Protecting Bad Bureaucrats or Serving America’s Veterans?

by Newt Gingrich: On Thursday, Republicans on the House Veterans Affairs Committee took a decisive step to make serving America’s veterans more important than protecting bad bureaucrats.

In setting the precedent that bureaucrats will be held accountable and that bureaucratic incompetence and dishonesty will not be tolerated, the Veterans Administration Accountability Act (H.R. 1994) takes head-on the system of entrenched, unaccountable bureaucracy that began in 1883, when Congress passed the law creating today’s civil service system.

Challenging that 132-year-old system is an extraordinary action.

Congressman Jeff Miller of Florida, Chairman of the House Committee on Veterans Affairs, has shown consistent courage and determination in seeking to reform the Veterans Administration so it can effectively serve veterans.

The Veterans Administration Accountability Act has drawn support from veterans across the country.

The American Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars of the United States (VFW), Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA), Concerned Veterans for America (CVA), AMVETS, Paralyzed Veterans of America (PVA), and Vietnam Veterans of America (VVA) have all come out in favor of the bill.

The consensus that is growing for profound reform at the Veterans Administration comes after nearly a decade of adding money and personnel without seeing better outcomes.

Since 2006, the VA budget has increased by 90 percent and the number of employees has grown by nearly 100,000 (a 40% increase). The VA is now dramatically bigger than the entire Marine Corps.

Yet after all of that effort, a recent report warned that the number of veterans waiting a month or more for service had jumped by 50 percent in the last year.

As Chairman Jeff Miller has said, “What’s missing from the equation is not money or manpower; it’s accountability.”
The VA Accountability Act passed out of the Subcommittee on Economic Opportunity yesterday on a straight party-line vote of 5-4.

It will now go to the Committee on Veterans’ Affairs for markup and then to the House floor. Senator Marco Rubio has carried the companion bill in the Senate.

As people learn more about how bad bureaucrats and bad bureaucracy are hurting our veterans, the pressure to pass this simple accountability reform will increase.

I encourage you to contact your representatives in Congress and urge them to cosponsor the Veterans Administration Accountability Act.

What is at stake is much more than just reforming the Veterans Administration.

At a time when the Director of the Office of Personnel Management can shrug off a hacking attack that may have resulted in the Chinese stealing 18 million federal records, we need real reforms.

The Director’s assertion that she doesn’t “believe anyone is personally responsible” for missing a year-long cyberattack which lost the personal records of 18 million people typifies the collapse of competence and accountability in the federal bureaucracy.

The IRS loses billions each year to theft and false refunds. An estimated 26 percent of Earned Income Tax Credit payments were made in error last year (costing up to $16 billion). The GAO estimates that the IRS lost another $6 billion in fraudulent refunds.

The State Department routinely loses money, fails to operate in a timely manner, and runs systems that are simply incompetent.

The Pentagon contains billions of dollars’ worth of waste. It can’t even keep track of its spending using modern accounting systems, and routinely fudges numbers to make its books reconcile for the Treasury.

Hopefully Chairman Miller’s and Senator Rubio’s bills for accountability in the Veterans Administration will be the beginning of a major effort by Congress to enable the bureaucracy in every department and agency to be held accountable and managed effectively.

The next step after reforming personnel management should be to ask the departments to identify the Congressionally-imposed rules, regulations, and restrictions that are almost as great an impediment to effectively managing the government as is the complexity of the bureaucracy itself.

Elected officials should feel encouraged by a recent Clarus poll which found that the American people are overwhelming ready for real change in Washington bureaucracies.

As Ron Faucheux reported, the poll asked “What if a candidate for President made government reform, management performance, and cleaning out obsolete laws and regulations, major campaign issues — would that make you much more inclined to vote for that candidate…?”

As Ron summarized the results:
78% of voters say they’d be more inclined to vote for a candidate for President who made government reform a major issue. Also, 72% of Democrats, 88% of Republicans and 71% of independents agree. While government reform would appear to be a good issue for candidates of both parties, it’s especially powerful among the Republican electorate. Almost half of GOP voters (48%) say they’d be “much more” inclined to vote for a candidate who made reform a major issue; among Democrats, it’s 33%.”Chairman Jeff Miller and Senator Marco Rubio are leading the way in a reform effort the American people will support and encourage. This week’s vote could become the beginning of real and historic change.
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Newt Gingrich is a former Georgia Congressman and Speaker of the U.S. House. He co-authored and was the chief architect of the "Contract with America" and a major leader in the Republican victory in the 1994 congressional elections. He is noted speaker and writer. The above commentary was shared via Gingrich Productions.

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Governor Walker Signs SB 35, Repealing 48-hour Waiting Period

NRA-ILA: The National Rifle Association scored another victory for gun rights in Wisconsin today when Governor Scott Walker signed into law Senate Bill (SB) 35. The new law eliminates a 48-hour waiting period on all point-of-sale handgun purchases in the state.

“This important measure marks the end of an antiquated law that’s served as nothing but a needless burden on law-abiding gun owners in the Badger state,” said Chris W. Cox, executive director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action. “We applaud the state legislature for making the preservation of Second Amendment rights a priority.”

SB 35 repeals a 1979 law enacted to allow time for background checks, and to create a so-called “cooling off” period for someone intent on committing a crime. Today, background checks can be completed while a customer is still in the store, and statistics routinely show waiting periods have no impact on homicide rates. In fact, studies show crime rates are higher in states with a waiting period than in those without.

“On behalf of all NRA members and Second Amendment supporters in Wisconsin, the NRA would like to thank SB 35’s lead sponsors, Senator Van Wanggaard and Representative Romaine Quinn, as well as Governor Scott Walker,” concluded Cox.
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Established in 1871, the National Rifle Association is America's oldest civil rights and sportsmen's group. More than five million members strong, NRA continues to uphold the Second Amendment and advocates enforcement of existing laws against violent offenders to reduce crime. The Association remains the nation's leader in firearm education and training for law-abiding gun owners, law enforcement and the armed services.

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FBI Files Document Communism in Valerie Jarrett’s Family

Valerie June Bowman Jarrett is a Senior Advisor to the President of the United States and Assistant to the President for Public Engagement and Intergovernmental Affairs in the Obama administration. She is a Chicago lawyer, businesswoman, and civic leader. Prior to that she served as a co-chairman of the Obama–Biden Transition Project.

Valerie Jarrett
Imgage via White House website

by Judicial Watch: Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) files obtained by Judicial Watch reveal that the dad, maternal grandpa and father-in-law of President Obama’s trusted senior advisor, Valerie Jarrett, were hardcore Communists under investigation by the U.S. government.

Jarrett’s dad, pathologist and geneticist Dr. James Bowman, had extensive ties to Communist associations and individuals, his lengthy FBI file shows. In 1950 Bowman was in communication with a paid Soviet agent named Alfred Stern, who fled to Prague after getting charged with espionage. Bowman was also a member of a Communist-sympathizing group called the Association of Internes and Medical Students. After his discharge from the Army Medical Corps in 1955, Bowman moved to Iran to work, the FBI records show.

