The jockeying begins for the late Senator Inouye's to-die-for Capitol "hideaway"

In 2011 both Senators Inouye and Levin declined to trade up.

by Ken

The late Sen. Daniel Inouye of Hawaii was a lot of things, most of them admirable, and many of them enduringly special. He did a lot of good for the people of his state and the people of his country, and I'm sure that mattered to him.

But the senator was something else, something that probably mattered more to his fellow members of the world's greatest deliberative body (or whatever it was the Senate used to call itself before it became too silly for words) than to you or me. He was, by the time of his death, the Senate's longest-serving member.

Now to you or me that probably wouldn't mean much more than that he'd been around the joint a long time -- apparently couldn't think of anything he'd rather do, and didn't have a lot of trouble getting reelected. But to his fellow senators that longevity meant something else:

Perks!!! And if there's anything pols love, it's perks. I might go so far as to say that if there's 10 or 20 or 100 things pols love, it's perks. And Senator Inouye had a dilly. Let's let the Washington Post's Emily Heil tell the story in this "In the Loop" piece.

In Capitol, prime 'hideaway' spot is available

By Emily Heil

Hot real estate news on Capitol Hill -- and it has nothing to do with a trendy condo development.

One of the most incredible properties in the Capitol building is opening up. The death of Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii) late last year means that the lovely "hideaway" office he occupied will soon be available.

Inouye was the chamber's most senior member, meaning he had dibs on the choicest of all the private hideaways -- those offices in the Capitol building given to senators in addition to their official spaces. His was a second-floor office on the Capitol's tony West Front, which affords sweeping views down the Mall, that originally was occupied by the Librarian of Congress before the library moved into its own space in 1897.

The former library spaces, which were also later used by the Supreme Court before the court decamped in 1935, are said to be breathtaking, with crystal chandeliers, marble fireplaces and mahogany galore.

Since Inouye's death, the hideaway has undergone a refurbishment -- nothing major, just a little spiffing up, we hear. And soon, the process of passing it on will begin.

Typically, hideaways are offered to senators in order of seniority, which means the space will be made available to the chamber's now-most-senior members, (with the addition of the office space inside the Capitol Visitors Center, even the most junior senator has at least a closet-sized hideaway to call his own).

But those next in line for the Inouye digs, including Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-Vt.) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) already have pretty swanky spaces that they might not want to leave.

Some senators make their hideaways semi-public spaces where they hold meetings with staffers and visiting constituents, while others prefer to keep them very exclusive -- keeping their locations secret so they can slip away from colleagues, reporters, maybe even their own staff.

Curious to know more about Senator Inouye's enchanted space, I dug up a June 2011 report by Roll Call's Daniel Newhauser, "Senators Stay Put in Hideaways." It confirms Emily Heil's suspicion that Senator Leahy may be in no hurry to move. Actually, it tells us that this business of space upgrading is more complicated than we uninitiateds might expect. For example, while Senator Inouye was entitled by rank to his choice of available spaces, that doesn't necessarily mean that he had done all the trading up he could have done. It turns out that both he and Senator Leahy passed last time around on the musical-chairs-like hideaway derby, which Newhauser described as "a cross between Trading Spaces and the NBA draft.

Every two years, after some of the longest-serving lawmakers retire or pass away, the remaining Senators start the process of shuffling spaces, seeking to enhance their status with a coveted secret office.

But about a quarter of the way through the process this year, many of the chamber's senior lawmakers are sticking with the spoils of their seniority, content with the plush Capitol refuges decades of service have afforded.

Not all the seniority-rich senators stood pat.

Four of the 10 longest-serving sitting Senators decided it was time for an upgrade, including [Utah Republican Orrin] Hatch, who snagged the legendary space once occupied by the late Sen. Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.), and [Michigan Democrat Carl] Levin, who moved into the impressive hideaway of former Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.).

