Say this for the $787 billion behemoth that Congress voted on on Friday — never in our history has a more important vote been cast on legislation with so little scrutiny. Couldn't they at least read the thing before voting on it?...The bill that President Obama called "the largest change in domestic policy since the 1930s" was jammed down Congress' throat, breaking almost all the promises of bipartisanship and transparency along the way.
(Speech from November 14, 2007. At approximately 9:20 in, Obama promises that, unlike the "secretive" Bush Administration, his administration will ensure full disclosure and ample time for Americans to comment on, specifically, legislation. How could a 1000 plus page bill, printed late Thursday night and voted on by the House and Senate the following day, POSSIBLY be read by a single member of Congress, let alone by the American people? -Roland)
Texas officials are drafting plans for law enforcement and military responses to the growing Mexican gang violence threatening to spill across the U.S. border.
“Worst-case scenario, Mexico becomes the Western hemisphere’s equivalent of Somalia, with mass violence, mass chaos,” Ted Galen Carpenter, vice president for defense and foreign policy at the Cato Institute, a Washington-based think tank, told Fox News. “That would clearly require a military response from the United States.”
Now that Senator Kirsten E. Gillibrand represents all of New York rather than one conservative swath outside Albany, she has described her shift on hot-button issues like illegal immigration and gay marriage as a broadening of her position.
Republicans outnumber Democrats in her district.
But in the 20th Congressional District, which first sent Ms. Gillibrand to Washington in 2006, many are taking it as an abandonment of the principles that persuaded them to support a Democrat in this predominantly Republican area.
(Of course her constituents feel betrayed. Her carefully crafted positions on such matters as gun control have earned her an A plus rating from the NRA...yet now that she's about to become a US Senator, she casts all of that aside to govern as a neoliberal, prepared to consider further gun control restrictions. She's a liar. Can't trust a Democrat. -Roland)
Orchard Park police are investigating a particularly gruesome killing, the beheading of a woman, after her husband -- an influential member of the local Muslim community -- reported her death to police Thursday.
Police identified the victim as Aasiya Z. Hassan, 37. Detectives have charged her husband, Muzzammil Hassan, 44, with second-degree murder...Hassan is the founder and chief executive officer of Bridges TV, which he launched in 2004, amid hopes that it would help portray Muslims in a more positive light.
His mother and her boyfriend drove Terry Morris from Chicago to Tupelo and dumped him out of the car. Terry Morris was 12 years old and left to fend for himself. That was after years of abuse - sexual, verbal, physical.(snip)Today, Terry Morris is 43 and a lead player in NASA's Constellation program, aimed at sending astronauts back to the moon and on to Mars.
Here is the Joint Committee on Taxation's breakdown of the so-called tax cuts which are not tax cuts. As you will see, this is more endless tinkering with the tax code to push the liberal agenda. A $400 tax credit (which nets $8/week in 2010 for the average worker eligible) is not a tax cut. Even if we believe these numbers the total tax-related "stimulus" in 2009 is just over $90 billion -- a fraction of the total bill.
Also, Fox News readers have found the following pork (pulled directly from article):
(Hat tip to our friends at The Patriotic Resistance at Grassfire.org!)
More ransom kidnappings happen in Phoenix than in any other town in the United States, according to local and federal law-enforcement authorities. Most victims and suspects are connected to the drug-smuggling world, usually tracing back to the western Mexican state of Sinaloa, Phoenix police report.
Arizona has become the new drug gateway into the United States. Roughly half of all marijuana seized at the U.S.-Mexico border was found along Arizona's 370-mile-long stretch.
One result is a kidnapping epidemic. Nearly every other crime here is down. But police received 366 kidnap-for-ransom reports last year, 359 in 2007. Police estimate twice that number go unreported.
A Continental commuter plane coming in for a landing nose-dived into a house in suburban Buffalo, sparking a fiery explosion that killed all 49 people aboard and a person in the home.
Witnesses heard the twin turboprop aircraft sputtering before it went down in light snow and fog around 10:20 p.m. Thursday about five miles from Buffalo Niagara International Airport. Continental Connection Flight 3407 from Newark, N.J., came in squarely through the roof of the house, its tail section visible through flames shooting at least 50 feet high.
Drudge reports: Rep. John Culberson, TX claims the "stimulus" bill must be urgently voted on today -- because Speaker Nancy Pelosi is leaving at 6:00 PM for an 8 day trip to Europe!
Culberson made the charge on Houston's KSEV radio.
Pelosi is hoping to lead a delegation to Europe; there's a meeting with the Pope and an award from an Italian legislative group.
Calls to Pelosi's spokesman went unreturned.
In the rushing, Democrats have now broken their promise to have the public see the $790 billion bill for 48 hours before any vote.
Sen. Frank Lautenberg (D-N.J.) predicted that none of his Senate colleagues would 'have the chance' to read the entire final version of the 1,071-page bill before it comes up for a final vote.
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