do you reject the idea that opposing VAWA for specific reasons that were pointed out earlier by JP I believe, and opposing abortion can be done from a motivation outside of perpetrating "war on women"?
So, you're going to focus on one point (the VAWA) rather than focus on it all:
...you can't spin the fact that Republicans don't like women using contraception (the defunding of Planned Parenthood). Another thing is the mandating of New Mexico with their criminalizing abortions after a rape. How about Todd Akin and his ignorance? You can blame the other side for spinning as much as you'd like but the proof is there.
And there's so much more...
•In Texas, Rep. George Lavender, R-Texarkana, has proposed a bill (House Bill 2988) that would prevent any abortion except in cases of rape, incest or the life of the mother.
• The Texas State House of Representatives has passed the Sonogram Bill (HB 15), a measure requiring women to get a sonogram before ending a pregnancy, forcing even victims of rape to have a sonogram at least 24 hours before the procedure.
• Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) introduced a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives, the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act,” (HR 3) that would limit the rape exemption for abortion to “forcible rape” which would have defined many rapes, for example, statutory rape of a minor, as non-forcible and therefore not covered by federal assistance.
• Representative Joe Pitts (R-PA) introduced a bill (HR 358 – the “Protect Life Act”) would allow states to deny insurance coverage for birth control meaning hospitals could deny abortion procedures and transport to a facility that would provide a woman with an abortion even if failure to provide an abortion would mean the death of the woman.
• The U.S. House of Representatives passed (by a 234-182 vote) an amendment sponsored by Virginia Foxx (R-NC) prohibiting teaching hospitals from receiving federal funding if they teach doctors how to perform abortions. Unfortunately, as a result of this legislation new physicians will not receive the training needed to save women’s lives.
• Arizona’s House Bill 2625, which as azcentral.com reports, “would allow companies to opt out of covering contraception in their health-care plans for religious reasons,” proving once and for all that Arizona politicianss are legislating religion in violation of the Constitution, and that their religion trumps your beliefs.
[
Doesn't the ACLU run pretty far afield from partisan politics? I don't see any connection between them and Reps or Dems.
my point wasn't that the ACLU is partisan in anyway, but rather they opposed the VAWA in 94 and did NOT do so because they were conducting a war on women. based on some arguments I have read, one might be led to believe that if you oppose the VAWA you only would do so because of a war on women.
that’s right! Can’t we all just get together and focus on our real enemies: monogamous gays and stem cells… - Ned Flanders
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
where is it in the platform? I couldn't find it. Do you have the specific verbiage they used, I am interested in seeing it as this is the first I have heard they actually are conducting a war on women.
if you oppose abortion being legal, or the vawa for specific reasons, none of which include being 'for' violence on women, or equal pay laws... does that mean you are against women? What if you are a woman and oppose those things? Are you conducting a war on yourself out of self loathing?
Can you be against abortion without being a part of a war on women?
Do house reps who do not think expansion of unemployment is a good idea hate the poor?
And people wonder why there is so much vitriol in politics.
If you are against my position, you HATE and are against the group it would benefit the most.
I get what you are saying, Mike because "war" seems like a strong term but war can be subtle. If I were a woman and any group was trying to dictate my reproductive rights/choices I would feel as if a kind of war were being against me. I often notice that it's mostly men* who seem to object to this word usage.
edit * not referring to you specifically
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man [or woman] who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”
So what is it MikePegg? Why are republicans against me controlling if I want to become pregnant or not? Why would they think that it is in their power to regulate???
So what is it MikePegg? Why are republicans against me controlling if I want to become pregnant or not? Why would they think that it is in their power to regulate???
Because for the most part Republican politicians are old white guys who can't see women as equals
Just check out their binders full of women!!
• In Iowa, House File 2298, introduced by Rep. Kim Pearson, R-Pleasant Hill, would criminalize all abortions, including those resulting from rape and incest and would make no exceptions for the life of the mother when put at risk by her pregnancy. The punishment for ending a life (excepting of course the life of a mother) would be life in prison and women who miscarry will face criminal investigation.
• In Georgia, Senate Bill 438, sponsored by Sen. Mike Crane (R-Newman), would “provide that no health insurance plan for employees of the state shall offer coverage for abortion services.”
• From Iowa state Rep. Kim Pearson: House File 2298 introduces the crime of “Fetacide”: “Any person who intentionally terminates a human pregnancy, with the knowledge and voluntary onsent of the pregnant person, after the end of the second trimester of the pregnancy where death of the fetus results, commits feticide. Feticide is a class “C” “A” felony. Any person who attempts to intentionally terminate a human pregnancy, with the knowledge and voluntary consent of the pregnant person, after the end of the second trimester of the pregnancy where death of the fetus does not result, commits attempted feticide. Attempted feticide is a class “D” “B” felony.” A class A felony is punishable by life in prison, class B by 25 years. Keep in mind abortion is legal in the United States (see Roe v. Wade).
• Georgia Republican Rep. Terry England, in support of a bill which would ban abortions after 20 weeks (HR 954), says that women should be forced to carry dead fetuses to term. Why? Because cows and pigs have to do it and that’s apparently how his god wants it. Never mind the health risk to mothers being forced to carry dead fetuses to term.
• In Tennessee, the Life Defense Act of 2012 (H.B. 3808) would reveal the names not only of doctors who perform abortions but would also identify women who have abortions, posting that information on the Internet. According to HuffPo, the information revealed would include the woman’s “age, race, county, marital status, education level, number of children, the location of the procedure and how many times she has been pregnant.” The legislation is sponsored by state Rep. Matthew Hill (R-Jonesboro) after it was suggested by Tennessee Right To Life. Since Republicans control both House and Senate, the bill will in all likelihood pass, despite the ruling of the Tennessee Supreme Court in 2000 that abortion is a right protected by the state constitution.
• Wisconsin: SB 306, “Voluntary and informed consent and information on domestic abuse services”, authored by Sen. Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin) and Rep. Michelle Litjens (R-Oshkosh). The bill also “protects” women from RU-486 (but not men from Viagra). SB 306 was signed into law by Gov. Scott Walker on April 6, 2012. As a result, Planned Parenthood has done exactly what Wisconsin Republicans desire and suspended non-surgical abortions in Wisconsin. The lesson is: TRAP (Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers) laws work. Rose v. Wade says abortion is legal; TRAP laws make it impossible in practice.
• Wisconsin on April 6, 2012: Gov. Scott Walker signed into law SB 92 “relating to: prohibiting coverage of 2 abortions through health plans sold through exchanges.” This is an anti-Obamacare bill, pure and simple, and it states “This bill prohibits a qualified health plan offered through any exchange operating in this state from covering any abortion the performance of which is ineligible for funding from the state, a local government, or a long-term care district or from federal funds passing through the state treasury.“
• In Mississippi: “In addition to the abortion law signed by Bryant today, on Tuesday the House passed a backdoor “personhood” amendment to a bill intended to protect Mississippi children. If enacted, the amended bill could outlaw birth control, infertility treatments and all abortions — no exceptions. After passing the House, Senate Bill 2771 is now in the Senate for a concurrence vote.”
• Arguing that it is “morally wrong to take the tax dollars of millions of pro-life Americans and use them to fund organizations that provide and promote abortions,” Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind, introduced a bill (HR 217) in the U.S. House of Representatives to strip Planned Parenthood of federal funding, despite the many other services Planned Parenthood provides to both men and women, including contraception and STD testing.
• South Dakota flirted with a law to make the murder of an abortion doctor legal as self-defense.
• When South Dakota was forced to drop the idea of murdering abortion doctors, Nebraska and Iowa picked up the idea.
And finally,
• A total of 37 states mandate abstinence education while contraception falls increasingly under attack by Republican legislatures.
•In Texas, Rep. George Lavender, R-Texarkana, has proposed a bill (House Bill 2988) that would prevent any abortion except in cases of rape, incest or the life of the mother.
• The Texas State House of Representatives has passed the Sonogram Bill (HB 15), a measure requiring women to get a sonogram before ending a pregnancy, forcing even victims of rape to have a sonogram at least 24 hours before the procedure.
• Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) introduced a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives, the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act,” (HR 3) that would limit the rape exemption for abortion to “forcible rape” which would have defined many rapes, for example, statutory rape of a minor, as non-forcible and therefore not covered by federal assistance.
• Representative Joe Pitts (R-PA) introduced a bill (HR 358 – the “Protect Life Act”) would allow states to deny insurance coverage for birth control meaning hospitals could deny abortion procedures and transport to a facility that would provide a woman with an abortion even if failure to provide an abortion would mean the death of the woman.
• The U.S. House of Representatives passed (by a 234-182 vote) an amendment sponsored by Virginia Foxx (R-NC) prohibiting teaching hospitals from receiving federal funding if they teach doctors how to perform abortions. Unfortunately, as a result of this legislation new physicians will not receive the training needed to save women’s lives.
• Arizona’s House Bill 2625, which as azcentral.com reports, “would allow companies to opt out of covering contraception in their health-care plans for religious reasons,” proving once and for all that Arizona politicianss are legislating religion in violation of the Constitution, and that their religion trumps your beliefs.
• How about Paul Ryan and his "Protect Life" Act (also deemed the “Let Women Die Act”), that would allow hospitals to refuse abortion to a woman, regardless of whether her life was in danger.
what do all of them have in common...let me see...ph yes, republicans hate women.
Who hates themselves more, a woman republican or a poor republican?
It was so easy to prove too I can't believe I didn't see it before. All you had to do was show how many times they attempt to limit the same thing, which we both know means they are simply doing so because they hate women and their 'rights'
and you didn't answer the question, do you reject the idea that one could oppose VAWA and abortion without perpetrating a war on women? Or, if you are against legal abortion, does that automatically mean you are conducting a war on women?
it is as likely as me believing that the Democrats have a war on capitalism because they support the idea of a carbon tax and a windfall profits tax on oil companies...
So what is it MikePegg? Why are republicans against me controlling if I want to become pregnant or not? Why would they think that it is in their power to regulate???
If you are talking about abortion it is because they believe it is a person at the moment of contraception, usually on religious grounds or their belief in their own version of right and wrong.