Hatch said his elegant new third-floor office, with a fireplace, large windows and high arched ceilings, is a significant upgrade, especially because it is just paces from the Senate floor.

"This one has a convenience factor to it that my other ones have not," he said Thursday. "I've had a variety of offices over here and I like this one better than any one I've had."

Senator Levin's move, Newhauser noted, was somewhat unusual, in that he actually had two years' seniority over his new digs' former tenant, Chris Dodd.

[H]e may have been enthralled by the history; the room was the site of Samuel Morse's first demonstration of the telegraph. He may also have been keen on what a former Dodd staffer described as "one heck of a view."

Located in a private hallway near the Old Senate Chamber, the space is not as large as Kennedy's, but it has its perks.

"It has a fireplace in it, and it has a great view right down the West Front of the Capitol," the former Dodd staffer said. "It was a great room. That's one of those things that you acquire after a long and respectable career."

Senator Leahy, whom our intrepid reporter caught ribbing Senator Hatch about the cost of the remodel of his new space (which would be borne by us the taxpayers -- "We've got to maintain it because it was the original library for Thomas Jefferson's books," he explained to Roll Call), explained why he was in no hurry to trade spaces.

"Why would I want to give up mine?" he asked. "I've got the most beautiful view probably in the whole Capitol."

An avid photographer, the second-most-senior Senator, brandishing a professional-grade digital camera, scrolled to a freshly snapped photo to prove his case.

"Recognize that guy?" he asked Wednesday, pointing to a man clad in familiar orange-tinted sunglasses, his arm casually resting on a balcony ledge looking out on a spectacular view of the Washington Monument. "It's Bono."

The seven-term Senator is the proud inhabitant of a first-floor hideaway, formerly the stomping grounds of the late Sen. Ted Stevens (R-Alaska). With a fireplace, built-in bookshelves, a private bathroom and a balcony, it is a rare gem among the Capitol's hidden offices, and certainly enough to impress even a rock star.

Leahy's neighbor, Sen. Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), the most senior Senator, also decided not to move this year, said his spokesman Peter Boylan -- although he did take over the late Sen. Robert Byrd's (D-W.Va.) sprawling suite, which occupies the entire northwest corner of the Brumidi Corridor and includes some of the painter's famous frescoes. The space used to be Byrd's hideaway before he asked the Rules and Administration Committee to repurpose the President Pro Tem office in 2009 so he could snatch the room next door as well.

That room, a modest space with a fireplace, tall arched and frescoed ceilings and large windows overlooking Lower Senate Park, remained empty as of Friday.

The two Senators' spots are adjacent to the Speaker's office and like Leahy, Inouye's hideaway, once the office of the Librarian of Congress, has a working fireplace and large windows.

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Daniel Inouye (1924-2012)

"When asked in recent days how he wanted to be remembered, Dan said, very simply, 'I represented the people of Hawaii and this nation honestly and to the best of my ability. I think I did OK.' "

-- from a statement issued today by Senator Inouye's staff

by Ken

This is a tough one, even though the senator was 88 (despite which he had been talking seriously about running for a tenth term in 2016) and was known to be seriously ill. According to the staff statement:

United States Senator Daniel K. Inouye, World War II veteran, Medal of Honor recipient and Hawaii's senior Senator, passed away from respiratory complications at 5:01 p.m. Eastern Standard Time today at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.

His wife Irene and his son Ken were at his side. Last rites were performed by Senate Chaplain Dr. Barry Black.

He is survived by his wife, Irene Hirano Inouye, his son Daniel Ken Inouye Jr., Ken's wife Jessica, and granddaughter Maggie and step-daughter Jennifer Hirano. He was preceded in death his first wife, Maggie Awamura.

Senator Inouye's family would like to thank the doctors, nurses and staff at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center for the extraordinary care he received. . . .

Inouye was elected as Hawaii's first U.S. House representative upon statehood in 1959, and was elected to the Senate in 1962, eventually becoming the Senate's president pro tempore and second-longest-serving member, as well as chairman of the Appropriations Committee.

