● Shelby Steele: The Exploitation of Trayvon Martin... ● Protecting You From The UN-Frendly Skies... Prohibited Items Found 3/2 to 3/8... ● Congressional earmarks sometimes used to fund projects near lawmakers' properties... ● Public Law List (112st Congress - 2012)... ● Congress's Phony Insider-Trading Reform... ● Obama denounces Senate vote to block Cordray at consumer watchdog agency... ● Walker signs 'castle doctrine' bill, other measures... ● Holder faces House Republicans over health-care law, ‘Fast and Furious’... ● Postal workers behaving badly!... ● The supercommittee failed because Democrats insisted on $1 trillion in new taxes...
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When the people fear the government, there is tyranny; When the government fears the people, there is liberty.  ~ Thomas Jefferson

 

Entries Tagged as 'Republicans'

U.S. Rep. Ribble moves out of District – A Democrat Move. Not illegal but defiantly WRONG

September 17th, 2011 · Corruption, Ethics, House, Republicans, Wisconsin

At least Kagen stood by his District.  You lost my Vote for re-election!

SHERWOOD — U.S. Rep. Reid Ribble confirmed reports Tuesday that he recently moved out of the 8th Congressional District and returned to his family’s three-bedroom home on Lake Winnebago in Sherwood, a house he left more than a year ago to challenge incumbent Democrat Steve Kagen in last fall’s midterm election.

Consequently, Ribble is no longer a voter in the district he represents in Congress. Ribble’s Sherwood home is in the 6th Congressional District, where Republican Tom Petri is the incumbent.

Ribble defended the move by asserting, “Northeast Wisconsin is my home and always will be.”

“I have a long and personal tie to the 8th District and assertions to challenge this are just ridiculous,” the Republican congressman wrote in a statement. “I grew up in Appleton, went to Appleton East High School and coached volleyball at Appleton East High School for over 20 years. My roofing business was located in Kaukauna and my wife’s longtime bookstore was also in Appleton.”

Amid reports he recently moved out of an apartment he had been renting in Lawrence in the 8th District, Ribble confirmed he intends to take his Sherwood residence off the sluggish housing market, where it had been on sale for nearly $600,000 as recently as last week, according to online real estate postings.

“My wife and I initially put our Sherwood house up for sale last year,” Ribble wrote. “With the listing contract coming to an end soon, the house is coming off the market until the housing market turns around. We are not immune to the negative effects of the unsteady housing market and just like many Americans across the country, we have had to change our plans.”

Ribble said he had planned to move to a smaller home in the 8th District that “requires less maintenance” given his frequent travel between Washington, D.C., and the Fox River Valley.

“We wish the home would have sold, but unfortunately the tough housing market prevented this from happening,” Ribble wrote.

Ribble’s spokeswoman did not clarify when the move back to Sherwood occurred or whether Ribble intends to transfer his voter registration.

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Senate spending bill contains thousands of earmarks

December 15th, 2010 · Accountability, Congress, Corruption, Democrats, Dissention, Economy, Ethics, Federal Spending, Fraud Alert, Greed, Non-Transparency, Republicans, Selling Out the US, Tax Dollars, Taxes, Terrorism from Within

By Philip Rucker and Paul Kane Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, December 15, 2010; 12:00 AM

Weeks after swearing off earmarks, many senators stand to gain tens of millions of dollars for pet projects in a massive spending bill that could be their last chance at the money before a more conservative Congress begins next month.

The $1.2 trillion bill, released on Tuesday, includes more than 6,000 earmarks totaling $8 billion, an amount that many lawmakers decried as an irresponsible binge following a midterm election in which many voters demanded that the government cut spending.

“The American people said just 42 days ago, ‘Enough!’ . . . Are we tone deaf? Are we stricken with amnesia?” Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), a leading earmark critic, said on the Senate floor, flipping through the 1,924-page bill as he pounded his desk.

The bill includes $18 million for two nonprofits associated with deceased Democrats, the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy and Rep. John P. Murtha; $349,000 for swine waste management in North Carolina; and $6 million for a rural Iowa school program named after Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa).

