Thursday, April 29, 2010

Rep. Darrell Issa: Econ 101: Answering America on CSPAN’s Washington Journal (Video)

Bonus:

You Get It, Washington Doesn’t: Big Government Spending Is Killing Our Economic Recovery

Wednesday, April 21, 2010

Rep. Edward Royce (R-CA40): Countering Nuclear Terrorism (Video)

Royce gives an opening statement during the Foreign Affairs Committee hearing entitled, “Stopping the Spread of Nuclear Weapons, Countering Nuclear Terrorism: The NPT Review Conference and the Nuclear Security Summit.”

Royce presses State Department representatives on the results of the Nuclear Security Summit.

Rep. Royce presses State Department representatives on the results of the Nuclear Security Summit.

Rep. Ed Royce (R-CA40): To Geitner on Lehman Brothers

Royce Questions Geithner on Lehman Brothers

Rep. Darrrell Issa: Did Democrat Political Pressure Set the S.E.C.‘s Goldman Agenda? (Video)

GOP Watchdog Darrell Issa Questions S.E.C Timing of Goldman Suit

Steve Poisner, Gubernatorial Candidate: How Obamacare Will Hurt California

Steve Poisner has a nice article at Big Government today that makes the point on how Obama policies put a big hurt on California.

• How Obamacare Will Hurt California

President Obama signed into law what will surely be known as one of the worst pieces of public policy in American history.  His big-government takeover of America’s healthcare system passed against the will of many Americans.  It marks a loss for liberty and a victory for greater government control.

[...]

Californians will also have to bear the burden of an enormous new strain on state finances.  The health care bill achieves expanded health coverage in part by radically enlarging the Medicaid program.  State governments pay a substantial portion of Medicaid’s costs.  The chief deputy director for California’s health care programs has stated the bill’s Medicaid provisions will add an additional $2 billion to $3 billion to the state budget annually.  Our state has already been struggling to close a $20 billion budget gap.  Now the health care bill will force us to pay for expansion of a program riddled with waste and abuse.

Even as Californians struggle with rising health costs and growing budget deficits, Obamacare will slam them with new taxes and fees.  Worse still, the proceeds these taxes may be used to provide benefits to illegal immigrants.

The health care bill ostensibly limits benefits to lawful residents and bars illegal immigrants from the bill’s programs. But there is reason to believe that these provisions are little more than a sham designed to provide political cover for congressional Democrats while giving a wink and nod to fraudulent participation by illegal immigrants.

Friday, April 16, 2010

Gardner Pleads Guilty to Murdering Amber DuBois and Chelsea King

This scumbag deserves to die a horrible death. He has pleaded guilty 2 murdering 2 beautiful young girls and the attempted rape of another in exchange for the death penalty being taken off the table. Good luck in prison sleazeball, even convicts have a code and that code doesn’t include condoning what you have done.

• Sex offender pleads guilty to murdering 2 teens

SAN DIEGO — Sex offender John Albert Gardner pleaded guilty Friday to murdering two teenage girls in San Diego County after prosecutors agreed not to seek the death penalty.

Gardner, 31, faces life in prison without parole for killing 14-year-old Amber Dubois and 17-year-old Chelsea King.

He also pleaded guilty to attempting to rape another woman who was jogging in San Diego last year.

[...]

In a surprising turn, Gardner admitted Friday to kidnapping, raping and stabbing Amber. He also admitted dragging Chelsea to a remote area where he raped, strangled and buried her.

Sentencing was set for June 1.

Prosecutor Kristen Spieler told the judge the victims’ families agreed to the plea agreement. She was not immediately available for comment after the hearing.

