Posts Tagged ‘Health Care’

PA GOP News Brief – 7.28.10

July 28th, 2010 |

Author: admin

PA GOP News Brief – 7.28.10

1. Philadelphia Daily News: Sestak’s tone-deaf when it comes to earmarks

2. The Hill: Voters can’t shake deficit worries

3. Delaware County Times: Corbett: Businesses need help from state

4. Delaware County Times: Public health insurance divides 7^th district candidates

5. The Hill: Obama flubs on creating new jobs

1. Philadelphia Daily News: Sestak’s tone-deaf when it comes to earmarks

Joe Sestak readily admits he has trouble answering questions succinctly.

He says that much of what he’s asked about is so complicated that he needs time to explain things. He also says this is a drawback in his profession and tells me that he works on it “constantly.”

The Democratic congressman and Senate candidate should work a little harder to reconcile taking campaign contributions from those benefiting from federal “earmarks” (which direct money to be spent on specific projects) while claiming “a personal policy” against doing so.

2. The Hill: Voters can’t shake deficit worries

The federal budget deficit will matter more to voters this year than it has in the past decade, according to polls.

While it continues to trail the near-double-digit unemployment rates and overall state of the economy as a leading concern for voters, it is proving central to the 2010 election.

“It used to be that people had vague concerns about the deficit. They knew there was one, but it didn’t seem to really matter,” said Republican Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty, a likely candidate in the 2012 presidential race. “Now average people outside of politics are zoomed in on it. You go to the grocery store or the dry cleaners or some place and average people, they make comments about the debt, the deficit and spending.”

The rise in deficit worries is exposing the political risk in a key plank of the Democratic agenda: pumping taxpayer money into the economy in the short term, while attempting to keep deficits and debt in check in the long term.

After barely registering for at least a decade, deficits began rising rapidly among voter concerns in 2009. Massive Tea Party protests around the country since early last year helped stir up public attention and unrest.

By February of this year, 11 percent of those polled by Gallup said the federal deficit was the most important issue facing the nation.

3. Delaware County Times: Corbett: Businesses need help from state

The next governor needs to reduce spending and remove any barriers for small businesses to flourish, said Pennsylvania Attorney General and Republican gubernatorial candidate Tom Corbett during a visit to Archway Press Inc. in Sharon Hill Tuesday.

Corbett called the family-owned Archway a success story in Pennsylvania for weathering the economic storm; though owner Tom Gaffney said the business has taken its lumps too, with a full-time workforce reduced from 20 percent to nine employees and productivity down about 20 or 25 percent in the last two years.

Corbett said such small businesses need government to be on their side. He has proposed cutting business taxes and holding the line on new taxes, streamlining tax paperwork, aligning state and federal investment expenses, and eliminating the inheritance tax.

4. Delaware County Times: Public health insurance divides 7^th district candidates

While the Democratic candidate for the 7th Congressional District kicked off an economic tour Tuesday, the Republican candidate denounced a public health insurance option.

State Rep. Bryan Lentz, D-161, of Swarthmore, is running against Republican Pat Meehan, a former U.S. attorney, for the seat currently occupied by U.S. Rep. Joe Sestak, who is running for U.S. Senate.

…

Meehan kicked off his business tour back in May with a stop at the Ridley Park Business District. Since then, Meehan has hosted a roundtable discussion, forums and other events with small-business owners and executives.

Meehan on Tuesday said he was concerned about U.S. Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) call for a public health insurance option. He said it “will cost the taxpayers billions of dollars and over time crowd out private insurance companies, leaving consumers with no choice but to sign up for a government plan.”

5. The Hill: Obama flubs on creating new jobs

The Obama administration has been focused on the wrong jobs numbers. Instead of obsessing over the president’s sagging job approval ratings, the focus should have been on a job-creation initiative.

We finally have a genuine “most important issue or problem” according to every poll out there, yet the president doesn’t seem to be responding, except to try and keep people on unemployment benefits. Even a public jobs initiative would be welcomed at this juncture, but things won’t really get better in this economy until consumer confidence rises in response to the availability of more jobs in the private sector.

The president isn’t the only one who seems confused about this matter. Last week a Quinnipiac University poll announced that Americans believe jobs are more important than deficit reduction. “American voters say 64-30 percent that reducing unemployment is more important than reducing the federal budget deficit,” said the pollsters’ release. It went on, “Even Republicans say 58-38 percent that reducing unemployment is more important.”

Mike Barley
Director of the Communications and Technology Departments

Republican Party of Pennsylvania
717-234-4901, ext. 115
mbarley@pagop.org

Posted in Briefs, Democrat, National, Republican, State |

Tags: Corbett, Deficit Spending, Earmarks, Health Care, Health Insurance, Jobs, Sestak |

No Comments »

PA GOP News Brief 7.12.2010

July 12th, 2010 |

Author: admin

v\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);} o\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);} w\:* {behavior:url(#default#VML);} .shape {behavior:url(#default#VML);}

PA GOP News Brief 7.12.2010

1) Tom Corbett visits with Business owners in Downtown Elizabethtown

2) BigGovernment.com: Pat Toomey: Cap-and-Trade would Hammer Economy, Job Creation

3) Human Events: Obama Ban Kneecaps Gulf Coast Economy

4) Pottstown Mercury: Pat Meehan Op-Ed: Uncertainty is killing job creation

5) Rasmussen Reports: 53% favor Repeal of Health Care Law

1) Tom Corbett visits with Business owners in Downtown Elizabethtown

Republican gubernatorial candidate Tom Corbett today toured the business district of Elizabethtown, meeting with merchants and business owners listening to their concerns and explaining his plan to improve small businesses.

“It is time for small businesses to have someone on their side in Harrisburg,” said Corbett. “For far too long, state government has been an adversary to job growth.”

2) BigGovernment.com: Pat Toomey: Cap-and-Trade would Hammer Economy, Job Creation

Last week’s national unemployment numbers demonstrated that the economic recovery President Obama promised us is still a ways away. In Pennsylvania the unemployment rate increased last month hovering just above 9%.

Given these numbers, the last thing Washington politicians should be doing is supporting legislation that would cost thousands more jobs. But that is exactly what my very liberal opponent, Congressman Joe Sestak, is doing.

Not only did Congressman Sestak sponsor and vote for a cap-and-trade energy tax, he argued that the tax did not go far enough!

A cap-and-trade energy tax would impose an onerous indirect tax on the production and consumption of carbon-based energy. It would cap the amount of carbon dioxide businesses could emit, impose a penalty when the cap is exceeded, and would require that carbon emissions be cut by 20 percent of 2005 levels by 2020.

3) Human Events: Obama Ban Kneecaps Gulf Coast Economy

The crisis in the Gulf of Mexico intensified Friday as one of the largest drilling companies in the world announced movement of its deepwater drilling rig Ocean Endeavor from the Gulf of Mexico to Egypt.

“With new contracting severely restricted in the Gulf of Mexico as a result of the uncertainties surrounding the offshore drilling moratorium, we are actively seeking international opportunities to keep our rigs fully employed,” said Diamond Offshore President and CEO, Larry Dickerson. “We greatly regret the loss of U.S. jobs that will result from this rig relocation.”

The announcement came as a group of Congressmen toured Grand Isle, La., to get a first-hand look at the local impact of the spill.

“The greatest damage that’s going to happen in Louisiana — that’s already happening — is to jobs and the economy,” Rep. John Fleming (R-La.) told HUMAN EVENTS after the site visit. “The moratorium on deepwater drilling which actually has now failed in court twice but nonetheless just the delay — the uncertainty of all this — we’re already seeing crews stack their rigs and move on.”

4) Pottstown Mercury: Pat Meehan Op-Ed: Uncertainty is killing job creation

Over the past few months, I have met and spoken to many small business owners and managers to see how we can restore growth in our economy. Despite spending hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars on bailouts and stimulus programs, we continue to see high unemployment. With so many people not going back to work, the inescapable question is “Why not?”

Some truly astonishing figures recently released by the Federal Reserve offer a clue. Those figures show that non-financial companies in the United States have socked away $1.84 trillion in cash and other liquid assets as of the end of March. The Wall Street Journal reported that those cash reserves represented a 26 percent increase from the prior year — the largest increase ever according to records going back to 1952. It also found that cash accounted for “7 percent of all company assets, including factories and financial investments, the highest level since 1963.”

This is cash that could be reinvested in businesses to spur growth and hire new employees. But instead, businesses are holding onto the cash, even though it is earning next to nothing in interest. It is clear to me that the $1.84 trillion in cash is being horded as insurance against unknown but feared burdens from government.

5) Rasmussen Reports: 53% favor Repeal of Health Care Law

Fifty-three percent (53%) of voters’ nationwide favor repeal of the recently passed national health care law. The latest weekly Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey on the subject finds that 42% oppose repeal.

This is the second lowest level of support for repeal in 17 weeks of surveying since the health care bill was passed by Congress. It marks what appears to be a continuing downward trend in support for repeal since June. Last week, support for repeal spiked back up to 60%, but that may have been due to renewed publicity about the law as it actually began to be implemented.

Mike Barley
Director of the Communications and Technology Departments

Republican Party of Pennsylvania
717-234-4901, ext. 115
mbarley@pagop.org

Posted in Briefs, Democrat, Local, National, Republican, State |

Tags: Cap & Trade, Corbett, Gulf Coast Economy, Health Care, Meehan |

No Comments »

PA GOP News Brief 6.10.2010

June 7th, 2010 |

Author: admin

6.10.2010

1) PA GOP Media Advisory: PA GOP To Hold Summer Meeting This Weekend

2) The Wall Street Journal: Issa Pushes for Probe of Sestak, Romanoff Job Talks

3) kdka.com: Republican Senate Candidate Pat Toomey Explains Former Position On Wall Street

4) Allentown Morning Call: Bucks County recorder of deeds dies

5) Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: Issa requests probe of 2 Obama aides

1) PA GOP Media Advisory: PA GOP To Hold Summer Meeting This Weekend

This Friday and Saturday, June 11^th and 12^th, 2010, the Republican Party of Pennsylvania will hold its 2010 Summer Meeting at the Hershey Lodge & Convention Center. Over the weekend, the Republican Party of Pennsylvania will have the opportunity to hear from 2010 U.S. Senate candidate Pat Toomey, Gubernatorial candidate Tom Corbett and Lt. Governor candidate Jim Cawley.

On Friday night, we will hold our annual Celebrate Pennsylvania Dinner where Pennsylvania Republicans will hear from former U.S. Senator and potential 2012 presidential candidate Rick Santorum and California Congressman Darrell Issa, who has served as a leading critic of the White House and their attempts to bribe Congressman Joe Sestak out of the U.S. Senate race.

On Saturday, our recently elected Republican Party members will conduct their first meeting. Our Party will hear reports from candidates and elected officials, as well as hear the latest news from various Party committees and regional political updates.

2) The Wall Street Journal: Issa Pushes for Probe of Sestak, Romanoff Job Talks

If Republicans succeed in capturing the majority in either the House or Senate, expect them to use subpoena power to investigate the White House’s job discussions with Joe Sestak and Andrew Romanoff. In the meantime, GOP lawmakers are doing what they can to keep the spotlight on the involvement of top Obama administration officials in efforts to push aside primary challengers for the administration’s favored candidates.

Rep. Darrell Issa, of California, ranking Republican on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee said Wednesday he sent letters to the U.S. Office of Special Counsel seeking Hatch Act investigations of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and his deputy, Jim Messina.

White House counsel Bob Bauer, in a memo last month, said former President Bill Clinton had offered an unpaid post to Rep. Joe Sestak (D., Pa.) to get him to drop his primary campaign against Sen. Arlen Specter (D., Pa.). Last Thursday, the White House said that Messina discussed possible administration jobs with Andrew Romanoff, a former speaker of the Colorado House of Representatives, to keep him from a primary race against Sen. Michael Bennet. The Hatch Act forbids restricts partisan political activities by government employees.

