New DNC Head Kaine Offers Corporate Donors Access

Virginia Governor Tim Kaine has a Harvard Law School degree, has twice won statewide office, and is fluent in Spanish. It's a recent line on his resume that may become an issue as President-elect Barack Obama's choice to head the Democratic Party.

Kaine, 50, is the chairman of the Southern Governors' Association, a group that raises money from tobacco, oil, energy and pharmaceutical companies in exchange for access to governors and other state officials.

Read the whole story here.

Comments

[mick7191]

No. Absolutely not.

[Plus15]

It's now time for the Democratic Party to divorce itself from the DLC - Democratic Leadership Council Cretins who have scummed up the party since the Clinton years. The voters from the primaries to the election have rejected these GOP wanna be's and yet just like the rest of the villagers these people don't get it. We don't want lame money grubbing rightists like Kaine, Vilsack, Reid, Bayh and McAuliffe
driving our party and we clearly and overwhelmingly voted against them. With all due respect for the Obama team - it was the imaginative, forward thinking and political issues loyal Howard Dean who turned the party around and got the Democratic Party (not the DLC) ready to elect Obama and the rest of the Democrats. Tim Kaine is a lightweight. We deserve much, much better.

[tel8034]

Where was all this "public oversight" when Cheney's Haliburton was making billions in Iraq?

In fact where was this new found public oversight in the past 8 years?

Obama must feel like the minority shopper who gets all of the "SPECIAL ATTENTION" (that no white shopper ever gets) when they browse through the store.

[oafishcad]

We traded Dean for this guy? Change I don't wanna believe is happening.

[OB-GYN]

As a Virginian, I object to a sitting Governor being anywhere buy in Virginia doing it's business. I'm not a fan of Tim Kaine, and the HuffPo post demonstrates well why this is true.

Regardless, we need Governor Kaine right here. He was off at PE Obama's side long enough, and we have a major fiscal brew on our hands between Dems and Repugs and the state budget.

Why should Virginians suffer more? No, PE Obama and Governor Kaine, you both need to stick to basics and not tap a Governor who already has made a pledge to the people of Virginia.

[Grannysue]

Apparently Tim didn't get the "Change memo", I'm sure there will be a good many politicians who just love business as usuall who will attempt to keep the same old standards alive, hopefully, someone will clue this guy in, or dump him either way he's not representative of the change this country wants.

[soot]

You guys saying "shut the heII up and let Obama do his job" are as bad as the bushies. Its increasingly apparent to me that there exist people like you who are fans of popular politicians and nothing more, and don't care which direction they take your country in.

Tim Kaine needs to either change the rules of the SGA or step back and let somebody else fill that position, this kind of pay-to-play access should be criminal.

[vinny]

it's up to liberal democrats to hold the Democratic Party's feet to the fire... everyone else is just along for the ride...

[eugenegerard]

You idiots. Do you see were corporate access got you. We are in a Depression. You had a chance to take the country back. You continue to sell it out to the highest bidder. A pox upon all of you.

[RTIII]

"Southern Governors' Association" sounds like an illegal operation; if the association is trading access to governors for money, isn't this a form of corruption? Isn't it illegal? Sure sounds like it SHOULD be, given their activities, given as; "a group that raises money from tobacco, oil, energy and pharmaceutical companies in exchange for access to governors and other state officials."

Disgusting.

And Obama WANTS this guy?!
.

[rosiebond007]

We are looking for CHANGE
Kaine better take note or he will have to go.
Obama was pretty strict about access so let's wait and see.

[MyNameIsJames]

We may be looking for CHANGE.

The question is - however- does the Democratic Party want change? The answer is NO!!! Obama has NOT promised to be a reformer so real change may or may not be coming to Washington

[JZ735]

Obama CLAIMED he was for change...clearly, evidence so far has been to the contrary with his picks for cabinet...I like some of his choices, but no one, not anyone who is sane and rational, would claim that Clinton people being back in DC is a sign of change...

[frappe]

The simple truth is that if Americans see "more of the same" rather than needed change and a clean break from the past that has gotten us into this horrible economic and environmental mess, the Democratic party's majority will be short-lived. That's a fact. People are not stupid and they expect real change and a focus that works for all in the context of smart and responsive governance.

[Retrofuturistic]

Doesn't sound like "change" to me. Disgusting. And disappointing.

[SonofKemet]

"CHANGE"?

NOPE....MORE OF THE SAME..

BOUGHT AND PAID FOR DEMOCRATS.....OPEN FOR BUSINESS

[CanuckChomsky]

I really do hope you're wrong. And I'm slowly getting fed up with Obama filling up every single post in his administration with Clinton White House staffers and departmental appointees. Prudence is one thing, but a retreat into Bill Clinton's 'free-market' lite approach will not do nearly enough to lift the U.S out of this recession. It's time he took a good look at FDR's New Deal.

[JZ735]

Sold you all down the river...but, like so many Bushbots who to the end of his tenure continue to excuse and brown nose for Dumbyah, there will be those on here and elsewhere who will continue to shill for Obama as he makes a fool out of you and so many who were hoping, just hoping, he would be new blood and a new day...NOT happening...wake up, Obamaphiles, you have been hoodwinked...some of us saw right through him from the start...knew, however, he was much better than the incompetent McCain, but still knew he was no better than any other politician and had no illusions that he would be unique or different than so many other politicians...it of course turns out that we're right, and have every reason to gloat.

[NeoCentristDonkey]

I get the feeling Obama and Clinton were playing a little game of charades throughout the primary.

Vote for Clinton, you get Clinton; Vote for Obama, you get Clinton

Tell me how this party and administration would have been any different if Hillary was now the PE?

[JZ735]

It seems you are right...I have no problem with Hillary, or most ex-Clintonites, except for the loathesome Rahm Emanuel, who obviously had his tutu on too tight when he was a ballerina.

[mommadona]

DUH......

Eliminate the DLC.

I SWEAR - I hear Howard Dean giggling......

"Suckers!"

[aOsO]

What's the point of this story? Will Kaine still be a governor when he's the DNC chair?

[shengirl]

For the last year of his being governor he will have a DNC assistant to do a lot of the grunge work of the DNC, the letter writing, etc. He was adamant he was not going to give up being Va. gov-- if he did, a Repub would then take over. O called him and met with him four times before he convinced him to take the DNC position. After his final year as gov., he will then devote himself full time to the DNC position. O was fine with this, he really wanted Ka ine in the position. I'm getting a little tired of huffpost trying to dig up one scandal or another about him. He is a close friend of O's, he was the first gov. to publicly support him, he was seriously considered for VP or a cabinet position, and he was courted by O for the DNC job-- he did not go pushing for it. K is a capable and decent man, so lay off.

[DMHendrix]

I agree with your post...but, it was Bloomberg "news" who made the insinuations re: Kaine and then in typical fashion HuffPo gave it a catchy headline.

[chopenhopper]

If you follow Virginia politics, you know that kaine is turning his back--and has turned his back--on many of the people who supported him and got him elected--the VEA and many of the state's teachers can attest to that.