The staff statement recalls:

[H]e enlisted in the U.S. Army shortly after Imperial Japan attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941. He served with 'E' company of the 442 Regimental Combat Team, a group consisting entirely of Americans of Japanese ancestry. Senator Inouye lost his arm charging a series of machine gun nests on a hill in San Terenzo, Italy on April 21, 1945. His actions during that battle earned him the Medal of Honor.

During his recuperation in a Miichigan hospital, Politico's Kate Nocera recalls:

Inouye famously met two other veterans who would become his lifelong friends: Sen. Bob Dole (R-Kan.) and the late Sen. Philip Hart (D-Mich). The building was later named the Hart-Dole-Inouye Federal Center in honor of the three men.

The Washington Post's announcement of Senator Inouye's death invokes a fine piece done by the paper's Jason Horowitz in October 2010, "Sen. Daniel Inouye, Hawaii's reigning son," but among the initial outpourings following the news of Senator Inouye's death, the remembrance I like best is the conclusion of Kate Nocera's Politico piece:

Inouye gave the keynote speech at the 1968 Democratic National Convention where he spoke of the country's struggles with racism and bias while the country was struggling with Civil Rights and the Vietnam war.

"This is my country," Inouye said then. "Many of us have fought hard for the right to say that. Many are now struggling today from Harlem to Da Nang that they may say this with conviction."

He called for Americans to reject violent protests but continue to speak out against discrimination calling for a "new era of politics."

"Let us build not only new buildings but new neighborhoods -- and then let us live in them, all as full citizens and all as brothers," he said. [Emphasis added]

“In closing I wish to share with you a most scared word of Hawaii. It is aloha. To some you who visited us it may have meant hello. To others aloha may have meant goodbye. But to those of us who have been privileged to live in Hawaii, aloha means I love you. So to all of you, my fellow Americans, aloha.”

Aloha, senator.

The Hart-Dole-Inouye Federal Center in Battle Creek, MI

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It appears that the Big Stinky Cheeses of Demdom lie as pathologically as their GOP soulmates

It would count for something if thugs like Master Rahm and the DCCC stooges would stop lying about why they hate candidates like Colleen Hanabusa, but don't hold your breath.

by Ken

As Howie and I have frequent cause to note, the increasingly unapologetic right-wing sympathies of the Democratic Party leadership make it harder and harder to distinguish the power-brokers of the two major parties without a scorecard.

In his Morning Line today, washingtonpost.com's Chris Cillizza has an updated version, faithfully "carrying the water" for the Big Cheeses of Demdom, of an earlier item on the latest development in the lineup for the November election for the Hawaii House seat just lost to the Republicans in a special election:

Former Rep. Ed Case (D-Hawaii) has opted not to run for the seat in the general election a week after he and state Senate President Colleen Hanabusa (D) split the Democratic vote and handed the seat to Rep. Charles Djou (R-Hawaii) in a special election.

The good news for Democrats in the Case decision is that are now likely to avoid a difficult and costly primary - the latest in the nation, in fact. The bad news is that the candidate they are left with is the one national party leaders -- if not their state counterparts -- regarded as the weaker of the two candidates.

Hanabusa had the support of the state's two senators -- Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka but party leaders in Washington didn't see a path to victory for her since she struggled to win over moderate Democrats and independents. While the White House and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee made it quite clear they preferred Case, neither entity wound up officially weighing in at all -- a move that effectively ceded the seat to Djou for the next six months.

The November general election, of course, provides much different dynamics. There won't be two Democrats on the ballot, and the electorate will be different too. Regardless of what party leaders thought of Hanabusa before, she will now likely be the only Democrat on the ballot in a district where President Barack Obama won 70 percent of the vote in 2008.

I have no doubt that the Big Cheeses of Demdom hate Hanabusa and love Case every bit as much as loyal Waterboy Chris represents. They're just lying their sorry butts off about why.