In the form of birth control, they reject the idea that the government should tell a business they have to cover something that the business may be morally/religiously against...any number of reasons really...none of which include hatred of you because you are a woman.
I defend the GOP as rationally as possible here because they don't get a lot of that, I don't defend everything they do because I am not a republican nor am I crazy enough to believe they are infallible. I am open-minded enough to realize that they don't oppose abortion and birth control mandates because they hate women and will do whatever they can to harm them.
They certainly aren't a party that prides itself on being for individual women's rights, or even for being what they say they want, but to buy into a war on women and use that vocabulary is not useful in anyway but to obfuscate the arguments for or against a certain, individual bill...
War on Women...sounds great, makes a great head line...
As to a further more basic answer to the question in bold, I ask myself that about government every day..., my conclusion is a war on personal freedom
that’s right! Can’t we all just get together and focus on our real enemies: monogamous gays and stem cells… - Ned Flanders
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
Alrighty then. YOU are OK with the GOP prioritizing a fetus's health ahead of a woman's. And that is all. You are reading what you want to, rather than reading what is proof, of an entire party willing to pass laws (remember that this is a party that is anti-gov't!) not against sex, or the ability of a man to shoot puppies into a partner, but to take away primary health decisions of the woman. And that is all, there it is.
Like plenty of people watching the power outage in the New Orleans Superdome during the Super Bowl on Sunday, Michael Brown cracked a Katrina joke on Twitter.
Unlike plenty of people, Brown, former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency under President George W. Bush, was in charge of managing the federal response to the 2005 hurricane that killed more than 1,800 people and left thousands of residents homeless.
"Someone just told me there was fighting going on in the NOLA Superdome," Brown tweeted, adding the hash tag, "#shocked."
Brown resigned as director of FEMA in the wake of what many critics said was slow and incompetent response to Katrina’s aftermath--and just a week after President Bush, on his first post-storm visit to the region, said, “Brownie, you’re doing a heckuva job.”
His Superdome tweet also drew criticism, but Brown, now a talk radio host, did not back down.
"Come see the water line marks on the street signs by my church and see how funny Katrina/Dome tweets are," Twitter user Duris Holmes wrote.
"I saw them," Brown replied. "Blanco Nagin refused to look."
"Screen shots on iPad," he later tweeted. "Great for capturing vitriol that's later deleted from Twitter feed."
Brown added: "Blocking is quite useful, too."
It's not the first time since his FEMA resignation that Brown's been at the center of a controversy.
Last fall, Brown criticized President Obama for responding to Hurricane Sandy too early.
"You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry." - Lincoln
So what is it MikePegg? Why are republicans against me controlling if I want to become pregnant or not? Why would they think that it is in their power to regulate???
If you are talking about abortion it is because they believe it is a person at the moment of contraception, usually on religious grounds or their belief in their own version of right and wrong. In the form of birth control, they reject the idea that the government should tell a business they have to cover something that the business may be morally/religiously against...any number of reasons really...none of which include hatred of you because you are a woman.
Yet they want to legislate religious preferences toward birth control. Legislating religion is in direct violation of the Constitution.
I defend the GOP as rationally as possible here because they don't get a lot of that, I don't defend everything they do because I am not a republican nor am I crazy enough to believe they are infallible. I am open-minded enough to realize that they don't oppose abortion and birth control mandates because they hate women and will do whatever they can to harm them.
They certainly aren't a party that prides itself on being for individual women's rights, or even for being what they say they want, but to buy into a war on women and use that vocabulary is not useful in anyway but to obfuscate the arguments for or against a certain, individual bill...
War on Women...sounds great, makes a great head line...
As to a further more basic answer to the question in bold, I ask myself that about government every day..., my conclusion is a war on personal freedom
You clearly didn't read the FACTS and bills that republicans are attempting to enact, above.
where is it in the platform? I couldn't find it. Do you have the specific verbiage they used, I am interested in seeing it as this is the first I have heard they actually are conducting a war on women.
if you oppose abortion being legal, or the vawa for specific reasons, none of which include being 'for' violence on women, or equal pay laws... does that mean you are against women? What if you are a woman and oppose those things? Are you conducting a war on yourself out of self loathing?
Can you be against abortion without being a part of a war on women?
Do house reps who do not think expansion of unemployment is a good idea hate the poor?
And people wonder why there is so much vitriol in politics.
If you are against my position, you HATE and are against the group it would benefit the most.
did you google it? seriously, it was the first fucking result.
■Preserving and Protecting Traditional Marriage
■Creating a Culture of Hope: Raising Families Beyond Poverty
■Adoption and Foster Care
■Making the Internet Family-Friendly
■Advancing Americans with Disabilities
■Repealing Obamacare
■Our Prescription for American Healthcare: Improve Quality and Lower Costs
■Ensuring Consumer Choice in Healthcare
■Supporting Federal Healthcare Research and Development
■Protecting Individual Conscience in Healthcare
■Reforming the FDA
■Reducing Costs through Tort Reform
■Education: A Chance for Every Child
■Attaining Academic Excellence for All
■Consumer Choice in Education
■Improving Our Nation’s Classrooms
■Addressing Rising College Costs
■Justice for All: Safe Neighborhoods and Prison Reform
We are the party of independent individuals and the institutions they create – families, schools, congregations, neighborhoods – to advance their ideals and make real their dreams. Foremost among those institutions is the American family. It is the foundation of our society and the first level of self-government. Its daily lessons-cooperation, patience, mutual respect, responsibility, self-reliance – are fundamental to the order and progress of our Republic. Government can never replace the family. That is why we insist that public policy, from taxation to education, from healthcare to welfare, be formulated with attention to the needs and strengths of the family.
Preserving and Protecting Traditional Marriage (Top)
The institution of marriage is the foundation of civil society. Its success as an institution will determine our success as a nation. It has been proven by both experience and endless social science studies that traditional marriage is best for children. Children raised in intact married families are more likely to attend college, are physically and emotionally healthier, are less likely to use drugs or alcohol, engage in crime, or get pregnant outside of marriage. The success of marriage directly impacts the economic well-being of individuals. Furthermore, the future of marriage affects freedom. The lack of family formation not only leads to more government costs, but also to more government control over the lives of its citizens in all aspects. We recognize and honor the courageous efforts of those who bear the many burdens of parenting alone, even as we believe that marriage, the union of one man and one woman must be upheld as the national standard, a goal to stand for, encourage, and promote through laws governing marriage. We embrace the principle that all Americans should be treated with respect and dignity.
Creating a Culture of Hope: Raising Families Beyond Poverty (Top)
The Republican-led welfare reforms enacted in 1996 marked a revolution in government’s approach to poverty. They changed the standard for policy success from the amount of income transferred to the poor to the number of poor who moved from welfare to economic independence. We took the belief of most Americans – that welfare should be a hand up, not a hand out – and made it law. Work requirements, though modest, were at the heart of this success. That is why so many are now outraged by the current Administration’s recent decision to permit waivers for work requirements for welfare benefits, in other words, to administratively repeal the most successful anti-poverty policy in memory. Instead of undermining the expectation that low-income parents and individuals should strive to support themselves, benefit programs like food stamps must ensure that those benefits are better targeted to those who need help the most.
For the sake of low-income families as well as the taxpayers, the federal government’s entire system of public assistance should be reformed to ensure that it promotes work. Each year, this system dispenses nearly $1 trillion in taxpayer funds across a maze of approximately 80 programs that are neither coordinated nor effective in solving poverty and lifting up families. For many individuals collecting benefits from multiple categorical programs, efforts to work or earn more actually result in less money in their pocket through the resulting loss of benefits. This poverty trap would ensnare even more Americans if Obamacare were implemented. Taking a part time job, working an extra shift, or even just marrying someone who works, would result in a loss of benefits, thereby discouraging the very acts necessary to achieve the American Dream.
Adoption and Foster Care (Top)
Families formed or enlarged by adoption strengthen our communities and ennoble our nation. We applaud the Republican legislative initiatives that led to a significant increase in adoptions in recent years, and we call upon the private sector to consider the needs of adoptive families on a par with others. Any restructuring of the federal tax code should recognize the financial impact of the adoption process and the commitment made by adoptive families. The nation’s foster care system remains a necessary fallback for youngsters from troubled families. Because of reforms initiated by many States, the number of foster children has declined to just over 400,000. A major problem of the system is its lack of support, financial and otherwise, for teens who age out of foster care and into a world in which many are not prepared to go it alone. We urge States to work with the faith-based and other community groups which reach out to these young people in need.
Making the Internet Family-Friendly (Top)
Millions of Americans suffer from problem or pathological gambling that can destroy families. We support the prohibition of gambling over the Internet and call for reversal of the Justice Department’s decision distorting the formerly accepted meaning of the Wire Act that could open the door to Internet betting. The Internet must be made safe for children. We call on service providers to exercise due care to ensure that the Internet cannot become a safe haven for predators while respecting First Amendment rights. We congratulate the social networking sites that bar known sex offenders from participation. We urge active prosecution against child pornography, which is closely linked to the horrors of human trafficking. Current laws on all forms of pornography and obscenity need to be vigorously enforced.
Advancing Americans with Disabilities (Top)
We renew our commitment to the inclusion of Americans with disabilities in all aspects of our national life. In keeping with that commitment, we oppose the non-consensual withholding of care or treatment from people with disabilities, including newborns, as well as the elderly and infirm, just as we oppose euthanasia and assisted suicide, which endanger especially those on the margins of society. Because government should set a positive standard in hiring and contracting for the services of persons with disabilities, we need to update the statutory authority for the Ability One program, a major avenue by which those productive members of our society can offer high quality services. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) has opened up unprecedented opportunities for many students, and we reaffirm our support for its goal of minimizing the separation of children with disabilities from their peers. We urge preventive efforts in early childhood, especially assistance in gaining pre-reading skills, to help many students move beyond the need for IDEA’s protections. We endorse the program of Employment First, developed by major disability rights groups, to replace dependency with jobs in the mainstream of the American workforce.
