From WaPo …
Michael S. Steele, the newly elected chairman of the Republican National Committee, arranged for his 2006 Senate campaign to pay a defunct company run by his sister for services that were never performed, his finance chairman from that campaign has told federal prosecutors.
President Obama gives his support to the new stimulus bill, declaring that “perfect should not be the enemy of the absolutely necessary.” Meanwhile, the Republican leadership lines up to indicate that they will still oppose it. That and other political news in today’s TPMDC Saturday Roundup.
One of the interesting side lights to the Stimulus Bill fight is that it’s given John McCain an angle to get his ego and anger engaged again in the political fray. McCain went on the floor today with a harsh response to President Obama’s speech yesterday before the House Democrats.
So Senate Republicans invoked the threat of a filibuster. And the ‘centrist’ group has leveraged that threat to add more tax cuts that won’t accomplish anything and cut out a lot of spending that would.
As the ‘Day in 100 Seconds’ diehards among you will have noticed, there was no episode today. That’s because it was a special day in TPM land. While the editorial side of things went along more or less as usual today. It was with a skeleton staff, as our real world offices got packed up from the place we’ve worked out of for the last three years and moved to a new office about eight blocks away.
CNN reports that the Senate has a reached tentative deal for a $780 billion stimulus package.
Late Update: We’re getting mixed signals on whether it’s a done deal along the lines reported by CNN. Elana Schor reports.