California jobless rate swells to 12.6 percent

I think it is even worse than these figures indicate. In our own household, my son was out of work for almost 3 mo. before getting called back part time to his job, my d-i-l’s business closed and she was fortunate enough to find a job right away, but it is at half the pay she was making and it is such a long drive, about half the pay she is getting has to go in the gas tank just to get her there. Three friends of ours are out of work and they each tell of even more friends of theirs in the same boat. And, of course, because so little or no money is coming in, everyone is behind on bills, rent or mortgage payments. The experts say to contact your lenders and those you are obligated to financially and be upfront and honest and they’ll work with you. I call BS on that. Most everyone we know who is out of work is struggling to keep their cell phones on so that they at least have a contact number, in case one of the many jobs they’ve applied for comes through. Yesterday, everyone was saying that they have no money to send with their taxes and we all know the tax man doesn’t care that millions who had good jobs and good income last year, have nothing left to pay this years. Of all the people I know that have been out of work for months, only one has found a job and that is the temporary employment as a census worker.

• California jobless rate swells to 12.6 percent

California’s unemployment rate hit a modern record of 12.6 percent in March, though it rose only a fraction over the previous month, the state Employment Development Department reported Friday.

[...]

More than 2.3 million Californians remained unemployed, with 362,000 more people jobless than a year ago.

California’s jobless rate grew from 12.5 percent in February after holding steady for a month. The rate was 10.6 percent in March 2009.

Rep. Gary Miller (CA-42) Discusses Birthright Citizenship on America’s Newsroom with Bill Hemmer

Rep. Devin Nunes (CA-21 ): Green Energy Hoax: Rhetoric vs. Reality (Video)

Rep. Ed Royce (CA-40): Presses HUD Secretary on GSEs Role in Financial Crisis

Sunday, April 11, 2010

Tax Day Tea Party - Temecula, CA

April 15

Tea Party & Anti-Tax Protest

Temecula, CA

Time: April 15, 2010 from 2pm to 6pm

Location: Temecula Duck Pond

Street: Rancho California Road & Ynez Road

City/Town: Temecula, California

Website or Map: http://maps.google.com/maps?f…
Phone: http://www.desertrosebooks.com/TemeculaTeaParty.html

Event Type: tea, party, rally, &, anti-tax, protest
Organized By: Bridget Blanton & Rick Reiss

• Event announcements are also now posted online

RELATED:

• Beware of the Tea Party Crashers at the Tax Day Rallies

Friday, April 09, 2010

Is California Too Big to Fail?

• Reason.tv: Why California is Doomed (Spending!); Q and A With Flash Report’s Jon Fleischman

Thursday, March 25, 2010

Rep. Darrel Issa (R-CA49) Considers Asking for Special Prosecutor to Investigate WH Bribes for Votes

Darrell Issa, who happens to represent the District where I live, has been very visible and vocal throughout the health care debate and now he is considering asking for a Special Prosecutor to investigate the Obama administration’s blatant bribery attempts to gain the votes they needed to pass the monstrous health care bill. 

• GOP Lawmaker Darrell Issa Poised to Call for Special Prosecutor to Investigate White House

Rep. Darrell Issa, the top Republican on the House Oversight committee, told CBS News Wednesday that he will call for a special prosecutor to investigate the White House if it does not address Rep. Joe Sestak’s claim that he was offered a federal job in exchange for dropping out of the Pennsylvania Senate primary.

“If the public doesn’t receive a satisfactory answer, the next step would be to call for a special prosecutor, which is well within the statute,” Issa (pictured) told Hotsheet.

The California Republican has been pushing for the White House to provide details of conversations between Sestak and administration officials in the wake of Sestak’s comment during a radio interview last month that he was offered a high-ranking administration job in exchange for dropping his primary challenge against Sen. Arlen Specter.

Asked if that job was secretary of the Navy, Sestak declined to comment. His press secretary told CBS News that the lawmaker stands by his original statement that he was offered the job in exchange for an administration post.

[...]

On March 10th, Issa sent a letter to White House lawyer Robert Bauer asking for details about communications between Sestak and the White House. In the letter, he pointed to statutes he said could have been violated if Sestak was offered a quid pro quo arrangement in which he would be given an administration job in exchange for leaving the race.

Issa said the move may have violated anti-bribery provisions of the federal criminal code as well as prohibitions on government officials interfering in elections and using federal jobs for a political purpose. Violation of each provision is punishable by up to one year in jail.