Repealing Obamacare (Top)
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act – Obamacare – was never really about healthcare, though its impact upon the nation’s health is disastrous. From its start, it was about power, the expansion of government control over one sixth of our economy, and resulted in an attack on our Constitution, by requiring that U.S. citizens purchase health insurance. We agree with the four dissenting justices of the Supreme Court: “In our view the entire Act before us is invalid in its entirety.” It was the high-water mark of an outdated liberalism, the latest attempt to impose upon Americans a euro-style bureaucracy to manage all aspects of their lives. Obamacare has been struck down in the court of public opinion and is falling by the weight of its own confusing, unworkable, budget-busting, and conflicting provisions. It would tremendously expand Medicaid without significant reform, leaving the States to assume unsustainable financial burdens. If fully implemented, it could not function; and Republican victories in the November elections will guarantee that it is never implemented. Congressional Republicans are committed to its repeal; and a Republican President, on the first day in office, will use his legitimate waiver authority under that law to halt its progress and then will sign its repeal. Then the American people, through the free market, can advance affordable and responsible healthcare reform that meets the needs and concerns of patients and providers. Through Obamacare, the current Administration has promoted the notion of abortion as healthcare. We, however, affirm the dignity of women by protecting the sanctity of human life. Numerous studies have shown that abortion endangers the health and well-being of women, and we stand firmly against it.
Our Prescription for American Healthcare: Improve Quality and Lower Costs (Top)
We believe that taking care of one’s health is an individual responsibility. Chronic diseases, many of them related to lifestyle, drive healthcare costs, accounting for more than 75 percent of the nation’s medical spending. To reduce demand, and thereby lower costs, we must foster personal responsibility while increasing preventive services to promote healthy lifestyles. We believe that all Americans should have improved access to affordable, coordinated, quality healthcare, including individuals struggling with mental illness.
Our goal is to encourage the development of a healthcare system that provides higher quality care at a lower cost to all Americans while protecting the patient-physician relationship based on mutual trust, informed consent, and privileged patient confidentiality. We seek to increase healthcare choice and options, contain costs and reduce mandates, simplify the system for patients and providers, restore cuts made to Medicare, and equalize the tax treatment of group and individual health insurance plans. For most Americans, those who are insured now or who seek insurance in the future, our practical, non-intrusive reforms will promote flexibility in State leadership in healthcare reform, promote a free-market based system, and empower consumer choice. All of which will return direction of the nation’s healthcare to the people and away from the federal government.
To return the States to their proper role of regulating local insurance markets and caring for the needy, we propose to block grant Medicaid and other payments to the States; limit federal requirements on both private insurance and Medicaid; assist all patients, including those with pre-existing conditions, through reinsurance and risk adjustment; and promote non-litigation alternatives for dispute resolution. We call on State officials to carefully consider the increased costs of medical mandates, imposed under their laws, which may price many low-income families out of the insurance market. We call on the government to permanently ban all federal funding and subsidies for abortion and healthcare plans that include abortion coverage.
To achieve a free market in healthcare and ensure competition, we will promote price transparency so that consumers will know the actual cost of treatments before they undergo them. When patients are aware of costs, they are less likely to over-utilize services. We support legislation to cap non-economic damages in medical malpractice lawsuits, thereby relieving conscientious providers of burdens that are not rightly theirs and addressing a serious cause of escalating medical bills. We will empower individuals and small businesses to form purchasing pools in order to expand coverage to the uninsured. Individuals with pre-existing conditions who maintain continuous insurance coverage should be protected from discrimination. We support technology enhancements for medical health records and data systems while affirming patient privacy and ownership of health information.
Ensuring Consumer Choice in Healthcare (Top)
Consumer choice is the most powerful factor in healthcare reform. Today’s highly mobile work force requires portability of insurance coverage that can go with them from job to job. The need to maintain coverage should not dictate where families have to live and work. Putting the patient at the center of policy decisions will increase choice and reduce costs while ensuring that services provide what Americans actually want. We must end tax discrimination against the individual purchase of insurance and allow consumers to purchase insurance across State lines. While promoting “co-insurance” products and alternatives to “fee for service,” government must promote Health Savings Accounts and Health Reimbursement Accounts to be used for insurance premiums and should encourage the private sector to rate competing insurance plans. We will ensure that America’s aging population has access to safe and affordable care. Because seniors overwhelmingly desire to age at home, we will make home care a priority in public policy. We will champion the right of individual choice in senior care. We will aggressively implement programs to protect against elder abuse, and we will work to ensure that quality care is provided across the care continuum from home to nursing home to hospice.
Supporting Federal Healthcare Research and Development (Top)
We support federal investment in healthcare delivery systems and solutions creating innovative means to provide greater, more cost-effective access to high quality healthcare. We also support federal investment in basic and applied biomedical research, especially the neuroscience research that may hold great potential for dealing with diseases and disorders such as Autism, Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s. If we are to make significant headway against breast and prostate cancer, diabetes, and other killers, research must consider the special needs of formerly neglected groups. We call for expanded support for the stem-cell research that now offers the greatest hope for many afflictions – with adult stem cells, umbilical cord blood, and cells reprogrammed into pluripotent stem cells-without the destruction of embryonic human life. We urge a ban on human cloning and on the creation of or experimentation on human embryos. We support restoring the Drug Enforcement Administration ban on the use of controlled substances for physician-assisted suicide. We oppose the FDA approval of Mifeprex, formerly known as RU-486, and similar drugs that terminate innocent human life after conception.
Protecting Individual Conscience in Healthcare (Top)
No healthcare professional or organization should ever be required to perform, provide for, withhold, or refer for a medical service against their conscience. This is especially true of the religious organizations which deliver a major portion of America’s healthcare, a service rooted in the charity of faith communities. We do not believe, however, that healthcare providers should be allowed to withhold services because the healthcare provider believes the patient’s life is not worth living. We support the ability of all organizations to provide, purchase, or enroll in healthcare coverage consistent with their religious, moral or ethical convictions without discrimination or penalty. We likewise support the right of parents to consent to medical treatment for their children, including mental health treatment, drug treatment, and treatment involving pregnancy, contraceptives and abortion. We urge enactment of pending legislation that would require parental consent to transport girls across state lines for abortions.
Reforming the FDA (Top)
America’s leadership in life sciences R&D and medical innovation is being threatened. As a country, we must work together now or lose our leadership position in medical innovation, U.S. job creation, and access to life-saving treatments for U.S. patients. The United States has led the global medical device and pharmaceutical industries for decades. This leadership has made the U.S. the medical innovation capital of the world, bringing millions of high-paying jobs to our country and life-saving devices and drugs to our nation’s patients. But that leadership position is at risk; patients, innovators, and job creators point to the lack of predictability, consistency, transparency and efficiency at the Food and Drug Administration that is driving innovation overseas, benefiting foreign, not U.S., patients. We pledge to reform the FDA so we can ensure that the U.S. remains the world leader in medical innovation, that device and drug jobs stay in the U.S., that U.S. patients benefit first from new devices and drugs, and that the FDA no longer wastes U.S. taxpayer and innovators’ resources because of bureaucratic red tape and legal uncertainty.
Reducing Costs through Tort Reform (Top)
Frivolous medical malpractice lawsuits have ballooned the cost of healthcare for the average American. Physicians are increasingly practicing defensive medicine because of the looming threat of malpractice liability. Moreover, some medical practitioners are avoiding patients with complex and high-risk medical problems because of the high costs of medical malpractice lawsuits. Rural America is hurt especially hard as obstetricians, surgeons, and other healthcare providers are moving to urban settings or retiring, causing a significant healthcare workforce shortage and subsequently decreasing access to care for all patients. We are committed to aggressively pursuing tort reform legislation to help avoid the practice of defensive medicine, to keep healthcare costs low, and improve healthcare quality.
Education: A Chance for Every Child (Top)
Parents are responsible for the education of their children. We do not believe in a one size fits all approach to education and support providing broad education choices to parents and children at the State and local level. Maintaining American preeminence requires a world-class system of education, with high standards, in which all students can reach their potential. Today’s education reform movement calls for accountability at every stage of schooling. It affirms higher expectations for all students and rejects the crippling bigotry of low expectations. It recognizes the wisdom of State and local control of our schools, and it wisely sees consumer rights in education – choice – as the most important driving force for renewing our schools.
Education is much more than schooling. It is the whole range of activities by which families and communities transmit to a younger generation, not just knowledge and skills, but ethical and behavioral norms and traditions. It is the handing over of a personal and cultural identity. That is why education choice has expanded so vigorously. It is also why American education has, for the last several decades, been the focus of constant controversy, as centralizing forces outside the family and community have sought to remake education in order to remake America. They have not succeeded, but they have done immense damage.
Attaining Academic Excellence for All (Top)
Since 1965 the federal government has spent $2 trillion on elementary and secondary education with no substantial improvement in academic achievement or high school graduation rates (which currently are 59 percent for African-American students and 63 percent for Hispanics). The U.S. spends an average of more than $10,000 per pupil per year in public schools, for a total of more than $550 billion. That represents more than 4 percent of GDP devoted to K-12 education in 2010. Of that amount, federal spending was more than $47 billion. Clearly, if money were the solution, our schools would be problem-free.
More money alone does not necessarily equal better performance. After years of trial and error, we know what does work, what has actually made a difference in student advancement, and what is powering education reform at the local level all across America: accountability on the part of administrators, parents and teachers; higher academic standards; programs that support the development of character and financial literacy; periodic rigorous assessments on the fundamentals, especially math, science, reading, history, and geography; renewed focus on the Constitution and the writings of the Founding Fathers, and an accurate account of American history that celebrates the birth of this great nation; transparency, so parents and the public can discover which schools best serve their pupils; flexibility and freedom to innovate, so schools can adapt to the special needs of their students and hold teachers and administrators responsible for student performance. We support the innovations in education reform occurring at the State level based upon proven results. Republican Governors have led in the effort to reform our country’s underperforming education system, and we applaud these advancements. We advocate the policies and methods that have proven effective: building on the basics, especially STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, and math) and phonics; ending social promotions; merit pay for good teachers; classroom discipline; parental involvement; and strong leadership by principals, superintendents, and locally elected school boards. Because technology has become an essential tool of learning, proper implementation of technology is a key factor in providing every child equal access and opportunity.