3) kdka.com: Republican Senate Candidate Pat Toomey Explains Former Position On Wall Street

The day after he won the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate, Pat Toomey had an ad on television against his new opponent, Democrat Joe Sestak.

Toomey says he wants the campaign to be about issues and he sees clear differences between the two candidates.

“We can be good people and have fundamental disagreements about what’s best for Pennsylvania and what’s best for America,” he said. “I like to think that that’s what Joe has in his heart. I think he’s completely mistaken about the path we should take. But I would like this conversation during this campaign to be about substantive policy differences.”

One big issue is Wall Street where Toomey has attacked Sestak for voting for the Wall Street bailout and Sestak has attacked Toomey for working on Wall Street and deregulating government oversight of finance. KDKA Political Editor Jon Delano asked Toomey what he did on Wall Street 20 years ago. “I arranged transactions that helped corporations lower their cost of borrowing,” he explained.

Toomey denies doing anything to cause the meltdown, saying he was not involved in risky home mortgage deals and was only involved in less-controversial derivatives. “I was involved in those derivatives, interest rate swaps and currency swaps, but the credit default swaps, for instance, that got a lot of understandable and very bad publicity, they were invented six years after I left the business,” Toomey said.

4) Allentown Morning Call: Bucks County recorder of deeds dies

John P. Murphy knew something was wrong Friday when Ed Gudknecht didn’t show up at the Maennerchor Society to watch the Flyers play Game 4.

“I’d love to see the Flyers win just for him,” said the manager of the Doylestown social club where Gudknecht was a member for more than three decades, as well as treasurer. Gudknecht died suddenly Tuesday at age 73. He served as Bucks County’s elected recorder of deeds for a quarter century, longer than anyone in county history.

The first deputy recorder, Bob Dickson, said Gudknecht was a generous person who modernized the office. He instituted electronic record keeping, remote Internet access to the county’s records, an identity theft prevention program and a disaster recovery system.

Gudknecht served in the Navy from 1957 to 1962, Dickson said. He was also an active member of the county GOP, and served as a delegate to the 2008 Republican National Convention in Minneapolis. He was past president of the Pennsylvania Recorder of Deeds Association, Association of Title Examiners and Doylestown Area Jaycees.

5) Pittsburgh Tribune-Review: Issa requests probe of 2 Obama aides

U.S. Rep. Darrell Issa on Wednesday asked the federal Office of Special Counsel to investigate two top aides to President Obama for attempting to influence Democratic Senate primaries.

White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel and his deputy, Jim Messina, tried to clear a path for favored candidates in the Pennsylvania and Colorado primaries, the White House has said. Issa, R-Calif., wants the Office of Special Counsel to investigate whether either man violated the federal Hatch Act, which prohibits using public office for political activity.

“Rahm Emanuel was leveraging the power and access of his official position to advance the political interests of the Democratic Party by affecting the result of the Pennsylvania Democratic primary,” Issa said.

White House Counsel Robert Bauer said nothing improper occurred. Emanuel enlisted former President Clinton to discuss whether Rep. Joe Sestak wanted an unpaid position on a presidential advisory board, rather than mount a challenge to Sen. Arlen Specter, Obama’s endorsed candidate, Bauer said in a report released May 28. Sestak beat Specter 10 days earlier.

“The counsel’s office has looked into each of these circumstances and determined that nothing inappropriate occurred,” White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said.

PA GOP News Brief 6.07.2010

1) pa2010.com: Poll: Corbett up 16 in guv race

2) Roll Call: Specter Posse Gallops Back to GOP

3) Bloomberg News: U.S.’s $13 Trillion Debt Poised to Overtake GDP: Chart of Day

4) The Daily Local News: VAT is no solution to budget woes

5) RedState: Remember Those Deficit Savings From Obamacare?

1) pa2010.com: Poll: Corbett up 16 in guv race

Five months before the general election for governor, Republican Tom Corbett is holding a comfortable 16-point lead, according to a new poll.

The Rasmussen survey released Saturday showed Corbett, the state Attorney General, winning 49 percent of the vote, compared to 33 percent for Allegheny County Executive Dan Onorato. Thirteen percent of likely voters are still undecided and five percent prefer another candidate, according to the poll.

The survey of 500 likely voters, conducted June 2, had a margin of error of 4.5 percent.

2) Roll Call: Specter Posse Gallops Back to GOP

After their defeat in the Democratic Primary, a number of Arlen Specter’s supporters and staff are defecting to the Toomey campaign.

A cadre of influential Republicans long loyal to Arlen Specter have parted ways, politically speaking, with the party-switching Senator, a process that has accelerated since his defeat in the Pennsylvania Democratic primary.

David Urban, Specter’s chief of staff from 1997 to 2002, when Specter was still a Republican, is leading a coordinated effort to help get former GOP Rep. Pat Toomey elected to the Senate — even though Specter is backing Toomey’s Democratic foe.

Urban, a Western Pennsylvania native, has been joined by longtime members of Specter’s kitchen cabinet in building support for Toomey among moderate Republicans in the Keystone State and in Washington, D.C. The group includes party insiders and current and former chiefs of staff to Pennsylvania GOP Members. Not all members of the group backed Specter after he switched parties in April 2009, but others, such as lobbyist Steve Hart, are close personal friends who stuck by him through the Democratic primary and actively aided his re-election bid.

“Nobody in this town is more of a Specter loyalist than me,” Urban said. “I would like to say, at least, that we’re very close. If he were in the general election, I’d be working my best to get him re-elected. But now that he’s out, I’d say Pat Toomey is the clear choice.” The group that Urban is assembling is set to meet July 14 at the GOP’s Capitol Hill Club for its first strategy session.

3)Bloomberg News: U.S.’s $13 Trillion Debt Poised to Overtake GDP: Chart of Day

President Barack Obama is poised to increase the U.S. debt to a level that exceeds the value of the nation’s annual economic output, a step toward what Bill Gross called a “debt super cycle.”

The CHART OF THE DAY tracks U.S. gross domestic product and the government’s total debt, which rose past $13 trillion for the first time this month. The amount owed will surpass GDP in 2012, based on forecasts by the International Monetary Fund. The lower panel shows U.S. annual GDP growth as tracked by the IMF, which projects the world’s largest economy to expand at a slower pace than the 3.2 percent average during the past five decades.

“Over the long term, interest rates on government debt will likely have to rise to attract investors,” said Hiroki Shimazu, a market economist in Tokyo at Nikko Cordial Securities Inc., a unit of Japan’s third-largest publicly traded bank. “That will be a big burden on the government and the people.”

Gross, who runs the world’s largest mutual fund at Pacific Investment Management Co. in Newport Beach, California, said in his June outlook report that “the debt super cycle trend” suggests U.S. economic growth won’t be enough to support the borrowings “if real interest rates were ever to go up instead of down.”

3) The Daily Local News: VAT is no solution to budget woes

Guest columnists Congressmen Joe Pitts (PA16) and Jim Gerlach (PA6) explain why at VAT tax is not the right answer to our country’s deficit problems.

If you walk into an Apple store in the United States you can walk out with a brand-new iPod for around $212. If you purchase from the same retailer in England, you can expect to pay the equivalent of $230. Why the difference? Much of this disparity is because of a value-added tax paid on manufactured products in Britain.

A value-added tax, or VAT, is a type of sales tax paid by raw materials producers, manufacturers and retailers at each stage of production. This type of tax is common in most European nations, but does not exist in the U.S. However, this situation may not last much longer. Paul Volcker, one of President Obama’s top economic advisers, has publicly called for a new VAT. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi has said that Congress should look into creating the new tax.

The complexity of the VAT system means that the government needs to hire additional IRS agents and auditors to enforce the tax. A 1984 estimate by the Congressional Budget Office showed that a VAT would lead the IRS to expand its work force by more than 20,000. A new estimate would probably show a significant increase in the number of workers needed to enforce the VAT.

By the end of the year we could see a very serious debate about whether Congress should look to the VAT to balance the budget. The president’s debt commission is searching for ways to balance the federal budget. In Washington, one of the most talked-about recommendations is the VAT.

The U.S. is one of the few industrialized nations that doesn’t impose a VAT. We believe that what makes us different from other nations is what makes our economy the strongest in the world.

4) RedState: Remember Those Deficit Savings From Obamacare?

Avik Roy, a savvy health care analyst in New York City who writes an excellent blog on health policy, took the time to talk with me for The Heartland Institute’s Health Care News podcast about what we learned last week when it comes to the White House’s fraudulent case for Obamacare.

In case you missed it — because for some reason, the Washington media types didn’t find time to cover this story — Congressional Budget Office Director Doug Elmendorf offered an astounding rejection of the notion that the new health care regime, which President Obama frequently cited as a profound and necessary deficit-lowering measure, does anything to improve America’s deficit picture.

Despite the best efforts of OMB chief Peter Orszag and others, the spin that Obamacare was a budgetary cure has already been revealed as a complete falsehood, even before the implementation costs of the vast majority of its policies are fully known. As Roy writes:

“At this point, there are only two camps of honest people: those who believe Obamacare will blow up the budget, and that this is a problem; and those who believe that Obamacare will blow up the budget, and that this is not a problem (because wealth redistribution is more important, and because the wealthy can be taxed more if needed).”

The more we learn about what is in this bill, the more we see how disastrous it will be for this country, and how wrongheaded its approach is to solving our health care problems.

Posted in Briefs, Democrat, Election, National, Republican, State |

Tags: Bloomberg, Health Care, Obama, Specter, Toomey, VAT |

No Comments »

PA GOP News Brief 5.07.10

May 7th, 2010 |

Author: admin

PA GOP News Brief 5.07.10

1) PA GOP: Patrick Murphy Gets Paid Back For His Loyal Support Of The Pelosi Agenda

2) Toomey’s Fundraising Pace Still Growing

3) Public Opinion Strategies Poll: Burns Over Critz 43%-41%

4) Pataki, Burns Call For Repeal Of Health-Care Bill

5) Rove: The President And The Politics of Civility

——————————————————————————–

1) PA GOP: Patrick Murphy Gets Paid Back For His Loyal Support Of The Pelosi Agenda

Republican Party of Pennsylvania Chairman Rob Gleason continues to highlight Congressman Patrick Murphy’s track record of choosing the wishes of Nancy Pelosi over the needs of his constituents in light Murphy’s selection to a high-level U.S. House Committee.

“It appears that Patrick Murphy has finally been rewarded for blindly following the big-government agenda of Speaker Nancy Pelosi,” Gleason said. “After consciously deciding to sell out his constituents by supporting an extreme liberal agenda that will empty the wallets of American taxpayers for generations to come, one can only question if this was Murphy’s reward for his health care vote.

“Whether it comes to supporting government-run, taxpayer-funded health care or the nearly $1 trillion stimulus bill that has failed to create jobs, Speaker Nancy Pelosi can always count on Patrick Murphy to be a strident and enthusiastic supporter of her big-government agenda.”

2) Toomey’s Fundraising Pace Still Growing

U.S. Senate candidate Pat Toomey, who has received the endorsement of the Republican Party of Pennsylvania, continues to post strong fundraising numbers that reflect the widespread support his campaign is receiving across the Commonwealth.

“Toomey raised just over $1 million in April, his campaign said Friday morning. That comes after he doubled-up on incumbent Senator Arlen Specter’s fundraising over the three months prior, raising more than $2 million between from January through March. The pre-primary reporting period encompasses only April 1 to April 28, but at this rate, Toomey would be raking in an impressive $3 million per quarter…

“I am very grateful for all the support our campaign has received over the past year,” Toomey said in a statement. “As I travel across the Commonwealth, I meet more Pennsylvanians who ask how they can get involved and support my effort to bring real fiscal change to Washington. It is because of our enthusiastic supporters that I am confident we will win in November.”

