PoliticalAction.com Blog

From the Congressional Budget Office Director

This morning the Obama Administration released a description of its health care proposal, and CBO has already received several requests to provide a cost estimate for that proposal. We had not previously received the proposal, and we have just begun the process of reviewing it?a process that will take some time, given the complexity of the issues involved. Although the proposal reflects many elements that were included in the health care bills passed by the House and the Senate last year, it modifies many of those elements and also includes new ones. Moreover, preparing a cost estimate requires very detailed specifications of numerous provisions, and the materials that were released this morning do not provide sufficient detail on all of the provisions. Therefore, CBO cannot provide a cost estimate for the proposal without additional detail, and, even if such detail were provided, analyzing the proposal would be a time-consuming process that could not be completed this week.

WASHINGTON, DC – President Barack Obama today announced that the Federal Government will reduce its greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution by 28 percent by 2020. Reducing and reporting GHG pollution, as called for in Executive Order 13514 on Federal Sustainability, will ensure that the Federal Government leads by example in building the clean energy economy. Actions taken under this Executive Order will spur clean energy investments that create new private-sector jobs, drive long-term savings, build local market capacity, and foster innovation and entrepreneurship in clean energy industries.

As the single largest energy consumer in the U.S. economy, the Federal
Government spent more than $24.5 billion on electricity and fuel in 2008
alone. Achieving the Federal GHG pollution reduction target will reduce
Federal energy use by the equivalent of 646 trillion BTUs, equal to 205
million barrels of oil, and taking 17 million cars off the road for one
year. This is also equivalent to a cumulative total of $8 to $11 billion
in avoided energy costs through 2020.

“As the largest energy consumer in the United States, we have a
responsibility to American citizens to reduce our energy use and become more efficient,” said President Obama. “Our goal is to lower costs, reduce pollution, and shift Federal energy expenses away from oil and towards local, clean energy.”

Federal Departments and Agencies will achieve greenhouse gas pollution
reductions by measuring their current energy and fuel use, becoming more energy efficient and shifting to clean energy sources like solar, wind and geothermal. Examples of agency actions that are underway are available on the White House Council on Environmental Quality website and can be found at www.whitehouse.gov/ceq.

On October 5, 2009, President Obama signed Executive Order 13514 on Federal Sustainability, setting measureable environmental performance goals for Federal Agencies. Each Federal Agency was required to submit a 2020 GHG pollution reduction target from its estimated 2008 baseline to the White House Council on Environmental Quality and to the Director of the Office of Management and Budget by January 4, 2010. The Federal target announced today is the aggregate of 35 Federal Agency self-reported targets.

Greenhouse gas emissions serve as a useful metric to measure the
effectiveness of agency energy and fuel efficiency efforts as well as
renewable energy investments. Agencies are already taking actions that will contribute towards achieving their targets, such as installing solar arrays at military installations, tapping landfills for renewable energy, putting energy management systems in Federal buildings, and replacing older vehicles with more fuel efficient hybrid models.

As a next step, the Office of Management and Budget will validate and score each agency’s sustainability plan, assuring a long-term return on
investment to the American taxpayer. To ensure accountability, annual
progress will be measured and reported online to the public.

Texas Straight Talk – A weekly column
Rep. Ron Paul (R) – TX 14

Last week politicians in Washington made a few things clear about how they really feel about the state of the union. First, they are beginning to hear the growing discontent with the size and scope of government and the broken promises that keep piling up. Certain events in Massachusetts recently made that statement loud, clear and unavoidable. In the face of those events, the powers that be made the determination that some populist rhetoric was in order, and the idea of a spending freeze in Washington was proposed, albeit with several caveats. These caveats to the proposed spending freeze ensure that we are not at any real risk of actually doing anything about spending.