Consumer Choice in Education (Top)
The Republican Party is the party of fresh and innovative ideas in education. We support options for learning, including home schooling and local innovations like single-sex classes, full-day school hours, and year-round schools. School choice – whether through charter schools, open enrollment requests, college lab schools, virtual schools, career and technical education programs, vouchers, or tax credits – is important for all children, especially for families with children trapped in failing schools. Getting those youngsters into decent learning environments and helping them to realize their full potential is the greatest civil rights challenge of our time. We support the promotion of local career and technical educational programs and entrepreneurial programs that have been supported by leaders in industry and will retrain and retool the American workforce, which is the best in the world. A young person’s ability to achieve in school must be based on his or her God-given talent and motivation, not an address, zip code, or economic status.
In sum, on the one hand enormous amounts of money are being spent for K-12 public education with overall results that do not justify that spending. On the other hand, the common experience of families, teachers, and administrators forms the basis of what does work in education. We believe the gap between those two realities can be successfully bridged, and Congressional Republicans are pointing a new way forward with major reform legislation. We support its concept of block grants and the repeal of numerous federal regulations which interfere with State and local control of public schools.
The bulk of the federal money through Title I for low-income children and through IDEA for disabled youngsters should follow the students to whatever school they choose so that eligible pupils, through open enrollment, can bring their share of the funding with them. The Republican-founded D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program should be expanded as a model for the rest of the country. We deplore the efforts by Congressional Democrats and the current President to kill this successful program for disadvantaged students in order to placate the leaders of the teachers’ unions. We support putting the needs of students before the special interests of unions when approaching elementary and secondary education reform.
Because parents are a child’s first teachers, we support family literacy programs, which improve the reading, language, and life skills of both parents and children from low-income families. To ensure that all students have access to the mainstream of American life, we support the English First approach and oppose divisive programs that limit students’ ability to advance in American society. We renew our call for replacing “family planning” programs for teens with abstinence education which teaches abstinence until marriage as the responsible and respected standard of behavior. Abstinence from sexual activity is the only protection that is 100 percent effective against out-of-wedlock pregnancies and sexually-transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS when transmitted sexually. It is effective, science-based, and empowers teens to achieve optimal health outcomes and avoid risks of sexual activity. We oppose school-based clinics that provide referrals, counseling, and related services for abortion and contraception. We support keeping federal funds from being used in mandatory or universal mental health, psychiatric, or socio- emotional screening programs.
We applaud America’s great teachers, who should be protected against frivolous litigation and should be able to take reasonable actions to maintain discipline and order in the classroom. We support legislation that will correct the current law provision which defines a “Highly Qualified Teacher” merely by his or her credentials, not results in the classroom. We urge school districts to make use of teaching talent in business, STEM fields, and in the military, especially among our returning veterans. Rigid tenure systems based on the “last in, first out” policy should be replaced with a merit-based approach that can attract fresh talent and dedication to the classroom. All personnel who interact with school children should pass background checks and be held to the highest standards of personal conduct.
Improving Our Nation’s Classrooms (Top)
Higher education faces its own challenges, many of which stem from the poor preparation of students before they reach college. One consequence has been the multiplying number of remedial courses for freshmen. Even so, our universities, large and small, public or private, form the world’s greatest assemblage of learning. They drive much of the research that keeps America competitive and, by admitting large numbers of foreign students, convey our values and culture to the world.
Ideological bias is deeply entrenched within the current university system. Whatever the solution in private institutions may be, in State institutions the trustees have a responsibility to the public to ensure that their enormous investment is not abused for political indoctrination. We call on State officials to ensure that our public colleges and universities be places of learning and the exchange of ideas, not zones of intellectual intolerance favoring the Left.
Addressing Rising College Costs (Top)
College costs, however, are on an unsustainable trajectory, rising year by year far ahead of overall inflation. Nationwide, student loan debt now exceeds credit card debt, roughly $23,300 for each of the 35,000,000 debtors, taking years to pay off. Over 50 percent of recent college grads are unemployed or underemployed, working at jobs for which their expensive educations gave them no training. It is time to get back to basics and to higher education programs directly related to job opportunities.
The first step is to acknowledge the need for change when the status quo is not working. New systems of learning are needed to compete with traditional four-year colleges: expanded community colleges and technical institutions, private training schools, online universities, life-long learning, and work-based learning in the private sector. New models for acquiring advanced skills will be ever more important in the rapidly changing economy of the twenty-first century, especially in science, technology, engineering, and math. Public policy should advance the affordability, innovation, and transparency needed to address all these challenges and to make accessible to everyone the emerging alternatives, with their lower cost degrees, to traditional college attendance.
Federal student aid is on an unsustainable path, and efforts should be taken to provide families with greater transparency and the information they need to make prudent choices about a student’s future: completion rates, repayment rates, future earnings, and other factors that may affect their decisions. The federal government should not be in the business of originating student loans; however, it should serve as an insurance guarantor for the private sector as they offer loans to students. Private sector participation in student financing should be welcomed. Any regulation that drives tuition costs higher must be reevaluated to balance its worth against its negative impact on students and their parents.
Justice for All: Safe Neighborhoods and Prison Reform (Top)
The most effective forces in reducing crime and other social ills are strong families and caring communities supported by excellent law enforcement. Both reinforce constructive conduct and ethical standards by setting examples and providing safe havens from dangerous and destructive behaviors. But even under the best social circumstances, strong, well-trained law enforcement is necessary to protect us all, and especially the weak and vulnerable, from predators. Our national experience over the last several decades has shown that citizen vigilance, tough but fair prosecutors, meaningful sentences, protection of victims’ rights, and limits on judicial discretion can preserve public safety by keeping criminals off the streets.
Liberals do not understand this simple axiom: criminals behind bars cannot harm the general public. To that end, we support mandatory prison sentencing for gang crimes, violent or sexual offenses against children, repeat drug dealers, rape, robbery and murder. We support a national registry for convicted child murderers. We oppose parole for dangerous or repeat felons. Courts should have the option of imposing the death penalty in capital murder cases.
In solidarity with those who protect us, we call for mandatory prison time for all assaults involving serious injury to law enforcement officers. Criminals injured in the course of their crimes should not be able to seek monetary damages from their intended victims or from the public.
While getting criminals off the street is essential, more attention must be paid to the process of restoring those individuals to the community. Prisons should do more than punish; they should attempt to rehabilitate and institute proven prisoner reentry systems to reduce recidivism and future victimization. We endorse State and local initiatives that are trying new approaches, often called accountability courts.
Government at all levels should work with faith-based institutions that have proven track records in diverting young and first time, non-violent offenders from criminal careers, for which we salute them. Their emphasis on restorative justice, to make the victim whole and put the offender on the right path, can give law enforcement the flexibility it needs in dealing with different levels of criminal behavior. We endorse State and local initiatives that are trying new approaches to curbing drug abuse and diverting first-time offenders to rehabilitation.
Public authorities must regain control of their correctional institutions, for we cannot allow prisons to become ethnic or racial battlegrounds. Persons jailed for whatever cause should be protected against cruel or degrading treatment by other inmates. In some cases, the institution of family-friendly policies may curtail prison violence and reduce the rate of recidivism, thus reducing the enormous fiscal and social costs of incarceration. Breaking the cycle of crime begins with the children of those who are prisoners. Deprived of a parent through no fault of their own, these youngsters should be a special concern of our schools, social services, and religious institutions. Thirty years ago, President Reagan’s Task Force on Victims of Crime, calling the neglect of crime victims a “national disgrace,” proposed a Constitutional amendment to secure their formal rights. While some progress has been made to rectify that situation, the need for national action still persists in the unacceptable treatment of innocent victims. We call on the States to make it a bipartisan priority to protect the rights of crime victims, who should also be assured of access to social and legal services; and we call on the Congress to make the federal courts a model in this regard for the rest of the country.
The resources of the federal government’s law enforcement and judicial systems have been strained by two unfortunate expansions: the over-criminalization of behavior and the over-federalization of offenses. The number of criminal offenses in the U.S. Code increased from 3,000 in the early 1980s to over 4,450 by 2008. Federal criminal law should focus on acts by federal employees or acts committed on federal property – and leave the rest to the States. Then Congress should withdraw from federal departments and agencies the power to criminalize behavior, a practice which, according to the Congressional Research Service, has created “tens of thousands” of criminal offenses. No one other than an elected representative should have the authority to define a criminal act and set criminal penalties. In the same way, Congress should reconsider the extent to which it has federalized offenses traditionally handled on the State or local level.
"You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry." - Lincoln
Like plenty of people watching the power outage in the New Orleans Superdome during the Super Bowl on Sunday, Michael Brown cracked a Katrina joke on Twitter.
Unlike plenty of people, Brown, former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency under President George W. Bush, was in charge of managing the federal response to the 2005 hurricane that killed more than 1,800 people and left thousands of residents homeless.
"Someone just told me there was fighting going on in the NOLA Superdome," Brown tweeted, adding the hash tag, "#shocked."
Brown resigned as director of FEMA in the wake of what many critics said was slow and incompetent response to Katrina’s aftermath--and just a week after President Bush, on his first post-storm visit to the region, said, “Brownie, you’re doing a heckuva job.”
His Superdome tweet also drew criticism, but Brown, now a talk radio host, did not back down.
"Come see the water line marks on the street signs by my church and see how funny Katrina/Dome tweets are," Twitter user Duris Holmes wrote.
"I saw them," Brown replied. "Blanco Nagin refused to look."
"Screen shots on iPad," he later tweeted. "Great for capturing vitriol that's later deleted from Twitter feed."
Brown added: "Blocking is quite useful, too."
It's not the first time since his FEMA resignation that Brown's been at the center of a controversy.
Last fall, Brown criticized President Obama for responding to Hurricane Sandy too early.
