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If Tea Partiers decide to make Bob Corker a target next year he's vulnerable to it. 43% of Republican primary voters in the state say they'd prefer to nominate a more conservative alternative to Corker next year, compared to just 38% who say they'd rather put Corker forth again. It's not that Republican voters are particularly negative toward Corker. He has a a 60/19 approval spread with them and 55% think he's ideologically 'about right' compared to just 23% who think he's 'too liberal.' But a plurality of them would like to replace him with someone further to the right...

For Democrats hoping to withstand the push for permanently smaller government, the enemy is now within. On Tuesday, Sen. Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., joined with Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., to propose the Commitment to American Prosperity Act, which would gradually lower the ceiling for all federal spending to 20.6% of GDP by 2020, down from a projected 24.7% this year. The Corker-McCaskill CAP bill goes a big step further than President Obama’s Fiscal Commission, which aimed to reduce spending to 21.8% of GDP by 2020. And it does so without the inducement for Democrats of more than $1 trillion in tax...

(RTTNews) - A prominent Tea Party group sent a message to members on Monday identifying five current Republican Senators that they intend to target in 2012. Tea Party Nation named Sens. Dick Lugar, R-Ind., Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, Scott Brown, R-Mass., and Bob Corker, R-Tenn., as Republicans that need to be sent into retirement, accusing them of being Republicans In Name Only, or RINOs. The message cited Lugar's vote against a ban on earmarks as well as a his votes in favor of the DREAM Act and the START Treaty. Hatch was also criticized for being a "pork...

Backroom deals won’t do Tennessee much good if America’s national security is compromised. Tennessee Senators Lamar Alexander (R) and Bob Corker (R) must not have considered national security when they decided to vote in favor of ratifying the dangerous New START Treaty. They also failed to research Russia’s alliance with countries like Iran, China, North Korea and Venezuela. It appears the Tennessee Senators were interested in bringing home the pork at the expense of our nation’s security. Zachary Roth’s December 23rd article states: “It will likely include more than $6 billion dollars for a uranium processing facility, to be built...

But the modernization isn't likely to be carried out in anything like a rational, cost-effective way..... It will likely include more than $6 billion dollars for a uranium processing facility, to be built at the Y-12 weapons compound in Oak Ridge, Tennessee..... Indeed, the states' two GOP senators, Bob Corker and Lamar Alexander, both said that money for modernization -- and therefore, in all likelihood, pork for their district -- was a key condition of their support.

The Senate voted 67-28 to pass a cloture motion, seemingly enough to assure final ratification. Eleven Republicans joined with 56 Democrats to pass the cloture motion. It will take 67 votes to ratify the New Start pact, which would give the Obama administration its top foreign policy goal in the lame-duck session. Among Republicans announcing their support were Richard G. Lugar of Indiana, George V. Voinovich of Ohio, Scott Brown of Massachusetts, Olympia J. Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine, Lamar Alexander and Bob Corker of Tennessee, Johnny Isakson of Georgia, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, Thad Cochran of Mississippi, and...

On Sunday night, after a weekend of wrangling, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.) filed for cloture on the New START treaty, setting up a crucial Tuesday vote on whether to end debate. A final vote could come on Thursday. As Josh Rogin observes, keep an eye on Sen. Bob Corker (R., Tenn.) as the clock ticks...

UPDATE, 4:11 p.m.: In an interview with me just now, Senator Bob Corker doubled down on his contention that if Dems move on DADT, Republicans will be less likely to support START. "I felt like momentum was growing for START," Corker said, adding that since Reid announced he was holding votes on DADT and DREAM, it has had a "chilling effect." "I'm watching support for the treaty erode, because of highly partisan political issues being brought up solely because activist groups in the Democratic Party want this done," he continued. Corker said he wasn't issuing a personal threat, and was...

NASHVILLE -- U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., says he has told Volkswagen officials that he thinks it would be "highly detrimental" to the German manufacturer if the United Auto Workers organizes its Chattanooga assembly plant. "I was asked to give input, and I did," Corker said. The advice stemmed from his experience trying to negotiate with the union during the 2008 federal bailout of GM and Chrysler, he said. "I certainly shared with [VW] I couldn't see how there was any possibility it could be a benefit to them to enter into a contract with UAW," said Corker, a former...

Here we go. With a mere 13 days to go in this election -- an election in which all things left are on the verge of being thoroughly repudiated if every poll out there is to believed -- a shocking story appears. A story in LaborUnionReport.com has Tennessee GOP Senator Bob Corker telling "high dollar donors" at a GOP event something prospective Republican voters will be surprised to hear: Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell and his GOP colleagues have no intention whatsoever to repeal ObamaCare. None. Zip. According to what the story says are "multiple sources," here's the skinny: The...