3) Public Opinion Strategies Poll: Burns Over Critz 43%-41%

12th Congressional District Republican candidate Tim Burns continues to gain momentum in one of the most closely watched races in the country. According to the non-partisan polling firm Public Opinion Strategies, Burns is leading his Democratic opponent 43%-41%.

“The bottom line is that Tim Burns is leading this special election. Further, by every measurement, this survey shows that Tim Burns’ coalition is more aware of the election, more interested and more galvanized in their support. These results are not unlike those measured prior to the Massachusetts senate race as well as governors races in New Jersey and Virginia.”

4) Pataki, Burns Call For Repeal Of Health-Care Bill

Former New York Governor George Pataki traveled to the 12th Congressional District yesterday to express his support for Republican candidate Tim Burns and to join him in his opposition to the Democrats’ government-run health care plan.

“Burns said his contest with Democrat Mark Critz of Johnstown is “a referendum on the health-care bill” and more broadly the “agenda” set forth by President Obama and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi.

“We need health-care reform,” said Burns, who faces voters May 18 in a special election to succeed the late Rep. John P. Murtha. But Burns contends that Congress passed the current legislation without understanding it and “against the will of the people.”

5) Rove: The President And The Politics of Civility

In an article that first appeared in The Wall Street Journal, former White House Deputy Chief of Staff Karl Rove calls on President Obama to take the lead on reigning in the harsh rhetoric of his Party and instead focus on an honest and open discussion of the issues.

“If Mr. Obama is serious about his commitment to courtesy and respect, then he will need to demonstrate presidential leadership and rein in the verbal excesses of the leaders of his own party. He could start by having a conversation with Speaker Nancy Pelosi, who condemned those with different views on health care as being ‘un-American.’ He might also share a word with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who recently accused Republicans of being ‘anti-American’ and wanting to continue to “make love to Wall Street” by pressing for changes in a bill regulating the financial industry.”

Posted in Briefs, Election, Local, National, Republican, State |

Tags: Health Care, Obama, Pelosi, Toomey, Wall Street Journal |

No Comments »

PA GOP News Brief 4.15 2010 See Briefs

April 9th, 2010 |

Author: admin

Come join us for our annual
fundraiser dinner!
This year’s dinner will be held on Saturday
May 8, from 5-8 pm at the Springettsbury Fire
Hall. All you can eat steak and shrimp
dinner. Yep, that’s right…ALL YOU CAN EAT
STEAK and SHRIMP!
We are honored to have as our guest speaker
Congressman Pat Toomey!
Tickets are just $35 for adults…$60 if you want
a professional photo with Pat. Ages 12 and
under is $15, and 3 and below are free.
So why not come out, enjoy some of the best
bluegrass music around (featuring Chairman
Peck and the Boys), meet the candidates and
our current elected officials, and enjoy ALL
YOU CAN EAT STEAK and SHRIMP!
Please contact Chris Reed for additional details
and tickets at 683-7456.

PA GOP News Brief 4.16 2010

1) Indiana Gazette: Go back to basics on budget, Corbett tells town hall meeting

2) Pittsburgh Tribune Review: Toomey: Welfare state plan shocking

3) DelCo Times: Senate candidate Toomey talks small business

4) Politico: Specter haul dwarfed by Toomey

5) Politico: A tale of two Obamas: Up in D.C., down in U.S.

1) Indiana Gazette: Go back to basics on budget, Corbett tells town hall meeting

The Indiana Gazette has an update on Tom Corbett’s campaign for Governor.

ELDERTON – The budget is the most important issue facing Pennsylvania, Attorney General and governor-hopeful Tom Corbett said. And if he is elected, he would rebuild it from the ground up.

“Let’s take a look at how we’re spending money,” he told a crowd of about 60 people at a town hall meeting Wednesday afternoon in Elderton. “We need to go back to the beginning.”

Corbett spent the day in Indiana and Armstrong counties, touring Diamond Drugs in White Township to tout his support of small businesses and answering questions at the Indiana-Armstrong Patriots’ town hall meeting in the Smith Complex.

Corbett is one of the Republicans running for governor in the primary election and has received the Republican endorsement. A Philadelphia native but nearly lifelong Pittsburgh resident, he has served as attorney general since 2004.

“You have to be able to connect with people, you have to understand all regions of the state are important,” he said. “Our current governor knows one region is important.”

Sabrina Balister, of Elderton, started the long line of voters with their questions written on pieces of notebook paper: Does Corbett intend to follow through with the lawsuit he joined against the health care bill?

“If I filed it, why would I not stick it out?” he replied. “This is not about health care, it’s about the Constitution of the United States. … And it’s about whether the federal government can tell you what to buy. ”With nearly all the questions, Corbett took a small-government approach with his answers.

2) Pittsburgh Tribune Review: Toomey: Welfare state plan shocking

The Pittsburgh Tribune Review reports on the Tax Day rally with Pat Toomey, Tom Corbett and Tim Burns.

Ignoring his primary opponent altogether and making only passing references to the senator he wants to unseat in November, Republican Pat Toomey lambasted Democrats in control of Washington by declaring Thursday night in Latrobe that “it is staggering what they want to do.”

Invoking the names of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and President Obama, Toomey said, “These guys are trying to turn us into a European-style welfare state.”

…Burns pledged “never” to vote for higher taxes as a member of Congress.

“I believe the country is in a fight for its very life,” said Burns, who decried Pelosi’s ringing endorsement of the recently passed health care reform bill with a bit of political embroidering of his own.

“Pelosi got and said now we (in Congress) can join those who established Medicare and Social Security. That is wonderful. Medicare and Social Security are bankrupt.”

In what otherwise was a low-key address, Corbett received a hearty cheer when he mentioned the action he took as state attorney general to oppose the health care law with a legal suit challenging the bill’s constitutionality.

Corbett said as governor he would cut the state budget, although he did not pinpoint how or by what amount. Dwelling somewhat on the intricacies of state tax policies, Corbett went on to extol the virtues of the natural gas industry in Pennsylvania as an economic generator. The industry needs a tax environment that would enable it to flourish, he suggested.

3) DelCo Times: Senate candidate Toomey talks small business

Delaware County Times reports on a roundtable discussion held by Pat Toomey.

Republican U.S. Senate candidate and former U.S. Rep. Pat Toomey held a roundtable discussion on economic and health-care issues with local business people Thursday morning at the Country Squire Diner in Broomall.

Toomey said he is in tune with the concerns of small business owners, having been one himself. Toomey and his brothers launched a successful restaurant business in 1990 with two locations in Allentown and Lancaster.

“We had a couple hundred employees and we did OK,” he said. “It was a pretty good business, but it was tough and I learned what it takes to create jobs, what it means to have to make a payroll on Friday, what it means to have your life savings invested in a building and wondering whether anyone’s going to walk through that door and help you to pay your bills and recover any of that.”

Toomey said Congress might be better served if it had more business people in it, a sentiment shared by Lucien Calhoun, president of financial consulting firm Calhoun, Baker Inc., which he founded in 1989.

Toomey claimed President Barack Obama’s legislative agenda is already having a “chilling effect” on economic growth and job creation, referring to proposed cap-and-trade carbon emissions legislation, unprecedented deficits, the proposed Employee Free Choice Act and the recently passed health-care reform bill.

“It’s really hard to overstate the problem we have with spending, in my mind,” he said. “For 60 years, the federal government averaged spending of about 20 percent of (gross domestic product) with remarkably little variation, regardless of who was in control. In one year, this administration took that to 25 percent of GDP. That is a 25 percent increase in the size of government overnight.”

4) Politico: Specter haul dwarfed by Toomey

Politico reports on the Pat Toomey’s stellar fundraising during the 2010 first quarter.

Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter was outraised by a more than two-to-one margin last quarter by his Republican challenger, former Rep. Pat Toomey. Specter reported Thursday that he’d brought in $1.1 million in the first three months of the year, compared with $2.3 million for Toomey.

The incumbent Democrat still maintains a considerable cash-on-hand advantage: he has $9.06 million in his account, while Toomey reported banking over $4 million. And Specter easily outdistanced his primary challenger, Rep. Joe Sestak, who only raised $442,000 for the quarter, banking $5.3 million.

Specter’s quarterly fundraising totals have gradually declined since he switched parties a year ago. He brought in $1.92 million in the third quarter of 2009 and $1.15 million in the fourth quarter, before posting his latest, $1.1 million take.

5) Politico: A tale of two Obamas: Up in D.C., down in U.S.

Politico reports on the disconnect between President Obama’s Washington Insider image and his image he tries to project to the American voter.

The cover of The Atlantic this month shows a shirt-sleeved President Barack Obama and the headline, “WHY HE’S RIGHT.” It reflects the Washington conventional wisdom that Obama is on a roll, bolstered by his long-delayed victory on health reform.

Someone should tell the rest of the country.

While Washington talks about Obama’s new mojo, polls show voters outside the Beltway are sulking — soured on the president, his party and his program. The Gallup Poll has Obama’s approval rating at an ominous 49 percent, after hitting a record low of 47 percent last weekend. A new poll in Pennsylvania, a bellwether industrial state, shows his numbers sinking, as did recent polls in Ohio and Florida.

So there are two Obamas: Rising in D.C., struggling in the U.S...

“Everyone in the pressure cooker in Washington got all excited like the millennium had arrived [when health care reform passed], but I don’t think most reasonable people read it that way,” Democratic Tennessee Gov. Phil Bredesen said. Bredesen said people are worried about the cost and “appalled at the process in the Congress that produced it.”…

In Pennsylvania, Obama’s personal approval rating is at 42 percent, compared to 49 percent who disapprove of his job performance, Susquehanna Polling and Research said this week. And a Daily Kos/Research 2000 poll earlier this month in Ohio showed Obama eking out a 46 percent to 45 percent approval-to-disapproval rating, with only 42 percent of independent voters approving of his job performance.

Recommended Reading:

Wall Street Journal: Showdown Looms on Finance Rules

PA GOP News Brief 4.15.2010

1) Erie Times: Pa. GOP visits Erie

2) Pittsburgh Tribune Review: Attorney General Corbett touts toughness in bid for governor

3) Wall Street Journal: Karl Rove: Why Republicans Are Winning on the Tax Issue

4) The Hill: Gregg: GOP locking down against financial reform bill

5) TPM: Poll: Public Split On Whether They Would Prefer Obama Or George W. Bush

1) Erie Times: Pa. GOP visits Erie

The Erie Times reports on the PA GOP’s PelosiCare Accountability Tour stop in the 3^rd Congressional District on Wednesday.

The Republican Party of Pennsylvania’s PelosiCare Accountability Tour rolled into the 3^rd Congressional District, where party officials and local leaders spoke out about Congresswoman Kathy Dahlkemper’s decision to support government-run health care.

“The fact that Congresswoman Kathy Dahlkemper has told her constituents that ‘there is nothing to be afraid of’ when it comes to government-run health care demonstrates how out-of-touch she is with the people of the 3^rd Congressional District,” PA GOP Spokesman Mike Barley said. “While Kathy Dahlkemper doesn’t mind standing side-by-side with liberal leaders like Nancy Pelosi, her support for a government-run health care plan that raises taxes, kills jobs and drives a government-sized wedge between patients and their doctors will have a devastating effect on the 3^rd Congressional District for years to come.

Today’s visit to the 3^rd Congressional District and Congresswoman Kathy Dahlkemper marked the third stop in the PA GOP’s PelosiCare Accountability Tour in the 3^rd Congressional District. Also attending today’s press conference were Erie County Republican Committee Chairman Verel Salmons, Republican Party of Pennsylvania Spokesman Mike Barley, Dr. Dennis Michalak, small business owner Donna Reese of General Exterminating, Derek Dye of Allegheny College and a group of local college students.