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) epitomizes the conflicted nature of the debate. Formerly a member of the committee that doles out earmarks, McConnell reluctantly embraced a moratorium on the practice last month to send a signal that Republicans are serious about curbing spending.

Yet the legislation includes provisions requested this year by McConnell, including $650,000 for a genetic technology center at the University of Kentucky, according to an analysis of the bill by Taxpayers for Common Sense, a nonpartisan watchdog.

Saying he was now “vigorously in opposition” to the legislation, McConnell said Tuesday that rushed consideration of the bill “here on Christmas Eve” compelled him to try to block the bill through a filibuster. “I’m going to vote against things that arguably would benefit my state. I do not think this is the appropriate way to run the Senate,” he said.

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Ron Paul to chair monetary policy subcommittee overseeing Fed

December 11th, 2010 · Accountability, Change of Power, Republicans

By Felicia Sonmez

Texas Republican Rep. Ron Paul is poised to chair the House Domestic Monetary Policy Subcommittee, putting the gavel of the panel overseeing the Federal Reserve into the hands of one of the central bank’s most outspoken critics.

Rep. Spencer Bachus (R-Ala.), the incoming chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, announced Thursday that Paul will head the subcommittee when Republicans assume the majority in the 112th Congress.

“This is the leadership team that crafted the first comprehensive financial reform bill to put an end to the bailouts, wind down the taxpayer funding of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and enforce a strong audit of the Federal Reserve,” Bachus said in a statement, adding that the committee’s “first priority is to end the taxpayer funded bailout of Fannie and Freddie.”

On Wednesday, a group of about 30 tea party-aligned groups wrote a letter urging Bachus and House Speaker-designate John Boehner (R-Ohio) to support Paul’s bid for subcommittee chairman. The letter was in response to reports that GOP leaders were mulling ways to block Paul from becoming chairman over concerns that his views are too radical.

In the letter, the groups warned that the “implied message” of blocking Paul would be “one of indifference towards the concerns of those who helped put the Republican Party back in the majority.”

Paul has been a harsh critic of the Federal Reserve and has pushed for measures that would audit the central bank or abolish it altogether. The subcommittee also has jurisdiction over “precious metals,” and Paul has advocated a return to the gold standard.

By Felicia Sonmez | December 9, 2010

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New GOP governors will affect health law

November 9th, 2010 · Change of Power, Government, Healthcare, Republicans

By N.C. Aizenman Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, November 9, 2010; 12:52 AM

Republicans’ consolidation of power in state capitols is likely to expand the number of states that employ a far more limited, free-market-oriented approach to implementing the nation’s new health-care law than the robust regulatory model favored by its supporters.

Although the law is a federal statute, it tasks states with administering many of its most important provisions and grants them considerable leeway.

It is up to states to run markets, known as “exchanges,” through which individuals and small businesses will be able to buy health insurance plans, often with federal subsidies, beginning in 2014. States will also oversee a mostly federally funded expansion of Medicaid to cover a far larger share of the poor.

Many incoming Republican governors made their antipathy to the law a plank of their campaigns. Tennessee Gov.-elect Bill Haslam denounced it as “an intolerable expansion of federal power.” Wyoming Gov.-elect Matt Mead promised to join 21 states contesting its constitutionality in federal courts. And Maine, one of the first states to set up a task force to implement the law, will now be led by Paul LePage, a tea-party favorite who vowed to work against the legislation and predicted that voters would soon see headlines about him telling President Obama to “go to hell.”

Such state leaders cannot completely block implementation of the law: If they are unwilling or deemed unready to run an exchange by 2014, the legislation empowers the federal government to step in with its own version. But the law does grant states a fair amount of discretion.

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Republicans target health-care bill, government spending as Obama acknowledges election setback

November 6th, 2010 · Accountability, Change of Power, Obama Exposed, Republicans

By Anne E. Kornblut, Paul Kane and Shailagh Murray Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, November 4, 2010; 12:19 AM

Leaders of the new Republican majority emerged emboldened Wednesday, promising to slash the size of government and setting their sights on repealing President Obama‘s signature health-care overhaul.