According to Waterboy Chris, it's all about "electability." "Party leaders in Washington didn't see a path to victory for her since she struggled to win over moderate Democrats and independents." This sounds like hard-headed politics, but it's really just bullshit. They love Case because he's a proven right-wing Democratic hack, and they hate Hanabusa -- beyond the fact that she's a woman (for a woman to draw official party support these days it appears she has to be either really rich or really conservative) -- because she believes in traditional Democratic values, which drives demon Dem corporatists like Master Rahm bonkers. So much so that, as they demonstrated all too blatantly in the special election, they'd sooner see a Republican in that House seat.

Howie covered this race at some length in January, and indeed the election played out just as foreseen, with Case running third behind Republican Charles Djou and Hanabusa, thereby allowing Djou to turn the seat Republican. There are no reports of Master Rahm, the man who supposedly lives to build Democratic majorities, shedding tears.

Is it not obvious that Master Rahm and his stinky Beltway stooges aren't afraid of Hanabusa losing; but rather are riddled with angst at the prospect of her winning? Of course the Master has been playing this game for ages: masquerading as the bare-knuckled battler on behalf of the Democratic Party when his real interest is purging the party as much as possible of pols to the left of, say, Heath Shuler, and maximizing the ranks of what we might call "coin toss" Dems. Or should I say "bushels o' bucks" Dems?

I guess I stand corrected regarding my recent suggestion that the Stinky Cheeses have stopped pretending that the issue in their support of all these crap candidates is an "electability" thing:

In this election cycle even the pretense of an "electability" factor has more and more been dropped, as the official party organs increasingly find themselves stumping for candidates who (probably fortunately) couldn't beat any candidate unencumbered by a sex scandal. It becomes increasingly clear that the party hacks support right-wing "Democrats" because they're the people they're most comfortable with -- people who will fit right into the Beltway's kabuki politics, where "order" requires giving highest consideration to the people who pay for it.

Just as spinmeistering, you have to admire the effrontery of the Stinky Cheeses in imposing their view of both Democratic values and Hawaiian politics over those of the state's Democratic U.S. senators, Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka (left), both of whom solidly endorsed Hanabusa. (There can't be a lot of precedents for a national party overriding the judgment of two senators of their party.)

It could be argued that Akaka holds a grudge against Case for primarying him in his 2006 reelection bid, but that seems to quite a good reason for holding a grudge -- not to mention a commentary on Case's party "loyalty." Inouye and Akaka have made it clear that they welcomed Case to Congress after he wangled his way -- via an earlier special election, in 2003 -- into Hawaii's other House seat, vacated by the death of Rep. Patsy Mink, but that he was a great disappointment to them as a congressman, until he gave up the seat to try to oust Akaka.

Case really thinks he belongs in the U.S. Senate. Howie noted that he's said to check the newspaper every day when he wakes up to see if maybe the 85-year-old Inouye didn't. Not surprisingly, given his virually Republican voting record, during his brief time in Congress he was a favorite of the K Street cash dispensers, and as the Dem Stinky Cheeses showed in the special election, they'll go a long way to advance the electoral prospects of one of their own.

As the general election race for the House seat now held by Republican Djou gets into gear, we'll find out what they're prepared to do for a real Democrat like Hanabusa. Political common sense says this is an R seat ready and waiting to be returned to the D column, but that's without reckoning on the interest of the Stinky Cheeses of the national party in keeping her far, far outside the Beltway.

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Trouble In Paradise-- Will Liebermanism Re-Infect Hawai'i?

