News Blog for social, fiscal & national security conservatives who believe in God, family & the USA. Upholding the rights granted by God & guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution, traditional family values, "republican" principles / ideals, transparent & limited "smaller" government, free markets, lower taxes, due process of law, liberty & individual freedom. Content approval rests with the ARRA News Service Editor. Opinions are those of the authors. While varied positions are reported, beliefs & principles remain fixed. No revenue is generated for or by this "Blog" - no paid ads - no payments for articles.Fair Use Doctrine is posted & used. Blogger/Editor/Founder: Bill Smith, Ph.D. [aka: OzarkGuru & 2010 AFP National Blogger of the Year] Contact: editor@arranewsservice.com (Pub. Since July, 2006)Home PageFollow @arra
One of the penalties for refusing to participate in politics
is that you end up being governed by your inferiors. -- Plato
(429-347 BC)
Thursday, January 29, 2009
DeMint Sponsors Amendment to Reinstate Mexico City Policy
Yesterday, U.S. Senator Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) made the following statementafter he joined U.S. Senator Mel Martinez (R-Florida) and others in introducing an amendment to reinstate the Mexico City Policy during debate on the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) bill. Last week, President Obama overturned the Mexico City Policy by Executive Order, thereby allowing the use of taxpayer dollars to fund and promote abortion overseas. “Taxpayers should never be forced to pay for the destruction of human life, here at home or overseas,” said Senator Jim DeMint. “President Obama campaigned on a platform of reducing abortions, yet one of his first official acts was to force millions of American taxpayers who find this practice immoral to pay for more abortions overseas.”
Without the Mexico City Policy restrictions, countries that have strong pro-life laws may be forced to reduce their protection of the unborn in order to receive U.S. foreign aid. “We cannot have a debate about protecting the health of children while we’re use tax dollars to destroy the lives of the most vulnerable children. Children are a precious blessing and this amendment ensures American taxpayers will not be forced to support ending the lives of unborn children abroad.”
Please contact Arkansas Senator Blanche Lincoln and Senator Mark Pryor and ask them to support this legislation would stop taxpayer funding of abortions overseas.Tags:abortion, Mexico City policy, SCHIPTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
Stimulus: Promoting Birth Control, Not Self-Control
Tony Perkins, FRC: Exactly what kind of stimulus did Speaker Nancy Pelosi have in mind? That's a question more Americans are asking now that details are trickling in about the controversial $825 billion "economic recovery" package. As it stands, more than 10 percent of the proposal--$87 billion--would allow states to expand their "family planning" services through Medicaid. The country's recession is crippling families, and the Democrats' solution is spending billions of dollars on contraception? On yesterday's "This Week" program on ABC, George Stephanopoulos pressed Speaker Pelosi for an explanation.
STEPHANOPOULOS: Hundreds of millions of dollars to expand family planning services. How is that stimulus? PELOSI: Well, the family planning services reduce cost... The states are in terrible fiscal budget crises now and part of what we do for children's health... [is] to help the states meet their financial needs... [O]ne of the initiatives you mentioned, the contraception, will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government. STEPHANOPOULOS: So no apologies for that? PELOSI: No apologies. No. We have to deal with the consequences of the downturn in our economy.
In other words, children are a burden to the economy, and Pelosi believes it's the government's responsibility to eliminate them. More than anything, her comments underscore the shortsightedness of these liberal policies. All reports indicate that the global family is on the decline. Although America's birth rate isn't plunging like that of European countries, it has slowed. The reason we don't find ourselves in a "demographic winter" is largely because of the fertility rates of our immigrants, many of whom come from cultures that value life. Overall, the U.S. is hovering at its replacement level, which is hardly enough to finance the Baby Boomers' retirement. If Pelosi and her Congress continue to deemphasize the family, America will travel even farther down the deadly path of our European friends.
In the meantime, Congress continues to spend outside of its means, proving that the nation will need more children--not less--to help pay the bills for Social Security, Medicaid, and other government entitlements that Democrats hope to expand. Obviously, there's a practical danger in suggesting that babies are problems or "punishments" (as President Obama called them) instead of blessings that build bridges to the future. For a realistic look at real economic recovery, we encourage you to read FRC's just released tax policy proposal:FRC: Taxes in the Stimulus Package and the New CongressSee also:Heritage Foundation brief:What Is the Spending Multiplier on a Pack of Condoms?Tags:contraception, economic stimulus, Family Research Council, FRC, Nancy Pelosi, Tony PerkinsTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
Yesterday, the Senate voted 60-34 to confirm Timothy Geithner as Treasury secretary. See:The B.O. Republicans who voted for Geithner Many Americans are suffering frustration over the double standard of special "grace" to Geithner who violated the law and now gets oversee the very agency (the IRS) that will enforce those same rules on the taxpayers.