According to Bowman’s government file the Association of Internes and Medical Students is an organization that “has long been a faithful follower of the Communist Party line” and engages in un-American activities. Bowman was born in Washington D.C. and had deep ties to Chicago, where he often collaborated with fellow Communists. JW also obtained documents on Bowman from the U.S. Office of Personnel Management (OPM) showing that the FBI was brought into investigate him for his membership in a group that “follows the communist party line.” The Jarrett family Communist ties also include a business partnership between Jarrett’s maternal grandpa, Robert Rochon Taylor, and Stern, the Soviet agent associated with her dad.

Jarrett’s father-in-law, Vernon Jarrett, was also another big-time Chicago Communist, according to separate FBI files obtained by JW as part of a probe into the Jarrett family’s Communist ties. For a period of time Vernon Jarrett appeared on the FBI’s Security Index and was considered a potential Communist saboteur who was to be arrested in the event of a conflict with the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR). His FBI file reveals that he was assigned to write propaganda for a Communist Party front group in Chicago that would “disseminate the Communist Party line among…the middle class.”

It’s been well documented that Valerie Jarrett, a Chicago lawyer and longtime Obama confidant, is a liberal extremist who wields tremendous power in the White House. Faithful to her roots, she still has connections to many Communist and extremist groups, including the Muslim Brotherhood. Jarrett and her family also had strong ties to Frank Marshal Davis, a big Obama mentor and Communist Party member with an extensive FBI file.

JW has exposed Valerie Jarrett’s many transgressions over the years, including her role in covering up a scandalous gun-running operation carried out by the Department of Justice (DOJ). Last fall JW obtained public records that show Jarrett was a key player in the effort to cover up that Attorney General Eric Holder lied to Congress about the Fast and Furious, a disastrous experiment in which the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco Firearms and Explosives (ATF) allowed guns from the U.S. to be smuggled into Mexico so they could eventually be traced to drug cartels. Instead, federal law enforcement officers lost track of hundreds of weapons which have been used in an unknown number of crimes, including the murder of a U.S. Border Patrol agent in Arizona.

In 2008 JW got documents linking Valerie Jarrett, who also served as co-chairman of Obama’s presidential transition team, to a series of real estate scandals, including several housing projects operated by convicted felon and Obama fundraiser/friend Antoin “Tony” Rezko. According to the documents obtained from the Illinois Secretary of State, Valerie Jarrett served as a board member for several organizations that provided funding and support for Chicago slum projects operated by Rezko.

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IRS Employees Erased 422 Backup Tapes Containing 24,000 of Lois Lerner’s Emails

Lerner testifies before the United
States House Committee on Oversight
and Government Reform in 2014.

by Leah Jessen: Investigators at the Internal Revenue Service are looking to agency employees as the reason thousands of emails from former IRS official Lois Lerner were lost, and the agency’s watchdog said today their actions were a mistake.

The Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration (TIGTA) J. Russell George testified before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee and told lawmakers IRS employees erased 422 backup tapes that housed 24,000 emails sent to and from Lerner.

Employees erased the contents of the tapes just a month after IRS officials were told that thousands of Lerner’s emails were missing because of a hard drive crash.

In his testimony, George said he “did not uncover evidence that the erasure was done in furtherance of an effort to destroy evidence or conceal information from Congress and/or law enforcement.”

Additionally, the IRS watchdog noted that it’s likely the employees didn’t know about a 2013 directive instructing them not to destroy such email backup tapes during the investigation.

Despite George’s assurances, Hans von Spakovsky, senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal the findings are troubling.

“Neither the IRS nor the Justice Department, which has supposedly been investigating the IRS targeting of conservative organizations, would tolerate the destruction of over 400 backup tapes and 24,000 emails,” he said. “They would be in court trying to have an individual American or a business charged with destruction of evidence.”

“This is particularly egregious because it happened after the IRS had received a subpoena and a protective order prohibiting the destruction of the emails,” von Spakovsky continued. “I also have a hard time believing that IRS officials did not know this was wrong—everyone in the agency knew about the Lerner scandal and the investigation.”

Investigation into Lerner’s emails began after George released an audit two years ago detailing IRS agents’ heavy scrutiny of applications from tea party and conservative groups filing for tax-exempt status.

Lerner was head of the division overseeing tax-exempt organizations during the time the groups were targeted. She retired from the tax agency in 2013.

Last year, the IRS told Congress that Lerner’s hard drive had crashed in 2011, resulting in the loss of thousands of emails sent during the same time period the groups were singled out.

Since then, the IRS has been able to produce 78,000 emails from Lerner that were originally discovered missing.
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Melissa Quinn (@_LeahKay_) is a news reporter for The Daily Signal.

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Republicans Determine Actions After Supreme Court Upholds Obamacare Subsidies

by Melissa Quinn: On the heels of the freshly handed-down Supreme Court ruling on the legality of the subsidies in federally-run exchanges awarded under President Obama’s health care law, congressional Republicans are turning their attention to a budget mechanism that would fast-track a repeal of Obamacare through Congress.

The Supreme Court ruled 6-3 in favor of the Obama administration in King v. Burwell, upholding the federal subsidies awarded under the health care law.

The case examined whether consumers purchasing health insurance on the federal exchange, HealthCare.gov, were eligible to receive subsidies. Obamacare’s plain language limited the availability of those subsidies to states operating their own exchange. However, the law’s advocates insist that the spirit of the law clearly granted subsidies to all consumers.

When the law took effect in October of 2013, just 16 states and the District of Columbia were operating their own exchanges. The remaining 34 states opted to use HealthCare.gov.

In anticipation of the Supreme Court’s ruling, Republicans crafted legislation that would have served as a response to the decision should the high court strike down the federal subsidies. One plan included extending the subsidies through 2017, while another from Rep. Paul Gosar of Arizona eliminated the subsidies altogether and repealed Obamacare’s three most costly mandates.

Now, Republicans are turning to a fast-track tool known as budget reconciliation as their recourse for repealing Obamacare.

Budget reconciliation requires lawmakers to include “instructions” in a budget resolution that would require House and Senate committees to reconcile the law with the budget. House and Senate GOP leaders included broad reconciliation language in this year’s budget resolution that would allow for Obamacare’s repeal.

However, it’s not clear if that’s how the procedure will be used, and in a press conference today, House Speaker John Boehner of Ohio wouldn’t commit to using reconciliation to repeal the health care law.

“There was a lot of talk of using reconciliation to deal with Obamacare — I’m sure there probably still is—but my point is there’s been no decision made as to how to pursue,” he said.

President Obama would almost certainly veto any legislation sent to his desk that rolls back his signature health care law.

Republicans are also drafting their own replacements to Obamacare, though lawmakers haven’t yet coalesced behind a plan.
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Melissa Quinn (@MelissaQuinn97 ) is a news reporter for The Daily Signal.