2) Pittsburgh Tribune Review: Attorney General Corbett touts toughness in bid for governor

The Pittsburgh Tribune Review reports on Tom Corbett’s campaign to be our state’s next governor.

Tom Corbett fielded questions for 45 minutes about jobs, the economy, state spending, taxes, energy and health care reform as a Republican candidate for governor during a town hall meeting held by the Indiana-Armstrong Patriots group Wednesday afternoon at the Smith Complex.

Then the state’s attorney general took a few minutes to tell the 60 people attending why he was the best choice to be the next governor.

“Prosecutors are leaders and executives,” said Corbett. “We have to make the tough decisions. I’ve also been in the corporate sector and I understand how business works.

“People want somebody who’s going to deal with the budget crisis we have in the state,” he said. “They want somebody who is going to lead the way in reducing the budget and reducing the taxes that allow businesses to grow. I think it is very important to have that executive who is willing to do the tough job.”

Corbett told the group his motto is, “Do your job. Do what you promised.”

3) Wall Street Journal: Karl Rove: Why Republicans Are Winning on the Tax Issue

Karl Rove latest column in The Wall Street Journal highlights the Republican Party’s commitment to lower taxes and limited government.

Today’s last-minute trip to the post office to mail in your return is a reminder of one of life’s unpleasant realities: paying taxes. Always important in politics, the tax issue is likely to play a larger role this year than in any midterm election since 1994.

A recent Rasmussen survey reported that 66% of Americans believe the nation is over-taxed. There’s a reason. Under President Barack Obama taxes are going up—a lot.

House Ways and Means Committee Republicans have issued a summary of the 25 tax increases signed into law by Mr. Obama so far. They total $670 billion over the next 10 years, including 14 tax hikes (including an annual tax on every insurance policy and an annual tax on brand-name drugs) that break Mr. Obama’s solemn 2008 campaign pledge never to raise taxes on families making less than $250,000 a year.

Many of these taxes are part of the ObamaCare monstrosity. New levies on investment, drugs, medical devices and insurance policies eventually will hit ordinary Americans, and the public knows it. A late March Fox News poll asked, “If major health care reform legislation is passed, do you think your taxes will increase, decrease or stay about the same?” Seventy-five percent think their taxes will increase.

Tax concerns will hurt congressional Democrats. In rural areas, their opposition to repeal of the death tax antagonizes farmers and ranchers. Then there are America’s 32 million small-business owners, who feel put upon by the administration’s tax everyone-and-everything philosophy.

New York Times: Poll Finds Tea Party Backers Wealthier and More Educated

Politico: Another liberal judge? No thanks

Washington Times: Health care battle sinks Obama in polls

PA GOP News Brief .14.2010

1) Pittsburgh Post Gazette: Burns up 4 in polling last month

2) Rasmussen Polling: Virtual Tie: Specter v. Sestak 44-42. Toomey Gains: Toomey v. Specter 50-40

3) The Hill: Warning of higher taxes

4) New York Times: G.O.P. Takes Aim at Plans to Curb Finance Industry

5) Politico: Dems: Ignore GOP in court choice

1) Pittsburgh Post Gazette: Burns up 4 in polling last month

The Pittsburgh Post Gazette reports on a recently released poll showing Tim Burns beating Mark Critz in the 12^th Congressional District Special Election.

We already knew there was going to be lots of national attention on the special election to fill Jack Murtha’s congressional seat, and that Democrats were starting to sweat a loss. Time to throw some more (bituminous) coal on the sauna — polling done last month in the 12th District showed Republican Tim Burns with a 4-point lead over Democrat Mark Critz, despite the 2:1 Democratic registration edge.

The results from the poll of 400 likely voters by GOP strategist Gene Ulm — given to us in memorandum form by a Republican source — are from a full month ago, but still point out some troubling things for John Murtha’s former district director. It was done more than two weeks before either candidate started advertising in the district, and pointed out the negativity over health care reform that the National Republican Congressional Committee has tried to exploit lately with its own ads.

A previous poll done around the same time had Critz up by 4 points. The pair is also running head-to-head in first quarter fundraising. According to the Pa Dept of State, the district is 62 percent registered Democrat; 29 percent Republican; and 9 percent other. (Any registered voter can cast a ballot in the special election.)

2) Rasmussen Polling: Virtual Tie: Specter v. Sestak 44-42. Toomey Gains: Toomey v. Specter 50-40

Rasmussen reports that Sestak is now dead even with Specter. Toomey maintains his lead and is up 10 points against Specter.

…Support for Sestak has remained in the narrow range of 35% to 38% in surveys since last October. But he’s gained ground among likely Democratic Primary voters and now trails Specter by a negligible 44% to 42% in the race for the party’s Senate nomination. Democratic voters pick their nominee in a May 18 primary…

Republican hopeful Pat Toomey for the first time registers 50% support in his race against incumbent Democrat Arlen Specter in Pennsylvania’s contest for the U.S. Senate.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of likely voters in the state shows Specter earning 40% of the vote, a level he’s held steady at since the first of the year. Four percent (4%) prefer some other candidate, and six percent (6%) are undecided.

Toomey this month also makes his strongest showing to date against Specter’s Democratic Primary challenger, Congressman Joe Sestak. Toomey picks up 47% support to Sestak’s 36%. Given this match-up, five percent (5%) like another candidate, and 12% are undecided.

See Also: Washington Post: Can Sestak Win?

3) The Hill: Warning of higher taxes

After expanding entitlement programs via government-run health care, the Obama Administration warns that the budget deficit will have to be countered by… higher taxes. The Hill reports:

Higher taxes must be considered to rein in the country’s mounting debt, a member of President Barack Obama’s fiscal reform commission told The Hill on Monday.

Alice Rivlin, who headed the Congressional Budget Office and the Office of Management and Budget, said that the highest priority is to reduce healthcare spending but that reforms to entitlement programs and higher taxes should also be considered.

A day after Volcker spoke, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said Americans could only avoid unsustainable budget deficits by choosing from “higher taxes, modifications to entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare, less spending on everything else from education to defense, or some combination of the above.”

House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) last month also floated higher taxes as part of the mix. He said a “balanced approach” of spending cuts — including fewer entitlement benefits for the rich — and new revenues should be considered.

Domenici described the battle to rein in the debt as a war.

“It’s like we are having a war on our doorstep that is gigantic, and somebody has to lead this parade pretty soon,” said Domenici.

4) New York Times: G.O.P. Takes Aim at Plans to Curb Finance Industry

The New York Times reports on the Republican objections to the Democrats Wall Street legislation.

WASHINGTON — Drawing the lines for a fierce election-year battle over regulating the nation’s financial system, Senate Republicans on Tuesday insisted that legislation proposed by Democrats and the White House would only encourage future taxpayer bailouts of big banks.

The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, criticized the Democrats’ plans to regulate Wall Street as arrogant and partisan, echoing the recent health care fight in which he accused Democrats of carrying out a government takeover.

“We cannot allow endless taxpayer-funded bailouts,” Mr. McConnell said in a floor speech. “That’s why we must not pass the financial reform bill that’s about to hit the floor. The fact is this bill wouldn’t solve the problems that led to the financial crisis. It would make them worse.”

5) Politico: Dems: Ignore GOP in court choice

Politico reports on the upcoming nomination test for SCOTUS after Supreme Court Justice Stevens retires.

Democratic senators are urging President Barack Obama to abandon any hope of winning broad Republican support for his upcoming Supreme Court pick — and to nominate, instead, a dominant liberal voice who will counteract the current conservative majority.

…But National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Cornyn of Texas warned that going that route could backfire on Democrats at the polls.

“Folks that vote Republican and independents that lean Republican — they understand this debate and the importance of nominating and confirming judges who are impartial ideologically,” said Cornyn, who also serves on the Judiciary Committee. “I think there’s one way the president can guarantee a big fight … nominate an ideologue.”

Of course, a strong liberal nominee could alienate some moderate Democrats as well. Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson, the conservative Democrat who has seen his poll numbers tank amid the health care debate, said he doesn’t foresee joining a GOP filibuster if Obama nominates a liberal judge, but he also said it’s “premature” to rule out that possibility.

Nelson said “of course” he’s concerned about liberals pushing for a liberal nominee, just as conservatives pushed for conservative justices.

“I want to see someone who doesn’t bring an ideology to the bench,” Nelson said.

Recommended Reading:

Wall Street Journal: Crony Contracts

PA GOP News Brief 4.13.2010

1) Patriot News: Attorney general has right to sue over insurance law

2) The Daily Item: Toomey pushes for job creation, strong economy

3) NYT: Baffled by Health Plan? So Are Some Lawmakers

4) Roll Call: McConnell Says GOP to Get Tough on Deficit Spending

5) Politico: GOP looks toward 2010 in court fight

1) Patriot News: Attorney general has right to sue over insurance law

State Rep. Doug Reichley penned an op-ed for The Patriot News on the obligation of Attorney General Tom Corbett to challenge the health care legislation.

For the last few weeks, Attorney General Tom Corbett has been under fire for his decision to challenge the constitutionality of the federal health care law. Interestingly, supporters of the law who are the most vocal against Corbett’s challenge are not claiming the lawsuit is frivolous. They simply don’t seem to understand how anyone could question the majority party’s “mandate” to pass the bill.

Instead of watching the law’s supporters act flabbergasted because numerous bipartisan attorneys general across the nation are challenging the law, we should be asking: Why shouldn’t Pennsylvania’s chief law enforcement official rely on sound legal analysis to challenge the most far-reaching legislation enacted in the past 40 years?

The outcry against Corbett’s decision reveals a disconcerting unwillingness by liberals to subject the health care act to the same constitutional scrutiny that other policies have endured. For many years, our courts have been the forum in which liberals have challenged many statutes, executive branch policies and judicial precedents. Now that one of the liberal holy grails — health insurance reform — is being challenged, why all this moralistic hand-wringing from left-leaning editorialists and politicians?

Instead of huffing and puffing about the supposed unfairness of the federal lawsuit, supporters of the health care law need only to read the two cases the attorney general cites as the legal grounds for intervention in the lawsuit.

2) The Daily Item: Toomey pushes for job creation, strong economy

The Sunbury Daily Item reports on a recent visit from Pat Toomey and his ideas to put America back on track.

Supporting and encouraging small businesses is what U.S. Senate candidate Pat Toomey said needs to be done to create jobs in today’s economy.

“A strong, growing economy is great for all communities if we get back economic growth and job creation,” he said Monday during a meet-and-greet in Sunbury.

The Republican is vying for the Senate seat held by Arlen Specter, a Democrat.

In addition to Sunbury, he stopped at Susquehanna University in Selinsgrove and in Danville before heading up to Williamsport.

About 25 people came out to the brief meeting in the city’s Edison Hotel, where Toomey gave an introduction, highlighting his main campaign focuses — including jobs, the economy and health care — before holding a question-and-answer session.

“I recognize the only sustainable jobs are private sector,” he told the group. “We need to help launch entrepreneurs.”

3) NYT: Baffled by Health Plan? So Are Some Lawmakers

WASHINGTON — It is often said that the new health care law will affect almost every American in some way. And, perhaps fittingly if unintentionally, no one may be more affected than members of Congress themselves.

In a new report, the Congressional Research Service says the law may have significant unintended consequences for the “personal health insurance coverage” of senators, representatives and their staff members.

For example, it says, the law may “remove members of Congress and Congressional staff” from their current coverage, in the Federal Employees Health Benefits Program, before any alternatives are available.

The confusion raises the inevitable question: If they did not know exactly what they were doing to themselves, did lawmakers who wrote and passed the bill fully grasp the details of how it would influence the lives of other Americans?

The law promises that people can keep coverage they like, largely unchanged. For members of Congress and their aides, the federal employees health program offers much to like. But, the report says, the men and women who wrote the law may find that the guarantee of stability does not apply to them.