Senate begins consideration of the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (SCHIP) expansion bill (H.R. 2). Actions in the House continue to be irrational. President Barack Obama is scheduled to visit the Republican policy lunch today for a formal introduction as president and for a potential discussion of his economic proposals.
As the stimulus bill continues to be worked on in Congress, it’s becoming clearer that Democrats have overreached in crafting it. Despite admonishments from President Obama not to throw earmarks and pet projects in the bill, Democrats in Congress simply couldn’t help themselves, “larding up the $825 billion bill with $50 million in arts subsidies, $200 million for teacher bonuses and a whopping $15.6 billion worth of Pell Grants for college students,” as theLas Vegas Review-Journal put it yesterday.
Indeed, even the San Francisco Chronicle is skeptical of the spending projects in the House version of the bill. In an editorial today, the Chronicle wonders, “Are the shopping lists designed to reward political bases or genuinely get the economy rolling?” It notes that “One wish list approved by the Democratic-controlled House Appropriations Committee goes on for 12 pages.” The editorial concludes, “before the solutions are chosen, the administration must present a clear rationale for which items will qualify - and why - for an enormous spending plan that is supposed to lay the foundation for an economic recovery. That hasn’t happened yet.”
At least House Speaker Nancy Pelosi may have been embarrassed enough to consider dropping one of the strangest expenditures put forward: funding for birth control. The AP reports that “Democratic officials say House leaders are seriously considering deleting family planning funds for the low-income from an economic stimulus bill” after being asked by the Obama administration.
However, there remains the question of whether all this spending will actually get money into the economy in a timely fashion. A new CBO report out today shows that the Democrats’ bill won’t even meet the goals laid out by the Obama White House for timely spending. According to Reuters, the bill “will pour some $525.5 billion, or 64%, via spending and tax cuts into the ailing economy within 19 months,” but the White House target was 75%. Of course, the second half of 2010 is hardly the “swift and extraordinary action” on the economy Obama said he wanted yesterday.
On the Today Show this morning, Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell noted, “Frankly, what’s developing here is [Obama’s] biggest problem is with his own party, the Democratic Party, which seems to be drifting away from what he said he wanted, which was for the package to include at least 40 percent tax relief and to be earmark-free.”Tags:US Congress, US House, US Senate, Washington D.C.To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
Dr. Bill Smith (Ozark Guru): In the Arkansas Ozarks, we love fly fishing be for bass, trout or pan fish. But one of my delights is standing in the White River and enticing a trout to rise to my offered "nypmh" or "woolly bugger."
The same is true for us political junkies. We enjoy hearing rumors that a person is at least considering rising to the call to run for office. Jason Tolbert, a CPA, blogger, and videographer has kept his ear to the "concrete" for news about potential candidates. Previously, he broke news about Tim Griffin’s possible run for the Senateas the republican challenger to incumbent U.S. Sen. Blanche Lincoln.
Now Jason has done it again. He has identified that one of his former university friends, Mark Darr, has begun the initial stages of preparing for a campaignas a republican candidate to challenge incumbent Arkansas Lieutenant Governor Bill Halter. Also, Jason has heard rumors that two others who may be considering running for the position.
We hope that many others will rise to the challenge and come forward as republican candidates to challenge democrats state-wide at all levels from county offices, to the state offices, to candidates for Congress. And Jason, thank you for searching out and keeping us informed but don't forget that in the far northern reaches of the Arkansas Ozarks, the trout are waiting. And that's no rumor!Tags:Arkansas, Bill Smith, fly fishing, Ozark Guru, presidential candidates, RepublicanTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
The B.O. Republicans who voted for Geithner - Video of Inhofe’s statement
Hat Tip and Thank you to Michelle Malkin:
Here is the roll call vote on the [Tim] Geithner nomination:
And here are the 10 B.O. (Barack Obama/Bend Over) Republicans who sided with Obama and the Dems:
Corker (R-TN)
Cornyn (R-TX)
Crapo (R-ID)
Ensign (R-NV)
Graham (R-SC)
Question: Where was GOP Sen. Kit Bond (R-MO)?