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SCOTUS Decision on Same-Sex Marriage

Today In Washington, D.C. - June 26, 2015
Congress is not in session today and both chambers will return on Jul 7th after their 4th of July Vacations. No votes occurred in the Senate yesterday. It seemed they were ready to "get out of Dodge," i.e D.C.. SCOTUS was issuing their rabid decisions creating law yesterday and their major reshaping of American Culture was scheduled for today. More on that later.

Yesterday the House passed:
H. Res. 341 (240-184) aka, Booting State Flag with reference to states Confederate heritage. It Resolved, "That the Speaker of the House of Representatives shall remove any State flag containing any portion of the Confederate battle flag, other than a flag displayed by the office of a Member of the House, from any area within the House wing of the Capitol or any House office building, and shall donate any such flag to the Library of Congress."
H.R. 1295 Trade Preferences Extension Act of 2015: (286-138) Agreeing to an amendment by the Senate of House Bill
H.R. 1615 (423-0) — "To direct the Chief FOIA Officer of the Department of Homeland Security to make certain improvements in the implementation of section 552 of title 5, United States Code (commonly known as the Freedom of Information Act), and for other purposes."
H.R. 2200 (420-2) (247-180) - To amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to establish chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear intelligence and information sharing functions of the Office of Intelligence and Analysis of the Department of Homeland Security and to require dissemination of information analyzed by the Department to entities with responsibilities relating to homeland security, and for other purposes."

A couple additional comments relative to yesterdays "SCOTUScare" decision on the Affordable Care Act. Despite the triumphant rhetoric from President Obama and Democrats in Congress, yesterday’s ruling by the Supreme Court on federal exchange subsidies doesn’t change the long list of problems inherent to Obamacare, nor does it change the law’s longstanding unpopularity with voters.

Recognizing this reality, Politico writes today, “Obamacare has cleared a second major hurdle at the Supreme Court — but its troubles are far from over. The law is still highly unpopular, and significant structural issues remain: Health insurance rates are rising, many people don’t have as much choice of doctors and hospitals as they’d like, some states continue to struggle with their exchanges, and 21 states still haven’t backed Medicaid expansion. . . .

“Some of the states that decided to set up an exchange are dealing with ongoing technological problems or financial difficulties, especially now that they can’t get federal grants.

“Hawaii decided earlier this year to move to HealthCare.gov for enrollment, and Colorado and Vermont are still working to fix problems with their systems. Some Republicans in blue states are already saying their states should switch to the federal exchange now that the subsidies will stay nationwide. . . .

“The law’s legal problems are not yet over, either. Another challenge to the ACA mandate that employers cover contraception in their insurance plans is moving through the courts — and very likely to return that issue to the Supreme Court in the next term. And a suit backed by the House of Representatives against the law’s cost-sharing provisions was filed earlier this year. . . .

“The law remains underwater in the polls.Politico then looks at the many reasons Americans remain unhappy with the effects of Obamacare: “For one, the public is frustrated with insurance premium increases that they view as directly related to Obamacare. A Kaiser Family Foundation analysis found that 2016 premiums are up by a greater percentage than in 2015. Benchmark silver-level plans are rising by an average of 4.4 percent in a select group of cities but could be much higher in parts of the country — with a Wellmark plan in South Dakota wanting to raise rates by 42.9 percent, CareFirst seeking a nearly 30 percent increase in Maryland and Health Care Service Corp. going after a 51.6 percent hike in New Mexico. While premiums were on their way up before the law passed, the public faults Obamacare — and that’s something the White House hasn’t been able to shake. . . .

“Some people who have signed up have been shocked to discover the size of their deductibles or that they can’t go to the doctor they want because insurers have imposed narrow ‘in-network”’ care. . . .

“The law’s future is also threatened by the potential repeal of a few elements that are particularly vulnerable to Democratic opposition.

“Repeal of the medical device tax passed the House last week with nearly enough votes to override a presidential veto. A Medicare payment board that is tasked with controlling health care spending is unpopular with House Democrats, too, and likely to get a repeal vote soon. . . .

“The ‘Cadillac tax’ on high-cost employee health insurance plans, which goes into effect in 2018, is vehemently opposed by labor unions and some Democrats on Capitol Hill.”

So while the president tried to declare the discussion of his unpopular health care law over yesterday, there are clearly many many problems with it that must be highlighted.

TODAY THE SUPREME COURT RELEASED IT 5-4 DECISION REDEFINING MARRIAGE. A definition that has been a bedrock of American society since its foundation.

As Gary Bauer, Campaign for Working Families, noted: Today, five unelected lawyers on the Supreme Court decided that they know better than thousands of years of Judeo-Christian civilization and millions of American voters.

The majority opinion, written by Justice Anthony Kennedy who joined the four most liberal justices, redefines marriage coast-to-coast. Once again, the Supreme Court has imposed its morality on the entire country and told millions of citizens that their votes and their values do no matter.

In his dissent, Chief Justice John Roberts told supporters of same-sex marriage that they could celebrate their victory and the expanded benefits that come with it. "But do not celebrate the Constitution. It had nothing to do with it," he wrote.
"Although the majority randomly inserts the adjective 'two' in various places, it offers no reason at all why the two-person element of the core definition of marriage may be preserved while the man-woman element may not. . . . It is striking how much of the majority's reasoning would apply with equal force to the claim of a fundamental right to plural marriage." ... " “Celebrate the achievement of a desired goal. Celebrate the opportunity for a new expression of commitment to a partner. Celebrate the availability of new benefits. But do not celebrate the Constitution. It had nothing to do with it.”
Justice Antonin Scalia, well-known for his scathing critiques, was particularly harsh in his dissent. He called the decision a "judicial putsch" and compared Justice Kennedy's reasoning to "the mystical aphorisms of the fortune cookie."

Justice Scalia warned that the decision represented a "threat to American democracy." Consider this excerpt:
"Today's decree says that my Ruler, and the Ruler of 320 million Americans coast-to-coast, is a majority of the nine lawyers on the Supreme Court. . . . This practice of constitutional revision by an unelected committee of nine . . . robs the People of the most important liberty they asserted in the Declaration of Independence and won in the Revolution of 1776: the freedom to govern themselves."Justice Clarence Thomas wrote in his dissenting opinion, "Aside from undermining the political processes that protect our liberty, the majority's decision threatens the religious liberty our Nation has long sought to protect."

We will provide more analysis in the days ahead. But there is one thing we must focus on right now: How do we respond?

Are we going to throw up our hands and give up? If that response is widely embraced, I guarantee you that your children will grow up in a country that no longer tolerates religious liberty.

So you can run up the flag of surrender or you can redouble your efforts at your church, within your families and with the groups and candidates you support.

This is absolutely critical in the upcoming 2016 elections. The men and women we elect to public office nominate and confirm the judges who serve on our courts, including the Supreme Court.