First of all is timing. It wouldn’t go into effect until 2011, which allows plenty of time to increase spending levels quite a bit before they are frozen. If the administration really understood and cared about our spending problems they would not freeze spending a year from now, but cut spending immediately and significantly. But, spending cuts almost never happen in Washington, and they are not likely now or a year from now – if the politicians have anything to say about it.

The second caveat is the huge areas of the budget that are shielded from this freeze. The entire State Department budget is exempt, as are all entitlements, all military industrial spending and almost all foreign aid. Fully 7/8 of federal spending is excluded from this freeze, and some areas to be frozen were actually set to decrease, which means a freeze actually guarantees a higher level of spending.

Especially insulting is the idea that in spite of our own fiscal problems at home, taxpayer dollars will continue to be sent overseas in the form of foreign aid where it often does more harm than good. When need is demonstrated to Americans and they can afford it, they can be counted on for a tremendous outpouring of private, voluntary charity to worthy aid organizations, as we recently saw in Haiti. By contrast, government-to-government aid is taken from the poor by force and too often enriches the corrupt. It is counterproductive and wasteful. But the idea of eliminating, freezing, or reducing foreign aid is not up for serious debate any time soon.

The third caveat is what is included in the freeze that would make it politically impossible to pass Congress, for example air traffic controllers salaries, education, farm subsidies and national parks.

I do not necessarily want a cut in spending in this country – I just want to change who does the spending. The spending should be done by the people who earn the money, if they choose, and on what they choose, without any government interference. That is what makes the economy work. Politicians should stick to the very limited roles given them by the constitution instead of allocating such a sizeable portion of our capital and intervening through regulations and tax policy. But because politicians have disregarded the constitution, and the people have no idea what rule they will break next, there is already a very real spending freeze underway in this economy, by the people. If government would stick only to what it was authorized to do, and leave the rest to the people, most of these problems would resolve themselves.

Hooray Jack! Where have you been all this time?

FOXNews.com

The head of C-SPAN has implored Congress to open up the last leg of health care reform negotiations to the public, as top Democrats lay plans to hash out the final product among themselves.

C-SPAN CEO Brian Lamb wrote to leaders in the House and Senate Dec. 30 urging them to open “all important negotiations, including any conference committee meetings,” to televised coverage on his network.

“The C-SPAN networks will commit the necessary resources to covering all of the sessions LIVE and in their entirety,” he wrote.

In a Tuesday afternoon press conference on health legislation negotiations, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi appeared to object to the premise behind the request.

“There has never been a more open process for any legislation in anyone who’s served here’s experience,” she said.

However, Republican leaders sided with C-SPAN’s calls for transparency.

“As House Republican leader, I can confidently state that all House Republicans strongly endorse your proposal and stand ready to work with you to make it a reality,” Minority Leader John Boehner wrote in response to the letter. “Hard-working families won’t stand for having the future of their health care decided behind closed doors. These secret deliberations are a breeding ground for more of the kickbacks, shady deals and special-interest provisions that have become business as usual in Washington.”

Democratic leaders could bypass the traditional conference committee process, in which lawmakers from both parties and chambers meet to reconcile differences between the House and Senate versions of a bill. Top Democrats in the House, Senate and White House were meeting Tuesday evening to figure out the final product in three-way talks before sending it back to both chambers for a final vote.

“We don’t even know yet whether there’s going to be a conference,” Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Chris Van Hollen said responding to a question about the C-SPAN request. “It’s not clear whether or not that’s going to happen yet.”

This format would seem ideal for closed-door meetings, which congressional Democrats have used many times to figure out sensitive provisions in the health care bill — though President Obama pledged during the campaign to open up health care talks to C-SPAN’s cameras.

“That’s what I will do in bringing all parties together, not negotiating behind closed doors, but bringing all parties together, and broadcasting those negotiations on C-SPAN so that the American people can see what the choices are,” Obama said at a debate against Hillary Clinton in Los Angeles on Jan. 31, 2008.