Update - Answer: Missed his plane, but would have voted against.
***
Sen. Jim Inhofe’s statement on the floor in opposition to Geithner says it all. Mark his words:
Tags:GOP, Michelle Malkin, Secretary of Treasury, Tim Geither, video, voteTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
In the fall, he told the Washington Blade what gay activists could expect under an Obama presidency. "I will continue to do what I’ve done throughout my career and in this campaign," he said, "speak out on behalf of the cause for … for LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and 'transgendered') Americans." In April 2008, Obama told a gay-activist magazine: "I for a very long time have been interested in repeal of DOMA" (the Defense of Marriage Act, which is the only thing preventing same-sex "marriage" from spreading across the U.S.).
Obama stood against all three marriage-protection amendments in the November elections (California, Arizona and Florida), saying: "I support extending fully equal rights and benefits to same-sex couples under both state and federal law. That is why I oppose the divisive and discriminatory efforts to amend the California Constitution, and similar efforts to amend the U.S. Constitution or those of other states.” Gary Bauer, president of American Values responded: "Did you catch that? According to Senator Obama, if you try to make sure that marriage remains the union of one man and one woman in your home state, YOU are being 'divisive and discriminatory.' "
Obama has pledged support for special rights for homosexual employees, as well as the creation of a new class of crimes based on the victim's real or perceived gender identity. He wants to allow same-sex couples to adopt, guaranteeing those children will grow up without either a mom or a dad. More of his radical agenda is spelled out at WhiteHouse.gov.
Although Obama has pledged allegiance to the gay and "transgender" agenda, he refuses to support those who are dealing with unwanted same-sex attractions. His Council for Faith-Based and Neighborhood Partnerships will not provide funding to faith-based organizations if they are working to help people overcome unwanted homosexuality.
"When it comes to moral issues, it is clear that Obama is entirely committed to the radical left-wing ideology at the expense of the common-sense traditional values that have served our nation so well for so long," Bauer said. "Openly embracing homosexual 'marriage' is certainly 'change,' but it’s clearly not the kind of change that most Americans want." Tags:Barack Obama, CitizenLink, DOMA, gay agenda, LGBTTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
Stop the Left's Multi-Billion Dollar Handout to ACORN & Other Liberal Allies - #Pork #TCOT #corruptlibs #diggcon #statebooks
Dick Armey, Chairman FreedomWorks: We knew it was coming, and it’s finally here.After weeks and weeks of anticipating when and how the newer, stronger Democrat-led Congress would first strike against our individual liberties and expand the size of our already bloated government, the wait is over and we now know what we are up against.This week both the House and Senate will be moving a massive $825 billion economic stimulus package full off wasteful spending, and worse still multi-billion dollar handouts to their liberal allies. Specifically, radical Left-wing groups such as the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN) could have access to billions of dollars should this stimulus plan pass.
Take Action NOW! ACORN is an extremist organization that has come under close scrutiny lately for voter fraud activities. They have a notorious reputation for doing anything to get Democrats elected. Should your hard-earned tax dollars be used to make groups like this stronger?It’s pretty obvious what the Democrats are trying to do. They want to strengthen their grassroots backbone so that they can dig in, protect their majority in Congress, and clear the way to enacting their big-government agenda for years to come.In the name of Freedom, we can’t let them get away with this.
The stimulus plan being considered in Congress this week will do nothing to help spur the economy out of recession. What it will do is waste your hard-earned money and strengthen the hand of the Left. Despite all the talk on the Left of bipartisanship and “reaching across the aisle,” fiscally sound approaches to boosting our economy such as tax cuts and tighter spending controls were ignored by the Democrat leadership. Click here to TAKE ACTION and send an urgent email to your Representative and Senators urging them to oppose the stimulus plan. And use our toll-free hotline to Congress at (866) 928-3035 to be connected with the offices of your lawmakers and hammer home this message.
Nancy Pelosi's funding for contraceptives - nothing to do with stimulating the economy!
$650 million for digital TV coupons.
$600 million for new cars for the federal government - will they buy from Detroit Auto Industry!
$6 billion for colleges/universities – many which have billion dollar endowments.
$50 million in funding for the National Endowment of the Arts.
$44 million for repairs to U.S. Department of Agriculture headquarters.
$200 million for the National Mall, including $21 million for sod.
Tags:ACORN, action alert, Congressional Pork, Dick Armey, economic stimulus, Freedom WorksTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
Update (6:10 pm): Geithner confirmed by 60-34 vote .