4) Roll Call: McConnell Says GOP to Get Tough on Deficit Spending

Roll Call reports on the comments from Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell regarding GOP focus in Washington over the next few weeks.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) said Monday that Republicans will focus on deficit spending over the course of the next several weeks as Democrats prepare to take on Wall Street and push their jobs agenda.

“Americans worry that we’re on the cusp or maybe even past the cusp of a debt crisis,” McConnell said on the floor after the two-week spring recess. “We must get a handle on the deficit and the debt. This is the issue that will focus our attention in the weeks and months ahead.”

McConnell’s comments came just hours before Senators were scheduled to cast a procedural vote to extend unemployment insurance benefits. Republicans blocked the extension before the recess in part because the measure wasn’t paid for. According to McConnell’s floor remarks Monday, that message will continue during the seven-week work period leading up to Memorial Day.

“And over the coming weeks, I assure you, Republicans will continue to give our colleagues across the aisle and our president the opportunity to live up to the president’s commitment on Feb. 13: ‘Now, Congress will have to pay for what it spends, just like everybody else.’” McConnell said. “Americans will not tolerate another crisis of Washington’s making.”

5) Politico: GOP looks toward 2010 in court fight

Politico reports on the upcoming SCOTUS nomination battle after the announced retirement of Justice Stevens.

Republicans are enthusiastic about the prospect of Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens’s departure, not because it signals an end to his liberal jurisprudence but rather for its rich political value.

Many in the party expect the nomination battle to succeed him will be a major asset to GOP House and Senate candidates, serendipitously timed to coincide with the homestretch of the midterm election campaign.

In their view, Supreme Court confirmation hearings will serve to stoke an already fired-up GOP base, particularly if President Barack Obama nominates a liberal jurist, and could potentially put Democratic candidates in conservative-minded states on the defensive.

“The GOP and conservative base has one more reason to stay excited, interested and activated. This is now reaching a perfect-storm level of conservative and GOP activation enthusiasm,” said Republican media consultant Rick Wilson. “For liberals, this is a no-win.”

Recommended Reading:

Talking Points Memo: GOP Ad Goes After Health Care Bill In PA-12 Special Election

Hill: Gallup: GOP leads by four in generic congressional ballot

PA GOP News Brief 4.8.2010

1) CNN: Republicans have advantage in Pennsylvania

2) Hill: White House adviser suggests raising taxes, possibly adding a value-added tax

3) Big Government: GOP Will Win House and Senate

4) Washington Times’ Water Cooler: Steele: Republicans and the tea party movement

5) Politico: RNC keeps eyes on the prize

1) CNN: Republicans have advantage in Pennsylvania

CNN reports on the latest polling number showing U.S. Senate candidate Pat Toomey and PA Gubernatorial Tom Corbett in the lead.

Republicans have the advantage in this year’s battle for Pennsylvania governor and for one of the state’s U.S. Senate seats, according to a new poll.

A Quinnipiac University survey of Pennsylvania voters released Thursday indicates that the leading GOP candidate, Attorney General Tom Corbett, remains ahead of each of the three top Democratic contenders by double digits in hypothetical general election matchups. The incumbent governor, Democrat Ed Rendell, is term limited and prevented from running for re-election this year.

According to the poll, in the Senate campaign Republican challenger Pat Toomey leads Sen. Arlen Specter 46 percent to 41 percent, with 12 percent undecided. The advantage for Toomey is just inside the poll’s sampling error. Toomey trailed Specter in a Quinnipiac poll released a month ago. The two men have exchanged small leads since last autumn.

Toomey is a former congressman and former head of the Club for Growth, a limited-government and anti-tax organization. Specter, a five-term senator, switched parties from Republican to Democrat last spring. At the time of the party flip, he cited the difficulty in winning the Republican primary against Toomey as a factor.

2) Hill: White House adviser suggests raising taxes, possibly adding a value-added tax

The Hill reports on the White House’s statements that rasing taxes on the middle class will be needed to fight the deficit and out of control spending…

A top White House adviser on economics is suggesting a new tax might be needed to address rising deficits.

White House adviser Paul Volcker said taxes should be raised to help control deficits and the United States may need to consider a European-style value-added tax, according to a Reuters report.

The former chairman of the Federal Reserve said the value-added tax, “was not as toxic an idea” has it has been in the past, he told a group at a New York Historical Society event Tuesday night. Volcker also suggested that a carbon or energy-related tax may become necessary to bring the budget back into check.

Volcker acknowledged that the ideas weren’t popular but that the outlook on entitlement spending and budget deficits were grim without some changes.

“If at the end of the day we need to raise taxes, we should raise taxes,” he said.

Republicans went on the attack against the possible tax quickly on Wednesday, with the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) releasing a litany of instances in which President Barack Obama has pledged not to raise taxes on the middle class.

See Also: WSJ: Volcker on the VAT

3) Big Government: GOP Will Win House and Senate

Big Government comments on the possibility of the GOP winning the House and Senate in 2010.

…Each time the Republican activists battle, they become stronger. Their cyber and grass roots grow deeper. The negatives that attach to so-called “moderate” Democratic incumbents increase. And each time Obama, Reid and Pelosi defy public opinion and use their majorities to ram through unpopular legislation, frustration and anger rise.

Were Obama’s ambitions to slacken, perhaps a cooling-off might eventuate. But soon the socialist financial takeover bill will come on the agenda, followed by amnesty for illegal immigrants, cap-and-trade and card-check unionization. Each bill will trigger its own mobilization of public opposition and add to the swelling coalition of opposition to Obama and his radical agenda.

And, all the while, the deficit will increase, interest rates will rise and unemployment will remain high.

Finally, Obama is now responsible for healthcare in America. When premiums rise, it will be his fault. When coverage is denied, it will be on his watch.

When Medicare cuts kick in, it will be Obama who gets the blame.

Carville’s last book touted “40 more years of Democrats.” Now he dreams of a loss of “only” 25 seats in the House and “six or seven” senators. But these are pipe dreams. Republicans will gain more than 50 House seats and at least 10 in the Senate, enough to take control in both chambers. That’s reality.

4) Washington Times’ Water Cooler: Steele: Republicans and the tea party movement

The Washington Times has the latest from RNC Chairman Michael Steele regarding the Tea Party movement.

Tea Partiers and other Americans – of all political stripes – are tired of the failed logic that government-knows-best. They’re tired of being taxed too much for a government that spends too much, delivers too little, and charges the bill on the backs of our children and grandchildren. They’re sick of political leaders in Washington ignoring their will on issues like health care, at the expense of problems that are hitting them the hardest at home: jobs and a sluggish economy. And, perhaps most of all, they’re sick of those in power attempting to dismiss and ascribe nefarious motives to their legitimate and democratic opposition to the Obama-Pelosi-Reid leftist agenda.

These activists adhere to the Founding Fathers’ vision of a limited government that preserves individual liberty and promotes economic prosperity, then gets out of their way. They believe in the power of America’s entrepreneurial spirit, a competitive free market, and local communities working together of their own free will to solve our country’s problems. They know that America can remain that shining city on a hill, the brightest beacon for freedom and opportunity in the world, and believe that our best days are ahead of us.

Today, America is better off for having the Tea Party protesters fight for these American values and help us get back to our roots. My friends, the Republican Party shares these same principles and stands ready and willing to partner with the growing number of concerned citizens involved in the Tea Party movement and others. Together, we have the power to take back our country from Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid in the 2010 mid-term elections, then from President Obama in 2012.

5) Politico: RNC keeps eyes on the prize

Politico reports on role that the RNC plays in elections nationwide.

As chairman of the California Republican Party and chairman of the RNC’s State Chairmen’s Committee, I believe I’m in a good position to weigh in on the impact the RNC is having out in the field.

So let’s talk about the facts on the ground.

The Republican base is energized today, and candidate recruitment bolstered, in large part because of the stunning Republican victories in Virginia and New Jersey. Two Democratic governors had to turn the office keys over to Republican successors.

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie and Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell both acknowledged that they would not have won without the $13 million the RNC pumped into their races. This was in addition to the logistical and other support.

What the RNC does is unique in U.S. politics. It builds infrastructure that enables efficient use of volunteers to contact voters, identify supporters and get out the vote.

In 2009, during the gubernatorial races in Virginia and New Jersey, there were almost three times as many contacts with voters than during the 2008 presidential campaign.

Any good candidate will tell you, these volunteer voter contacts are essential to victory. The many volunteers whose contacts swayed undecided voters, and ensured that supporters of Republican candidates actually voted, were using RNC equipment, in offices paid for by the RNC. They were checking data from voter files enhanced by the RNC, and were coordinated by professional RNC staffers.

Posted in Briefs, Miscellaneous |

Tags: Bush, Cobrett, Corbett, Deficit Spending, Health Care, Jobs, Law Suit, MCConnell, Politico, Rove, Specter, Taxes, Toomey |

No Comments »

York County Republican Spring Dinner (Also see informational briefs on side panel)

March 30th, 2010 |

Author: admin

PA GOP News Brief 4.5.2010

1) PA GOP: State Senator Don White Discusses Impact Of Cap-And-Trade Legislation On The 12th Congressional District

2) Wall Street Journal: The Tax Police and the Health-Care Mandate

3) Wall Street Journal: Tea Party Anger Reflects Mainstream Concerns

4) The Hill: McCarthy slams ‘anti-taxpayer policies’ like health bill in Republican address

5) Real Clear Politics: The Poisonous Politics of Self-Esteem

1) PA GOP: State Senator Don White Discusses Impact Of Cap-And-Trade Legislation On The 12th Congressional District

State Senator Don White, who represents Pennsylvania’s 41^st State Senatorial District, released a statement regarding the 12^th Congressional District Special Election and the devastating impact cap-and-trade legislation will have on southwestern Pennsylvania.

“At a time when Pennsylvanians’ are struggling to make ends’ meet, Democrats in Washington have actively worked to advance the national energy tax known as cap-and-trade. This legislation will endanger the jobs of countless workers in our critical energy sectors while having a devastating impact on our Commonwealth’s economy.

“Cap-and-trade may sound like a good idea in Washington, D.C., but here in southwestern Pennsylvania, this legislation will deal a significant blow to our area’s vital coal, steel and manufacturing industries while raising electric rates dramatically for families, farmers and job creators. Even the Congressional Budget Office projects that this tax will cost the average family of four more than $12,000 over the next ten years while The Heritage Foundation estimates this bill will cause more than 1.1 million workers to lose their jobs. That is simply too much of a burden for families in southwestern Pennsylvania to bear, especially during the worst economic crisis our nation has faced since The Great Depression.

2) Wall Street Journal: The Tax Police and the Health-Care Mandate

The Wall Street Journal reports on the enforcement of individual health care mandates and the use of the IRS.

Is there an IRS agent in your future?

Shortly before Barack Obama signed the health-care bill, Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee created a stir with a report suggesting our new law will lead the Internal Revenue Service to hire as many as 16,500 new agents. The Republicans came up with the figure by extrapolating from the IRS budget, the amount spent on employees, and the $10 billion in new funding that the Congressional Budget Office says the IRS will need to meet its new responsibilities under this legislation.

…

Almost by definition, those hit by the mandate will be either young people starting out, or those working for smaller businesses that do not provide employees with health coverage. Back in November, a report by the Congressional Budget Office and Joint Committee on Taxation estimated that nearly half (46%) of the mandate penalties will be paid by Americans under 300% of the poverty line.

In today’s dollars, that works out to $32,500 for an individual. For a family of four, it’s $66,150. Generally speaking, these are not the folks who have to worry about paying taxes on, say, a villa in the Dominican Republic or income from the International Monetary Fund.

So we are left with one of two possibilities. The first is that the penalty for not having “minimal essential coverage” is fully enforced, in which case Americans of relatively modest means will get a lesson in how the government deals with people who don’t pay up.