Four justices of the Supreme Court are 76 years-old or older. The odds are overwhelming that the next president we elect will have the opportunity to fundamentally change the ideological balance of the Supreme Court.This issue alone would be worth every effort you can possibly make and every dime you could possibly invest between now and next November to ensure that we take back the White House and hold the Senate!

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Congress Must Help Obamacare Victims the Court Ignored

Phil Kerpen

by Phil Kerpen, Contributing Author: The lawyering and the judging is over, and the Supreme Court has ruled that subsidies and mandates that the Obamacare law limited to “an exchange established by the state” also apply to Healthcare-dot-gov. That’s what the Obama administration has claimed since 2011, so there is no disruption of the sort that would have occurred if the government had lost. Democrats won’t roll out the stories of victims who were worried they would lose subsidies. But there were very real victims in the Supreme Court’s King v. Burwell decision. Millions of people who got their hours cut at work because of the employer mandate, which because it is linked to subsidies was at issue in the case, will now continue to suffer. It’s a terrible policy, and Congress needs to repeal it.

In King and related cases, the plaintiffs were individuals and employers subject to mandates only because of the disputed subsidies. The way the employer mandate is written, it applies only to companies with subsidy-eligible employees. No subsidy, no mandate.

A study by former Congressional Budget Office Director Douglas Holtz-Eakin and his colleague Brittany La Couture at the American Action Forum found that 3.3 million Americans now working less than 30 hours a week stood to gain hours if King had prevailed. The study also found that 1.27 million workers would be added to the labor force. Now those millions of Americans remain, thanks to the Supreme Court, victims of the employer mandate. We should not overlook them.

We recently asked members of the nonprofit organization I run, American Commitment, about the impact the employer mandate had on them. We received dozens of heartbreaking stories – many of them from adjunct college instructors, who have been hit especially hard.

Elizabeth Honaker, an English instructor in Sparta, Tenn. with multiple advanced degrees has dedicated her life to teaching. But because of Obamacare’s employer mandate, she can no longer make ends meet.

Honaker said: “In 2013, my supervisor called me in and she said I have some bad news. They told me that Obamacare would forbid me from teaching more than 18 credit hours a year. Otherwise we have to give you healthcare. It just didn’t make any sense.”

She had high hopes for the Supreme Court case, saying “striking down the employer mandate would be a Godsend to me.”

Similarly, Charlie Liebert, an adjunct in Greensboro told us: “I used to teach seven courses. And now I can only teach four as a result of Obamacare. So that’s a 40 percent decrease in my compensation. And I can work more than 30 hours, but Obamacare says I can’t. That’s absurd.”

Obamacare should be fully repealed, but that will be very difficult to accomplish before the next national election. Repealing the employer mandate, on the other hand, could – and should – happen right away.

This need not be a partisan issue. Jimmy Hoffa, Jr. and other union leaders, a core Democratic constituency, famously said Obamacare “will shatter not only our hard-earned health benefits, but destroy the foundation of the 40 hour work week that is the backbone of the American middle class.”

Former White House spokesman Robert Gibbs is on the record that the mandate should be repealed, and last year the liberal Urban Institute came out swinging with a study called: “Why Not Just Eliminate the Employer Mandate?” Their conclusion: “eliminating the employer mandate would eliminate labor market distortions in the law… and have little effect on coverage.”

The employer mandate is hurting millions of Americans, and helping almost nobody. It is hated by key constituencies of both parties. The Supreme Court left it intact. Congress must not.

Or as Elizabeth Honaker put it: “I just want Congress to come to its senses. Give me back my hours, please.”
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Phil Kerpen is president of American Commitment. Follow him at (@kerpen) and on Facebook. He is a contributing author at the ARRA News Service.

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Tags: Phil Kerpen, American Commitment, SCOTUS, decision, King v. Burwell, employer mandate,  reduced work hours, Obamacare victims, hurting millions, Americans, Congress, needs to act, To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Distractions . . .

. . . Loss of American Sovereignty - Fast Track passes under the nose of the American people while everyone was looking at the Confederate flag Issue.

Editorial Cartoon by AF "Tony" Branco

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Senate Commerce Committee Surrenders U.S. Oversight Of The Internet

by Robert Romano, Senior Editor, ALG News Service: Americans for Limited Government President Rick Manning today issued the following statement blasting the Senate Commerce Committee for rejecting by a 3-21 vote an amendment to the Dotcom Act by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) that would have required Congressional approval of any relinquishment of the Internet Assigned Numbers Authority (IANA) to the Internet Corporation of Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN):

"Once again, members of Congress are voting to surrender congressional authority to the Obama administration, without even an opportunity to see what they're voting on. Nobody in Congress has seen ICANN's proposal to commandeer Internet governance from the U.S. government, but the Senate Commerce committee has blindly just authorized whatever plan they might come up with. This is reckless. U.S. government oversight of the IANA functions has guaranteed a free and open Internet for almost two decades. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

"It is alarming the speed with which members of both chambers of Congress are willing to cede U.S. sovereignty to an unaccountable private foundation that is now establishing a global monopoly over DNS resolution. Free of government oversight, there will no longer be any First Amendment protections for the Internet, guaranteeing the IANA functions will one day be used to engage in censorship. In the not so distant future, the Internet will not be so free and open."

Attachments:
"Can Ted Cruz save the Internet?" By Robert Romano, June 24, 2015

Amendment to the Dotcom Act, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), June 24, 2015

Letter to Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation, June 24, 2015

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Government And Politics Won't Solve Our Racial Problem

by Star Parker: When horrible things happen, such as the tragic mass murder that occurred at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, South Carolina, we try to understand because it is through understanding that we solve problems.

Speaking about the incident, Hillary Clinton said: "It is tempting to dismiss a tragedy like this as an isolated incident — to believe that in today's America, bigotry is largely behind us, that institutionalized racism no longer exists. But despite our best efforts and our highest hopes, America's long struggle with race is far from finished."

Some of the Republican candidates for president are taking heat because they have not come out so boldly and clearly as Clinton regarding the racial dimension of this crime.

Here's the problem. No one, particularly with all the information we now have about the deranged young man who admitted to committing this crime, can question his racial motivations. He was a sick, pathological racist.

But Clinton, in her zeal to make political capital from this tragedy, conflated and confused very different things — racial bigotry and institutionalized racism - and as result, at a difficult and sensitive moment, threw out heat when we needed light.

Institutionalized racism is racism that a society officially endorses. It is present when there is a legal framework that supports it.

Institutionalized racism existed in the United States prior to the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Social realities and laws that permitted racial discrimination of various kinds were made illegal by those acts.

So Clinton misrepresents reality to suggest that "institutionalized racism" exists today in America. It does not.

Racial bigotry, on the other hand, is personal behavior. Does it exist? It certainly does. But personal affairs of the heart and affairs of state are different issues.

As Martin Luther King Jr. observed, "morality cannot be legislated, but behavior can be regulated.

Judicial decrees may not change the heart, but they can restrain the heartless."
The civil rights-era laws purged America of legal, institutionalized racism in the spirit of Dr. King, restraining "the heartless."