"Lenin is dead," Konstantin said as we toured Red Square in Moscow in the early 1990s. "He just hasn't been buried yet." And, sure enough, hard beside the Kremlin, the curious stood in cold lines to enter the tomb of Vladimir Lenin (1870-1924). Lenin's ghost - Communism - haunted Russia for almost 70 years after his death. Looking at today's economic environment, one need turn Kosta's phrase just a tad to make an increasingly obvious point: "Keynes is dead. He just hasn't been buried yet." The failure of the great Keynesian experiment of the early 21st century - i.e. President...

Tea-party activists, keen to build on their success toppling GOP incumbents in primaries this year, are already targeting more Republican veterans in the 2012 election. GOP senators like Bob Corker, above, have drawn criticism from tea-party activists for some of the positions they have taken over the years. Sen. Olympia Snowe of Maine, one of the most liberal Republicans in Congress, already has a conservative GOP primary opponent. Sen. Orrin Hatch (R., Utah), Sen. Bob Corker (R., Tenn.) and Sen. Richard Lugar (R., Indiana) have all drawn fire from the right wing of their party. Tea-party activists have put these...

Tennessee’s U.S. senators are among the richest of the 535-member Congress, according to newly released financial disclosures. U.S. Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., added more than $1 million to his wealth in 2009. With a worth last year of at least $18.3 million, he’s the 16th-richest member of Congress, according to an analysis by The Hill, a Washington, D.C., political newsletter. U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., reported no change last year but remained among the wealthiest senators, with a net worth of at least $12.1 million, The Hill reported. Among The Hill’s 50 wealthiest members of Congress, three were from Georgia...

President Barack Obama and Democratic leaders in Congress should swear off any major action during a lame-duck Congress, a Republican senator said Friday. Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) said if Democrats want to add stability to the economy, they should pledge not to move legislation that might not otherwise pass during the congressional session following Election Day. "I think one of the great things the administration can do to cause people to settle down is to say, absolutely, that they would oppose any great activity in a lame-duck session," Corker said during an appearance on CNBC. Republicans have expressed worry that...

After almost two years of calmly apologizing for American exceptionalism, quietly extending rights to those who have killed thousands of American citizens (and those who want to do the same) and steadily pressing a socialist agenda that defies both American majority opinion and American precedent; President Barack Obama is losing his cool. Foreign attackers didn't phase him and dissent over domestic issues didn't seem to register with him Not even the traditional opponent of a sitting president, the White House Press Corps, has been able to get under his skin. Granted he won't give them the opportunity, reducing their access...

It was billed as a high-noon cease-fire between President Barack Obama and Senate Republicans, but the rare, private Capitol Hill meeting instead turned into a heated shootout at the notion that anyone in the room has bipartisan intentions this election year. When Obama appealed for bipartisanship on legislation in the six months remaining before Election Day, freshman Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., confronted him, the senator later told reporters. "I told him I thought there was a degree of audacity in him even showing up today after what happened with financial regulation," Corker said after the meeting. "I asked him how...

The Senate today rejected a proposal by Sen. Bob Corker, R-Tenn., to impose a minimum 5% down payment for virtually all home mortgages. The amendment to the broader financial regulatory overhaul bill, which failed 42-57, would have required income verification and an assessment of borrowers’ ability to repay as well. Corker’s proposal also would have stripped out a provision that required financial firms securitizing loans to keep a 5% portfolio risk.

I just got this email from Bob Corker after sending him a letter voicing my opposition to PR statehood. Thank you for taking the time to contact my office regarding your concern with Puerto Rico becoming a state. Your input is important to me, and I appreciate the time you took to share your thoughts. As you may know, Puerto Rico is a territory of the United States and as of 1917 the people of Puerto Rico are U.S. citizens. As a U.S. territory Puerto Rico can establish a local government with its own constitution that applies to local governing....

Wednesday, March 31, 2010, 1:59pm CDT Corker: Health reform won't be repealed Nashville Business Journal - by Brian Reisinger Staff Writer U.S. Sen. Bob Corker said Wednesday that Republican efforts to repeal sweeping health care reform are futile, and instead promoted incremental fixes in a wide-ranging talk in Nashville. In the immediate aftermath of the reform’s passage, many of Corker’s Republican colleagues, including 2008 presidential contender Sen. John McCain, have pledged to repeal the legislation. Corker described that as unlikely, given the reality of needing 67 votes in the Senate to overcome a presidential veto of repeal legislation. “The fact...

Tennessee Sen. Bob Corker Believes There is Still Room for Compromise on Health Care. BY SHAILAGH MURRAY Republican Sen. Bob Corker stood before a packed high school auditorium this week for his 24th and final town hall meeting of the summer, sketching out his vision for the bipartisan health-care plan he says he is convinced Congress can pass.