Asked about the request to Congress, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said he hadn’t seen the letter.

“I know the president is going to begin discussions today on health care to iron out differences between the House and Senate bills,” he said.

Lamb urged Congress in his letter to fling open the doors in the final stretch of the negotiations.

“President Obama, Senate and House leaders, many of your rank-and-file members, and the nation’s editorial pages have all talked about the value of transparent discussions on reforming the nation’s health care system,” he wrote. “Now that the process moves to the critical stage of reconciliation between the chambers, we respectfully request that you allow the public full access, through television, to legislation that will affect the lives of every single American.”

Lamb said his network would use “the latest technology” to be “as unobtrusive as possible” during the talks.

In his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech today, President Obama asserted:

“[T]he world must come together to confront climate change.”

President Obama will be attending the Copenhagen UN climate change conference on December 18 where he will be an active participant “as [in the words of 'The White House Blog' for Dec. 10] the global community, with the United States in a leading role, works towards securing the strongest possible outcome in Copenhagen.”

Lisa Jackson, United States EPA Administrator, is already in Copenhagen making promises to work with Congress to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions:

“We will work closely with our Congress to pass comprehensive clean energy reform through the U.S. Congress … and lowering U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by more than 80% below current levels by 2050.”

If you oppose U.S. participation in a new UN climate change agreement which would lead to a loss of U.S. sovereignty, costly “climate debt” payments to developing nations, economy-destroying caps on greenhouse gas emissions, and further empowerment of the UN as a world government, then contact your representative and senators and tell them to oppose any Copenhagen UN climate change agreement.

Thanks.

Your friends at The John Birch Society

Next week, Congress will vote on President Obama’s plan to escalate the war in Afghanistan. These wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have been going on almost a decade. There are first and second graders in this country who have never known an America at peace. To them, America is always at war.

President Obama inspired us in his run for President with his message of peace. He told Iowans about his courageous stance against the war in Iraq, “I opposed this war from the beginning. I opposed the war in 2002. I opposed the war in 2003. I opposed it in 2004 and 2005 and 2006.”

This is why Obama was elected: to bring peace and prosperity to our country.

Obama told the people in Illinois who elected him to the Senate, that “the consequences of war are dire, the sacrifices immeasurable. We may have occasion in our lifetime to once again rise up in defense of our freedom, and pay the wages of war. But we ought not – we will not – travel down that hellish path blindly.”

He told us that we should “not stay the course or take the conventional path because the other course is unknown.” These are the words of a man of peace, and I believe that we can remind the President that he can be that man of peace.

Help me remind the President of something very basic: Peace is good, and war is bad. I’ve set up a site at www.TiredOfWar.com where you can send the White House a message, written using his own words and some of your own, that peace is good.

We do not want to join a battle to occupy a foreign country indefinitely, no matter how much the military-industrial establishment may press for it. General Petraeus already said in May that Al Qaeda doesn’t even operate in Afghanistan any more, and President Karzai agreed.

But we do want to join the battles that President Obama told us about before he became President, the battles, he said, “against ignorance and intolerance, corruption and greed, poverty and despair.” Those are the battles that, “we willingly join.”

Click here to send your message to the White House now.

www.TiredOfWar.com

We will end these wars. It’s going to take time, but we will bring peace to America.

Mr. President, be the President that we voted for, the President that you promised to be. We agree with you that we should not “travel down this hellish path blindly.”  It is time to come home.

Regards,

Alan Grayson
Member of US Congress

Obama White House Issues EPA TAX Threat!
The Obama White House has threatened that the EPA will dictate command and control measures AKA socialism to by-pass Congress. Triggering a set of legal responsibilities and obligations to control emissions as well as an arsenal of options and powers to regulate CO2 including increasing taxes and penalties if you do not comply.

The Obama “Green Energy Tax” plan is worse than the “Regressive Cap-and-Trade” legislation is that Congress calls “the American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009,” which taxes every single person in America. Every time anyone flips on a light switch under “Cap and Trade,” some tax dollars are collected.