But why, a half-century later, does so much sick personal racial bigotry remain? Why does there remain such a sharp racial consciousness? Why does it remain so prevalent that individuals are judged by the color of their skin rather than the content of their character?

A good deal of this is driven by the refusal of so many — mostly liberals such as Clinton — to accept King's simple but profound point that racial bigotry is a moral problem and that "morality cannot be legislated."

The plethora of government programs driven by the pretense that government can go beyond just protecting citizens to become an active tool for creating a more just society have worsened the very problem they pretend to address. Making segregation illegal — making discrimination illegal — is far different from forced integration and mandated quotas.

Liberal policies have forced ongoing and increased racial consciousness and division in the country. In doing so, by taking government where it does not belong, trying to solve a moral problem it cannot solve, they have made the problem worse and sharpened, rather than eased, racial tensions.

Worse, taking government where it does not belong has diminished the most important factor needed to solve this problem, which is more, not less, personal moral responsibility by both the victims and the victimizers.

Appreciation for the awesome humility, forgiveness and love demonstrated by the families of the victims of this horrible crime and the other members of this church is the greatest homage we can pay to those who were murdered.

As a nation, we should be turning to the God to whom they were praying, whose teachings they were studying when they were murdered. The answers are there. Not in politics and not in Washington.
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Star Parker is an author and president of CURE, the Center for Urban Renewal and Education. CURE is a non-profit think tank that addresses issues of race and poverty through principles of faith, freedom and personal responsibility.

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Safety, Savings and Symbolism

by Paul Jacob, Contributing Author: How can the U. S. save $2.5 billion a year, reduce the federal workforce by 4,000 hires, and engage in a symbolic act of undoubted patriotism, all at the same time?

Get rid of the Department of Homeland Security.

Matt A. Mayer, a former DHS employee who claims to have "written more on DHS than just about anyone," writes in Reason that dismantling DHS would increase co-ordination and decrease inefficiencies.

Since DHS was put in place, in 2003, to increase governmental co-ordination in the face of terrorist threats, Mayer's charge that it serves the opposite cause should . . . give us pause.

Establishing the DHS didn't get rid of turf wars. Why would it? It increased the turf rather than merely reroute chains of communication and command. All other agencies still exist. Extra turf exacerbates co-ordination difficulty.

And then there's what state and local law enforcement faces: "the multi-headed hydra" The federal operation remains fragmented, which "only ensures that key items will fall through the cracks between these departments, whose personnel spend far too much time fighting each other for primacy than they should. Our enemies couldn't ask for a more fertile environment within which to attack us."

I added the italics, for emphasis.

Ever since Jimmy Carter ran for the presidency on consolidating bureaucratic departments in the nation's capital, but delivered, instead, new departments, the "logic" of adding new bureaucracies onto old has proven to be the "easy answer" for insiders. But a transparent failure, for everyone else.

So, start over. Get rid of the inefficient monster.

And take heart: republics don't have "homelands"; empires do. Let's stop playing the wrong game.

This is Common Sense. I'm Paul Jacob.
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Paul Jacobs is author of Common Sense which provides daily commentary about the issues impacting America and about the citizens who are doing something about them. He is also President of the Liberty Initiative Fund (LIFe) as well as Citizens in Charge Foundation. Jacobs is a contributing author on the ARRA News Service.

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Tags: Paul Jacob, Common Sense, DHS, monster, safety, savings, symbolism To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Sean Hannity: ‘We Need a New Speaker’

Sean Hannity

Rob Bluey, editor-in-chief, The Daily Signal:: Conservative talk-radio host Sean Hannity voiced outrage over Speaker John Boehner’s treatment of House conservatives, calling leadership’s punishment of members “disgusting.”

During an interview Wednesday with two lawmakers who bucked party leadership, Hannity directed his criticism at Boehner, the Ohio Republican, for attacking members of his own party rather than standing up to President Obama.

“So John Boehner is basically doing to you guys what he should be doing to Obama,” Hannity said. “He’s bullying you guys and caves every time he negotiates with Obama.”

“How pathetic in my opinion that John Boehner is so petty,” Hannity told Reps. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., and Ken Buck, R-Colo., two of more than a dozen Republican lawmakers who have faced punishment for failing to toe the party line.

“I find the whole thing disgusting,” Hannity added. “This is why I said we need a new speaker.”

Hannity, who opposed Obama’s trade deal, applauded Meadows and Buck for voting against a rule last week that nearly toppled the plan. In all, 34 Republicans voted against GOP leadership on what is typically a routine procedural motion.

Because of his opposition to the rule, Meadows was booted from his position as the chairman of the Government Operations subcommittee by House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah. He joins a host of other conservatives who experienced Republican leadership’s “culture of punishment” in the wake of last week’s vote.

Leadership removed Reps. Trent Franks of Arizona, Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming and Steve Pearce of New Mexico from the GOP’s whip team last week after they opposed the motion.

Additionally, Reps. Elise Stefanik of New York and Mimi Walters of California—both viewed as close allies of Boehner—called a meeting of freshman lawmakers for early tomorrow morning where the future of their current class president will be discussed.

Rep. Ken Buck, R-Colo., who opposed last week’s procedural rule on Trade Promotion Authority, was elected unanimously to serve as head of the freshman class last year. But, he will likely be removed from the post at tomorrow’s meeting.

Hannity told Buck his fate was sealed even before Republican freshman meet Thursday morning.

“You’re walking into an execution,” Hannity said. “They are going to rip you out of that position.”

Buck joked, “I’ve got a bullet-proof vest I might need to wear.”

Buck added that leadership’s actions have distracted and splintered the Republican caucus.

Meadows told Hannity he expects other Republicans to suffer retribution for voting their conscience.

“I believe there’s more to come,” Meadows said. “They’ve been holding meetings with other members who voted against this rule. So it’s important that the listeners truly just flood the phone lines with calls to say this is not the American way. It may be the D.C. way, but it’s not working for us.

“It’s time we stand up to those who believe power should be for the speaker and a few of his elite lieutenants. Now’s the time we have to stand up. Because if not, we’re going to lose our democracy.”

Meadows said he was grateful for an outpouring of support. “Our phones have been ringing off the hook,” he told Hannity.

As the interview drew to a close, the popular talk-radio host concluded that it was time for Boehner to go.

“Our only hope is that there’s a strong enough conservative elected that can restore order and common sense and a vision to the Republican caucus, which has proven itself to be weak,” Hannity said.

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Tags: Rob Bluey, The Daily Signal, Sean Hannity, Speaker of the House To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

SCOTUS Releases Divided Decisions | Obama declares 'The Affordable Care Act Here To Stay'

Today in Washington, D.C. - June 25, 2015
The House reconvened at 9 AM today.
Bills which may be considered:
H.R. 1735 - "To authorize appropriations for fiscal year 2016 for military activities of the Department of Defense, for military construction, and for defense activities of the Department of Energy, to prescribe military personnel strengths for such fiscal year, and for other purposes, with the Senate amendment thereto."
H.R. 1295 - "To extend the African Growth and Opportunity Act, the Generalized System of Preferences, the preferential duty treatment program for Haiti, and for other purposes."
H.R. 2822 — "Making appropriations for the Department of the Interior, environment, and related agencies for the fiscal year ending September 30, 2016, and for other purposes."