It'a shocking what this idiot did or didn't do during Katrina
it's shocking what he said last night
It's shocking that this conservative republican idiot lives in one of the most liberal, progressive, democratic parts of the country (Boulder, CO)
:fp:
■Saving Medicare for Future Generations
■Strengthening Medicaid in the States
■Security For Those Who Need It: Ensuring Retirement Security
■Regulatory Reform: The Key to Economic Growth
■Protecting Internet Freedom
■A Vision for the Twenty-First Century: Technology, Telecommunications and the Internet
■Protecting the Taxpayers: No More “Too Big to Fail”
■Judicial Activism: A Threat to the U.S. Constitution
■Restructuring the U.S. Postal Service for the Twenty-First Century
■Protecting Travelers and their Rights: Reforming the TSA for Security and Privacy
■The Rule of Law: Legal Immigration
■Honoring Our Relationship with American Indians
■Preserving the District of Columbia
■Modernizing the Federal Civil Service
■America’s Future in Space: Continuing this Quest
■Honoring and Supporting Americans in the Territories
We are the party of government reform. At a time when the federal government has become bloated, antiquated and unresponsive to taxpayers, it is our intention not only to improve management and provide better services, but also to rethink and restructure government to bring it into the twenty-first century. Government reform requires constant vigilance and effort because government by its nature tends to expand in both size and scope. Our goal is not just less spending in Washington but something far more important for the future of our nation: protecting the constitutional rights of citizens, sustainable prosperity, and strengthening the American family.
It isn’t enough to merely downsize government, having a smaller version of the same failed systems. We must do things in a dramatically different way by reversing the undermining of federalism and the centralizing of power in Washington. We look to the example set by Republican Governors and legislators all across the nation. Their leadership in reforming and reengineering government closest to the people vindicates the role of the States as the laboratories of democracy.
Our approach, like theirs, is two-fold. We look to government – local, State, and federal – for the things government must do, but we believe those duties can be carried out more efficiently and at less cost. For all other activities, we look to the private sector; for the American people’s resourcefulness, productivity, innovation, fiscal responsibility, and citizen-leadership have always been the true foundation of our national greatness.
For much of the last century, an opposing view has dominated public policy where we have witnessed the expansion, centralization, and bureaucracy in an entitlement society. Government has lumbered on, stifling innovation, with no incentive for fundamental change, through antiquated programs begun generations ago and now ill-suited to present needs and future requirements. As a result, today’s taxpayers – and future generations – face massive indebtedness, while Congressional Democrats and the current Administration block every attempt to turn things around. This man-made log-jam – the so-called stalemate in Washington – particularly affects the government’s three largest programs, which have become central to the lives of untold millions of Americans: Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.
Saving Medicare for Future Generations (Top)
The Republican Party is committed to saving Medicare and Medicaid. Unless the programs’ fiscal ship is righted, the individuals hurt the first and the worst will be those who depend on them the most. We will save Medicare by modernizing it, by empowering its participants, and by putting it on a secure financial footing. This will be an enormous undertaking, and it should be a non-partisan one. We welcome to the effort all who sincerely want to ensure the future for our seniors and the poor. Republicans are determined to achieve that goal with a candid and honest presentation of the problem and its solutions to the American people.
Despite the enormous differences between Medicare and Medicaid, the two programs share the same fiscal outlook: their current courses cannot be sustained. Medicare has grown from more than 20 million enrolled in 1970 to more than 47 million enrolled today, with a projected total of 80 million in 2030. Medicaid counted almost 30 million enrollees in 1990, has about 54 million now, and under Obamacare would include an additional 11 million. Medicare spent more than $520 billion in 2010 and has close to $37 trillion in unfunded obligations, while total Medicaid spending will more than double by 2019. In many States, Medicaid’s mandates and inflexible bureaucracy have become a budgetary black hole, growing faster than most other budget lines and devouring funding for many other essential governmental functions.
The problem goes beyond finances. Poor quality healthcare is the most expensive type of care because it prolongs affliction and leads to ever more complications. Even expensive prevention is preferable to more costly treatment later on. When approximately 80 percent of healthcare costs are related to lifestyle -smoking, obesity, substance abuse-far greater emphasis has to be put upon personal responsibility for health maintenance. Our goal for both Medicare and Medicaid must be to assure that every participant receives the amount of care they need at the time they need it, whether for an expectant mother and her baby or for someone in the last moments of life. Absent reforms, these two programs are headed for bankruptcy that will endanger care for seniors and the poor.
The first step is to move the two programs away from their current unsustainable defined-benefit entitlement model to a fiscally sound defined-contribution model. This is the only way to limit costs and restore consumer choice for patients and introduce competition; for in healthcare, as in any other sector of the economy, genuine competition is the best guarantee of better care at lower cost. It is also the best guard against the fraud and abuse that have plagued Medicare in its isolation from free market forces, which in turn costs the taxpayers billions of dollars every year. We can do this without making any changes for those 55 and older. While retaining the option of traditional Medicare in competition with private plans, we call for a transition to a premium-support model for Medicare, with an income-adjusted contribution toward a health plan of the enrollee’s choice. This model will include private health insurance plans that provide catastrophic protection, to ensure the continuation of doctor-patient relationships. Without disadvantaging retirees or those nearing retirement, the age eligibility for Medicare must be made more realistic in terms of today’s longer life span.
Strengthening Medicaid in the States (Top)
Medicaid, as the dominant payer in the health market in regards to long-term care, births, and individuals with mental illness, is the next frontier of welfare reform. It is simply too big and too flawed to be managed in its current condition from Washington. Republican Governors have taken the lead in proposing a host of regulatory changes that could make the program more flexible, innovative, and accountable. There should be alternatives to hospitalization for chronic health problems. Patients could be rewarded for participating in disease prevention activities. Excessive mandates on coverage should be eliminated. Patients with long-term care needs might fare better in a separately designed program.
As those and other specific proposals show, Republican Governors and State legislatures are ready to do the hard work of modernizing Medicaid for the twenty-first century. We propose to let them do all that and more by block-granting the program to the States, providing the States with the flexibility to design programs that meet the needs of their low income citizens. Such reforms could be achieved through premium supports or a refundable tax credit, allowing non-disabled adults and children to be moved into private health insurance of their choice, where their needs can be met on the same basis as those of more affluent Americans. For the aged and disabled under Medicaid, for whom monthly costs can be extremely high, States would have flexibility to improve the quality of care and to avoid the inappropriate institutional placing of patients who prefer to be cared for at home.
Security For Those Who Need It: Ensuring Retirement Security (Top)
While no changes should adversely affect any current or near-retiree, comprehensive reform should address our society’s remarkable medical advances in longevity and allow younger workers the option of creating their own personal investment accounts as supplements to the system. Younger Americans have lost all faith in the Social Security system, which is understandable when they read the non- partisan actuary’s reports about its future funding status. Born in an old industrial era beyond the memory of most Americans, it is long overdue for major change, not just another legislative stopgap that postpones a day of reckoning. To restore public trust in the system, Republicans are committed to setting it on a sound fiscal basis that will give workers control over, and a sound return on, their investments. The sooner we act, the sooner those close to retirement can be reassured of their benefits and younger workers can take responsibility for planning their own retirement decades from now.
Unlike Social Security, the problems facing private pension plans are both demographic and ethical. While pension law may be complicated, the current bottom line is that many plans are increasingly underfunded by overestimating their rates of return on investments. This in turn endangers the integrity of the Pension Guaranty Benefit Corporation, which is itself seriously underfunded. In both cases, the taxpayers will be expected to pay for a bailout. As the first step toward possible corrective action, we call for a presidential panel to review the private pension system in this country of only those private pensions that are backed by the Pension Guaranty Benefit Corporation and to make public its findings.
The situation of public pension systems demands immediate remedial action. The irresponsible promises of politicians at every level of government have come back to haunt today’s taxpayers with enormous unfunded pension liabilities. Many cities face bankruptcy because of excessive outlays for early retirement, extravagant health plans, and overly generous pension benefits. We salute the Republican Governors and State legislators who have, in the face of abuse and threats of violence, reformed their State pension systems for the benefit of both taxpayers and retirees alike.
Regulatory Reform: The Key to Economic Growth (Top)
The proper purpose of regulation is to set forth clear rules of the road for the citizens, so that business owners and workers can understand in advance what they need to do, or not do, to augment the possibilities for success within the confines of the law. Regulations must be drafted and implemented to balance legitimate public safety or consumer protection goals and job creation. Constructive regulation should be a helpful guide, not a punitive threat. Worst of all, over-regulation is a stealth tax on everyone as the costs of compliance with the whims of federal agencies are passed along to the consumers at the cost of $1.75 trillion a year. Many regulations are necessary, like those which ensure the safety of food and medicine, especially from overseas. But no peril justifies the regulatory impact of Obamacare on the practice of medicine, the Dodd-Frank Act on financial services, or the EPA’s and OSHA’s overreaching regulation agenda. A Republican Congress and President will repeal the first and second, and rein in the third. We support a sunset requirement to force reconsideration of out-of-date regulations, and we endorse pending legislation to require congressional approval for all new major and costly regulations.
The bottom line on regulations is jobs. In listening to America, one constant we have heard is the job-crippling effect of even well-intentioned regulation. That makes it all the more important for federal agencies to be judicious about the impositions they create on businesses, especially small businesses. We call for a moratorium on the development of any new major and costly regulations until a Republican Administration reviews existing rules to ensure that they have a sound basis in science and will be cost-effective.
Protecting Internet Freedom (Top)
The Internet has unleashed innovation, enabled growth, and inspired freedom more rapidly and extensively than any other technological advance in human history. Its independence is its power. The Internet offers a communications system uniquely free from government intervention. We will remove regulatory barriers that protect outdated technologies and business plans from innovation and competition, while preventing legacy regulation from interfering with new and disruptive technologies such as mobile delivery of voice video data as they become crucial components of the Internet ecosystem. We will resist any effort to shift control away from the successful multi-stakeholder approach of Internet governance and toward governance by international or other intergovernmental organizations. We will ensure that personal data receives full constitutional protection from government overreach and that individuals retain the right to control the use of their data by third parties; the only way to safeguard or improve these systems is through the private sector.
