Category Archives: Economy

Budget-Killing Reagan Serving Hard Time in Senate

By Ben Franklin, American Post-Gazette

Not every guilty person looks it. Take Michele Reagan R-Scottsdale) for example. She is a soft spoken, pleasant woman with a kind face, but a few years ago her vote in the Legislature nearly wrecked the Arizona state budget, and threatened to bankrupt us. If Reagan were Democrat, you might understand, even if grudgingly, but this vote for Janet Napolitano’s out of control spending plan was incomprehensible. Michele Reagan is a wrecking ball wrapped in velvet.

In the aftermath after Napolitano was called to Washington to serve the Obama regime, the Republican legislature struggled to repair that dreadful budget. Wrestling greased pythons might have been easier. The Democrat money spenders fought hard to keep the ex-governor’s wild programs in place at the same time our economy was in free fall due to ludicrous Federal policies. It did not have to be that way. One woman, single handedly, had cast the key vote that destroyed our fiscal responsibility and threatened Arizona’s economic stability for several years afterward. That woman was our own Michele Reagan.

When Governor Napolitano took office in 2003, she pushed the Arizona Legislature to increase the budget at an annual rate of 12 percent, much faster than the growth rate of the state’s private sector, which expands 7 to 8 percent per year when times are good. State government spending reached 7.01 percent of the state’s economy – the biggest proportion since 1980.

With expenditures increasing so fast, it was inevitable tax revenues would fall short and a gigantic deficit would be the result. That gap reached $2.2 billion, the biggest per capita state deficit in the country. Did that sink in? We had the biggest deficit per capita in the entire United States, and Michele Reagan voted for that disaster.

More recently she was at it again. When Governor Brewer signed on to bringing Obamacare into Arizona on the wings of the Medicare system, Reagan once again voted with the Democrats for an expense-heavy medical insurance expansion that would wreak havoc on the state economy. Critics have pointed out that after the first couple of years, state tax payers would be digging deep into their pockets to keep this burdensome monster alive. The monster will then eat us, or at least a large part of our hard earned money.

When Reagan was asked why she voted for the bill, she said she wanted to give the House of Representatives a chance to weigh in also. However, in a subsequent round of voting, Reagan voted against the disastrous legislation. Reagan claimed her switch was due to the elimination of a trigger that would cancel state participation when Federal funding falls below 80%. In other words, she voted for it, and then against it when her vote was no longer critical to passage. Reagan had found cover for switching.

What is wrong with sticking to conservative principals and giving the people responsible government? Surely that can’t be too much to ask from our elected officials! Every Democrat voted for this healthcare bill, and Reagan voted with the Democrats on two of the most critical issues of our times.

Now, Michele Reagan wants to become our Secretary of State, but her ultimate goal is to take command on the 9th floor – in the Governor’s office. You do not want this to happen! Perhaps the woman is in the wrong party and ought to be encouraged to make a change. Perhaps she should be encouraged to retire. It’s OK. She doesn’t need the job and will do just fine without her meager state salary. Just think how much better Arizona will be with her out of office.

GOP Reaction to Increased Unemployment

Washington, DC – Today, Ways and Means Chairman Dave Camp (R-MI) released the following statement in reaction to the May jobs report from the U.S. Department of Labor.  A net total of 175,000 jobs were created and the unemployment rate for May increased to 7.6 percent from 7.5 percent in April.

 

“The fact that the unemployment rate remains this high is just more proof that this is the weakest economic recovery in our nation’s history.  And, while families are facing higher costs, many have had their pay frozen or, worse, their hours cut back.  Washington needs to focus on creating a stronger economy.  There is no one silver bullet, but two of the best things we can do is get our long-term debt under control and reform our tax code to make it more efficient and effective for families and employers.”

Gang of 6 RINOs no Friend to Taxpayers

From the East Valley Tea Party:

This “Gang of 6″ Republican Senators voted with the Democrats to pass the budge WITH Medicaid Expansion in it. !!