Or the penalty for violating the individual mandate will become like the fines for not filling out your Census form. In other words, unenforced. In that case, the costs of this legislation will be even higher and more hidden than we have been led to believe.

3) Wall Street Journal: Tea Party Anger Reflects Mainstream Concerns

The Wall Street Journal reports on the misrepresentation of Tea Party activists as a fringe movement.

There is danger for Democrats in recent attempts to dismiss the tea party movement as violent racists deserving of contempt. Demonizing these folks may energize the Democrats’ left-wing base. But it is a big turnoff to voters who have problems with the Democratic agenda that have nothing to do with racism.

Putting a racial lens on the tea party activists may also help Democrats by painting congressional Republicans into a corner as debate begins on immigration reform. Hispanic voters are going to be looking at Republicans and their tea party supporters for evidence of racism in any effort to block reform.

But Democrats cannot win elections without capturing the votes of independent-minded swing voters. And that is where writing off the tea party as a bunch of racist kooks becomes self-destructive. The tea party outrage over health-care reform, deficit spending and entitlements run amok is no fringe concern. And it is insulting to all voters to suggest that criticism of President Obama, even by people who want to throw him out of office, is motivated by racism.

…

Tea party activists are surprisingly mainstream when it comes to their grievances about politics. They fit right in with most American voters who tell pollsters the country has been headed in the wrong direction under both Presidents Bush and Obama. A Pew poll in early March found 71% of Americans “dissatisfied with the way things are going in the country today.” Republicans and Democrats in Congress have low ratings —23% and 31% approval respectively, according to Pew.

4) The Hill: McCarthy slams ‘anti-taxpayer policies’ like health bill in Republican address

The Hill reports on comments from Rep. Kevin McCarthy, GOP House leadership’s number three, regarding the Democrats job killing, tax increasing policies.

Healthcare legislation that was recently made law is poised to destroy American businesses, Rep. Kevin McCarthy (Calif.) said in the Republicans’ weekly address.

The House GOP’s chief deputy whip made the charge against the health law, which passed nearly two weeks ago, a day after the Labor Department released March’s jobs numbers with which Republicans expressed displeasure.

“Major employers are already being squeezed because of the tax increases and cost hikes thanks to the new healthcare law signed by President Obama,” McCarthy said. “The new law is just the latest in a series of anti-taxpayer policies coming out of Washington that is making it harder for Americans to save, invest, and hire, but it is by no means the last.”

Republicans are continuing to offer a full-throated opposition to President Barack Obama’s agenda in the wake of healthcare’s passage.

Political observers are keeping a close eye on the state of the economy as the calendar inches toward the fall’s midterm elections.

5) Real Clear Politics: The Poisonous Politics of Self-Esteem

As Democrats continue to try and sell government-run health care as the ‘right thing’ and those who oppose it as racist, Real Clear Politics comments on the use of charged rhetoric to win policy battles instead of running on real, practical solutions.

Given this evasion, the public agenda gravitates toward issues framed as moral matters. Global warming is about “saving the planet.” Abortion and gay marriage evoke deep values, each side believing it commands the high ground. Certainly, President Obama pitched his health care plan as a moral issue. It embodies “the core principle that everybody should have some basic security when it comes to their health care,” as he said when signing the legislation. Health care is a “right”; opponents are, by extension, less moral.

Obama’s approach was politically necessary. On a simple calculus of benefits, his proposal would have failed. Perhaps 32 million Americans will receive insurance coverage — about 10 percent of the population. Other provisions add somewhat to total beneficiaries. Still, for most Americans, the bill won’t do much. It may impose costs: higher taxes, longer waits for appointments.

People backed it because they thought it “the right thing”; it made them feel good about themselves. What they got from the political process are what I call “psychic benefits.” Economic benefits aim to make people richer. Psychic benefits strive to make them feel morally upright and superior. But this emphasis often obscures practical realities and qualifications. For example: The uninsured already receive substantial medical care, and it’s unclear how much insurance will improve their health.

PA GOP News Brief 4.1.2010

1) Wall Street Journal: Cash-Poor Cities Take On Unions

2) Washington Times: Health plan may hobble economy recovery

3) Reuters: Democrats lie low after healthcare victory

4) Politico: Dems squeezed by health care lawsuit

5) Wall Street Journal: Would the Founders Love ObamaCare?

1) Wall Street Journal: Cash-Poor Cities Take On Unions

The Wall Street Journal provides a shining example of how the existence of powerful unions creates an economic atmosphere that cannot sustain their luxurious demands.

Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa once organized for a teacher’s union here, and later ran a branch of the American Federation of Government Employees. That makes him an unlikely advocate for cutting the benefits of the city’s workers.

But with the city facing a budget deficit that could drain its reserves by summer, Mayor Villaraigosa wants to re-open contract talks with 45,000 cops, firefighters, librarians and other city employees in hopes of persuading them to contribute more to their pensions and health-care costs. His deputy chief of staff, Matt Szabo, puts it bluntly: “Unions have priced themselves out of a job.”

Nationwide, politicians looking for budget cuts are confronting politically powerful unions that represent state and local government employees—15% of U.S. workers and organized labor’s biggest stronghold.

…At the heart of this fight is an unbalanced equation: The economy is shrinking cities’ and states’ tax income as their pension and health-care costs have soared. As a result, some governments are diverting money from services to cover benefits, or raising taxes and fees. That doesn’t sit well with some taxpayers—many frustrated at seeing their own benefits being cut by private-sector employers.

2) Washington Times: Health plan may hobble economy recovery

The Washington Times reports on how a government take-over of health care will inhibit a robust economic recovery from one of our worst recessions in our nation’s history.

While President Obama’s health insurance mandate on businesses is being slowly phased in to prevent any immediate damage to the economic recovery, it nevertheless poses an obstacle to his overarching goal of creating jobs and could end up adding to spiraling medical costs rather than controlling them.

Economists not connected with either political party expect the new law to intensify the boom in health care spending – it already is the only major business sector that managed to grow during the recession – while adding to the reluctance of millions of businesses outside of health care to take on new workers because in the future they must provide costly and comprehensive medical benefits that previously were optional.

…

“Businesses will probably remain cautious when it comes to hiring,” said Harm Bandholz, an economist at Unicredit Markets. “They now face the certainty that their labor costs will increase in coming years.”

Companies with between 50 and 100 employees will be hit the hardest, he estimates, as they currently provide only about half their workers with health insurance and are not likely to be able to fully offset the cost of providing insurance using the tax credit implemented by Congress.

3) Reuters: Democrats lie low after healthcare victory

Reuters reports on Congressional Democrats trying to hide from their votes after supporting a government take-over of health care.

The week after passing landmark healthcare reform and handing President Barack Obama an important victory, members of the U.S. Congress returned to their home districts for a recess to face constituents and justify their votes after the bruising legislative battle.

While Obama made flying visits across the country to tout the new legislation, a number of key Democrats, who led the charge for healthcare reform, seemed to keep a low profile and are doing little to beat the drum.

Republican lawmakers, however, made quick plans to harness what they see as voter discontent over the issue — either by lambasting those Democrats who may be politically vulnerable or by shoring up their own shaky campaigns with criticism of “Obamacare.”

While healthcare reform was thought to be a defining issue in congressional elections, many experts believe it may lose steam by November and prove less important for voters than unemployment and the economy.

Before public anger over healthcare fades, Republicans from veteran senators to freshman congressmen were racing to get their message out at the outset of the two-week spring recess.

4) Politico: Dems squeezed by health care lawsuit

Politico reports on Democratic Attorney Generals who now find themselves caught between supporting President Obama’s liberal government-take-over agenda and listening to voters at home.

They played almost no role in crafting or passing the new federal health care legislation, but Democratic attorneys general have suddenly emerged as prominent actors in the post-passage drama over the constitutionality of the landmark law.

Until recently, the Democratic attorneys general have largely sat on the sidelines as more than a dozen of their GOP counterparts banded together to pursue a lawsuit against the centerpiece of President Obama’s domestic policy agenda. Like many in their party, they dismissed the suit as a naked political play without any legal grounding—an opinion based on the fact that many of the Republicans advancing the cause are seeking higher office.

But now, some of the Democratic AGs have become reluctant combatants, dragged into the fray by GOP governors and legislators who insist that their reluctance to join the case is a clear attempt to protect their national party’s interests.

The Democratic attorneys general facing the most pressure tend to hail from Republican-leaning states—indeed, it’s no coincidence that the only Democrat to join the lawsuit is Buddy Caldwell, the attorney general from Louisiana, a state where Obama is unpopular.

Complicating the situation, several of those Democratic AG’s are themselves running for higher office. In Kentucky, Democratic Attorney General Jack Conway—who is running for an open Senate seat—has said the establishment of programs like Social Security and Medicare prove that Congress has authority to implement a sweeping health care overhaul without violating state rights but his Republican opponents frame his resistance as evidence of his fealty to a liberal national party.

5) Wall Street Journal: Would the Founders Love ObamaCare?

The Wall Street Journal provides insightful analysis of America’s direction in light of government’s increasing intrusion into all aspects of our private lives.

The Democratic left, its pundits and academics criticizing the legal challenges to ObamaCare seem to be arguing that their version of our political structure is too big to change.

That’s not true. The American people can and do change the nation’s collective mind on the ordering of our political system. The civil rights years of the 1960s is the most well-known modern example. (The idea that resistance to Mr. Obama’s health plan is rooted in racist resentment of equal rights is beyond the pale, even by current standards of political punditry.)

Powerful political forces suddenly seem to be in motion across the U.S. What they have in common is anxiety over what government has become in the first decade of the 21st century.

The tea party movement is getting the most attention because it is the most vulnerable to the standard tool kit of mockery and ridicule. It is more difficult to mock the legitimacy of Scott Brown’s overthrow of the Kennedy legacy, the election results in Virginia and New Jersey, an economic discomfort that is both generalized and specific to the disintegration of state and federal fiscs, and indeed the array of state attorneys general who filed a constitutional complaint against the new health-care law. What’s going on may be getting past the reach of mere mockery.

…

The 10th Amendment tumult does not mean anyone is going to secede. It doesn’t mean “nullification” is coming back. We are not going to refight the Civil War or the Voting Rights Act. Richard Russell isn’t rising from his Georgia grave.

It means that the current edition of the Democratic Party has disconnected itself from the average American’s sense of political modesty. The party’s members and theorists now defend expanding government authority with the same arrogance that brought Progressive Era reforms down upon untethered industrial interests.

In such times, this country has an honored tradition of changing direction. That time may be arriving.

Posted in Briefs, Democrat, Miscellaneous, National, Republican, State |

Tags: Cap & Trade, Health Care, law suits, McCarthy, Politico, Tea party, Unions |

No Comments »

Heath Care Bill Past Sunday — March 21st Also See Brief Page

March 23rd, 2010 |

Author: admin

Last night, after months of outrageous maneuvers and backroom deals like the “Louisiana Purchase,” “Gator-ade” and the “Cornhusker Kickback,” Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her Democratic colleagues successfully pushed through their ill-advised, massive, government-run health care legislation.

Unfortunately, Pennsylvania Democratic Congressmen Chris Carney, Paul Kanjorski, Kathy Dahlkemper and Patrick Murphy provided President Obama and Speaker Pelosi with the necessary votes to put them over the top so that they could pass legislation that destroys our nation’s health care system. I am pledging to you today that the PA GOP will make sure every Pennsylvanian remembers that each of these Congressmen chose to appease their extreme left-wing leaders by supporting their extreme liberal agenda, rather than cast their ballots in the best interests of the constituents they were elected to represent.

Help support our efforts by donating $10, $25, $50, $100, $250 or $500 to ensure these Democratic Congressmen can no longer support Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s liberal agenda. We must work to get her fired!

Don’t believe the spin coming from the White House! This bill does not address the health care needs of Americans. Instead, it will raise taxes and kill jobs.