House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) began to lay the groundwork for what is still a loosely defined Republican agenda, but he signaled his desire not to overreach or misinterpret the election results as giving his party a large mandate. GOP leaders agreed that their victory had more to do with what the public opposed than what they offered.

“It’s pretty clear that the Obama-Pelosi agenda is being rejected by the American people,” Boehner, the speaker-in-waiting, told reporters. “We’re going to continue and renew our efforts for a smaller, less costly and more accountable government.”

Looking exhausted despite a heavy coat of makeup, the president began to deal with the most severe blow of his political career. At a midday news conference, he said he would redouble his efforts to work with House Republicans, but he also firmly defended his policies of the past two years and suggested that his failures were more about messaging than anything else.

“Over the last two years, we’ve made progress. But, clearly, too many Americans haven’t felt that progress yet, and they told us that yesterday,” Obama said at the White House. “What yesterday also told us is that no one party will be able to dictate where we go from here.”

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House Republicans to make a conservative ‘Pledge to America’

September 23rd, 2010 · Change of Power, Economy, Obama Exposed, Republicans

By Paul Kane and Perry Bacon Jr. Washington Post Staff Writers
Thursday, September 23, 2010; 2:36 AM

House Republicans will announce an expansive agenda on Thursday called a “A Pledge to America” that proposes to shrink the size of government and reform Congress, offering a conservative plan of action they will pursue if they win a majority in the midterm elections.

Republicans would slash $100 billion in government spending on non-military agencies and replace President Obama‘s landmark health-care legislation with a scaled-back version. Small businesses would be able to deduct from taxes up to 20 percent of their annual income, and the Pentagon would receive increased funding to more quickly implement a ballistic missile defense system.

The plan would also eliminate any unspent money from last year’s $814 billion stimulus package and from legislation that authorized hundreds of billions of dollars to prop up failing Wall Street firms.

There are no specifics about how the spending cuts would be carried out, and the agenda does not outline how Republicans would deal with Social Security and other expensive federal entitlement programs, saying only that lawmakers “will make the decisions that are necessary” to cut costs.

The agenda is designed to give voters a broad outline of what proposals House Republicans will push if they regain the majority and to give their candidates specifics to cite on the campaign trail. It also aims to answer a favorite attack line of Democrats: that Republicans have no new ideas and are merely the “Party of No.”

“The need for urgent action to repair our economy and reclaim our government for the people cannot be overstated,” Republicans write in the Pledge, according to a draft document released Wednesday night.

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Unlikely battleground of Wisconsin reflects Democrats’ vulnerability in midterm elections

September 7th, 2010 · Accountability, Change of Power, Obama Exposed, Republicans, Wisconsin

By Karen Tumulty – Monday, September 6, 2010; 10:47 PM

MILWAUKEE – Democrats in Congress are no longer asking themselves whether this is going to be a bad election year for them and their party. They are asking whether it is going to be a disaster.

The answer will probably be found in states such as Wisconsin, one of a growing number of spots on the map where Democrats accustomed to winning reelection with ease – including Sen. Russell Feingold – are unexpectedly in trouble.

The GOP pushed deep into Democratic-held territory over the summer, to the point where the party is well within range of picking up the 39 seats it would need to take control of the House. Overall, as many as 80 House seats could be at risk, and fewer than a dozen of these are held by Republicans.

Political handicappers now say it is conceivable that the Republicans could also win the 10 seats they need to take back the Senate. Not since 1930 has the House changed hands without the Senate following suit.

“Given the races in play – six for Republicans and 13 for Democrats – a plausible case can now be made that those 10 seats are within their reach,” the nonpartisan Cook Political Report wrote last week. But it predicted that the GOP‘s gain will fall just short of that, at seven to nine seats.

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Republicans making gains against Democrats ahead of midterm elections

September 7th, 2010 · Accountability, Change of Power, Obama Exposed, Republicans

By Dan Balz and Jon Cohen Washington Post Staff Writers
Tuesday, September 7, 2010; 12:04 AM

Republicans are heading into the final weeks of the midterm campaign with the political climate highly in their favor, according to a new Washington Post-ABC News poll. Americans are increasingly frustrated by a lack of economic progress, deeply dissatisfied with the federal government and critical of President Obama‘s leadership.