Yesterday the House passed H.R. 2042 — "To allow for judicial review of any final rule addressing carbon dioxide emissions from existing fossil fuel-fired electric utility generating units before requiring compliance with such rule, and to allow States to protect households and businesses from significant adverse effects on electricity ratepayers or reliability."

At 10:51 AM today the House passed H.R. 1615 (423-0) — "To direct the Chief FOIA Officer of the Department of Homeland Security to make certain improvements in the implementation of section 552 of title 5, United States Code (commonly known as the Freedom of Information Act), and for other purposes."
At 12:47 PM today the House passed H.R. 2200 (420-2) (247-180) - To amend the Homeland Security Act of 2002 to establish chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear intelligence and information sharing functions of the Office of Intelligence and Analysis of the Department of Homeland Security and to require dissemination of information analyzed by the Department to entities with responsibilities relating to homeland security, and for other purposes."

The Senate reconvened at 9:50 AM today and began a period of morning business. No votes are scheduled for today.

Yesterday, the Senate voted to pass all the remaining trade legislation. Senators voted 60-38 to concur in the House amendment to the Senate amendment to H.R. 2146, which sent Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) to the president’s desk for his signature.

The Senate then voted 76-22 to invoke cloture on the motion to concur in the House amendment to H.R. 1295, the bill containing the reauthorization of the Trade Adjustment Assistance (TAA) program and trade preferences for countries in Africa. Senators then agreed to the motion to concur by voice vote, sending that bill back to the House for approval.

Following those votes, the Senate agreed by voice vote to go to conference with the House on H.R. 644, the customs enforcement bill.

The Supreme Court this morning released a divided decisions.

In Texas Department Of Housing And Community Affairs et al. V. Inclusive Communities Project, Inc., et al, the Supreme Court ruled 5-4 that the 1968 Fair Housing Act doesn't solely ban overt discrimination in the housing market. The court said the law can also prohibit seemingly race-neutral policies that have the effect of disproportionately harming minorities and other protected groups, even if there is no overt evidence of bias behind them. A Washington Post article details this decision.

In King v. Burwell, which addressed the ability of the government to grant subsidies to customers of the federal Obamacare exchange, the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that the subsidies should be available in states where consumers rely on the federal government exchange. The President Obama declared in a Rose Garden speech: “The Affordable Care Act is here to stay.”

Roberts was joined by Justices Anthony M. Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen G. Breyer, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. Opposing the decision were Justices Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr.

The Washington Post noted, "Scalia said Roberts, who also wrote the decision in 2012 that saved the Affordable Care Act from that challenge, has performed 'somersaults of statutory interpretation” to preserve the act: “We should start calling this law SCOTUScare.' The comment drew laughter as Scalia underlined his disagreement with the decision by reading part of his dissent from the bench.

The two cases, Scalia said, 'will publish forever the discouraging truth that the Supreme Court of the United States favors some laws over others, and is prepared to do whatever it takes to uphold and assist its favorites.'"

This morning on the Senate Floor, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell addressed the Supreme Court ruling on King v. Burwell:“That we’re even discussing another of Obamacare’s self-inflicted brushes with the brink — again — is the latest indictment of a law that’s been a rolling disaster for the American people.

“Today’s ruling won’t change Obamacare’s multitude of broken promises, including the one that resulted in millions of Americans losing the coverage they had and wanted to keep. Today’s ruling won’t change Obamacare’s spectacular flops, from humiliating website debacles to the total collapse of exchanges in states run by the law’s loudest cheerleaders. Today’s ruling won’t change the skyrocketing costs in premiums, deductibles, and co-pays that have hit the middle class so hard over the last few years.

“The politicians who forced Obamacare on the American people now have a choice: crow about Obamacare’s latest wobble towards the edge, or work with us to address the ongoing negative impact of a 2,000-page law that continues to make life miserable for too many of the same people it purported to help.”
Former Arkansas governor and 2016 Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee made the following statement in response to the Supreme Court's ruling on King v. Burwell."Today's King v. Burwell decision, which protects and expands ObamaCare, is an out-of-control act of judicial tyranny. Our Founding Fathers didn't create a 'do-over' provision in our Constitution that allows unelected, Supreme Court justices the power to circumvent Congress and rewrite bad laws. The Supreme Court cannot legislate from the bench, ignore the Constitution, and pass a multi-trillion dollar 'fix' to ObamaCare simply because Congress misread what the states would actually do. The architects and authors of ObamaCare were intentional in the way they wrote the law. The courts have no constitutional authority to rescue Congress from creating bad law. The solution is for Congress to admit they screwed up, repeal the 'nightmare of Obamacare', and let states road-test real health care reforms.

"Everywhere I go, I talk to American families who keep getting punched in the gut with outrageous insurance premiums and infuriating hospital bills. ObamaCare was railroaded through Congress to 'solve' our healthcare problems, but five years later, American families are getting railroaded by runaway mandates, big government bureaucracy, and out-of-control healthcare costs. ObamaCare is a $2.2 trillion Washington disaster that raided billions from Medicare and did nothing to fix our broken system of 'sick care,' which rewards irresponsibility and penalizes commonsense. As President, I will protect Medicare, repeal ObamaCare, and pass real reform that will actually lower costs, while focusing on cures and prevention rather than intervention. The status quo is unfair, unaffordable, unsustainable, and completely un-American."
American Conservative Union Chairman Matt Schlapp sums up the majority feeling of conservatives regarding the judicial activism evidenced by the Supreme Court:“Today we are reminded of why it is destructive to have activists on the Supreme Court who are empowered by their hubris to act as Judge, Senator and King.

“What’s clear is that Professor Jonathan Gruber, President Barack Obama, Leader Harry Reid and former Speaker Nancy Pelosi thought they could force Republican governors to create their own state-based insurance exchanges. But because those 36 governors found Obamacare’s mandates so repellent, they spared their constituents and chose the unsubsidized Federal insurance exchanges instead.

“Chief Justice John Roberts now thinks it is his job to re-write the unambiguous language of the law to achieve a certain outcome: the radical Leftist dream of socialized medicine.

“Justice Roberts and the other concurring five justices have disgraced their office, sprayed graffiti on the Constitution, and set America on a path toward a constitutional crisis. In fact, two of these Justices blatantly deceived Congress during their confirmation hearings, and lied to the Presidents who appointed them. Justices Roberts and Anthony Kennedy promised President George W. Bush and President Ronald Reagan that they would follow the letter of the law.

“Under oath, Justice Roberts swore that he would not engage in judicial activism. He has betrayed his own integrity, the integrity of the court and the American people.