Last night, Speaker Pelosi said on the floor of the U.S. House that this bill will insure an additional 32 million Americans, while cutting our national deficit by $1.3 trillion. Wow! That doesn’t even begin to pass the smell test. That is akin to someone walking up to you with the keys to a brand new Ferrari and telling you that you are really going to enjoy how much this new car is going to cut your monthly bills. This bill is nothing short of a massive tax increase that will add to the burden of future generations of Americans. Don’t be fooled!

With your support, the PA GOP will be holding Senators Arlen Specter and Bob Casey as well as the entire Pennsylvania Democratic Congressional Delegation, Congressmen Joe Sestak, Chris Carney, Paul Kanjorski, Kathy Dahlkemper, Patrick Murphy, Tim Holden, Jason Altmire, Allyson Schwartz, Mike Doyle, Chaka Fattah and Bob Brady, accountable for choosing President Obama, and their Democratic Party bosses over the needs and concerns of their constituents.

Donate today! Please consider making a secure online donation of $10, $25, $50, $100, $250 or $500 to help us get rid of the Democrats who supported the government-takeover of our health care system!

With Democrats across the nation emboldened by this perceived victory, your assistance is critical in the continued fight to take Washington back in November.

Sincerely,
Rob Gleason
Chairman
Republican Party of Pennsylvania

PA GOP News Brief 3.26.2010

1) PA GOP: PelosiCare Accountability Tour Kicks Off In Congressman Paul Kanjorski’s District

2) Morning Call: Toomey supports AG’s health care lawsuit

3) NYT: Paul Ryan: Fix Health Reform, Then Repeal It

4) Real Clear Politics: The Reality of Obamacare

5) Cantor: It’s The Democrats Who Are Fanning The Flames of Violence (VIDEO)

1) PA GOP: PelosiCare Accountability Tour Kicks Off In Congressman Paul Kanjorski’s District

The Republican Party of Pennsylvania, Lou Barletta and concerned Luzerne County residents from all walks of life held press conference in Wilkes Barre yesterday. Read the PA GOP release below:

Today, Hazleton Mayor and 11^th Congressional District Republican candidate Lou Barletta headlined the Republican Party of Pennsylvania’s PelosiCare Accountability Tour regarding Congressman Paul Kanjorski’s decision to support PelosiCare over the needs of his constituents.

“Paul Kanjorski thinks the opposition to this terrible bill is coming from partisans,” Barletta said. “What he doesn’t understand is that Americans know exactly what Kanjorski and Nancy Pelosi did and that is push through devastating legislation that negatively affects citizens from all walks of life, age groups and occupations. Kanjorski can keep on ignoring us but he won’t be able to ignore the voters on Election Day.”

Also attending today’s press conference were Luzerne County Chairman Terry Casey, Republican Party of Pennsylvania Executive Director Luke Bernstein, Dr. Michael Rittenberg, George Hayden (President of George J. Hayden Electric, Inc.), and a group of college students.

“By voting for government-run health care legislation, Congressman Kanjorski proved yet again that he cares far more about doing the bidding of extreme liberal leaders like President Barack Obama and Speaker Nancy Pelosi than carrying the water of the constituents he was elected to represent,” Bernstein said. “The government takeover of the health care and student loan industry will negatively affect nearly every Pennsylvanian by killing jobs, raising taxes and driving a government-sized wedge between patients and their doctors.”

The Hill reported earlier this week that Speaker Nancy Pelosi admitted that Congressman Paul Kanjorski’s support for her government-run health care bill helped to put it over the top:

“But when word spread that previously undecided Rep. Paul Kanjorski (D-Pa.) was a yes, all uncertainty was eliminated.

“Pelosi and her team had finally done it. They had the votes.” (Hopper, Mark, “Pelosi methodically moved members,” The Hill, 3/22/10)

Bernstein concluded, “The people of the 11^th Congressional District deserve a real leader, not someone who simply serves as liberal Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s puppet.”

2) Morning Call: Toomey supports AG’s health care lawsuit

The Morning Call reports on Pat Toomey’s support of Tom Corbett’s suit to halt the unconstitutional government-run health care bill that recently passed.

It’s no secret that Republican candidate for Senate, Pat Toomey, thinks the new federal health care reform law is bad for America.

So, it’s no surprise that Toomey would stand by Pennsylvania Attorney General Tom Corbett’s efforts to legally challenge the constitutionality of the law.

“There are legitimate legal questions surrounding the legislation, and I applaud Attorney General Corbett for pursuing them,” Toomey said in a statement on Thursday.

As reported by dear friend and colleague, John Micek, a group of 13 top state lawyers argue that the “health care bill’s provision requiring people to buy health insurance — or face a fine if they do not — exceeds Congress’ constitutional authority to regulate interstate commerce. They also argue that the bill violates the 10th Amendment, which sets down the boundaries for state and federal rights.”

Toomey denounced the law when it passed the House on Sunday night as the product of “extreme politics of one-party rule.” He pledged to work to repeal it and replace it with “commonsense bipartisan health care reforms that lower premiums, give doctors and patients more control of health care decisions, and do not further burden our troubled economy.”

3) NYT: Paul Ryan: Fix Health Reform, Then Repeal It

Rep. Paul Ryan comments in the New York Times about a viable strategy to repeal government-run health care and replace it with real reform.

ON Thursday night, Congress sent to President Obama the reconciliation package to remove some of the embarrassing provisions in his signature legislative achievement, health care reform. But a serious fix for what ails health care in America will entail far more than merely tweaking the new law of the land; we will need to repeal the entire faulty architecture of the government behemoth and replace it with real reform.

To be clear: it is not sufficient for those of us in the opposition to await a reversal of political fortune months or years from now before we advance action on health care reform. Costs will continue their ascent as the debt burden squeezes life out of our economy. We are unapologetic advocates for the repeal of this costly misstep. But Republicans must also make the case for a reform agenda to take its place, and get to work on that effort now.

…

The case for attempting health care reform was not difficult to make. Skyrocketing health care costs are driving more and more families and businesses to the brink of bankruptcy, leaving affordable coverage out of reach for millions of Americans and accelerating our path to fiscal ruin. The challenge was how to deal with the seemingly inexorable increase in health care costs.

Yet the Congressional majority went at this goal backward: with the force of the federal government, cover all Americans – then figure out which screws to twist to contain costs. Democrats opted for this approach because their concern was never about costs. It was about expanding coverage through an expansion of government.

As the dust settles from this historic and fiscally calamitous week, we have to try to steer this country back in the right direction. The opposition must always speak with vigor and candor on the need for wholesale repeal and for real reform to fix what’s broken in health care.

PA GOP News Brief 3.5.2010

March 1st, 2010 |

Author: admin

PA GOP News Brief 3.5.2010

1) CBS Philly: Exclusive: Tracking Pennsylvania’s Stimulus Money

2) NY Times: Rash of Scandals Tests Democrats at Sensitive Time

3) Roll Call: GOP Mounts Message Offensive to Defeat Health Care

4) Real Clear Politics: One Giant Government Leap Backwards

5) National Journal, Hotline: GOP Insiders See More Midterm Opportunities

1) CBS Philly: Exclusive: Tracking Pennsylvania’s Stimulus Money

CBS Philly reports on wasteful stimulus spending.

Did you know there’s such a thing as a “couch potato” gene?

Apparently the federal government is aware, because researchers at the University of Pennsylvania received nearly half a million dollars in federal economic stimulus money to study one.

That’s not all.

How would you like to spend tens of thousands of dollars on “maritime security” for a ship that never leaves the Delaware River?

Or spend roughly $150,000 for a study of the song of zebra finches?

After a year on the books, we wanted to see where exactly all the money from the $787 billion economic stimulus bill is being spent. So we pored through thousands of projects in Pennsylvania, New Jersey and Delaware.

While lots of projects have created jobs, Eyewitness News found millions of dollars in taxpayer money going to projects that created few or no jobs.

…

“It’s very disturbing,” says Congressman Jim Gerlach (R, Pennsylvania). Congressman Gerlach says he voted against the stimulus package last year in part because he was worried not enough money was going directly to job creation.

2) NY Times: Rash of Scandals Tests Democrats at Sensitive Time

The New York Times reports on the scandal laden Democratic Party and what it means for the 2010 elections.

The ethical woes facing Democrats are piling up, with barely a day passing in recent weeks without headlines from Washington to New York and beyond filled with word of scandal or allegations of wrongdoing.

The troubles of Gov. David A. Paterson of New York, followed by those of two of the state’s congressmen, Charles B. Rangel and Eric J. Massa, have added to the ranks of episodes involving prominent Democrats like Eliot Spitzer, Rod R. Blagojevich and John Edwards.

Taken together, the cases have opened the party to the same lines of criticism that Democrats, led by Representatives Nancy Pelosi, now the House speaker, and Rahm Emanuel, now White House chief of staff, used effectively against Republicans in winning control of the House and Senate four years ago.

The mix of power and the temptations of corruption can be a compelling political narrative at any time. But with voters appearing to be in an angry mood and many already inclined to view all things Washington with mistrust, the risks for Democrats could be that much greater this year.

4) Real Clear Politics: One Giant Government Leap Backwards

Lawrence Kudlow comments for Real Clear Politics on the failures of the Democratic Congress as they attempt to use reconciliation to pass bad legislation.

Rather than a post-partisan olive branch to congressional Republicans and the American public, President Obama’s latest health-care speech was a declaration of war. He’s more than willing to use a 51-vote reconciliation majority to jam through a roughly $2 trillion health-care plan that amounts to a government takeover of nearly one-fifth of the economy. He’s prepared to stick Uncle Sam right in the middle of the age-old relationship between patients and doctors, and doctors and hospitals, all while subjugating the private health-care insurance system to the status of a government-run utility — without bending the cost curve downward.

More spending. More tax hikes on investors, businesses, and individuals. New government boards to control prices, ration care, and redistribute income. The Obama administration is basically taking a giant government leap backwards that the country doesn’t want to take.

5) National Journal, Hotline: GOP Insiders See More Midterm Opportunities

The National Journal reports on a DC ‘insiders poll’ asking D’s and R’ about their predictions for 2010.

Senate Min. Leader Mitch McConnell is still likely to head the minority party in the next Congress, but he could have a lot of reinforcements, according to this week’s National Journal Political Insiders Poll.

When asked how many Senate seats the Dems would gain or lose in the upcoming midterm elections, 98 Dem Insiders said on average that the loss would be 5 seats. GOP Insiders were even more bullish: the 97 respondents predicted the average loss would be 7 seats, which would bring the GOP total to 48, up from 41.

60% of the Dem Insiders surveyed said the party would lose at least 5 seats. While 51% of GOP Insiders said that the Dem losses would be at least 7 seats, only 4% thought that the party would gain at least 10 seats, giving them outright control of the upper chamber.

Posted in Briefs, Democrat, Miscellaneous, National, Republican, State |

Tags: David Paterson, Eliot Spitzer, Health Care, John Edwards, Rep. Paul Ryan's plan, Rod Blagojevich, Scandals, Stimulus Package |

No Comments »

PA GOP News Brief 2.24.2010

February 24th, 2010 |

Author: admin

PA GOP News Brief 2.24.2010

1) PA GOP: It’s Baaaaaack!!! Obama And His Fellow Democrats Resurrect Same Failed Big Government-Run Health Care Plan

2) Real Clear Politics: PA Gov, Sen Poll: Toomey Keeps Big Lead
3) Washington Post: Obama’s health reform gamble raises questions of judgment

4) Republican Leader Boehner: The President’s Health Care Plan Will Destroy American Jobs

5) National Review: A Roadmap to Better Health Care

1) PA GOP: It’s Baaaaaack!!! Obama And His Fellow Democrats Resurrect Same Failed Big Government-Run Health Care Plan

Republican Party of Pennsylvania Chairman Rob Gleason released a statement regarding President Barack Obama and his Democratic colleagues’ insistence on pushing a government-run health care plan that Americans just don’t want.

