Below is the text of DNC Chairman Tim Kaine’s statements on the passing of Congressman John Murtha:

“Today we mourn the loss of a great American figure who dedicated his life to serving his country both in the military and in the halls of Congress. Congressman Murtha had a storied 37-year career in the U.S. Marine Corps and in 1974 he became the first Vietnam War combat veteran elected to Congress.

“Just the other day, Congressman Murtha became the longest serving Pennsylvanian in the history of the House of Representatives. During his career, he worked hard to bring tens of thousands of middle class jobs to western Pennsylvania. His legacy as a fighter for his causes and his constituents will be remembered long after his passing.

“Our thoughts and prayers today are with the Congressman’s wife, his children and his grandchildren.”

Congressman Murtha was a brave voice, and he will be missed.

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We want Toyota to succeed, so one day they will open their Mississippi plant and bring the thousands of jobs with them.

In the meantime, the State of Mississippi is hurting, and we are continuing to pay the debt services on a deal Gov. Barbour struck with Toyota despite the automakers’ failure to fulfill their obligations.

Recalls for Camry’s have dominated the news. Now comes another round of recalls, which is a harbinger of more fiscal woes for the company. These recalls affect the Prius, the model expected to be built in Mississippi.

The longer Toyota struggles financially, the longer it will be before they open the Mississippi plant. And the longer Mississippians will continue to throw their tax dollars at an empty site in North Mississippi.

Gov. Barbour needs to go back to Toyota and tell them that they should pay their own debt services until the time they can open the Mississippi plant.

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I’ll be tweeting about the State of the State address for the Democratic Party. If you want to catch it, or if you want to read what we said, visit us at @msdemocrats.

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You need less than 20 minutes to spare to listen to Dr. King’s famouse I Have A Dream speech.

While nowhere near the length of most oration today, it remains one of the most insightful, forward-thinking speeches our nation has heard.

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Wow. I knew the far right would go too far. I knew they would one day equate their movement to the sacrifices, the great fights, the true bravery of the men, women and the movement that gave birth to our nation.

I didn’t know they’d do so in a special election for U.S. Senate. And I didn’t know it would have this soundtrack.

It takes some audacity to equate the Obama Administration with the tyrannical government our young nation faced in the Revolutionary War. But these nutjobs have gone and done it.

H/T: Y’all Politics.

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The Mississippi Business Journal has a few telling photos about what the governor thought of the water shortage in Jackson this week.

While businesses were shut down and families were living without water, he had his employees washing his cars. So much for that whole water conservation alert stuff.

Shame on you, governor.

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Gov. Haley Barbour was on Neil Cavuto’s show Friday, during which he joined the chorus of Republicans claiming that there was never another terrorist attack on American soil after the 9/11 attacks while George W. Bush was president.

From News Hound:

As Media Matters points out, in 2001, Richard Reid, the “shoe bomber” tried to blow up an American Airlines plane bound for Miami, in order to “carry out terrorist operations for Al-Qaeda.”

In 2002, there was an attack at the El-Al ticket counter at LAX airport. Two years later, the Justice Department said the attack, which killed two people, was an act of “international terrorism.”

In 2006, a University of North Carolina man drove an SUV onto campus striking 9 people. Mohammed Reza Taheri-Azar wanted to “follow in the footsteps of one of my role models, Mohammed Atta, one of the 9/11/01 highjackers.”

Host Neil Cavuto should have corrected the record (as Bill O’Reilly sort of did when Monica Crowley tried to make the same claim).

You can watch the video of Barbour here:

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Gov. Barbour is proving once again that the rank partisanship in the Legislature is because of his style of slash-and-burn politics.

The governor has asked for additional power to cut agency budgets to offset the budget deficit we are facing. NEMS Daily Journal reporter Bobby Harrison explains in his column:

Under current law, when revenue collections do not meet projections, the governor can cut any agency up to 5 percent. But he cannot cut any agency more than 5 percent until he cuts all agencies 5 percent.

Plus, if he takes more than 5 percent, the cuts must be the same percentage for all agencies.

Barbour wants the authority to make cuts of his choosing up to 10 percent.

Barbour already has trimmed $225 million. To make the additional needed cuts, he said, he would have to take money from areas like debt service, which the state is legally obligated to pay, and items the state must fund because of court orders.

House Appropriations Chairman Johnny Stringer, D-Montrose, proposed a bill last week that would give Barbour most of what he wanted. The only caveat was that all agencies would have to be cut equally. Nonetheless, it exempted the areas of the budget that needed to be exempted and provided the governor with more budget-cutting authority.

That was not good enough for Barbour. And it appears not good enough for Senate Appropriations Chairman Alan Nunnelee, R-Tupelo. Again, from Harrison’s column:

Nunnelee said he plans for his committee to take up legislation next week that gives the governor the authority he wants to make cuts.

In other words, Nunnelee plans to do the governor’s bidding. After all, Nunnelee is running for Congress in the First Congressional District. He can’t win without the governor’s help. So Nunnelee is proving to be a kept man, so to speak.

The reason Stringer and other Democratic leaders are refusing to give the governor absolute budget cutting authority is to protect larger agencies such as public health and public education — two agencies the governor has shown a propensity toward fiscally destroying.

Nunnelee, it seems, cares little to protect public education and public health. He’s voted for the governor’s budget plans most every year, and these are budget plans that usually grossly underfund education and health care agencies.

For Nunnelee, underfunding public education and public health seems to be an odd choice. He hails from Tupelo, which is home to both one of the strongest school districts in the state and one of the largest, most well respected hospitals in the state.

That’s just more reason we don’t need dictatorial leaders in Jackson and blind followers in Washington.

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This from the Public Service Comission:

Northern District Public Service Commissioner Brandon Presley (D-Nettleton) was elected Chairman of the state Public Service Commission (PSC) by fellow Commissioners Lynn Posey and Leonard Bentz during the Commission’s monthly meeting in Jackson yesterday.

Presley, a former two-term Nettleton mayor, said serving as Chairman is an honor. “I thank my colleagues for their support. I look forward to 2010 being a very productive year for the PSC and one in which we make giant strides for the consumers of Mississippi.”

Commissioner Presley will serve as Chairman for the full year in 2010.

Read the press release here.

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In the midst of the legislative session kicking off, it seems the petition drive to place Voter ID on the 2011 ballot has been lost a bit in the shuffle.

Never fear, however, that the Republican Party is working hard to gather as many names as possible. If an email sent out yesterday by the Harrison County Republican Party chairman is any indication, they are a long way from making their goal.

Here’s an excerpt from the email:

Message from a Conservative trying to change corrupt elections:

I need your help on the Voter ID petition drive. This is a state-wide ballot initiative to require a photo ID when voting in order to prevent voter fraud.

Our goal for Jackson County is 5,547 signatures. So far we have collected 2,799. We need 2,748 more signatures in order to meet our goal. In order to achieve this, we need 70 people to collect one sheet (10 signatures) per week for all 4 weeks in January.

You’ll note the fear-mongering (and lying) that starts the email. The truth is that Republicans and Voter ID proponents have yet to point to ANY voter fraud that would be solved by Voter ID.

That said, having about half of Jackson County’s goal to go with a little over a month left seems a bit shocking. One would have thought Jackson County would have been one of the first counties the GOP would have signed up.

Could it be that people down there are more concerned about real issues instead of wedge issues? That’s a thought.

To be honest, I would have thought they were closer to their goal. I’ve been working under the assumption that the state GOP would not fail to get Voter ID on the ballot.

We’ll find out Feb. 14.

Edited by author to change name of county from Harrison to Jackson.

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