Mediaboss Marketing

Butler Derrick, a 10-term South Carolina Democrat who won election to the U.S. House as a Watergate baby from the Class of 1974, worked to preserve his states fraying textile industry and made a surprise decision to support gun-control laws, died May 5 at his home in Easley, S.C. He was 77.

The cause was cancer, said John Gregory, a former congressional aide.

Mr. Derrick was among the many Democrats swept into office after the Watergate political scandal that led to President Richard M. Nixons resignation in August 1974.

Mr. Derrick became the senior House Democrat from South Carolina by the time he declined to seek reelection in 1994. He was the last Democrat to date to represent the 3rd District a western swath that included communities such as Aiken and Anderson. Amid the Republican resurgence of 1994, Lindsey O. Graham, now a U.S. senator, won Mr. Derricks House seat.

During his tenure on Capitol Hill, Mr. Derrick seldom frequented public affairs shows. But he rose steadily through the ranks to become, by the early 1990s, a chief deputy whip of his party and a ranking member on the House Rules Committee. He also served many years on the Budget Committee.

As chairman of the Congressional Textile Caucus, he worked effectively on a bill to impose quotas on cheap imports competing with the major but increasingly beleaguered textile industry in the South.

He opposed the North American Free Trade Agreement, which went into effect in 1994. Mr. Derrick said the agreement would threaten the remaining textile and apparel jobs in his district.

Mr. Derrick often voted with Democrats on environmental and nuclear energy policy because his district was home to several nuclear facilities.

He also sided with Democrats on defense and military-spending issues as well as on abortion rights. Aware of his districts growing conservative constituency, however, he supported the death penalty.

Mr. Derrick, a longtime National Rifle Association supporter, broke with the organization in the early 1990s to support gun control legislation. He voted to pass the Brady Bill named after former presidential press secretary James S. Brady, who was seriously injured in the 1981 assassination attempt on President Ronald Reagan.

Read more:
Butler Derrick dies at 77; former South Carolina congressman

Abhisit's proposal essentially is no different from the PDRC's on three issues - resignation by the caretaker prime minister and her Cabinet, formation of an interim government to carry out reforms, and postponement of the next election.

What differs is that Abhisit's proposal sets a shorter timeframe than the PDRC's. The ruling Pheu Thai Party found Abhisit's proposal was unacceptable. Pheu Thai wanted a clear date for the next election. They questioned the practicality of Abhisit's proposal and also branded it unconstitutional.

Pheu Thai instead issued its proposal for a way out of the deadlock. Unveiled by Noppadon Pattama, a spokesman for ex-PM Thaksin Shinawatra, the five-point proposal called on all political parties to contest the next election and promise reforms in their campaign.

Pheu Thai's proposal also called on a reform council to be set up after the election, a new post-election government to focus on reforms and to be in power for six to 12 months, and to hold a national referendum on reforms that required constitutional amendments.

Another proposal came from Gothom Arya, director of Mahidol University's Research Centre for Peace Building. He suggested that a joint committee of members from both Pheu Thai and Democrat parties draft a reform-council proposal containing ideas from the Reform Now Network, the PDRC, and the pro-government United Front of Democracy against Dictatorship. He said there should be a referendum on the reform-council ideas, along with the next election.

For Gothom, the proposal for an unelected, neutral prime minister was unconstitutional.

He suggested a deputy prime minister should be appointed to head the caretaker cabinet during the reform period while the prime minister took a long leave.

He asked both Abhisit and outgoing prime minister Yingluck Shinawatra to get closely involved in the process of gathering reform ideas from their political parties. Judging from the proposals offered above, there is no lack of ideas for ways out for our country, although some proposed solutions may be more "democratic" or more practical than others.

What is important is that the conflicting parties should admit that nobody could take all or lose nothing in a negotiation. To allow the country to move forward, they should give priority to the country's benefit and reach an accord as soon as possible.

Time is running out.

Follow this link:
Many ideas, but time's running out for an accord

by George Bennett | May 7th, 2014

Crist: GOP treatment of "the African-American president" was "a big reason" he left party.

Crists remarks in an interview with Fusion TVs Jorge Ramos echo his claims to Stephen Colbert in February that his infamous Fort Myers stimulus hug of President Barack Obama angered GOP activists in part because Obama was a Democrat, but not just a Democrat, an African-American.

Then-Republican Crist was initially the frontrunner for the partys 2010 Senate nomination, but fell far behind Rubio and left the party to become an independent in 2010. He became a Democrat in December 2012.

You left the Republican Party because you were going to lose to Marco Rubio, Ramos said.

Crist said he left because the partys leadership went off the cliff and I couldnt be consistent with myself and my core beliefs, and stay with a party that was so unfriendly toward the African-American president, Ill just go there.

He referred again to the African-American president and said the way some in the party treated Obama was a big reason he left the GOP.

RNC spokesman Izzy Santa responded to Crists remarks in an e-mail to Fusion: Being a flip-flopper is bad enough, but playing the race card to win over voters is pitiful.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 7th, 2014 at 7:12 am and is filed under 2010 campaigns, 2014 campaigns, Barack Obama, Charlie Crist, George Bennett, Marco Rubio. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.

Tim Burke, Publisher, The Palm Beach Post.

Read more:
Charlie Crist says Ill just go there, plays race card again in explaining party switch

Republican hawks want Obama to give missiles to coup govt in Kiev.
Ukraine plunges into complete chaos-perfect timing to ship missiles to Kiev? America war hawks, including John McCain think so. "In the Now" with RT #39;s Senior Political correspondent Anissa...

By: IN THE NOW

The rest is here:
Republican hawks want Obama to give missiles to coup govt in Kiev. - Video

2014 Idaho Attorney General Primary Debate (Republican)
Lawrence Wasden and Chris Troupis face off in the 2014 primary debates.

By: Aaron Kunz

Original post:
2014 Idaho Attorney General Primary Debate (Republican) - Video