A Vision for the Twenty-First Century: Technology, Telecommunications and the Internet (Top)
The most vibrant sector of the American economy, indeed, one-sixth of it, is regulated by the federal government on precedents from the nineteenth century. Today’s technology and telecommunications industries are overseen by the Federal Communications Commission, established in 1934 and given the jurisdiction over telecommunications formerly assigned to the Interstate Commerce Commission, which had been created in 1887 to regulate the railroads. This is not a good fit. Indeed, the development of telecommunications advances so rapidly that even the Telecom Act of 1996 is woefully out of date. An industry that invested $66 billion in 2011 alone needs, and deserves, a more modern relationship with the federal government for the benefit of consumers here and worldwide.
The current Administration has been frozen in the past. It has conducted no auction of spectrum, has offered no incentives for investment, and, through the FCC’s net neutrality rule, is trying to micromanage telecom as if it were a railroad network. It inherited from the previous Republican Administration 95 percent coverage of the nation with broadband. It will leave office with no progress toward the goal of universal coverage – after spending $7.2 billion more. That hurts rural America, where farmers, ranchers, and small business manufacturers need connectivity to expand their customer base and operate in real time with the world’s producers. We encourage public-private partnerships to provide predictable support for connecting rural areas so that every American can fully participate in the global economy.
We call for an inventory of federal agency spectrum to determine the surplus that could be auctioned for the taxpayers’ benefit. With special recognition of the role university technology centers are playing in attracting private investment to the field, we will replace the administration’s Luddite approach to technological progress with a regulatory partnership that will keep this country the world leader in technology and telecommunications.
Protecting the Taxpayers: No More “Too Big to Fail” (Top)
For more than a century, the U.S. was the world leader in financial services. The visionary management of capital was the lifeblood of the entire economy. By giving responsible access to credit, it helped small businesses grow, created jobs, and made Americans the best-housed people in history. By funding innovation, financial services underwrote our future. Then came the financial collapse of 2008 and a critical reassessment of the role and condition of financial institutions – most of which, it must be said, were responsible and healthy, especially those closest to their investors and borrowers.
In cases of malfeasance or other criminal behavior, the full force of the law should be used. But in all cases, this rule must apply: No financial institution is too big to fail. The taxpayers must never again be on the hook for the losses of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The public must never again be left holding the bag for Wall Street giants, which is why we decry the current Administration’s record of over-regulation and selective intervention, which has already frozen investment and job creation and threatens to make financial institutions the coddled wards of government.
A far better approach – protecting consumers and taxpayers alike – is institutional transparency. Banks need to know that they could be at risk, and investors need clear rules that are not subject to political meddling. The same holds true for the equity market regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission. We propose reasonable federal oversight of financial institutions, practical safeguards for consumers, and – what is crucial for this country’s economic rebound – sound spending, tax, and regulatory policies that will allow those institutions to once again become the builders of the next American century. We strongly support tax reform; in the event we do not achieve this, we must preserve the mortgage interest deduction.
Judicial Activism: A Threat to the U.S. Constitution (Top)
Despite improvements as a result of Republican nominations to the judiciary, some judges in the federal courts remain far afield from their constitutional limitations. The U.S. Constitution is the law of the land. Judicial activism which includes reliance on foreign law or unratified treaties undermines American law. The sole solution, apart from impeachment, is the appointment of constitutionalist jurists, who will interpret the law as it was originally intended rather than make it. That is both a presidential responsibility, in selecting judicial candidates, and a senatorial responsibility, in confirming them. We urge Republican Senators to do all in their power to prevent the elevation of additional leftist ideologues to the courts, particularly in the waning days of the current Administration. In addition to appointing activist judges, the current Administration has included an activist and highly partisan Department of Justice. With a Republican Administration, the Department will stop suing States for exercising those powers reserved to the States, will stop abusing its preclearance authority to block photo-ID voting laws, and will fulfill its responsibility to defend all federal laws in court, including the Defense of Marriage Act.
Restructuring the U.S. Postal Service for the Twenty-First Century (Top)
The dire financial circumstances of the Postal Service require dramatic restructuring. In a world of rapidly advancing telecommunications, mail delivery from the era of the Pony Express cannot long survive. We call on Congress to restructure the Service to ensure the continuance of its essential function of delivering mail while preparing for the downsizing made inevitable by the advance of internet communication. In light of the Postal Service’s seriously underfunded pension system, Congress should explore a greater role for private enterprise in appropriate aspects of the mail-processing system.
Protecting Travelers and their Rights: Reforming the TSA for Security and Privacy (Top)
While the aftermath of the 2001 terrorist attacks brought about a greater need for homeland security, the American people have already delivered their verdict on the Transportation Security Administration: its procedures – and much of its personnel – need to be changed. It is now a massive bureaucracy of 65,000 employees who seem to be accountable to no one for the way they treat travelers. We call for the private sector to take over airport screening wherever feasible and look toward the development of security systems that can replace the personal violation of frisking.
The Rule of Law: Legal Immigration (Top)
The greatest asset of the American economy is the American worker. Just as immigrant labor helped build our country in the past, today’s legal immigrants are making vital contributions in every aspect of our national life. Their industry and commitment to American values strengthens our economy, enriches our culture, and enables us to better understand and more effectively compete with the rest of the world. Illegal immigration undermines those benefits and affects U.S. workers. In an age of terrorism, drug cartels, human trafficking, and criminal gangs, the presence of millions of unidentified persons in this country poses grave risks to the safety and the sovereignty of the United States. Our highest priority, therefore, is to secure the rule of law both at our borders and at ports of entry.
We recognize that for most of those seeking entry into this country, the lack of respect for the rule of law in their homelands has meant economic exploitation and political oppression by corrupt elites. In this country, the rule of law guarantees equal treatment to every individual, including more than one million immigrants to whom we grant permanent residence every year. That is why we oppose any form of amnesty for those who, by intentionally violating the law, disadvantage those who have obeyed it. Granting amnesty only rewards and encourages more law breaking. We support the mandatory use of the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (S.A.V.E.) program – an internet-based system that verifies the lawful presence of applicants – prior to the granting of any State or federal government entitlements or IRS refunds. We insist upon enforcement at the workplace through verification systems so that jobs can be available to all legal workers. Use of the E-verify program – an internet-based system that verifies the employment authorization and identity of employees – must be made mandatory nationwide. State enforcement efforts in the workplace must be welcomed, not attacked. When Americans need jobs, it is absolutely essential that we protect them from illegal labor in the workplace. In addition, it is why we demand tough penalties for those who practice identity theft, deal in fraudulent documents, and traffic in human beings. It is why we support Republican legislation to give the Department of Homeland Security long-term detention authority to keep dangerous but undeportable aliens off our streets, expedite expulsion of criminal aliens, and make gang membership a deportable offense.
The current Administration’s approach to immigration has undermined the rule of law at every turn. It has lessened work-site enforcement – and even allows the illegal aliens it does uncover to walk down the street to the next employer – and challenged legitimate State efforts to keep communities safe, suing them for trying to enforce the law when the federal government refuses to do so. It has created a backdoor amnesty program unrecognized in law, granting worker authorization to illegal aliens, and shown little regard for the life-and-death situations facing the men and women of the border patrol.
Perhaps worst of all, the current Administration has failed to enforce the legal means for workers or employers who want to operate within the law. In contrast, a Republican Administration and Congress will partner with local governments through cooperative enforcement agreements in Section 287g of the Immigration and Nationality Act to make communities safer for all and will consider, in light of both current needs and historic practice, the utility of a legal and reliable source of foreign labor where needed through a new guest worker program. We will create humane procedures to encourage illegal aliens to return home voluntarily, while enforcing the law against those who overstay their visas.
State efforts to reduce illegal immigration must be encouraged, not attacked. The pending Department of Justice lawsuits against Arizona, Alabama, South Carolina, and Utah must be dismissed immediately. The double-layered fencing on the border that was enacted by Congress in 2006, but never completed, must finally be built. In order to restore the rule of law, federal funding should be denied to sanctuary cities that violate federal law and endanger their own citizens, and federal funding should be denied to universities that provide in-state tuition rates to illegal aliens, in open defiance of federal law.
We are grateful to the thousands of new immigrants, many of them not yet citizens, who are serving in the Armed Forces. Their patriotism should encourage us all to embrace the newcomers legally among us, assist their journey to full citizenship, and help their communities avoid isolation from the mainstream of society. To that end, while we encourage the retention and transmission of heritage tongues, we support English as the nation’s official language, a unifying force essential for the educational and economic advancement of – not only immigrant communities – but also our nation as a whole.
Honoring Our Relationship with American Indians (Top)
Based on both treaty and other law, the federal government has a unique government-to-government relationship with and trust responsibility for Indian Tribal Governments and American Indians and Alaska Natives. These obligations have not been sufficiently honored. The social and economic problems that plague Indian country have grown worse over the last several decades; we must reverse that trend. Ineffective federal programs deprive American Indians of the services they need, and long-term failures threaten to undermine tribal sovereignty itself.
American Indians have established elected tribal governments to carry out the public policies of the tribe, administer services to its tribal member constituents, and manage relations with federal, State, and local governments. We respect the tribal governments as the voice of their communities and encourage federal, State, and local governments to heed those voices in developing programs and partnerships to improve the quality of life for American Indians and their neighbors in their communities.
Republicans believe that economic self-sufficiency is the ultimate answer to the challenges confronting Indian country. We believe that tribal governments and their communities, not Washington bureaucracies, are best situated to craft solutions that will end systemic problems that create poverty and disenfranchisement. Just as the federal government should not burden States with regulations, it should not stifle the development of resources within the reservations, which need federal assistance to advance their commerce nationally through roads and technology. Federal and State regulations that thwart job creation must be withdrawn or redrawn so that tribal governments acting on behalf of American Indians are not disadvantaged. It is especially egregious that the Democratic Party has persistently undermined tribal sovereignty in order to provide advantage to union bosses in the tribal workplace.