Hawai'i has been a solidly Democratic bastion for as long as I can remember; and that's long. Bush didn't do very well there-- only 37% in 2000 and 45% in 2004-- but he looked like a champ compared to McCain who only managed to eke out a meager 26.6% of the vote. When progressive Democrat Neil Abercrombie decided to cash in his long House career and run for governor this year, Hawaii's most ambitious political hack, came screaming into the race. Case once represented the other (non-Honolulu) Hawaiian congressional district, but he gave up that seat to run against much-loved Daniel Akaka. Akaka is a progressive and Case is as far right as you can be and still be a Democrat. Akaka kicked his ass. Case is also awash in K Street lobbyist connections.

Case would prefer to run for Senate and is said to check the newspaper every day when he wakes up to see if the 85 year old Senator Daniel Inouye died overnight. His campaign against Akaka in 2006 revolved around Akaka's vote against attacking Iraq. Case said that had he been in the Senate he would have supported Bush's proposal to start the war against Iraq. Case was a consistent aisle crosser on important matters while he served in the House and seemed more comfortable voting with Republicans than with Democrats. Although he had one of the worst attendance records of any member of Congress, he consistently supported the GOP on job-killing trade legislation and on special interests legislation like abolishing the estate tax for the super-rich, making it easier for banksters to rip off consumers, screwing over working families on pensions and GOP proposals to shift the tax burden to the middle class. He generally voted with the most reactionary Democrats when they joined the GOP to stifle reform and anyone who likes Chamber of Commerce pawns and Patriot Act-type Dems like Dan Boren and Jim Marshall will be perfectly happy with Ed Case-- especially if xenophobia and war-mongering and making sure that victims of big corporations have no recourse to the courts are your cup of tea to boot.

The best shot Democrats have in defeating this slimy Republican-in-Democrats'-clothing is with State Senate President Colleen Hanabusa. The problem is that the Republicans have a strong candidate in Honolulu City Councilman Charles Djou. He isn't strong enough to win the seat against a Democrat but if there's a special election, whomever gets the most votes-- among Hanabusa, Case and Djou, is the congressman. Case is likely to play the role of spoiler by splitting the Democratic vote, allowing Djou to squeak in. This weekend mainstays of the state party tried to prevent that with a unified front in favor of Hanabusa. Both the state's beloved U.S. Senators, Daniel Inouye and Daniel Akaka, strongly endorsed Hanabusa.

At the opening of Hanabusa's campaign headquarters on Ward Avenue, Inouye, the state's leading Democrat, praised her skill as a labor attorney and Senate president and described her as a politician who keeps her word.

"It's good currency. You can count on it," he said. "She's got integrity. She's a very principled woman."
Inouye spoke in unusually personal terms about Case, a moderate Democrat who has alienated many in the party's establishment.

Inouye said Case insisted on running in a special election in 2002 to fill the remaining weeks in the late U.S Rep. Patsy Mink's term, even though many party leaders wanted Mink's husband, John, to have the honor. Case-- interested in obtaining seniority-- won the special election, and then a second special election in early 2003 to replace Mink in Congress.

Inouye said the state's congressional delegation welcomed Case but was let down. The senator said Case told the delegation he wasn't going to run against Akaka in the 2006 primary for Senate, then surprisingly announced his campaign. Case has said he never told the delegation he would not run against Akaka, only that he was keeping his options open.

Inouye and Akaka were joined by virtually the entire Hawai'i political establishment and by the state's powerful union leaders. They painted Case, accurately, as a bad faith player, an outright liar no one in Congress trusts and someone who never learned to be a team player for the good of his constituents.

In the Loop: Start packing for Prague! PLUS: Can a nice trip to Tokyo smooth the rocky Inouye-Cochran relationship?

The U.S. Ambassador's Residence in Prague -- 

great digs, and it comes furnished

by Ken

Here's one reason I try not to miss Al Kamen's "In the Loop" column in the Washington Post. You go in looking for embarrassing tidbits -- and of course soul-nourishing snark -- about our fine government servants, but you never know when you may stumble onto, well, it's not quite clear whether this item from today's column is a piece of career guidance or a hot real-estate tip:

House Hunters Int'l

Stop what you're doing! Right now! Double-check any household employees and especially your old tax returns. The beautiful ambassadorial residence in Prague, one of the finest homes in the U.S. diplomatic world, is apparently open again.