But the Obama “Green Energy Tax” plan doubles the price of your electric bill immediately with the tax money going straight to Obama and the Federal Government. Obama is taking Congress out of the loop so he doesn’t have to face political reality – that’s YOU and ME! He’s getting the EPA to do his dirty work!

HALT THE OBAMA “GREEN EXPRESS” IN COPENHAGEN!
FAX Obama And All 100 Senators – STOP Obama’s CLIMATE TREATY!

Obama – EPA & UN Lie About Global Warming

Global Warming Scientists Are Manipulating And Suppressing Data To Fabricate Global Warming Hysteria.

Carbon Dioxide DOES NOT Cause Global Warming!
Data clearly shows that global temperatures are decreasing even as Carbon Dioxide levels are increasing.

The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPPC) GW Data
The UN IPCC’s predicted warming path (pink region) bears no relation to the global cooling data that the IPCC has observed in the 21st century to date.

Just two weeks ago an unknown entity hacked into the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia servers and uncovered irrefutable proof that Global Warming Scientists were manipulating and suppressing data to fabricate the Global Warming Hysteria. Many have called this ClimateGate – The final nail in the coffin of Global Warming.

Obama’s Environmental Protection Agency declared Monday that greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide are a threat to public health and welfare. Even as Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla ordered an investigation into the Environmental Protection Agency’s alleged suppression of a 98-page report, co-authored by EPA analyst Alan Carlin that questioned the science behind global warming.

Obama’s EPA action is a threat to every American family and business and it leads to regulation of greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act.

The suppressed EPA report details how regulating gases like carbon dioxide WILL NOT reduce global warming. Carlin’s report states that the information the EPA is using is out of date, and that even as atmospheric carbon dioxide levels have increased, global temperatures have declined.

Inhofe said “He (Carlin) came out with the truth. They don’t want the truth at the EPA,” he’s ordered an investigation. “We’re going to expose it.”

Meanwhile in Coppenhagen so called scientists perpetuated the Global Warming lie saying this decade is set to be the warmest on record. Ignoring their own UN data and the truth that for seven and a half years global temperatures have been falling rapidly.

Obama Is Forcing A Green Tax DISASTER ON ALL Americans!!

HALT THE OBAMA “GREEN EXPRESS” IN COPENHAGEN!
FAX Obama And All 100 Senators – STOP Obama’s CLIMATE TREATY!

Obama will dictate a 17% reduction below 2005 emission levels by 2020 and a 30% by 2025. The problem is there is no plan on how to accomplish this goal without rationing energy and punitively taxing Americans. Furthermore, there is no scientific reason to undertake these goals.

A President with America’s best interests would attend the conference to demand integrity, honesty and dignity from the scientific community and rebuke the false findings and junk science that has dictated so much of our energy and environmental policies for the last decade. – Barack Obama is not a President with America’s best interest at heart.

Now that Obama has bowed is head subserviently to dictators and royalty, he intends to sign a provisional carbon emissions target which would bring America to its knees.

THE STAGE IS SET IN COPENHAGEN FOR THE . . .
WORLD CLIMATE ORDER Based on Lies!!
December’s Climate Treaty is happening now, Obama is in the Copenhagen Climate Conference on December 8 and 9, 2009. He is not there to serve America’s interest. He is going to Copenhagen to save the Climate agenda and to announce his pledge that American businesses and citizens will reduce emissions by force if necessary.

This is where I need your help IMMEDIATELY!

YOU CAN HALT THE OBAMA “GREEN EXPRESS” IN COPENHAGEN!
FAX Obama And All 100 Senators – STOP Obama’s CLIMATE TREATY!

Through your fax blasts and your giving, the Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise (CDFE) can greatly assist the disruption of such a disastrous decision! If Obama, Al Gore, and their cronies have their way, we will be ratifying this “greenhouse debacle” within days.

