Republican Norm Coleman, still locked in an ongoing fight with Democrat Al Franken for Minnesota's Senate seat is feeling confident about the latest court recount ruling.

Franken is currently 225 votes ahead of Coleman but the Minnesota Canvassing Board and Supreme Court has ruled 4,800 more ballots need to be examined.

"We got the entire universe of what we wanted to be counted," Coleman said on a conference call Wednesday morning.

He said the lead that Franken has enjoyed came from the partial opening of valid ballots that "came from areas that were predominately Democrat-dominated that gave Al Franken an artificial lead."

Coleman's team also say they expect 80-100 votes will be "washed away" from Franken's column when the court throws out ballots that have been double counted in the recount process.

Democratic Rep. Jim Cooper (Tenn.) vented to Air America about the way Speaker Nancy Pelosi was treating members who wanted to do things like read the bills being voted on.

It wasn't pretty.

Cooper, one of the 11 Democrats to vote against the House version of the stimulus bill, said he landed in hot water with Pelosi because he cared what was in the bill.

"I got in terrible trouble with our leadership because they don’t care what’s in the bill, they just want it pass and they want it to be unanimous," he said.  "They don’t mind the partisan fighting cause that’s what they are used to. In fact, they’re really good at it. And they’re a little bit worried about what a post-partisan future might look like. If members actually had to read the bills and figure out whether they are any good or not. We’re just told how to vote. We’re treated like mushrooms most of the time."

The interview is compelling. The good folks at Eyeblast.tv snipped it and posted it. Here it is below.

Jeffrey Poor of the Business and Media Institute finds a provision in the House and Senate version of the stimulus bill that forbids any money from going to a place of higher education that may

Specifically the language prohibits stimulus funds from being used to modernize, renovate, or repair of facilities:

(i) used for sectarian instruction, religious worship, or a school or department of divinity; or
(ii) in which a substantial portion of the functions of the facilities are subsumed in a religious mission

"This is an ACLU stimulus, because any school that gets funds to upgrade a student center or building where Bible studies or religious meetings may be held will be slapped with a lawsuit,” Wesley Denton, spokesman for Sen. Jim DeMint (R.-S.C.), told the Culture and Media Institute. “This bill declares a war on prayer at college campuses in this country. Students have constitutional right to use public facilities regardless of their religious views, and President Obama needs to step in to ask Sen. Reid and Speaker Pelosi to stop this attack on students of faith.”

Scott Murphy, the Democrat running for New York’s 20^th open seat, is sure to be wincing at all the attention on President Obama’s appointment picks who failed to pay their taxes.

Murphy is opposing Republican Jim Tedisco for the seat vacated by Democratic Rep. Kristin Gillibrand and the GOP already has their hands full of opposition research.

The New York Department of Taxation put out a lien in Murphy’s Small World Software Company in 1999 for $20,805. He paid up but the state had two other liens, worth about $750 combined, still outstanding.

The National Republican Congressional Campaign Committee issued a statement saying Murphy was “taking lessons in tax evasion from his party’s elite.”

Murphy isn’t being forthright about his role in creating a foreign web business, called bazee.com, either. The GOP feels his experience with this conflicts with his message about job creation in the U.S. and Murphy insists he was only an advisor to the start-up.

Cached pages of the website, however, list Murphy as the site’s founder. This reference was deleted from the page days before Murphy announced his candidacy.

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said Tom Daschle withdrew his name from consideration to become Health and Human Services Secretary because he didn't want to be a "distraction" from the president's agenda.

Gibbs said Nancy Killefer, who was on track to become the federal government's chief performance officer, resigned on Tuesday for similar reasons.

Both of them had a series of problems with their personal finances and failed to pay hundreds of thousands in taxes.

Gibbs said both "recognized you can't set an example of responsiblity but accept a different standard of service" during a White House press briefing Tuesday afternoon.

Obama's Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, however, also had tax problems. He failed to pay $34,000 in taxes while working for the IMF. Gibbs said Geithner's transgressions were not a deal-breaker because "Mr. Geithner has gone through a process..he has gone through the full Senate with bipartisan support."

