Republican Scott Brown this week stunned the political establishment by trouncing his Democratic heir in the race to fill the seat of the late Sen. Ted Kennedy. Massachusetts voters, hailing from one of the most liberal states in the Union, not only turned over the “Kennedy seat” to the GOP, but sent to Washington a man whose victory ended the Democrats’ 60-vote, filibuster-proof majority, possibly dooming national health care reform.

Republicans rejoiced at the outcome, describing the victory as a repudiation of health reform, the Democratic Congress and President Obama. Chastened Democrats didn’t know how to respond to a vote that hit with the political force of a tsunami. Some called for re-dedication to liberal policies advocated by the party’s left wing, and abandonment of any effort at bi-partisanship, while others pushed for a centrist approach to court moderate Republicans.

The Massachusetts vote directly imperiled health care reform. Many Democrats in Congress, worried about their own re-election prospects this fall in facing the same kind of angry electorate that delivered the blow in Massachusetts, said the health bill laboriously hammered out over the past year is now dead, and reform must be tackled in bits and pieces, with Republican support. Some called for abandonment of reform altogether in favor of a focus on jobs and the economy.

Across the spectrum, it was uniformly recognized: The Scott Brown victory was a game-changer of historic proportions.

Be sure to read what FACEOFF columnists Charlie Meyer and Steve Smoot have to say on this subject and If you have something to say about it, send us a letter-to-the-editor at: letters@newstribune.info. We want to hear what you have to say

FACEOFF: Was Scott Brown’s victory in Massachusetts a shot across the bow of the Democratic Party, or a hole in the hull?

On Dec. 17, President Obama signed an executive order that extended certain privileges and immunities to the International Criminal Police Organization, better known as Interpol.

Some conservatives have accused the president of ceding American sovereignty to an international organization, through the executive order.

Others have also suggested that the order is part of a plot to allow international courts to arrest and prosecute American officials for war crimes.

Still others say the move will allow the Obama Justice Department to store government files at the U.S. based Interpol office, beyond the reach of Congress and the public.

Last week the National Rifle Association posted a statement in response to charges that the Interpol order would allow police to confiscate Americans' firearms, saying there was no vaildity to the claim.

Administration officials say that the issue is being blown out of proportion, and that the order was a routine matter that grants Interpol protections accorded to other international organizations that operate in the country. The Obama order amends an executive order signed by President Reagan in 1983 that extended some rights — including immunity from lawsuits or prosecution for official acts — to Interpol. The Obama order goes further by also exempting Interpol from Freedom of Information Act requirements, to protect the files it maintains on criminals and terrorists.

Interpol has no police force that conducts investigations and makes arrests. Rather, it serves its 188 member countries by working as a clearinghouse for police departments in different nations to share law enforcement information — like files on wanted criminals and terrorists, stolen cars and passports, and notices that a law-enforcement agency has issued an arrest warrant for a fugitive.

In the United States, a bureau at the Justice Department staffed by American officials transmits information between law enforcement agencies and Interpol. If a foreign country issues an arrest warrant for a person inside the United States, it is up to the United States government, based on its own laws, to decide whether to apprehend the suspect.

Be sure to read what FACEOFF columnists Charlie Meyer and Steve Smoot have to say on this subject and If you have something to say about it, send us a letter-to-the-editor at: letters@newstribune.info. We want to hear what you have to say.

FACEOFF: Do you support the president’s decision to grant Interpol immunity within the U.S.?

In a bid to focus on providing wireless service in metropolitan areas, the Verizon phone company has proposed shedding 5 million rural landlines in 14 states, including West Virginia, and conveying the operations to Frontier Communications.

In the past three months, utility commissions in three of the 14 states involved — California, Nevada and South Carolina — have approved the deal. The West Virginia PSC is scheduled to hold a public hearing on the proposal Jan. 12 in Charleston.

The deal, valued at about $8.6 billion, would allow Verizon to focus on wireless services and the delivery of broadband Internet to metropolitan areas. As for Frontier, which has specialized in providing telephone and broadband service to rural customers, the sale would roughly triple its customer base. Frontier officials say customers will gain a company that has specialized in delivering services — especially broadband Internet — to rural areas.

Opponents, including union employee groups, counter that two previous landline sales by Verizon involved companies that subsequently went bankrupt, imperiling phone service to hundreds of thousands of people. 

They also claim that Frontier lacks the financial resources to incur

$3.3 billion debt from the deal, and still improve phone service in the affected regions.

Frontier officials say the other companies that failed in the prior Verizon sales lacked the expertise of Frontier, which will avoid such problems, in part, by acquiring existing Verizon billing systems.

Be sure to read what FACEOFF columnists Charlie Meyer and Steve Smoot have to say on this subject and If you have something to say about it, send us a letter-to-the-editor at: letters@newstribune.info. We want to hear what you have to say.

This weeks FACEOFF Question: Should the PSC approve the Verizon/Frontier sale?

Last week, in deliberations that stretched to Christmas Eve, the U.S.Senate passed a landmark health care reform bill that provides health insurance to virtually all of the 30 million Americans who now lack such coverage. The bill also eliminated insurance industry provisions that prevent those with “pre-existing conditions” and other health problems from obtaining health insurance. The bill did not include the “public option,”or government-sponsored health insurance that liberals had sought as part of health care reform. Passed along a party-line vote of 60-40, including two independents who caucus with Democrats, the bill must now be reconciled with health reform legislation passed by the House. The House bill contains provisions not included in the Senate version -- including the public option -- and those differences must now be hammered out. Senate officials have warned that the 60 votes in support of the measure are delicately balanced, and that any major changes to the Senate bill to bring it in line with the House version could disrupt that balance and bring down the entire bill. Critics say the bill falls far short of the health reform promised by the president, and is a fig-leaf to cover legislative failure to truly reform health care. Supporters say it is a signature piece of domestic legislation sought for decades by previous presidents, and finally achieved by the current office holder. 

Was Senate health care bill a “win’ for Obama?