Now that Barack Obama has bowed is head subserviently to dictators and royalty, he intends to sign a provisional carbon emissions target which would bring America to its knees.

Obama will dictate a 17% reduction below 2005 emission levels by 2020 and a 30% by 2025. The problem is there is no plan on how to accomplish this goal without rationing energy and punitively taxing Americans. Furthermore, there is no scientific reason to undertake these goals.

A President with America’s best interests would attend the conference to demand integrity, honesty and dignity from the scientific community and rebuke the false findings and junk science that has dictated so much of our energy and environmental policies for the last decade. – Barack Obama is not a President with America’s best interest at heart.

STOP THE COPENHAGEN GREEN WORLD ORDER!

We have prepared special faxes (see below) to be sent to President Obama and every Member of Congress. Let’s put the brakes on this very bad blow to our American free enterprise system. Will you assist the CDFE today?

All the G20 nations know perfectly well that “adaptation” to global warming would destroy their economies! It is my hope that someone, anyone who is a key insider adviser to President Obama, will let him know!

The last United Nations negotiating session before next month’s Copenhagen summit on climate change has ended in Spain, yet there is no agreement yet. There is still a change for good to win over evil.

Unfortunately, most Americans are uninformed about this climate change issue. You see, that is one of the main reasons why we exist—to use research and education to PROPERLY INFORM Americans on these free enterprise matters. Unfortunately, this treaty is a matter of life and death to us as a sovereign nation. In 1776 the United States was formed as a completely sovereign nation.

We must do everything within our power
to keep that sovereignty!!
This takeover of our sovereignty amounts to real TREASON!!

The Copenhagen Climate Treaty has two basic objectives:
* Prescribe energy use and consumption to the “haves”!!
* Shift wealth from the “haves” to the “have nots”!!
The accomplishment of these two objectives amounts to outright socialism at best-and global totalitarianism at worst. Both are NOT a win-win!!

Obama stands ready to sign the treaty!

That’s why our Senators must hear from us right away!

YOU CAN HALT THE OBAMA “GREEN EXPRESS” IN COPENHAGEN!
FAX Obama And All 100 Senators – STOP Obama’s CLIMATE TREATY!

Copenhagen can lead to a significant political agreement, but if it happens it will be a major disaster for the developed world, with the United States the biggest loser, since it would bankrupt the nation to bribe poor countries into surrendering their own development.

Insiders at the negotiating session in Spain said the missing ingredient – even more than the absence of agreement on targets, money and technology – was trust.

But treaty organizers are determined to have it pass. And with the help of our U. S. Senators and President Obama, it will! Swedish Finance Minister Anders Borg said at the close of the Spain session, “There will be a deal in Copenhagen, that’s quite clear. We won’t solve the problem in Copenhagen, but there will be progress.”

It is up to you and I to STOP THAT PROGRESS!

Part of the Copenhagen Climate Treaty unbelievably reads: “Industrialized countries have a dual obligation under the Treaty, representing their overall responsibility for keeping the world within limits of the global carbon budget and ensuring that adaption to the impacts of climate change is possible for the most vulnerable.

THIS DUAL BINDING OBLIGATION TAKES THE FORM OF EMISSIONS REDUCTIONS AS WELL AS THE PROVISION OF SUPPORT TO DEVELOPING COUNTRIES.”

Yes, that means we are giving away a part of our great country’s sovereignty!

If all elements of the Treaty (which hardly anyone knows a lot about!!) were to be voted in place, this December, it would establish a GLOBAL GOVERNMENT for the first time in history!!

This tyranny must come to a screeching HALT!

It is time for YOU to choose: tyranny or freedom?

YOU CAN HALT THE OBAMA “GREEN EXPRESS” IN COPENHAGEN!
FAX Obama And All 100 Senators – STOP Obama’s CLIMATE TREATY!