Top left to right… John McComish (LD18), Adam Driggs (LD28), Steve Pierce (LD1), Michele Reagan(LD23) (voted YES for the budget with the expansion amendment in the 3rd read) ,Bob Worsley (LD25) Rich Crandall (LD16)
Governor Brewer has manage to tear the Republican Party apart all while selling her soul to the Federal Government who is involved in scandal after scandal.
Obamacare is crumbling before our eyes and yet she jumps into the fire expecting the Federal Government will have the funds to expand our Medicaid program.
What was she thinking?  What were these 6 Republicans thinking?

Sen. Cruz: McCain out of Touch with Senate GOP

By United Press International

Senators who John McCain, R-Ariz., once called “whacko birds” are the real Republican mainstream, said Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, daring McCain to prove him wrong.

Cruz, a freshman senator endorsed by the Tea Party movement and the libertarian Republican Liberty Caucus, said on the Senate floor Thursday he and fellow deficit-hawk Republicans Rand Paul of Kentucky, Mike Lee of Utah and Marco Rubio of Florida were not a crackpot fringe for standing in the way of negotiations with the House to reconcile the two chambers’ competing U.S. budget proposals.

Indeed, they represent the GOP majority philosophy, Cruz said.

Cruz, Paul, Lee, Rubio and other conservative lawmakers with close Tea Party ties say they adamantly object to the appointment of a House-Senate conference committee to bridge the vast gap between the House and Senate budget versions unless the lawmakers are guaranteed negotiators won’t agree to link a budget deal to a debt-limit increase.

If that were to happen, such an agreement would let a debt-ceiling increase be approved in the Senate with a simple 51-vote majority, rather than the 60-vote supermajority usually needed for controversial measures.

McCain, a senator since 1987, called his upstart colleagues’ defiance obstructionist and said their demand for a guarantee showed their ignorance of how the Senate works.

“It’s not the regular order for a number senators — a small number, a minority within a minority here — to say they will not agree to go to conference,” McCain said Thursday.

“We’re here to vote, not here to block things,” he said. “We’re here to articulate our positions on the issues and do what we can for the good of the country and the let the process move forward.”

He said the budget blockade was the latest example of the small senators group pursuing a strategy that will “paralyze” the Senate process. He said it could provoke Democratic leaders to take extreme steps to change Senate rules to crack down on delaying tactics.

McCain previously criticized Tea Party tactics on other issues, including efforts to block votes on Cabinet nominations and gun-control legislation.

Two months ago he told The Huffington Post he considered them “whacko birds” after they filibustered John O. Brennan as President Barack Obama’s nominee to head the CIA until he guaranteed Washington wouldn’t use aerial drones to kill Americans in the United States.

“I think it can be harmful if there is a belief among the American people that those people are reflective of the views of the majority of Republicans. They’re not,” McCain said in the Post interview, published March 7.

Cruz said Thursday McCain was “impugning all 45 Republicans in this body” by suggesting Cruz and his colleagues were a small troublemaking minority of the GOP for continuing to stand in the way of the House-Senate conference committee and pressing the debt-ceiling issue.

“There may be more wacko birds in the Senate than is suspected,” Cruz said.

He challenged McCain to test the senatorial waters by seeing how many Republican senators are willing to sign a statement saying they supported letting the Senate raise the debt ceiling with a simple majority.

“I believe he will find that his representation to this body — that it is only a minority of Republicans that oppose that — is not accurate,” Cruz said.

Cruz challenged McCain, saying if the Arizona Republican can produce a document showing a majority of the Senate GOP supported the McCain position, “I will offer here and now to go to a home game of my Houston Astros wearing an Arizona Diamondbacks hat.”

Sen. Paul Exposes Foolishness of Sequester and ObamaCare

Democrats Want Your Money and They Want it Now

Kirstyn Sinema isn’t around to make shocking remarks in the Arizona Legislature anymore. So Democrat socialist Ed Ableser (Tempe) is taking up the dubious insert-foot-in-mouth mantle.