Senate reconvenes at 2 pm today. At 4 pm it is scheduled to begin debate on the nomination of Timothy Geithner to be Treasury Secretary with a vote expected around 6 pm. Following the vote on Geithner, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid plans to move to the SCHIP expansion bill (H.R. 2). It appears that many republican senators are "talking the talk" but are not "walking the walk" and will most likely vote for confirmation. The same can be said for any democrat that has cried foul about anyone who has not but "might have" violated the law. Geithner knowing violated the income tax law even after having been advised otherwise and now appears to be the person that both Pres. Obama and Democrats in Congress want to be in charge of the IRS and the Treasury. What a great motivator for the rest of us and the banks to follow the law. But then again, Geithner will now have evidence his overcoming his personal lack of principles by forcing the rest of America to follow the laws he broke. Someone wake me up from this horrible dream - wishful thinking but could enough Senators serve the American people instead of Washington and Obama's political interests and vote "no" on this confirmation. A special thank you to Sen. Jim Bunning (R-KY) for clearly defining why no one should vote for the confirmation of Geithner.
As the Democrats’ massive $825 billion economic stimulus bill continues to be considered in congressional committees, several prominent newspapers are questioning the concepts behind the bill and the dubious spending Democrats are stuffing it with.
In an editorial today, The Wall Street Journal dubs the bill “a time machine” because “[t]hat may be the only way to explain how spending on public works in 2011 and beyond will help the economy today.” The Journal reminds readers of last week’s CBO report, which found that “a mere $26 billion of the House stimulus bill’s $355 billion in new spending would actually be spent in the current fiscal year, and just $110 billion would be spent by the end of 2010.” Of course, the inconvenient report was quickly removed from the House Appropriations Committee website, according to the WSJ.
Other newspapers note the grab bag of spending projects in the bill and wonder how they’re supposed to create jobs. USA Today asks, “[H]ow does adding $2.1 billion to let 110,000 more kids participate in Head Start jump-start economic activity? Or devoting $150 million to aviation safety research or $50 million to the National Endowment for the Arts?”
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s hometown paper, the Las Vegas Review-Journal, writes, “congressional Democrats are showing no remorse in larding up the $825 billion bill with $50 million in arts subsidies, $200 million for teacher bonuses and a whopping $15.6 billion worth of Pell Grants for college students.” The Review-Journal also wonders, “[H]ow does all this jolt the economy? How does this create the jobs needed to support a recovery?”
The Washington Post wrote yesterday, “For sheer irrationality, it would be hard to top the $4.19 billion the bill would give to the Neighborhood Stabilization Program, on top of $4 billion authorized last year. This program gives local governments money to buy and rehabilitate homes that have been foreclosed on -- thus giving lenders an incentive to foreclose on more houses.” Despite all this, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Sunday “boldly defended a move to add birth control funding to the new economic ‘stimulus’ package, claiming ‘contraception will reduce costs to the states and to the federal government,’” according to Drudge.
The Wall Street Journal nicely sums up one of the key problems with the stimulus bill: “The spending portion of the stimulus, in short, isn’t really about the economy. It’s about promoting long-time Democratic policy goals, such as subsidizing health care for the middle class and promoting alternative energy. The ‘stimulus’ is merely the mother of all political excuses to pack as much of this spending agenda as possible into a single bill when Mr. Obama is at his political zenith.”Tags:Jim Bunning, Nancy Pelosi, Tim Geither, US Congress, US House, US Senate, Washington D.C.To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
Tony Perkins, Family Research Council: Americans watched on television as President Bush's jumbo jet soared out of sight yesterday--and with him, a long record of protecting the unborn. Although the Obama administration is a little over 24 hours old, the new President has already set to work undoing years of pro-life and pro-family policy.
Minutes after Obama took the oath of office, the transfer of power was made complete on the White House website. The page, once home to a host of family values, now welcomes an extreme collection of anti-life, anti-woman, and anti-family agendas. Under the caption "civil rights," Obama pledges to fight for nationwide civil unions, repeal of the Defense of Marriage Act, homosexual adoption, the Employment Non-Discrimination Act, expanded "hate crimes," and over 1,100 costly same-sex benefits. He promises to repeal "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" as well as block a federal amendment to preserve marriage. In exchange for the support of groups like Planned Parenthood, the abortion business is also due for a rich payoff from the 44th president, including his support of abortion-on-demand, more funding for "family planning" programs, embryonic stem cell experiments, and tax-funded abortion.