The White House did not respond to Issa’s letter by its March 18 deadline. Reporters have asked White House press secretary Robert Gibbs about the inquiry on six occasions.

On February 23rd, Gibbs said he had not looked into the matter. On March 1st, he said he had not made any progress on it. On March 9th, he said he did not have an update with him. On March 11th, he said he did not have anything additional on the matter. On March 12th, he said he did not have any more information on it.

On March 16th, Gibbs finally addressed the situation.

“Look, I’ve talked to several people in the White House; I’ve talked to people that have talked to others in the White House,” he said. “I’m told that whatever conversations have been had are not problematic.”

On Monday, Issa issued a second letter asking who Gibbs had spoken to about the matter and the basis for his comment that the interactions between the White House and Sestak were not problematic.

In the letter, Issa said that Gibbs’ comments that he is “collecting direct evidence from witnesses” implies “that the White House is allowing its communications staff to carry out investigative tasks ordinarily conducted by legal professionals in the Counsel’s office. Such slipshodness has all the makings of a cover up.”

Wednesday, March 24, 2010

Teachers, Taxes, and Totalitarian Tactics

California schools are among the lowest ranked in the country and yet have some of the highest paid teachers. Obviously bad teachers. They whine, they threaten, they and their students get violent, yet we are supposed to think they are noble? I don’t think so.

• California’s Greek Reaction
  Victor Davis Hanson

Recently our air waves have been thick with angry ads from the teachers’ unions. We are informed that the greedy, the wealthy, and corporations refuse to pay higher taxes, and thus the more noble of our citizens, such as teachers and their students, are suffering. Lost in the strident message is that California’s sales, income, and gas taxes are now the highest in the country (at a time when federal income, FICA, and health-care taxes are slated to rise to record levels on upper brackets); its teachers are the highest paid in the nation; and California’s students’ test scores in math and English are variously ranked from 46th to 49th in the nation. Given that about 150,000 Californians (out of some 36 million) pay nearly half of the income taxes, and given that estimates suggest nearly 3,500 more affluent Californians are leaving the state each week to no- or low-tax states like Nevada, Utah, Oregon, etc., it would seem suicidal to go after that shrinking 1-5 percent of taxpayers even further — all in order to ensure that the highest-paid teaching cadre in the nation continues business as usual, the results of which are only too clear from national rankings of state achievement in our public schools.

Monday, March 22, 2010

Fire Pelosi!

• Make Your Donation Towards Our Goal: $842,010 $1,002,010 in 40 Hours to Win 40 Seats

I doubt there is a snowball’s chance in hell that her constitutents will ever vote her out, but she only holds the Speakership because her party has the majority, so let’s take care of that and boot these socialists out and consign the Nannystate Speaker to the ash heap of history.

• FIRENANCYPELOSI.com

Sunday, March 21, 2010

Rep. Herger: House Republicans Demanding a Call of the House on Government Takeover Bill (Video)

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Where is Rep. Lorretta Sanchez (D-CA47)?

Apparently she skipped the festivities arm twisting in Washington today and preferred a fund raiser in Florida. Ace has the details, such as they are. No one knows where she is or whether she’ll show tomorrow, but she is whipping as a NO vote.

• Where is Representative Loretta Sanchez?

Oh my.

As their whip efforts narrow to just a handful of Members, House Democratic leaders are facing an unlikely problem vote: Rep. Loretta Sanchez (D-Calif.).

Sanchez was nowhere to be found on Saturday — she was in Florida on a fundraising jaunt, two Democratic sources said — and while leaders expected her to return for the Sunday vote on final passage, they weren’t assured. What’s more, leaders now list the Orange County Democrat as a “no” vote.

Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA22): Congressman McCarthy on Hannity

Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA22): 17 KGET interview on Health Care Reform

Friday, March 19, 2010

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA21): Water Torture on Glenn Beck

Congressman Devin Nunes appears on the Glenn Beck program to discuss healthcare.