Ableser just called churches and religious schools “freeloaders.” Invoking the old phrase “egg-sucking liberals” — Democrats who never saw another person’s dollar bill they didn’t want to vacuum up into a government sinkhole.

This lesson in absurd and outrageous Democrat greed and big government obsession cropped up over a bill introduced in the legislature that would protect religious schools from unemployment tax. With the Obama economy hurting families’ ability to send children to good private schools, Republicans have sought to ease their burden by exempting the schools from burdensome unemployment taxes. Most teachers and staff aren’t making much money by working at these much-needed antidotes to secular humanist government schools. Many an unfortunate family can’t afford to send their children to the best private schools, for financial reasons created and worsened by the Obama Administration and Democrats who sank the economy. Unemployment taxes could sink these small schools which are training up children in such admireable ways.

But Democrats like Ableser only see the money they think belongs to them, er uh, the government.

It’s not about “greed on Wall Street.” It’s about greed on West Washington Street in Phoenix and 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue in Washington, D.C.

An Interview with The Arizona Conservative

Isn’t the Conservative movement all about legislating morality?

In a word – no. All legislation, all lawmaking is someone’s morality. Those who say we’re imposing our morality on them are trying to impose their morality on us.

The Conservative movement is about advocating commonsense principles which have stood the test of time and which offer society the greatest opportunities of health and well-being.

Americans have the freedom to do a lot of things which were once considered harmful to the person, to others – and immoral. Rather than ask themselves “Can I do xyz,” people should ask themselves “Should I do xyz,” and “what are the consequences?” They don’t need government to decide that or ask for them. If everyone did this more often, we’d have  fewer social problems, less crime, fewer divorces, less gambling addiction, less drug and alcohol addiction, less crime, and fewer socially transmitted diseases. And the bottom line is that we would then see healthier families, neighborhoods and communities, and far less government spending on trying to pick up the broken pieces. It’s a matter of personal accountability.

Aren’t we as a nation progressing by doing away with so-called “archaic” morality laws?

We are not progressing as a nation, period. American society is in a tailspin. We are going in reverse; progressives just aren’t willing to admit it. It is not possible to progress given the current direction and worldview of those shaping the culture.

C.S. Lewis wrote: “In a sort of ghastly simplicity we remove the organ and demand the function.”

We have removed the Judeo-Christian morality as the source of morality and decision making at the highest levels of state and federal government. But we act shocked when someone commits a horrible crime.  We’ve said “no more of that old morality, we’ll take it from here.” But they’re taking it all in the wrong direction.

Sign of violence seen at a Mesa movie theater

Sign of violence seen at a Mesa movie theater

So we’re teaching children – through government and the influence of the mass media culture – that it’s not only okay, but preferential, to kill the defenseless and treat people with incivility. Look at the titles of movies and TV shows: Everybody Hates Chris, Kill Bill, The Weakest Link. And we’re surprised children are killing children? You can’t expect a high level of civility when the foremost messages presented to the public are negative and destructive.

And then there are the special interest pressure groups raising huge sums of money to buy politicians and demand judges fabricate special privileges radically altering society. Anyone who opposes them, no matter how civil the opposition, is demonized and called “hater.” Many of them are threatened. The radicals are demanding opponents lose their jobs just for having a different viewpoint. This is disturbing. And it’s not the recipe for a civil society.

The real story of “progressivism” can best be described as man’s inhumanity to man.

Should Conservatives support influential Republicans who are supporting amnesty and same-sex “marriage”? They don’t have anywhere else to go, do they?

No, no and yes they do.

We as a nation should never abandon the rule of law. If we do, we get chaos – everyone just doing their own thing. It will be a nation in great conflict. Every self-respecting, orderly nation must control its borders. Mexico certainly does, though it criticizes those in the U.S. who demand we control ours.