For the first time in more than four years, Republicans run about evenly with Democrats on the basic question of which party they trust to handle the nation’s biggest problems. Among registered voters, 40 percent say they have more confidence in Democrats and 38 percent say they have more trust in Republicans. Three months ago, Democrats had a 12-point advantage.

On the economy, 43 percent of voters side with Republicans when it comes to dealing with financial problems, while 39 percent favor Democrats. (Fifteen percent say they trust neither party more.) Although not a significant lead for Republicans, this marks the first time they have had any numerical edge on the economy dating to 2002. In recent years, Democrats have typically held double-digit advantages on the issue.

The principal obstacles to GOP electoral hopes continue to be doubts that Republicans have a clear plan for the country should they win control of the House or Senate in November. But overall, the poll shows that the party has made big gains in the public’s estimation since earlier this year.

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Gloom for Democrats as they look to November

September 1st, 2010 · Accountability, Change of Power, Congress, Obama Exposed, Republicans

By Dan Balz Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, August 31, 2010; 11:39 PM

The Gallup organization dropped a bomb on the political world this week. In shorthand, the pollsters said Monday that if the midterm elections were held now, Republicans would take control of the House – and probably by a comfortable margin.

On Tuesday, James Campbell, a professor of political science at the University of Buffalo, weighed in with a prediction based on his modeling of the political climate. He said that Republicans are poised to gain 51 or 52 House seats, at least 11 more than needed to depose the Democrats.

Election Day is still two months away, but the twin findings added to the fear among Democrats that their House majority – and possibly their Senate majority as well – is in jeopardy.

For decades, Gallup has asked voters the following question: “If the elections for Congress were being held today, which party’s candidate would you vote for in your congressional district?”

This week’s survey produced the largest lead for the Republicans in the history of asking that question: 51 percent to 41 percent. Ninety-six percent of Republicans said they would vote for the GOP candidate, while 88 percent of Democrats said they would support the Democrat. Independents, who helped power Democratic victories in 2006 and 2008, split 48 percent to 31 percent for Republicans.

This measurement (known as the generic ballot question) has sometimes been considered an imperfect or misleading indicator of House election results. Gallup begs to differ. Frank Newport, editor in chief of the Gallup poll, said that Gallup’s final survey of likely voters before Election Day has been an accurate predictor of the two parties’ share of the national vote in House elections. The national vote, in turn, he added, is an excellent predictor of seats won or lost.

Four years ago, when Democrats won control of the House, the final Gallup survey of likely voters gave Democrats an advantage of seven percentage points over Republicans. Their actual share of the national two-party vote was eight points more.

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Beck, Palin tell thousands to ‘restore America’

August 29th, 2010 · Accountability, Change of Power, Dissention, Obama Exposed, Republicans

By Amy Gardner, Krissah Thompson and Philip Rucker – Sunday, August 29, 2010; 12:08 AM

Conservative commentator Glenn Beck on Saturday drew a sea of activists to the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, where he championed a religious brand of patriotism and called on the nation to recommit itself to traditional values he said were hallmarks of its exceptional past.

On the anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech, steps away from where it was delivered, Beck and fellow “tea party” icon Sarah Palin staked a claim to King’s legacy and to that of the Founding Fathers. They urged a crowd that stretched to the Washington Monument to concentrate on the nation’s accomplishments rather than on its psychological scars.

“Something that is beyond man is happening,” Beck said. “America today begins to turn back to God.”

The event was billed as “nonpolitical,” and Beck steered clear of the partisan commentary that has made him a hero to many conservatives and a nemesis to many on the left. But political overtones were unmistakable, and the rally drew an enormous crowd – including many who said they were new to activism – that was energized and motivated to act.

The effort by Beck and Palin to lay claim to the mantle of the civil rights movement drew protests from the Rev. Al Sharpton and others who marched in a separate and much smaller event, to the Mall from Dunbar High School in Northwest Washington, to commemorate King’s speech 47 years ago.

“The ‘March on Washington’ changed America,” Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-D.C.) said at the Sharpton rally, referring to King’s speech. “Our country reached to overcome the low points of our racial history. Glenn Beck’s march will change nothing.”

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