Herger: A Vote for Government-Run Health Care is a Vote for Backroom Deals and Kickbacks (Video)

Thursday, March 18, 2010

Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA21): Democrats Pass Another Water Bill: This Time for Southern CA (Video)

First, waste water recycling for the Bay Area. Now Southern California water quality becomes a top Congressional priority. Meanwhile, no action is taken to address the government-imposed drought confronting the San Joaquin Valley.

Rep. Dan Lungren (R-CA03): Let’s not ignore the American People…

Rep. Dan Lungren addressing Congress : “Let’s remember August, it did occur, it is something that is a manifestation of the American people and how they feel. Let’s not ignore the American people. Let’s be the House of Representatives”

Jerry Brown Urges Unions to Attack

The Unions along with high taxes and a business unfriendly envirowhacko agenda has put California on the verge of bankruptcy, but by all means, send those thugs out to intimidate voters and elect more tax and spend D-baggers. Wake up California!

• Jerry Brown urges unions to ‘attack’

Faced with the daunting prospect of being significantly outspent by his Republican opponent, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Jerry Brown spoke to a labor group Tuesday and urged them to go on the offensive.

“We’re going to attack whenever we can, but I’d rather have you attack,” Brown said at a gathering of the California delegation of the Laborers’ International Union of North America in Sacramento. “I’d rather be the nice guy in this race. We’ll leave [the attacks] to ... the Democratic Party and others.”

Tucker Bounds, a spokesman for GOP candidate Meg Whitman, said Brown’s pitch was unseemly and perhaps even illegal.

“I think this is pretty clear evidence that Jerry Brown is actively seeking independent support to prop up his campaign from the unions attacking Meg Whitman,” Bounds said. “And more importantly, I think, it’s Jerry Brown in his own words laying out a very cynical campaign strategy that’s playing fast and loose with the campaign rules in California.”

Standing at the Doorstep of History

Hey, at least she has a doorstep. With the way things are going here in California, many of us might not even have that.

(H/T: NRO)

Rep. Issa (R-CA49) Takes the House Floor to Push for Common Sense Health Care Proposals (Video)

Rep. Buck McKeon (R-CA25) Two Government Takeovers at Once (Video)

The Democrats’ plan is a government takeover of student lending that will eliminate the private-sector choice and competition enjoyed by students and schools for more than four decades.

Rep Dan Lungren (R-CA03): Process raises constitutional questions (Video)

Transcript:
Mr. Speaker, when you practice law there is an old expression that goes something like this, if you have the facts- argue the facts - if you have the law- argue the law - if you have neither, attack your opponent. That appears to be what is happening.

There are those of us who have argued that the process that we are engaged in, that is we will not vote on the senate bill but we will kind of vote on the senate bill, we will deem it pass, is unconstitutional.

In response to that the Speaker of the House has said this, I think it’s ridiculous and the people who are tell you that it’s unconstitutional know better and you should be very outraged say things like that, they know when they talk, they are not telling the truth.

I resent being called a liar by the Speaker of the House. I resent the fact because there are constitutional scholars who have said this is unconstitutional.

Now, I have only argued one case before the Supreme Court which I won on behalf of the people of the state of California. So I am not considered one of the great practitioners before the Supreme Court, but we have spoken to one of them who will work with us in bringing this case to the Supreme Court if we try this outrage against the American People
Let’s stick to the facts, stick to the law and stop attacking people personally.

Tuesday, March 16, 2010

Rep. Dan Lungren (R-CA03): The Constitution: An inconvenient truth (Video)

Rep. Lungren (R-CA) speaking on the house floor in reference to the Slaughter Solution - a plan by Rep. Louise Slaughter (D-NY), the Democratic chair of the powerful House Rules Committee, to get the health care legislation through the House without an actual vote on the Senate-passed health care bill. Democratic leaders currently lack the votes needed to pass the Senate health care bill through the House. Under Slaughters use of the rules, Democratic leaders will overcome this problem by simply deeming the Senate bill passed in the House - without an actual vote by members of the House.

Rep. John Campbell (R-CA48): Campbell Floor Speech: Kill the Healthcare bill (Video)

Congressman John Campbell takes to the House floor to excoriate Speaker Pelosi and President Obama’s health care legislation.