“Justices Roberts and Kennedy promised to only look at the statutory language drafted by Congress and the Constitutionality of that language. Instead they acted like corrupt county politicians, trying to achieve a political outcome as if they were cutting backroom deals in a smoke-filled room. The Republican-led Senate should haul these robed manipulators back to explain why they lied during their confirmation hearings. CEO’s of private corporations are not allowed to commit perjury before Congress. Why should the head of the Judiciary be held to a lower standard?

“Those of us who labored to get John Roberts confirmed are owed an apology. What is more tragic is we owe our fellow Americans an apology for believing him in the first place.

“There are three honest justices on the nation's highest court: Justices Samuel Alito, Clarence Thomas, and Antonin Scalia. The world should know that Roberts and Kennedy have not behaved as justices but instead as political hacks without term limits. They have brought shame to their office and defied the Presidents who placed their trust in them.”

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Tags: SCOTUS, Supreme Court, decisions, Obamacare,  judicial activism To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Let’s Talk About Abortion: Ever Wondered Who Pays Abortion Doctors’ Medical School Bills?

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." ~ Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

by Dr. Alvita King: Ever wondered who convinces medical students, health care providers, doctors and the like to abandon the Hippocratic Oath to pursue careers which involve killing babies and maiming women?

They go into medicine to save, help and heal people; get an unexpected abortion scholarship, and millions end up dying.

The Hippocratic Oath is a sacred pledge for physicians: to treat the ill to the best of one's ability, to preserve a patient's privacy, to teach the secrets of medicine to the next generation, and more.

So according to the oath, in a pregnancy, the doctor would have two patients. Even in cases of rape and incest and human trafficking – knowing that abortion cannot heal but only compound these violations – the doctor has two patients, mother and child.

During the days of Gosnell's House of Horrors trial, the thought came to me that he, along with the doctor who aborted my second baby, and maybe hundreds of other abortion providers such as Lett in Alabama may have been early victims of phony "medical assistance education grants" that would require that recipients adapt to a eugenicists/genocidal mindset.

I became suspicious of the motivation behind PPH awards and grants while investigating the so-called MLK acceptance speech for the PPH Maggie Award. Uncle MLK didn't write the speech, didn't attend the ceremony, and didn't believe that abortion was a civil right. Mrs. Laura Bush and Mrs. Barbara Bush are prochoice. Their presidential husbands are prolife. Same with Mrs. Coretta Scott King and MLK. Coretta Scott King was prochoice in favor of a woman's right to choose abortion. She accepted the Maggie Award instead of her husband. MLK was prolife.

During her lifetime, in her own words, Planned Parenthood Founder Margaret Sanger said:"While the colored Negroes have great respect for white doctors, they can get closer to their own members and more or less lay their cards on the table … They do not do this with white people and if we can train the Negro doctor at the clinic, he can go among them with enthusiasm and … knowledge, which … will have far-reaching results among the colored people … The minister’s work is also important and he should be trained, perhaps by the Federation as to our ideals and the goal that we hope to reach. We do not want word to go out that we want to exterminate the Negro population, and the minister is the man who can straighten out that idea if it ever occurs to any of their more rebellious members.”Sanger is remembered as a popular eugenicist, genocide proponent, and promoter of the development of birth control pills. She was also a cofounder of the notorious sterilization program, The Negro Project, and was a favored consultant with the KKK. She was a forerunner and leader of what today is known as the abortion industry.

Even today, the abortion/anti-life and anti-natural family lobby spends millions annually to infiltrate and indoctrinate the health care world to push euthanasia, abortion, sterilization and other various forms of "population control."

In more current reports, mounting evidence of this trend surfaces:

Recently, an anonymous young British doctor undergoing her abortion training writes in The Guardian “If I’m honest, I haven’t found it emotionally easy (and I suspect neither have those closest to me!), but I’d never go back and change that decision. Not only have I received excellent tuition, but, perhaps more importantly, I have learnt much about life from the women I have cared for.” She concludes by writing of the end of her day, “I breathe my customary sigh of relief as I close my front door behind me and kick off my shoes. My boyfriend hears the latch and calls from the kitchen to ask me about my day. I mutter something nondescript, skimping on detail, then get straight to the point: ‘How about a glass of wine?’”

In another report on American students who attend a Cuban medical school on scholarships financed by Pastors for Peace, Breitbart.com notes that one of the graduates of the Cuban school, Carmen Landau, was recorded in a 2013 Live Action News video telling a woman at the Southwest Women’s Options clinic in Albuquerque that having an abortion would be like getting a “flu shot or vaccine.” One of the stipulations for these American students is that when they return to the U.S. from Cuba, they must “practice medicine in poor and underserved US communities.”

This having an abortion would be like getting a “flu shot or vaccine" language sounds suspiciously like the "abortion doesn't hurt as much as having a tooth pulled" pitch I was given before my abortions in the 1970's. I have since wondered, “Who paid to teach our doctors to kill rather than heal?”

In 1 Kings 10:7 the Bible says that not even half of the truth has been told. Galatians 4:16 asks "am I now your enemy because I tell you the truth?”

Well, it's time for the whole truth and nothing but the truth. Let's talk about abortion.
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Dr. Alveda King, niece of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., is the founder of King for America, Inc., consultant to the Africa Humanitarian Christian Fellowship and Pastoral Associate and Director of African-American Outreach for Priests for Life and Gospel of Life Ministries..

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Tags: Alvita King, Priests For Life, abortion, who pays, abortion doctors, medical school bills, To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

EPA Clean Air Plan Will Increase Black Poverty 23%, Hspanic Poverty 26%, Strip 19 Million Jobs

National Black Chamber of Commerce President
Harry Alford testifying in the Senate Environment and
Public Works Committee on 6/23/15. (Screen capture)

by Ali Meyer, CNS News: A study commissioned by the National Black Chamber of Commerce, which represents 2.1 million black-owned businesses in the United States, found that the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) Clean Power Plan would increase black poverty by 23 percent and cause the loss of 7 million jobs for black Americans by 2035.

The study also found that the EPA' plan would increase Hispanic poverty by 26 percent and cause the loss of 12 million jobs for Hispanic Americans by 2035.

The EPA proposed the Clean Power Plan on June 2, 2014 to cut carbon emissions from power plants. The National Black Chamber of Commerce commissioned the study to evaluate the potential economic and employment impacts of the plan on minority groups.

National Black Charmber of Commerce President Harry Alford explained the results of the report, “Potential Impact of Proposed EPA Regulations on Low Income Groups and Minorities” at the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee hearing on Tuesday.
“The study finds that the Clean Power Plan will inflict severe and disproportionate economic burdens on poor families, especially minorities,” said Alford in his prepared statement. “The EPA’s proposed regulation for GHG [greenhouse gas] emissions from existing power plants is a slap in the face to poor and minority families.

“These communities already suffer from higher unemployment and poverty rates compared to the rest of the country, yet the EPA’s regressive energy tax threatens to push minorities and low-income Americans even further into poverty,” Alford added.