Here is precisely how this Copenhagen Climate Treaty will adversely affect you:
* Double digit inflation as a result of all goods and materials becoming much more expensive
* Raise the deficit through increased borrowing by our Treasury
* Transfer economic growth and profits from the United States to lesser-prepared countries
* Delay the recovery of the United States, which will affect EVERY SEGMENT of our society
* Increased U. S. manufacturing job loss through new cap and trade laws
* Be even more in debt to communist China
* Increase your state and federal taxes
* Regulation of personal spending on energy by law and high prices
* Move away from the U.S. Dollar to a One-World currency
* Increased costs per gallon of gas
THE LIST GOES ON AND ON!

And yet, too few Americans have ever researched this subject at all! Or, they’ve seen Al Gore interviewed on some television program; and believe all the “doom and gloom” that he professes.

You thought that Obama’s “Healthcare Reform” was the most important issue. Lord knows, we’ve lived through all the debates these past few months—and months to come! YET&..

If we do not stand firm against Obama and the U. S. Senate ratifying this Copenhagen Treaty, YOU may be enslaved to a new Green World Order! This will not wait until someone else is president. This will not even wait until the elections of 2010. We are facing devastation next month!

YOU CAN HALT THE OBAMA “GREEN EXPRESS” IN COPENHAGEN!
FAX Obama And All 100 Senators – STOP Obama’s CLIMATE TREATY!

Let your voice, fax and check book be heard!

NO MORE SOVEREIGNTY SUICIDE!!
Even though President Obama pledged his allegiance to uphold the Constitution at his inauguration, his actions have not meshed with what can happen, literally, next month!

The U. S. Constitution dictates that treaty ratification must have approval votes by a TWO-THIRDS majority in the U. S. Senate.

Please join us in this SOVEREIGNTY SUICIDE STRUGGLE!

Act now! Don’t delay.

We will be looking for your urgent fax to the President and every U. S. Senator.

The nation you save will be your own.

Sincerely,

Ron Arnold
Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise
www.cdfe.org

P.S. I cannot underscore how important this issue really is. Do not let our President or our Senators SELL US OUT under the mis-guidance of helping other under-developed countries. The United States is the most generous and compassionate nation on earth already. If we allow our sovereignty to be destroyed, we will no longer have the ability to continue and increase our generous aid programs – or even feed our own people!

YOU CAN HALT THE OBAMA “GREEN EXPRESS” IN COPENHAGEN!
FAX Obama And All 100 Senators – STOP Obama’s CLIMATE TREATY!

Or SEND your donation to:

Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise
Dept Code – 3347
12500 NE 10th Place
Bellevue, WA 98005

The Center for the Defense of Free Enterprise is a non-partisan education and research organization which works on free enterprise studies, public policy research, book publishing, conferences, white papers, and media outreach. We are a tax-exempt educational organization under Section 501(c)(3) of the United States Tax Code. The Center was founded in 1976 and has been exempt since 1977. The Center does not seek or accept government funds. Contributions to the Center are tax deductible.

Open Letter to Obama: Please Bring Our Troops Home Now!

Mr. President:

I am writing to urge you to announce an immediate cease-fire followed by a withdrawal of all US troops from Iraq and Afghanistan in the fastest way consistent with the safety of our forces.

I urge you to end the use of Predator drones that kill civilians.

I call upon you to cease all covert operations in Africa, Asia, and North and South America.

Too many of your military advisors are implicated in torture, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and crimes against the peace. Your Justice Department operates at the zenith of injustice, defending Bush Administration criminality in U.S. Courtrooms.

I wrote to you earlier suggesting that if you did not investigate the crimes of the Bush Administration, you would be viewed as their accessory. Sadly, war crimes and torture are now committed with your name on them.

Please bring our troops home now.

Cynthia McKinney

(Cynthia McKinney is a former US Congresswoman)