It is not fair to legal immigrants for people to walk across the border illegally, going around the U.S. points of entry, and then demanding legal recognition and taxpayer benefits. Most people who immigrated here oppose illegal entry. Democrats only want to use these people’s votes: let them in, legal recognition and control over them and then demand their votes at election time.

Only about 2 percent of the population struggles with same-sex attraction, less than that in Arizona. Why should a tiny segment of the population be allowed to re-define marriage and subject more children to fatherlessness or motherlessness? The kids are not all right with this. In states where same-sex “marriage” is legal, very, very few homosexuals get married. For the most radical of the homosexual activists, it’s not really about marriage. It’s about destroying the traditional notion of family and marriage. We re-define marriage only at our own peril and a monumental loss of freedom. We opt for adult happiness over the well-being of children at our own peril and reap the social whirlwind. Homosexuality is not genetic, and same-sex “marriage” is not a civil right. That’s offensive to the people who truly suffered the indignation of slavery and denial of civil and human rights.

Republican leaders who want to join others by walking over the social cliff and into the moral abyss are absolutely undiscerning of what the end results will be. Conservatives must never acquiesce, must never join them or approve of this. There are more than enough conservative Republicans, independents and members of the Constitution Party to uphold principles and policies that will point this nation in the right direction.

Senator Harry Reid, other Democrats and many media and educational elites claim Conservatives are polarizing the nation. Is this accurate, and did conservatives create the culture war?

This is pure propaganda intended to direct attention away from those pushing for the most radical departure from U.S. history and tradition. The biblical explanation for this is calling evil good and good evil.

For most of America’s history, Judeo-Christian morality was the dominant worldview. But when those disagreeing with that worldview – John Dewey, Roger Baldwin, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt and others – moved the nation in a different direction, Christians and Conservatives were slow to defend the nation’s traditional ideals. By the time Dr. James Dobson, President Ronald Reagan and many others began to respond, the moral center had collapsed. Christians had been lulled to sleep by how things had always been; they were the frogs in the pot who were boiled before they what hit them.

Now the Conservative movement is organized and defending the worldview that enabled America’s greatness and freedom. But the recent decades of indoctrination by educators and the mass media culture, along with the government’s shift to the secular humanist religion and animosity toward Judeo-Christian morality have taken a terrible toll on the country. It will be a long, hard climb to get out of this mess. It will not happen through politics. It will take a cultural shift. Everything else flows through the culture, and our culture is weak, decadent and in turmoil. We cannot allow leftists to steal our children’s hearts and minds and turn them against us. Every year millions of our kids are graduating from indoctrination in school and college and moving us further away as a nation from where we need to be. Our focus needs to be on salvaging our youth and saving this nation from the policies and worldviews that are poisoning our culture. We must change the direction our young people are being led into following. It’s that simple. If we do not accomplish this, our culture will only continue to deteriorate.

The Obama Inauguration Speech YOU Heard

Each time we gather to inaugurate a President we bear witness to the enduring strength of our Constitution – which our “progressive” judges and justices are attempting to re-write.

We affirm the promise of our democracy – when it suits our needs.

We recall that what binds this nation together is not the colors of our skin or the tenets of our faith or the origins of our names. What makes us exceptional — what makes us American — is our allegiance to an idea articulated in a declaration made more than two centuries ago:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” – Life when it is wanted. Unalienable rights with the exclusion of religious freedom.

Today we continue a never-ending journey to bridge the meaning of those words with the realities of our time – revisionist reality according to secular humanists.

For history tells us that while these truths may be self-evident, they’ve never been self-executing; that while freedom is a gift from God, it must be secured by His people here on Earth. – And you must secure it in court if you can beat me in your lawsuits against my HHS mandate.

The patriots of 1776 did not fight to replace the tyranny of a king with the privileges of a few or the rule of a mob. They gave to us a republic, a government of, and by, and for the people, entrusting each generation to keep safe our founding creed. – until I arrived here to destroy that.

And for more than two hundred years, we have. – My mob friends with SEIU and other unions are enforcing my wishes.