We're hearing that Marc Nathanson, a mega-contributor, cable television mogul and former chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, is letting people know he's no longer looking to be nominated as ambassador to the Czech Republic, citing "personal reasons." We're told something came up in the vetting process that scotched the long-expected nomination.

The residence has been empty for a year, so you'll need to clean up some cobwebs, but trust us, we've toured that joint. To die for.

ELSEWHERE IN LOOPLAND: VIOLATING THE SANCTITY
OF THE CHAIRMAN-RANKING MEMBER RELATIONSHIP

This is also why we try not to miss "In the Loop."

It's too intimate to be talked about much in public, but there are few relationships more sacred than that between a congressional committee chairman and the ranking minority member. What, for example, would Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-MT) do without his significant other, Chuck Grassley (R-IA)?

Sometimes the relationship has to be put to the ultimate test to show just how deep the bond is. After all, did our Max take it personally when he spent all those months devising a health care "reform" bill designed for his Chuck to love, while Chuck was making it clear to everybody else on the planet that there wasn't any kind of Democrat health care bill that he would vote for? (Um, apparently not.)

Just how far one of these partners will go for the other was illustrated when the Senate Appropriations Committee's Daniel Inouye (D-HI) actually testifed on behalf of his committee mate, Ted Stevens (R-AK), in Stevens's corruption trial. The lesson is apparently lost on Stevens's replacement as ranking member on Appropriations, Thad Cochran (R-MS), however, in the era of the "Just Say No" Republicans:

Many seconds over Tokyo

Now that health care has been voted on in the Senate, the jets are warming up in earnest at Andrews Air Force Base to wing our nation's lawmakers off in search of those elusive facts. The Senate Appropriations Committee's chairman, Daniel Inouye (D-Hawaii), and ranking Republican, Thad Cochran (Miss.), are off to Japan next week. (Weather is not that great -- Wednesday's forecast high in Tokyo was only 50 degrees -- and the Japanese economy isn't that hot, either, but 50 degrees is better than here.) The miljet is actually picking up Inouye in balmy Hawaii.

The trip is to discuss defense issues, economic matters and the disturbingly rocky relationship between the two longtime allies. But maybe there'll also be a chance for the two top appropriators themselves to fix a little rocky patch in their longtime relationship.

Seems the duo, who've worked together for a long time, wrote the recent Defense Department approps bill together. It included about $167 million in earmarks that Cochran wanted. But Cochran then voted to filibuster the bill as part of a Republican-leadership-driven effort to block Democrats from returning to the health-care debate.

Inouye, we hear, was particularly upset by the move.

Cochran replaced Ted Stevens (Alaska) as the committee's ranking Republican. Stevens, Loop Fans may recall, was so close to Inouye that Inouye testified on his behalf during Stevens's trial for false statements regarding gifts he received from a contractor.

Meanwhile, there's some lingering resentment among Senate folks at Maine's GOP duo, Sens. Olympia J. Snowe and Susan Collins, for not explicitly committing themselves in advance to vote for cloture. The Dems hauled 92-year-old Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) to come in at 1 a.m. to make sure there were 60 votes to choke off the filibuster. As it turned out, both of the Republicans did indeed vote to stop debate.

Could be a long flight.

This just illlustrates why it is that I'll never be a Senate committee chairman (or, in all likelihood, ranking minority member). If that was me sitting there in Dan Inouye's chair with egg all over my face from that shithead Cochran's treachery, it would be just a matter of minutes before:

(a) Thad's $167M worth of earmarks were insta-ripped out of the package, and

(b) everyone who was scheduled to score a windfall under any of those earmarks is instead slated to have to cough up an amount equal to what he/she was going to pocket -- the full $167M worth, now coming back to the gov't instead of going out to Thaddites.

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