“The White House has proven once again that it cares more about scoring cheap political points than working to reform the health care system in this country,” Gleason said. “After months of watching both the U.S. Senate and U.S. House plans for government-run health care stall due to overwhelming public opposition, the best that the Obama Administration can do is merge two bad bills into one truly awful piece of legislation?

“Over the past year, Democrats in both chambers of Congress drafted their own government-run health care proposals. Each proposal has been met with concerns over the massive spending increases, higher taxes and a push towards a government-run system.

“Republicans want to begin a thoughtful, step-by-step approach to reforming our health care system that will take the best aspects of our current system and build upon them. We will not, however, be content with serving as background decorations for the President’s scheme to repackage a bad plan.”

2) Real Clear Politics: PA Gov, Sen Poll: Toomey Keeps Big Lead

Real Clear Politics reports on the latest polling data released by F&M College that shows our endorsed U.S. Senate candidate Pat Toomey continuing to lead his Democratic competition.

Former Rep. Pat Toomey (R) continues to lead his potential general election foes, Sen. Arlen Specter and Rep. Joe Sestak, by double digits among likely voters, according to a new Franklin & Marshall College Poll. Far more voters remain undecided, however, when Toomey is matched up against Sestak, both of whom are less well known around the state than Specter.

Senate
General Election
Toomey 44
Specter 34
Und 16

Toomey 38
Sestak 20
Und 39

3) Washington Post: Obama’s health reform gamble raises questions of judgment

The Washington Post reports on President Obama’s latest push for his government-run health care experiment.

On health-care reform, the strategy of President Obama and Democratic congressional leaders is psychologically understandable — as well as delusional.

It is easy to imagine the internal dialogue: “Well, they voted for me, overwhelmingly. I didn’t hide my views on this issue; I highlighted them. If they actually knew what was in the plan, they’d support it. If I don’t believe in this, I don’t believe in anything. Sometimes you just have to lead.” But there is a problem with this reasoning: After a year of debate, Democratic leaders — given every communications advantage and decisive control of every elected branch of government — have not only lost legislative momentum, they have lost a national argument. Americans have taken every opportunity — the town hall revolt, increasingly lopsided polling, a series of upset elections culminating in Massachusetts — to shout their second thoughts. At this for Democratic leaders to insist on their current approach is to insist that Americans are not only misinformed but also dimwitted. point, for Democratic leaders to insist on their current approach is to insist that Americans are not only misinformed but also dimwitted.

4) Republican Leader Boehner: The President’s Health Care Plan Will Destroy American Jobs

Republican Leader Boehner’s office talks about the Democrats’ health care proposal.

Yesterday, President Obama released a health care proposal that represents a doubling down by Democrats in their determination to defy the will of the American people and pass a government takeover of health care. Their latest iteration of health care “reform” manages to “take the worst of both the House and Senate bills and combine them into something more destructive,” as the Wall Street Journal put it in an editorial today.

As House Republican Leader John Boehner (R-OH) said in a press briefing today:

Americans are still asking ‘where are the jobs?‘ Yet the Democrats’ new health care proposal increases the Senate bill’s tax on employers who do not provide coverage from $750 to $2,000 per employee. CBO and numerous health care economists have made it clear that such a provision will reduce wages and eliminate jobs. Republicans have offered common-sense reforms to help small businesses create jobs. That’s what the American people want, not the job-killing agenda that Democrats keep trying to jam down their throats.

5) National Review: A Roadmap to Better Health Care

The National Review reports on Rep. Paul Ryan’s plan to improve our health care system, a fiscally sound alternative to ObamaCare.

It’s not often that a single member of Congress generates as much media interest and debate as Wisconsin representative Paul Ryan has with “A Roadmap for America’s Future.” But, given the document’s focus and the political moment, the attention is entirely understandable. This is truly a case of a man with a plan in the right place at the right time.

The most serious medium- and long-term economic challenge our nation faces is that the federal government has committed itself to spending far more than it can collect in taxes. Most of this excessive commitment is in the area of entitlements. Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid are already expensive — their combined cost to the federal government is expected to hit 9.8 percent of GDP in 2010. But they are set to become simply unaffordable in coming years with the retirement of the baby-boom generation and the continued rapid escalation of health-care costs. By 2030, federal spending on the Big Three is expected to reach 14.4 percent of GDP, according to the Congressional Budget Office.

…

Enter Paul Ryan. “Roadmap” is a comprehensive plan to head off such a crisis. Ryan’s goals couldn’t be more ambitious. He wants to restructure the nation’s middle-class entitlement programs to eliminate their unfunded liabilities, ensure a secure retirement for future generations, and make world-class health care a reality for one and all. Further, he wants to pay for a reformed and affordable welfare state with a tax system that promotes, rather than punishes, entrepreneurship and growth.

…

No, better federal management of the health-care sector is not the answer, and we have more than four decades of experience with government-run health insurance to prove it. The government can and should play an important oversight role in a reformed marketplace, but the only way to drive out wasteful spending, reward productivity, and find creative new ways to do more with less is with a competitive marketplace. It’s the key to fixing health care and to restoring sanity to the federal budget. And Congressman Ryan’s “Roadmap” points the way.

Posted in Briefs, Democrat, Election, National, Republican, State |

Tags: Boehner, Ecomony, Federal Gov. spending more than can collect in taxes, Health Care, Health Care Destroy Jobs, Rep. Paul Ryan's plan, Toomey |

No Comments »

PA GOP News Brief 2.10.2010

February 12th, 2010 |

Author: admin

PA GOP News Brief 2.10.2010

1) PA GOP: Kanjorski Can’t Find Support For Re-Election At Home
2) PA GOP: Bryan Lentz Bidding To Become Another Member Of Speaker Pelosi’s Posse?

3) WSJ: Ten GOP Health Ideas for Obama

4) Washington Post: GOP Rep. Paul Ryan tackles Obama’s path to deficit disaster

5) Reuters: Republicans flex new power, block Obama nominee

1) PA GOP: Kanjorski Can’t Find Support For Re-Election At Home

Republican Party of Pennsylvania Chairman Rob Gleason was not surprised to learn that Congressman Paul Kanjorski could only find four donors for his re-election efforts living within the 11^th Congressional District.

“It’s certainly a telling sign that the people that know Congressman Paul Kanjorski best are not willing to donate to his re-election efforts,” Gleason said. “Over the past few years, Congressman Kanjorski’s constituents have been forced to watch him waste their hard-earned taxpayer dollars, even referring to their hard-earned income as ‘free money.’

“The Congressman’s own campaign cited that the 11^th Congressional District has a ‘lower income threshold than a lot of other areas,’ using that as an excuse for not raising more funds from inside his own district.

“Congressman Kanjorski may take donations from Washington special interests, but at the end of the day he’s going to be held accountable for his actions by his constituents living in the 11^th Congressional District this November.”

2) PA GOP: Bryan Lentz Bidding To Become Another Member Of Speaker Pelosi’s Posse?

Republican Party of Pennsylvania Chairman Rob Gleason released a statement regarding Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s endorsement of State Representative and Congressional candidate Bryan Lentz. Pelosi referred to Lentz as a ‘great candidate’ during a recent Pennsylvania Democratic State Committee event.

“It’s not surprising that Bryan Lentz has become the favorite candidate of big government Washington Democrats like Speaker Nancy Pelosi,” Gleason said. “Speaker Pelosi’s endorsement of Bryan Lentz, including her decision to provide financial support to his campaign, serves as further proof that Bryan Lentz will work for Democratic leaders in Washington, D.C. instead of the hardworking Pennsylvanians living in the 7^th Congressional District.

“The truth of the matter is that, just like Speaker Pelosi, Bryan Lentz has a proven track record of supporting the type of fiscally irresponsible policies that raise taxes, kill jobs and place an undue financial burden on the thousands of families in the 7^th Congressional District who are struggling to make ends’ meet.

“We look forward to working hard to hold both Bryan Lentz and his Democrat friends in Washington accountable for their tax-and-spend voting records.”

3) WSJ: Ten GOP Health Ideas for Obama

Newt Gingrich and John Goodman comment in the Wall Street Journal about practical solutions for health care reform.

‘If you have a better idea, show it to me.” That was President Barack Obama’s challenge two weeks ago to House Republicans regarding health-care reform. He has since called for a bipartisan forum, not to start over on health reform but to “move forward” on the “best ideas that are out there.”

The best ideas out there are not those that were passed by the House and Senate last year, which consist of more spending, more regulations and more bureaucracy. If the president is serious about building a system that delivers more quality choices at lower cost for every American, here’s where he should start:

• Make insurance affordable.

• Make health insurance portable.

• Meet the needs of the chronically ill.

Cont…

4) Washington Post: GOP Rep. Paul Ryan tackles Obama’s path to deficit disaster

The Washington Post comments on Rep. Paul Ryan’s plans for fiscal discipline.

The new era of Democratic bipartisanship, like cut flowers in a vase, wilted in less than a week.

During his question time at the House Republican retreat, President Obama elevated congressman and budget expert Paul Ryan as a “sincere guy” whose budget blueprint — which, according to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), eventually achieves a balanced budget — has “some ideas in there that I would agree with.” Days later, Democratic legislators held a conference call to lambaste Ryan’s plan as a vicious, voucherizing, privatizing assault on Social Security, Medicare and every non-millionaire American. Progressive advocacy groups and liberal bloggers joined the jeering in practiced harmony.

5) Reuters: Republicans flex new power, block Obama nominee

Reuters reports on the new filibuster breaking vote in the US Senate and how it blocked Obama’s liberal labor appointment.

Obama’s fellow Democrats in the Senate fell far short of the needed 60 votes, 52-33, to end debate and clear the way for a confirmation vote on Craig Becker, who the president wants to put on the National Labor Relations Board.

Republicans prevailed with the help of two Democratic senators from conservative states, Ben Nelson and Blanche Lincoln. Nelson, like a number of Republicans, voiced fear that the union attorney would take a “personal agenda” to the NLRB.

While Democrats still hold the Senate majority, 59-41, Republicans have a stranglehold on the chamber — thanks to Scott Brown’s win in a special Senate election in Massachusetts last month.

Posted in Briefs, Democrat, Republican, State |

Tags: Health Care, Kanjorski, Obama, Paul Ryan, Pelosi, Scott BrownBryan Lentz, tea parties, Washington Posr |

No Comments »

Posts Tagged ‘Health Care’

PA GOP News Brief – 7.28.10

PA GOP News Brief 7.12.2010

PA GOP News Brief 6.10.2010

PA GOP News Brief 5.07.10

PA GOP News Brief 4.15 2010 See Briefs

3) Wall Street Journal: Karl Rove: Why Republicans Are Winning on the Tax Issue

3) Wall Street Journal: Karl Rove: Why Republicans Are Winning on the Tax Issue

See Also: Wall Street Journal: Europe’s VAT Lessons

See Also: Wall Street Journal: GOP Fights to Unify Opposition to Bill

Recommended Reading:

New York Times: Poll Finds Tea Party Backers Wealthier and More Educated

Washington Times: Health care battle sinks Obama in polls

York County Republican Spring Dinner (Also see informational briefs on side panel)

Heath Care Bill Past Sunday — March 21st Also See Brief Page

PA GOP News Brief 3.5.2010

3) Roll Call: GOP Mounts Message Offensive to Defeat Health Care

4) Real Clear Politics: One Giant Government Leap Backwards

See Also: Real Clear Politics: Democrats mired in swamp they vowed to drain

3) Roll Call: GOP Mounts Message Offensive to Defeat Health Care

4) Real Clear Politics: One Giant Government Leap Backwards

PA GOP News Brief 2.24.2010

PA GOP News Brief 2.10.2010

5) Reuters: Republicans flex new power, block Obama nominee

5) Reuters: Republicans flex new power, block Obama nominee