Gibbs flailed to answer more pressing why the president stood by Geithner despite his tax problems, but not Daschle. He would not answer a question if Obama would have kept supporting Daschle or Killefer if he had not withdrawn his name.

The most he would say is that there are "a few exceptions for people who are uniquely qualified to lead this country."

"I am not going to spend a lot of time up here today looking in the rear view mirror," he said.

Greg Sargent over at The Plum Line notices something that is going to be a making the Vanity Fair crew tear out their hair.

This photo in their upcoming issue includes Tom Daschle as part of "The Cabinet."

A bit presumptuous, no?

The Washington Post has launched a new web project to profile top political movers and shakers, www.whorunsgov.org

I was delighted when the editors asked me to pen their feature on Alaskan Governor Sarah Palin.

All of the profiles follow a similar format, explaining why the person matters and significant legislative accomplishments.

The site will later be opened up to the public for editing, so all the profiles will be in a "Wiki" like format, where individuals can update the piece. Unlike Wikipedia, however, the edits will be subjected to moderation and the original profile will always be available for viewing.

In the next few weeks I'll also be submitting profiles on former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, so keep checking back!

Right now news is coming in that yet another one of Obama's appointees has tax problems.

The Associated Press is reporting "Nancy Killefer, who failed for a year and a  half to pay employment taxes on household help, has withdrawn her candidacy to be the first chief performance officer for the federal government, the White House said Tuesday."

By my count, this is at least the fourth person with financial problems to be tapped to join Obama's inner circle. First there was Bill Richardson, then Tim Geithner, Tom Daschle and now Killefer.

Sure, Killerfer isn't as high-level as the other three, but she still underwent the vetting process....which brings me to my Big Question of the Day: "Does anyone at 1600 PA Avenue understand what VETTING is for?"

The vetting process is supposed to take place BEFORE the appointment is offered to smoke out any disqualifying factors for the position. Like not paying your taxes. It isn't just a formality to give the GOP a heads-up on how they can "obstruct" Obama's people.

If they have tax problems, they shouldn't be offered the posts in the first place, right? Isn't that why there's a vetting process?

Via AmSpec's Philip Klein:

It goes like this: Tom Daschle gets confirmed and his universal health-care plan is adopted, but I don't pay the taxes required to finance the program. I get caught, but simply write a letter apologizing for the oversight and am promptly rewarded with a high-profile government job.

Bank of America, one of the many banks to benefiting from a government bailout, is giving more than $2.1 million directly to the controversial interest group ACORN that engaged in fraudulent voter registration activities in the 2008 election.

The January 29 Chronicle of Philanthropy [subscription only] reported Bank of America's Charitable Foundation is giving the interest group $2,155,000 "for efforts to prevent foreclosures and educate people about finances and purchasing homes."

The gift is being made in four separate allocations, most of them going to Chicago--the city President Obama hails from. ACORN endorsed Obama in the 2008 presidential election and actively worked to elect  him by conducting various get-out-the-vote activities. In the process of those activities ACORN submitted hundreds of fraudulent voter registration forms to local election offices.

Two of the grants, one for $2 million and another for $85,000 are being made to a Chicago ACORN corporation. Another, for $20,000, is being given to a Las Vegas chapter. And, $50,000 is being gifted to ACORN in Miami.

Bank of America also released a statement detailing their charitable giving plans from October 2007-June 2009 HERE.

MSNBC has been vehemently questioning new RNC Chairman Michael Steele's call on the GOP to oppose Barack Obama's $825 billion spending bill today.

I appeared earlier this afternoon for one of these hits with anchor David Schuster and it seems to me a few things are going on here.

All of the anchors are "'wondering" if Steele is an "obstructionist" because he thinks the stimulus bill is bad policy and if the Senate will listen to him.  So, it seems to me, there are dual storylines MSNBC is pushing: 1) That Steele is an "obstructionist" because he doesn't roll over for Obama and 2) he will have his first "loss" if all the Senate Republicans don't vote against the bill like the House GOP did."