This city may have changed overnight, but our values are enduring. We will continue to advance faith, family, and freedom in the next four years. See also:Associated Press: Celebration over, Obama plunges into workday one Tags:civil unions, Family Research Council, homosexual marriage, Mexico City policy, pro-life, Tony PerkinsTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
Free At Last & The Right to Petition Protected One More Time
The following is an excerpt from today's article by Paul Jacob in Townhall. Paul is both a friend and advocate for freedom and citizen's rights. He was falsely charged by the Oklahoma Attorney General Drew Edmondson with “conspiracy to defraud the state” along with Rick Carpenter, a Tulsa political activist and Susan Johnson, head of National Voter Outreach. The three became known as the Oklahoma Three and symbolized the rights of taxpayers and suffered through the year and four monthly ordeal with dignity. In Paul's own words:
The Attorney General alleged that we willfully conspired to hire non-residents, non-Oklahomans, to circulate petitions on two ballot measures: One, the Taxpayer Bill of Rights, a measure to cap state spending; the other, a property rights measure called Protect Our Homes. Edmondson launched a media campaign, writing an op-ed and visiting a TV talk show to expound on how guilty we were.
We were innocent. Those actually managing the petition effort on the ground onsulted with state officials and were informed that it was indeed lawful for people to move to Oklahoma to work on the petition drive. The opinions of the regular enforcers of the law didn’t count, though. The state supreme court kept the Taxpayer Bill of Rights initiative off the ballot, ruling that anyone not intending to “permanently” reside in Oklahoma was not a resident. The court also tossed out the petitions of circulators whose residency status was challenged without ever affording those circulators an opportunity to defend themselves. One thing was certain: more than 15 percent of Oklahoma voters had very willfully signed to put the issue to a vote . . . a vote they were denied.
That wasn’t enough, however. The issue could always come back via a new petition drive. So could other issues. Soon, the Attorney General decided to go a step further, indicting the three of us on criminal charges. No one was charged as a non-resident circulator. Instead, the state took a swipe at
• one local political activist,
• the head of a major petition company that had worked on numerous conservative and libertarian issues, and
• me, an advocate for many national campaigns for term limits, property rights, spending restraint, and the like.
The prosecution was roundly blasted, right and left, by Steve Forbesand Ralph Nader, by the Wall Street Journal, Pulitzer prize-winning columnist Paul Greenberg and Tecumseh Countywide News in central Oklahoma. Most importantly, we were blessed with faith and trust that we would prevail in court, in the end . . . if we could afford to defend our rights for what might have been many years. We were under indictment for a year and four months, paid many legal bills, and still not even a preliminary hearing had been completed.
But just before Christmas, the federal Tenth Circuit struck down Oklahoma’s ban on non-residents circulating petitions, ruling the law an unconstitutional impediment to citizen petitioning. Not only did we not break the law, it wasn’t a law at all. In the last year, three federal circuits have overturned state residency restrictions, each time by unanimous panels.
Last Wednesday, Edmondson’s request for a rehearing by the Tenth Circuit was denied. On Thursday, he decided not to appeal the Tenth Circuit decision to the U.S. Supreme Court after all — and not to prosecute our case. Case dismissed. We’ve won a victory. The Oklahoma Three are free.
. . . In Oklahoma, citizens are demanding reform. Legislation that would open up the state’s initiative system and make it usable again is under consideration. I’m not through fighting back, either. Working for Citizens in Charge Foundation, I’m more driven than ever to work with people all across the political spectrum to protect and expand the right of the people to check their government through initiatives, referendum and recall. It’s true: Some see the initiative as a threat. My goodness, citizen control of government might break out! We can always hope. And, as free citizens, work for that day. Tags:Oklahoma, Paul Jacob, Free At Last, Right to Petition, petitions, taxpayer protectionTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
Rush Limbaugh sat down with Sean Hannity for an interview on Hannity on the Fox News Channel. Hannity interviewed Rush from the southern command center, Rushs studios, in South Florida. Hannity asked Rush for his general opinions on President Obama. Rush said the fact that Obama is historic is now irrelevant. Hes suspicious of Obama because the media has not vetted him and judge him based on how he says things, not what he says. Rush answered the question: Does he want Obama to succeed?
Tags:Barack Obama, Fox News, news, Politics, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, SuccessTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. Thanks!
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