Republicans recognize that each tribe has the right of consultation before any new regulatory policy is implemented on tribal land. To the extent possible, such consultation should take place in Indian country with the tribal government and its members. Before promulgating and imposing any new laws or regulations affecting trust land or members, the federal government should encourage Indian tribes to develop their own policies to achieve program objectives, and should defer to tribes to develop their own standards, or standards in conjunction with State governments.
Republicans reject a one-size-fits-all approach to federal-tribal-State partnerships and will work to expand local autonomy where tribal governments seek it. Better partnerships will help us to expand economic opportunity, deliver top-flight education to future generations, modernize and improve the Indian Health Service to make it more responsive to local needs, and build essential infrastructure in Indian country in cooperation with tribal neighbors. Our approach is to empower American Indians, through tribal self-determination and self-governance policies, to develop their greatest assets, human resources and the rich natural resources on their lands, without undue federal interference.
Like all Americans, American Indians want safe communities for their families; but inadequate resources and neglect have, over time, allowed criminal activities to plague Indian country. To protect everyone – and especially the most vulnerable: children, women, and elders – the legal system in tribal communities must provide stability and protect property rights. Everyone’s due process and civil rights must be safeguarded.
We support efforts to ensure equitable participation in federal programs by American Indians, including Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians and to preserve their culture and languages that we consider to be national treasures. Lastly, we recognize that American Indians have responded to the call for military service in percentage numbers far greater than have other groups of Americans. We honor that commitment, loyalty, and sacrifice of all American Indians serving in the military today and in years past and will ensure that all veterans and their families receive the care and respect they have earned through their loyal service to America.
Preserving the District of Columbia (Top)
The nation’s capital city, a special responsibility of the federal government, belongs both to its residents and to all Americans, millions of whom visit it every year. Congressional Republicans have taken the lead in efforts to foster homeownership and open access to higher education for Washington residents. Against the opposition of the current President and leaders of the Democratic Party, they have fought to establish, and now to expand, the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, through which thousands of low-income children have been able to attend a school of their choice and receive a quality education.
D.C.’s Republicans have been in the forefront of exposing and combating the chronic corruption among the city’s top Democratic officials. We join their call for a non-partisan elected Attorney General to clean up the city’s political culture and for congressional action to enforce the spirit of the Home Rule Act assuring minority representation on the City Council. After decades of inept one-party rule, the city’s structural deficit demands congressional attention.
As the center of our government, the District contains many potential targets for terrorist attacks. Federal security agencies should work closely with local officials and regional administrations like the Washington Area Metropolitan Transit Authority. A top priority must be ensuring that all public transportation, especially Metro rails, is functioning in the event of an emergency evacuation. Also, to ensure protection of the fundamental right to keep and bear arms, we call on the governing authority to pass laws consistent with the Supreme Court’s decisions in the District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago cases, which upheld the fundamental right to keep and bear arms for self-defense.
We oppose statehood for the District of Columbia.
Modernizing the Federal Civil Service (Top)
The federal workforce bears great responsibilities and sometimes wields tremendous power, especially when Congress delegates to it the execution of complicated and far-reaching legislation. We recognize the dedication of federal workers and the difficulty of their thankless task of implementing poorly drafted or open-ended legislation.
Under the current Administration, the civil service has grown by at least 140,000 workers, while the number making at least $150,000 has doubled. At a time when the national debt has increased to over $15.9 trillion under the current Administration, this is grossly irresponsible. The American people work too hard and too long to support a bloated government. We call for a reduction, through attrition, in the federal payroll of at least 10 percent and the adjustment of pay scales and benefits to reflect those of the private sector. We must bring the 130-year old Civil Service System into the twenty-first century. The federal pay system should be sufficiently flexible to acknowledge and reward those who dare to innovate, reduce overhead, optimize processes, and expedite paperwork.
Delinquency in paying taxes and repaying student loans has been too common in some segments of the civil service. A Republican Administration will make enforcement among its own employees a priority and, unlike the current Administration, will name to public office no one who has failed to meet their financial obligations to the government and fellow taxpayers.
America’s Future in Space: Continuing this Quest (Top)
The exploration of space has been a key part of U.S. global leadership and has supported innovation and ownership of technology. Over the last half-century, in partnership with our aerospace industry, the work of NASA has helped define and strengthen our nation’s technological prowess. From building the world’s most powerful rockets to landing men on the Moon, sending robotic spacecraft throughout our solar system and beyond, building the International Space Station, and launching space-based telescopes that allow scientists to better understand our universe, NASA science and engineering have produced spectacular results. The technologies that emerged from those programs propelled our aerospace industrial base and directly benefit our national security, safety, economy, and quality of life. Through its achievements, NASA has inspired generations of Americans to study science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, leading to careers that drive our country’s technological and economic engines.
Today, America’s leadership in space is challenged by countries eager to emulate – and surpass – NASA’s accomplishments. To preserve our national security interests and foster innovation and competitiveness, we must sustain our preeminence in space, launching more science missions, guaranteeing unfettered access, and maintaining a source of high-value American jobs.
Honoring and Supporting Americans in the Territories (Top)
We honor the extraordinary sacrifices of the men and women of the territories who protect our freedom through their service in the U.S. Armed Forces. We welcome their greater participation in all aspects of the political process and affirm their right to seek the full extension of the Constitution, with all the rights and responsibilities it entails. U.S. territories face serious economic challenges as they struggle to retain existing industries and develop new ones. Development of local energy options is crucial to reduce their dependence on imported fuel and promote economic stability. The Pacific territories should have flexibility to determine the minimum wage, which has seriously restricted progress in the private sector. A stronger private sector can raise wages, reduce dependence on public sector employment, and lead toward local self-sufficiency. All unreasonable economic impediments must be removed, including unreasonable U.S. customs practices.
We support the right of the United States citizens of Puerto Rico to be admitted to the Union as a fully sovereign state if they freely so determine. We recognize that Congress has the final authority to define the constitutionally valid options for Puerto Rico to achieve a permanent non-territorial status with government by consent and full enfranchisement. As long as Puerto Rico is not a State, however, the will of its people regarding their political status should be ascertained by means of a general right of referendum or specific referenda sponsored by the U.S. government.
"You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry." - Lincoln
Alrighty then. YOU are OK with the GOP prioritizing a fetus's health ahead of a woman's. And that is all. You are reading what you want to, rather than reading what is proof, of an entire party willing to pass laws (remember that this is a party that is anti-gov't!) not against sex, or the ability of a man to shoot puppies into a partner, but to take away primary health decisions of the woman. And that is all, there it is.
you are taking my saying there isn't a war on women and turning it into "YOU are OK with the GOP prioritizing a fetus's health ahead of a woman's" further proving my point that there is no middle ground. You either agree with me or you are against my cause because you hate the group that it would affect.
I am not for the GOP doing anything in regards to limiting abortion, but I understand their motivation is to end abortion rather than to deliberately take away rights of a woman because she is a woman.
You side stepped my question again.
you didn't answer the question, do you reject the idea that one could oppose VAWA and abortion without perpetrating a war on women? if you are against legal abortion, does that automatically mean you are conducting a war on women?
that’s right! Can’t we all just get together and focus on our real enemies: monogamous gays and stem cells… - Ned Flanders
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
still didn't see war on women anywhere in the platform, which is what you were talking about when you said it was in the platform right? If that wasn't what you were referring to there I am sorry, I went back a ways to catch up on the thread but maybe I just didn't go back far enough.
that’s right! Can’t we all just get together and focus on our real enemies: monogamous gays and stem cells… - Ned Flanders
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
Like plenty of people watching the power outage in the New Orleans Superdome during the Super Bowl on Sunday, Michael Brown cracked a Katrina joke on Twitter.
Unlike plenty of people, Brown, former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency under President George W. Bush, was in charge of managing the federal response to the 2005 hurricane that killed more than 1,800 people and left thousands of residents homeless.
"Someone just told me there was fighting going on in the NOLA Superdome," Brown tweeted, adding the hash tag, "#shocked."
Brown resigned as director of FEMA in the wake of what many critics said was slow and incompetent response to Katrina’s aftermath--and just a week after President Bush, on his first post-storm visit to the region, said, “Brownie, you’re doing a heckuva job.”
His Superdome tweet also drew criticism, but Brown, now a talk radio host, did not back down.
"Come see the water line marks on the street signs by my church and see how funny Katrina/Dome tweets are," Twitter user Duris Holmes wrote.
"I saw them," Brown replied. "Blanco Nagin refused to look."
"Screen shots on iPad," he later tweeted. "Great for capturing vitriol that's later deleted from Twitter feed."
Brown added: "Blocking is quite useful, too."
It's not the first time since his FEMA resignation that Brown's been at the center of a controversy.
Last fall, Brown criticized President Obama for responding to Hurricane Sandy too early.
Of course he is. The right wing media machine spins on and on...
Ya know Cincy, you can't spin the fact that Republicans don't like women using contraception (the defunding of Planned Parenthood). Something else that can't be spun is their resistance to renewing the Violence Against Women Act. Another thing is the mandating of New Mexico with their criminalizing abortions after a rape. How about Todd Akin and his ignorance? You can blame the other side for spinning as much as you'd like but the proof is there.
I'm not even a Dem but I know of Dems who are Pro-women's rights (Tester, Dean). Find me one Republican that defends women and their rights.
I would like to be 100% clear. I certainly don't agree with any one party on every issue. That would be pretty crazy and as far as I can see the only people that do get paid to do so.
Defunding of planned parenthood wasn't because they don;t like women that use contraception.
Criminalizing abortions after rape.... I get that the fetus is innocent, etc but certainly going to far. There end goal is no abortions and they are running out of playing space so they are panicking and unfortunately playing where they have left to play.
50% of aborted babies are women. Your "pro-women's rights" question....what rights are those exactly?
It could certainly be argues that 50% of aborted fetuses are not women... or men- they are fetuses which are in a stage preceding movement or consciousness. Fetuses are aborted, not babies. The vast majority of abortions occur early enough in the pregnancy that the fetus does not even resemble a person.
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man [or woman] who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”
It could certainly be argues that 50% of aborted fetuses are not women... or men- they are fetuses which are in a stage preceding movement or consciousness. Fetuses are aborted, not babies. The vast majority of abortions occur early enough in the pregnancy that the fetus does not even resemble a person.