Through blood drawn by lash and blood drawn by sword, we learned that no union founded on the principles of liberty and equality could survive half-slave and half-free. We made ourselves anew, and vowed to move forward together.

Together, we determined that a modern economy requires railroads and highways to speed travel and commerce, schools and colleges to train our workers.

Together, we discovered that a free market only thrives when there are rules to ensure competition and fair play. – The rules of socialism and excessive government regulation and control.

Together, we resolved that a great nation must care for the vulnerable, and protect its people from life’s worst hazards and misfortune. – Except for the preborn, the disabled, and the elderly (who should think about hospice).

Through it all, we have never relinquished our skepticism of central authority, nor have we succumbed to the fiction that all society’s ills can be cured through government alone. – But they can be dictated by government, against the will of the people.

Our celebration of initiative and enterprise, our insistence on hard work and personal responsibility, these are constants in our character. – But which we rejected in the last election campaign when we promised government control from cradle to grave.

But we have always understood that when times change, so must we; that fidelity to our founding principles requires new responses to new challenges; that preserving our individual freedoms ultimately requires collective action. – Or better yet, collectivist actions at the expense of those founding principles.

For the American people can no more meet the demands of today’s world by acting alone than American soldiers could have met the forces of fascism or communism with muskets and militias. – Nor can the people be left alone to take initiatives through churches, ministries and charitable organizations to feed and clothe the poor, the destitute, the starving, and those whose lives have been uprooted by natural disasters. Nor can all meet the demands of today’s world with rising taxes and unsustainable debt, amidst excessive government regulation and control. Now you must overlook liberal fascism here at home.

No single person can train all the math and science teachers we’ll need to equip our children for the future, or build the roads and networks and research labs that will bring new jobs and businesses to our shores. – No person has ever suggested building the transcontinental railroad or reaching the moon alone. And now innovation and achievement is being denigrated, discouraged, and hampered by the growing tentacles of big government.

Now, more than ever, we must do these things together, as one nation and one people. – Actually, comrades, as one growing centralized government bureacracy.

This generation of Americans has been tested by crises that steeled our resolve and proved our resilience. A decade of war is now ending. An economic recovery has begun. – American and allied forces have substantially reduced the capabilities of Islamic terrorists. Yet no real recovery has begun except in the campaign mode mind of the president.

America’s possibilities are limitless, — with the freedom from excessive government regulation

…. for we possess all the qualities that this world without boundaries demands – Especially the southern U.S. border which I’m attempting to dissolve.

youth and drive; diversity and openness; an endless capacity for risk and a gift for reinvention. – Especially for those industries moving out of the reach of tax monsters in California and New York.

My fellow Americans, we are made for this moment, and we will seize it — so long as we seize it together. – Or I’ll seize it alone as I enact policies and executive orders unpopular with the people.

For we, the people, understand that our country cannot succeed when a shrinking few do very well and a growing many barely make it. – Courtesy of tax increases and demonization of the achievers who take risks investing their wealth to create jobs allowing many to feed their families.

We believe that America’s prosperity must rest upon the broad shoulders of a rising middle class. – Micromanaged by my ever-growing administration, undermined by my demolition of America’s business climate.

We know that America thrives when every person can find independence and pride in their work; — Despite my demands that all be dependent on government their entire lives, “independent” people like Julia. For when I refer to America, I’m talkin’ big government, baby.

when the wages of honest labor liberate families from the brink of hardship. – But not from overly burdensome taxation.

We are true to our creed when a little girl born into the bleakest poverty knows that she has the same chance to succeed as anybody else, because she is an American; she is free, and she is equal, not just in the eyes of God but also in our own. – If she is allowed to leave her mother’s womb without dismemberment, and to experience a life directed by the “god” of big government.

We understand that outworn programs are inadequate to the needs of our time. – Such as government programs encouraging dependency, teen pregnancy, and risky, life-altering behavior.

