short of the first quarter’s 3.8% pace and the revised 4.2% growth posted for all of last year.
But it was the ninth straight quarter the economy exceeded its long-term growth rate of about 3%. And although the nation can’t match China’s gazelle-like 9.5% clip, it is outperforming most other industrialized nations and topping average growth during the booming 1990s.
Note that Sing couldn’t resist two not-so-subtle efforts to downplay the strong economic growth.
Bush Plans to Bypass Senate, Appoint Bolton (Warren Vieth and Sonni Efron, LA Times)
President Bush will sidestep Democratic opposition to his nomination of John R. Bolton as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations by making a recess appointment not subject to Senate confirmation, a senior administration official said Friday.
The appointment, which is likely to further roil relations with congressional Democrats….
If the Dems refuse to allow a vote, then the President will exercise his constitutional authority and sidestep them.
Dunce of the Week: Nancy Pelosi (Forbes)
This week our dunce’s cap gets passed to Nancy Pelosi, Democratic Leader, U.S. House of Representatives. In coming out against the Central America Free Trade Agreement, which passed the House this week, Pelosi made the familiar (and disingenuous) left-wing case: CAFTA, written by greedy capitalists, fails to include protections for labor and the environment. Otherwise she’d have voted for it.
Yeah, right. Over John Sweeney’s dead body you would.
The Dems aren’t even obstructing all that effectively these days. But you get the sense from them that if they can just take down a White House aide (Karl Rove) that most of the electorate doesn’t know, all will be right with their party.