(In my segment Schuster also asked me to justify how Steele has "any credibility" on the economy by pulling out statements he'd made as Maryland Lt. Governor I'd never seen with no context, but that's beside the point...)

Am I reading too far into this? Do you think they are trying to set Steele up for failure?

This is, after all, the network that Chris Matthews declared "opened its heart to change" and whose viewers populated the National Mall on inauguration day.

I really want to believe there are producers, reporters and anchors at MSNBC who are interested in news and issues (rather than being an arm of the Democratic  Party) but when programming, throughout the day, takes a consistently negative tone on the new RNC Chair it's pretty clear there's an agenda.

President Obama’s Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Health and Human Services Secretary nominee Tom Daschle have been getting some attention regarding their failure to pay taxes, but what about Al Franken?

Franken, who is still fighting incumbent GOP Sen. Norm Coleman for Minnesota’s Senate seat, failed to pay at least $70,000 in taxes to 17 states prior to running for office.

Minnesota’s Star Tribune reported Franken was paid to appear at a number of celebrity appearances across the country and file taxes appropriately in those states since 2003. Franken’s team released a spreadsheet to media detailing the debt through the campaign, but there has not been any verification Franken has actually paid them down yet.

Franken refused to answer questions and blamed his attorney Allen Chanzis for the error-- much like Geithner blamed the mass-market tax software for his failure to pay $34,000 in taxes.

Noticing a trend here?

Daschle, at least, seems to take some personal responsibility. He simply claims he made an "honest mistake" in forgetting pay employment taxes for his personal driver.

There a few other Democrats who have gotten in trouble for their finances lately although the media has been slow to make a narrative out of the obvious big picture story: Democrats Campaign to Raise Taxes, Fail to Pay Their Own.

We're still waiting for resolution on House Ways & Means Chairman Rep. Charlie Rangel’s multitude of tax transgressions that caused both the Washington Post and New York Times to call on Rangel to resign from the powerful post. (Rangel curiously blamed a language barrier for the tax omission.) Speaker Nancy Pelosi promised an ethics investigation report would be produced by January 3^rd.  Nearly a month later, there's still no report.

And what about that sweetheart deal Senate Banking Chairman Chris Dodd got on his mortgage? This was a hot story while he was overseeing the bailout of the housing industry, but seems to have been forgotten. Dodd promised to produce his mortgage papers for inspection at the height of the scandal, but that never happened. 

So, what's the deal? Are politicians, who create, implement and oversee tax policy, not expected to pay their taxes? Is this a "freebie" now? Geithner survived the media test, so is that the new standard?

How many Democrats will be allowed to get away with it before it becomes a story??

Steele is definitely interested in talking to new media.

Washington Post's Howard Kurtz reports:

The area's only progressive talk station is changing formats, dropping such syndicated liberal hosts as Ed Schultz, Stephanie Miller and Bill Press in favor of financial news, starting next week.

The move by Redskins owner Dan Snyder, who purchased the station, WWRC, and others in Washington last summer, leaves the city without a liberal radio outlet. Program Director Greg Tantum says he thought the station could work because of enthusiasm over Obama, but that ratings collapsed to a level that could not be measured after the election.

But ratings nearly doubled, he says, at Snyder's conservative station, WTNT, which features Laura Ingraham and Bill Bennett. Tantum said he will move Schultz to WTNT to give him another shot.

The Institute for Legal Reform is questioning a provision in the stimulus bill to boost trial lawyers.

The House-passed stimulus bill gives state AGs power to bring lawsuits for statutory damages  for violations of the federal Health Insurance Privacy and Accountability Act (HIPAA) statute.  ILR says This means state AG's will be able to contract with outside lawyers to file civil suits, with backing from the state.

“While the emergency economic stimulus package is aimed at turning our economy around and getting Americans back to work, the provision slipped into the House version and included in the Senate proposal is nothing more than a gift to the plaintiffs’ lawyers,” said ILR President Lisa A. Rickard.