So we must harness new ideas and technology to remake our government, revamp our tax code, reform our schools, and empower our citizens with the skills they need to work harder, learn more, reach higher. – So they can give more of what’s theirs to a government which will waste the fruits of their hard-earned labor on failing businesses. So they can more fully indoctrinate students in schools failing to educate, so citizens can settle for mediocrity while surrendering their God-given, Constitution-affirming rights to big government.

But while the means will change, our purpose endures: a nation that rewards the effort and determination of every single American. – Yes, I thought this line would get a laugh!

That is what this moment requires. That is what will give real meaning to our creed. – The creed I learned from Frank Marshall Davis and Saul Alinsky.

We, the people, still believe that every citizen deserves a basic measure of security and dignity. – Unless they oppose my secular worldview and my policies and executive orders. As long as you give more of your money to Planned Parenthood. As long as more of you substitute pain pills and hospice for medical treatment.

We must make the hard choices to reduce the cost of health care and the size of our deficit. – While I continue to raise the debt ceiling and put deficit reduction out of reach forever.

But we reject the belief that America must choose between caring for the generation that built this country and investing in the generation that will build its future. – Wait a minute. I’m the first person to suggest this.

For we remember the lessons of our past, when twilight years were spent in poverty and parents of a child with a disability had nowhere to turn. – And now we proudly observe that 90 percent of preborn children with Down syndrome are not allowed to live.

We do not believe that in this country freedom is reserved for the lucky, or happiness for the few. – Or those who take risks and invest their resources to create industries employing millions and feeding families.

We recognize that no matter how responsibly we live our lives, any one of us at any time may face a job loss, or a sudden illness, or a home swept away in a terrible storm. – Or job-killing fines for not funding abortion pill mandates.

The commitments we make to each other through Medicare and Medicaid and Social Security, these things do not sap our initiative, they strengthen us. – Especially those of us raiding those funds!

They do not make us a nation of takers; they free us to take the risks that make this country great. – Though some would argue that those who took the risks, who employed people who provided for their families, now have a right to their social security as retired folks.

We, the – GOVERNMENT — people, still believe that our obligations as – CONTROL OF — Americans are not just to ourselves, but to all posterity. We will respond to the threat of climate change, — No matter how well it’s been proven a fantasy.

knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations. – And fail to increase tax coffers and close down the coal industry.

Some may still deny the overwhelming –UNDERWHELMING – judgment of science, but none can avoid the devastating impact of raging

fires and crippling drought and more powerful storms. – Fires caused by arsonists and by lightning. We still haven’t slowed the rise of the oceans and healed the planet; how can we control the weather?

The path towards sustainable energy sources will be long and sometimes difficult. – And cost taxpayers billions to reward Solyndra and other green companies even though we knew they were going under.

But America cannot resist this transition, we must lead it. – We will lead by downsizing our military and economic capacities. By killing jobs and increasing food stamp rolls.

We cannot cede to other nations the technology that will power new jobs and new industries, we must claim its promise. – I don’t care how many Solyndras I give your money to.

That’s how we will maintain our economic vitality – And sustain this slumping economy while repeating the myth of recovery ad nauseum.

and our national treasure — our forests and waterways, our crop lands and snow-capped peaks. That is how we will preserve our planet, commanded to our care by God. – It’s okay to bring religion into this now, even though I’ve long entertained doubts about my faith.

That’s what will lend meaning to the creed our fathers once declared. We, the people, still believe that enduring security and lasting peace do not require perpetual war. – But our Army has recognized conservatives as terrorist threats and we will stockpile bullets and take their guns and religious freedom away.

Our brave men and women in uniform, tempered by the flames of battle, are unmatched in skill and courage. – And the raging passions of homosexual lust in the barracks.

Our citizens, seared by the memory of those we have lost, know too well the price that is paid for liberty. The knowledge of their sacrifice will keep us forever vigilant against those who would do us harm. – Not counting those Islamic forces I’ve befriended and given hundreds of millions of your dollars to.