"According to a recent study commissioned by the National Black Chamber of Commerce," Alford said, "the Clean Power Plan would: increase Black poverty by 23 percent and Hispanic poverty by 26 percent; result in cumulative job losses of 7 million for Blacks and nearly 12 million for Hispanics in 2035; and decrease Black and Hispanic median household income by $455 and $515 respectively, in 2035."

Sen. Tom Carper (D-Del.) rebutted this view, saying that states who have taken action on climate change have seen their economies grow.

“Many states, such as New York and Delaware, have already taken action to reduce the largest emitter of carbon pollution - power plant emissions,” Carper said. “As we will hear today, the economies of these states continue to grow at a faster rate than the states that have yet to put climate regulations in place. However, we need all states to do their fair share to protect the air we breathe and stem the tide of climate change. The EPA’s Clean Power Plan attempts to do just that.”

Opponents of the plan like Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-W.Va.) say that the Clean Power Plan will raise electricity prices and hurt businesses in her state.

“I introduced ARENA [Affordable Reliable Electricity Now Act] and am holding this hearing today because of the devastating impact that EPA’s proposed regulations will have on the families and businesses in my home state and across the nation,” said Capito. “I am not exaggerating when I say almost every day back home in West Virginia, there are new stories detailing plants closed, jobs lost, and price increases.”

One of the businesses in Capito’s home state, Ammar, Inc., a family-owned company that operates 19 Magic Mart stores in West Virginia, Virginia and Kentucky wrote Capito a letter about the EPA regulation.

“There was a time when your greatest obstacle was your competitor, but if you worked hard, took care of your customers and offered quality merchandise at a fair price, you could compete successfully,” the letter stated. “Unfortunately, that is now not the case… The largest impediment we have to operating our business successfully is our own government, particularly the EPA. The rulings issued by the EPA have devastated our regional economy.

“Coal provided 96 percent of West Virginia’s electricity last year. West Virginia has among the lowest electricity prices in the nation: last year, the average price was 27 percent below the national average,” said Capito. “But that advantage will not survive this administration’s policies. Studies have projected the Clean Power Plan will raise electricity prices in West Virginia by between 12 and 16 percent.”

“Put simply, there is no way that this massive, largely EPA-driven reduction in coal fired electricity generation is going to impact only coal states. It’s going to impact the majority of states, and the families and businesses within them. Often, the poorest and most vulnerable populations will bear the brunt of this increase,” she said.

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Tags: EPA, clean air plan, increase black poverty, lose 7 Million black jobs, 12 Million Hispanic jobs, National Black Charmber of Commerce, President Harry Alford To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

How Much Diversity Must We Tolerate?

100% Preventable: Killings
By Non-deported Illegals

by Phyllis Schlafly: In his seventh year of “fundamentally transforming the United States of America,” as Barack Obama memorably promised five days before he was elected president, we’re learning new details about thousands of immigrants who were released from custody after being convicted of serious, violent felonies and horrific sex crimes. Instead of doing his duty to keep bad people out of America (or remove them if they manage to sneak in), Obama is bringing us even more diversity by accepting thousands of refugees from terrorist-harboring countries such as Syria and Somalia.

Immigrants who commit a major crime inside the U.S. are supposed to be returned to their home country after completing their prison sentence. But a number of countries are refusing to take back their own criminals, so ICE just turns them loose in U.S. communities, freeing them to return to their criminal lifestyle.

We have a U.S. law that is supposed to deal with this; it requires our State Department to impose visa sanctions on countries that refuse to take back their own citizens. But Obama’s State Department simply ignores this law; that’s called executive discretion.

Senators Jeff Sessions (R-AL) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) have gotten Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to admit the awful truth: “One hundred twenty-one convicted criminals who faced deportation orders between 2010 and 2014 were never removed from the country and now face murder charges for killing Americans.”

Hundreds of other immigrants who were convicted of violent sex crimes, including depraved acts against children, were released into unsuspecting U.S. communities without being registered as sex offenders. The Boston Globe compiled a database of nearly a thousand immigrant sex fiends, a job made more difficult because ICE seems to care less about the safety of Americans than about the “privacy” of foreign criminals who shouldn’t even be here.

The excuse given for these outrageous releases is a Supreme Court decision called Zadvydas which held that persons awaiting deportation can’t be held indefinitely. That 2001 decision was accepted by the George W. Bush administration, which released hundreds of violent criminal immigrants including the accused perpetrator of the D.C. Mansion murders, Darron Wint.

Here are just a few of the blood-curdling crimes committed by illegal aliens released by the Obama Administration to continue their fun and games at the expense of very young girls.

Felix Rodriguez, a 57-year old sex offender, was convicted of raping children as young as four years old in the 1990s, but was freed to continue his crimes because Cuba refused to take him back. He then fatally shot his girlfriend in Kansas City, pled guilty, and is serving a 10-year sentence in a Missouri prison.

Andrew Rui Stanley, who was convicted in 2000 of many counts of sodomizing a child, was released in the U.S. after Brazil failed to provide a passport to accept him back to his native country. Again on the streets in our country, he viciously abused three St. Louis children, and the U.S. taxpayers are now supporting him in a U.S. prison.

Cuba refused to take back Luis-Leyva Vargas after he served time in a Florida prison for unlawful sex with a teenage girl. After he was released by ICE, he kidnapped an 18-year-old girl in Virginia at knifepoint and raped her. He is now serving a 55-year prison sentence, which U.S. taxpayers (instead of Cuban) are paying for.

Meanwhile, Obama has effectively given up enforcing our immigration laws at the workplace, which was the essential trade-off for the 1986 amnesty that Reagan reluctantly signed. A Washington Times headline revealed, “Obama gives free pass to businesses that hire illegals,” including aliens who should have been deported for violent crimes.

Although Obama used his executive action to give valuable benefits to the Communist rulers of Cuba without any quid pro quo whatsoever that might benefit the United States, Cuba still refuses to take back its citizens who have been convicted of crimes against Americans. Cuba refused to take back 878 criminals last year and has already rejected nearly 400 criminals this year.

Cuba is the biggest offender among the countries that refuse the return of their own citizens who committed crimes in our country, but there are at least a dozen other countries doing the same thing. It’s bad enough that those criminals committed vicious crimes against our girls, but it adds insult to injury when we have to spend U.S. taxpayers’ money to support foreign criminals for years in our institutions.

Republican Members of Congress have proposed several legislative solutions for this lack of cooperation by our so-called friendly neighbors, but to no avail. For starters, Congress should cut off all foreign aid and all other favors to countries that refuse to take back their own criminals.
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Phyllis Schlafly has been a national leader of the conservative movement since 1964. She founded and is president of Eagle Forum. She has testified before more than 50 Congressional and State Legislative committees on constitutional, national defense, and family issues.

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Tags: Phyllis Schlafly, Eagle Forum, diversity, illegals, criminals, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, ICE, convicted illegals, killing americans To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!