But we are also heirs to those who won the peace and not just the war; who turned sworn enemies into the surest of friends — and we must carry those lessons into this time as well. – Like my Hamas and Muslim Brotherhood buddies.

We will defend our people and uphold our values through strength of arms and rule of law. – Starting by gutting the United States Navy and refusing to defend the federal Defense of Marriage Act. By befriending the detainees at Gitmo.

We will show the courage to try and resolve our differences with other nations peacefully –-  After the election, since I have more flexibility now.

not because we are naïve about the dangers we face, but because engagement can more durably lift suspicion and fear. – So don’t worry about any appropriate responses to future Benghazis.

America will remain the anchor of strong alliances in every corner of the globe. – Except for the Middle East, Fort Hood, Pakistan and a few other strategic locations

And we will renew those institutions that extend our capacity to manage crisis abroad, for no one has a greater stake in a peaceful world than its most powerful nation. – That would be the nation of Russia, which I’ve entrusted to take over as the world’s leading power.

We will support democracy from Asia to Africa, from the Americas to the Middle East, because our interests and our conscience compel us to act on behalf of those who long for freedom. — And we’ll support communism in Cuba, Venezuela, and Kenya.

And we must be a source of hope to the poor, the sick, the marginalized, the victims of prejudice –- not out of mere charity, but because peace in our time requires the constant advance of those principles that our common creed describes: tolerance and opportunity, human dignity and justice. – With the exceptions of the preborn, the Christian owners of businesses, my domestic enemies, and all who oppose the homosexual agenda.

We, the people, declare today that the most evident of truths –- that all of us are created equal –- is the star that guides us still; just as it guided our forebears through Seneca Falls, and Selma, and Stonewall – Stonewall, where lawless homosexuals threatened the lives of police officers doing their duty

just as it guided all those men and women, sung and unsung, who left footprints along this great Mall, to hear a preacher say that we cannot walk alone; to hear a King proclaim that our individual freedom is inextricably bound to the freedom of every soul on Earth. – And where people, even my white grandmother, should be judged by the content of their character and not by the color of their skin.

It is now our generation’s task to carry on what those pioneers began. For our journey is not complete until our wives, our mothers and daughters can earn a living equal to their efforts. – Unless they work for me and accept our pay scale: 18 percent less for women.

Our journey is not complete until our gay brothers and sisters are treated like anyone else under the law –- for if we are truly created equal, then surely the love we commit to one another must be equal as well. – And our heterosexual brothers and sisters are treated equally as well, until anti-bullying laws and hate crime laws apply equally to all.

Our journey is not complete until no citizen is forced to wait for hours to exercise the right to vote. – I promise an executive order allowing everyone voting for me to go to the head of the voting line, even if they arrived 10 minutes prior to the closing of the polls. And even if they can’t prove they are a citizen.

Our journey is not complete until we find a better way to welcome the striving, hopeful immigrants who still see America as a land of opportunity – And who still come here legally and assimilate, unlike those cheating and flouting immigration law by entering the country illegally, or those who smuggle humans or drugs across our borders.

until bright young students and engineers are enlisted in our workforce rather than expelled from our country. – Never mind the law; I need voters now!

Our journey is not complete until all our children, from the streets of Detroit – who escape the murder and violence

to the hills of Appalachia, to the quiet lanes of Newtown, know that they are cared for and cherished and always safe from harm. – Give me your poor, your tired, your huddled masses, your guns. Your government will guarantee you a chicken in every pot and continued safety from all evil-doers.

That is our generation’s task — to make these words, these rights, these values of life and liberty and the pursuit of happiness real for every American. – Pursuant to the laws cheapening life and liberty and polarizing this great nation.

Being true to our founding documents does not require us to agree on every contour of life. – Especially the First Amendment.

It does not mean we all define liberty in exactly the same way or follow the same precise path to happiness. – Certainly not us Alinskyites.

Progress does not compel us to settle centuries-long debates about the role of government for all time, but it does require us to act in our time. – And act with impunity against the will of the people.

For now decisions are upon us and we cannot afford delay. – We must proceed with the worst possible “solutions” to the problems of our time. We cannot take the time to actually read the bills that will impact your lives for decades to come. We must pass them to see what is in them and then move forward and act upon them.

We cannot mistake absolutism for principle, or substitute spectacle for politics, — If you don’t count my refusal to negotiate with Republicans, grandstand, or diss Supreme Court justices to their face.

or treat name-calling as reasoned debate – Even if I do identify my opponents as ENEMIES. I’m justified doing that. You’re not.

We must act, knowing that our work will be imperfect. – I’ve never spoken truer words!

We must act, knowing that today’s victories – Well they are actually ATTACKS on life, liberty, Republicans and successful business owners.

will be only partial and that it will be up to those who stand here in four years and 40 years and 400 years hence to advance the timeless spirit once conferred to us in a spare Philadelphia hall. – And which were just rejected by about 99 percent of the voters from inner Philly.

My fellow Americans, the oath I have sworn before you today, like the one recited by others who serve in this Capitol, was an oath to God – BUT AS MY OWN PARTY DETERMINED LAST SUMMER, IT WILL NOT BE THE GOD MOST AMERICANS WORSHIP. NO. IT WILL BE MINE: ALLAH — and country, not party or faction. — And this is why I kept the Republicans out of health care negotiations.

And we must faithfully execute that pledge during the duration of our service. – Allah Akbar! Allah Akbar! Allah Akbar!

But the words I spoke today are not so different from the oath that is taken each time a soldier signs up for duty or an immigrant realizes her dream. My oath is not so different from the pledge we all make to the flag that waves above and that fills our hearts with pride. – The same flag I refuse to look at.

They are the words of citizens and they represent our greatest hope. You and I, as citizens, have the power to set this country’s course. – To set it correctly despite my radical agenda.

You and I, as citizens, have the obligation to shape the debates of our time – Though my friends and I actually know the debate is over.

not only with the votes we cast, but with the voices we lift in defense of our most ancient values and enduring ideals. – Those ancient values and enduring ideals I set into motion four long years ago.

Let us, each of us, now embrace with solemn duty and awesome joy what is our lasting birthright. With common effort and common purpose, with passion and dedication, let us answer the call of history and carry into an uncertain future that precious light of freedom. – The freedom to worship your federal government. Long live the government!

Thank you. MY GOD, NOT YOURS  – ALLAH — bless you, and may He forever bless these United States of America. – And the great downsizing project we are today embarked on today, some with us, many not.

House of Reps did Their Part to Save Taxpayers from Obama’s Fiscal Cliff

By Arizona Congressman Ben Quayle

As you have likely read in various media outlets, the fiscal cliff negotiations have basically shut down.  It is still possible to avert the fiscal cliff, and I truly hope we will, but we need to see some action from the President and the Senate.  However, it has become clear that the President wants to go over the cliff because he believes this will help him politically.

The media made a big deal of the fact that Republican leadership in the House pulled a tax bill due to lack of votes.  Some of the reporting on the bill makes it sound as if the failure to pass this bill means the House has refused to take action to avert the cliff.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  The House has voted on several measures this year to extend current tax rates and replace defense sequestration cuts — the two biggest issues in the fiscal cliff debate.  Therefore, the Senate has legislation they can work with to get a bill through both chambers.

The House of Representatives has expressed its will in these votes.  We want tax rates to stay the same for one year so we can enact fundamental tax reform on an expedited basis.  We also want to replace arbitrary and dangerous defense cuts with other spending cuts that won’t damage our national security.  Until the President and the Senate take action, it isn’t possible to shape legislation that can make it through both houses of Congress.   Hopefully Senator Reid will work on a bill next week.  I will keep you updated.

Although I will have a longer thank you to all of my constituents next week, here is my farewell address on the house floor from last week.

I hope everyone has a Merry Christmas!

Today’s Poll

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