One could argue that over 50% of the people in the world barely resemble a human being.
It could certainly be argues that 50% of aborted fetuses are not women... or men- they are fetuses which are in a stage preceding movement or consciousness. Fetuses are aborted, not babies. The vast majority of abortions occur early enough in the pregnancy that the fetus does not even resemble a person.
One could argue that over 50% of the people in the world barely resemble a human being.
It only seems that way, Cincy. Most people are just ordinary folks trying to get by. But I get what you're saying.
“The fear of death follows from the fear of life. A man [or woman] who lives fully is prepared to die at any time.”
It could certainly be argues that 50% of aborted fetuses are not women... or men- they are fetuses which are in a stage preceding movement or consciousness. Fetuses are aborted, not babies. The vast majority of abortions occur early enough in the pregnancy that the fetus does not even resemble a person.
They look like humans to me. The images I just saw online, 2, 3, 4 month old fetuses
look like people, they are people. I won't post one because it is sensitive and sad.
still didn't see war on women anywhere in the platform, which is what you were talking about when you said it was in the platform right? If that wasn't what you were referring to there I am sorry, I went back a ways to catch up on the thread but maybe I just didn't go back far enough.
it is summarized in my posts earlier in the thread.
"You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry." - Lincoln
let's all pile on ron paul now. i knew what he was trying to say in his tweet and i respect him for saying it. it is funny how quickly the conservative media and other republicans will stumble all over each other just to eat their own...
Ron Paul's puzzling critique of murdered SEAL Chris Kyle
In 140 characters, the newly retired congressman reminds us why he — and maybe his son — won't top the GOP presidential ticket
When news started spreading that Chris Kyle, a former SEAL and author of the best-selling autobiography American Sniper, was shot dead with a friend over the weekend — allegedly at the hands of a PTSD-suffering former Marine he was trying to help by taking him shooting at a hunting range — conservatives were incensed over the callous tweets of "some on the anti-gun Left." And then this happened:
"Chris Kyle's death seems to confirm that "he who lives by the sword dies by the sword." Treating PTSD at a firing range doesn't make sense"
And just like that, the three-time Republican presidential candidate's tenuous coalition of pro-gun libertarians, anti–Federal Reserve goldbugs, and foreign policy non-interventionists crumbled. Paul is an opponent of gun control — saying after December's Newtown, Conn., grade school massacre that "more guns equals less crime" and that "private gun ownership prevents many shootings" — but also of U.S. military adventurism. Kyle, also an outspoken gun-rights advocate, earned a reputation in Iraq as one of the deadliest snipers in U.S. military history. With Twitter erupting in outrage over his comment, Paul took to Facebook to explain himself:
As a veteran, I certainly recognize that this weekend's violence and killing of Chris Kyle were a tragic and sad event. My condolences and prayers go out to Mr. Kyle's family. Unconstitutional and unnecessary wars have endless unintended consequences. A policy of non-violence, as Christ preached, would have prevented this and similar tragedies. -REP
That not-quite-apology didn't quell the anger or the virtual yelling. "You really are vile," tweeted GOP strategist Rick Wilson; Commentary's John Podhoretz said Paul's tweet was "appalling." The newly liberated Paul "is more callous than ever, with an extra helping of sanctimony and a healthy dollop of anti-military sentiment," say the editors of Michelle Malkin's Twitchy. Not content with just "dancing on the grave of a military hero," Paul poured fuel on the fire by invoking Jesus to justify his "ghoulish" views. Even Paul's son, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) — rumored to have presidential ambitions himself — rushed out a statement to Breitbart.com: "Chris Kyle was a hero like all Americans who don the uniform to defend our country. Our prayers are with his family during this tragic time."
Et tu, Rand? says Ryan W. McMaken at Lew Rockwell's LRC Blog. Yes, "every American soldier is a hero, just like the Bronze-Star-winning Timothy McVeigh and the Marine Lee Harvey Oswald." But Rand isn't the only "sycophantic" conservative throwing Ron Paul under the bus for "truth-telling about the tragic outcomes that are sure to come from time spent in a military where rape, suicide, domestic abuse and general killing are widespread."
Who can be surprised that conservatives... have been falling all over themselves to condemn Ron Paul for quoting Jesus — in correct context, by the way — to note that the violence wrought by over a decade of nonstop war in America leads to tragedy on the home front?... The most transparent were the conservatives who claimed to be former supporters of Paul who must now go support some more "patriotic" politician: One who doesn't actually question anything the military does.... This is what it comes down to for most conservatives, of course. All that stuff about laissez faire and freedom and free markets has never been more than an act and an affectation.... Among conservatives, Ron Paul has only ever had minority support, for in the end, conservatives love government, as exhibited by their latest outrage. They just love it in a slightly different way from the left liberals. [Lew Rockwell]
Well, for better of for worse, this is the genuine Ron Paul, says BuzzFeed's Rosie Gray. Paul has started sending off his own tweets "since he left office," according to a spokeswoman, so "get used to off-the-cuff Twitter activity from the former presidential candidate." Paul's "remarkably offensive 140 character eulogy" is certainly a good reminder why politicians are "protected from scrutiny by both aides trained in press relations and friendly journalistic outlets," says Noah Rothman at Mediaite.
Paul has long opposed American military action... but the former veteran has begun to conflate the missions that he opposes with the men and women who carry those missions out. The sentiment Paul broadcast in this tweet betrays a contempt for Kyle that is, at best, ill-timed.... Paul would be smart to apologize for this insensitive remark, but his political opponents should be thankful for the clarity this unguarded moment has provided the general public. Though the 2012 campaign is long over, Paul's most stalwart supporters continue to insist that the Texas libertarian is the only politician who has the best interests of the troops at heart. This tweet would suggest otherwise. [Mediaite]
"You can tell the greatness of a man by what makes him angry." - Lincoln
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
let's all pile on ron paul now. i knew what he was trying to say in his tweet and i respect him for saying it. it is funny how quickly the conservative media and other republicans will stumble all over each other just to eat their own...
Ron Paul's puzzling critique of murdered SEAL Chris Kyle
In 140 characters, the newly retired congressman reminds us why he — and maybe his son — won't top the GOP presidential ticket
When news started spreading that Chris Kyle, a former SEAL and author of the best-selling autobiography American Sniper, was shot dead with a friend over the weekend — allegedly at the hands of a PTSD-suffering former Marine he was trying to help by taking him shooting at a hunting range — conservatives were incensed over the callous tweets of "some on the anti-gun Left." And then this happened:
"Chris Kyle's death seems to confirm that "he who lives by the sword dies by the sword." Treating PTSD at a firing range doesn't make sense"
And just like that, the three-time Republican presidential candidate's tenuous coalition of pro-gun libertarians, anti–Federal Reserve goldbugs, and foreign policy non-interventionists crumbled. Paul is an opponent of gun control — saying after December's Newtown, Conn., grade school massacre that "more guns equals less crime" and that "private gun ownership prevents many shootings" — but also of U.S. military adventurism. Kyle, also an outspoken gun-rights advocate, earned a reputation in Iraq as one of the deadliest snipers in U.S. military history. With Twitter erupting in outrage over his comment, Paul took to Facebook to explain himself:
As a veteran, I certainly recognize that this weekend's violence and killing of Chris Kyle were a tragic and sad event. My condolences and prayers go out to Mr. Kyle's family. Unconstitutional and unnecessary wars have endless unintended consequences. A policy of non-violence, as Christ preached, would have prevented this and similar tragedies. -REP
That not-quite-apology didn't quell the anger or the virtual yelling. "You really are vile," tweeted GOP strategist Rick Wilson; Commentary's John Podhoretz said Paul's tweet was "appalling." The newly liberated Paul "is more callous than ever, with an extra helping of sanctimony and a healthy dollop of anti-military sentiment," say the editors of Michelle Malkin's Twitchy. Not content with just "dancing on the grave of a military hero," Paul poured fuel on the fire by invoking Jesus to justify his "ghoulish" views. Even Paul's son, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) — rumored to have presidential ambitions himself — rushed out a statement to Breitbart.com: "Chris Kyle was a hero like all Americans who don the uniform to defend our country. Our prayers are with his family during this tragic time."
Et tu, Rand? says Ryan W. McMaken at Lew Rockwell's LRC Blog. Yes, "every American soldier is a hero, just like the Bronze-Star-winning Timothy McVeigh and the Marine Lee Harvey Oswald." But Rand isn't the only "sycophantic" conservative throwing Ron Paul under the bus for "truth-telling about the tragic outcomes that are sure to come from time spent in a military where rape, suicide, domestic abuse and general killing are widespread."
Who can be surprised that conservatives... have been falling all over themselves to condemn Ron Paul for quoting Jesus — in correct context, by the way — to note that the violence wrought by over a decade of nonstop war in America leads to tragedy on the home front?... The most transparent were the conservatives who claimed to be former supporters of Paul who must now go support some more "patriotic" politician: One who doesn't actually question anything the military does.... This is what it comes down to for most conservatives, of course. All that stuff about laissez faire and freedom and free markets has never been more than an act and an affectation.... Among conservatives, Ron Paul has only ever had minority support, for in the end, conservatives love government, as exhibited by their latest outrage. They just love it in a slightly different way from the left liberals. [Lew Rockwell]
Well, for better of for worse, this is the genuine Ron Paul, says BuzzFeed's Rosie Gray. Paul has started sending off his own tweets "since he left office," according to a spokeswoman, so "get used to off-the-cuff Twitter activity from the former presidential candidate." Paul's "remarkably offensive 140 character eulogy" is certainly a good reminder why politicians are "protected from scrutiny by both aides trained in press relations and friendly journalistic outlets," says Noah Rothman at Mediaite.
Paul has long opposed American military action... but the former veteran has begun to conflate the missions that he opposes with the men and women who carry those missions out. The sentiment Paul broadcast in this tweet betrays a contempt for Kyle that is, at best, ill-timed.... Paul would be smart to apologize for this insensitive remark, but his political opponents should be thankful for the clarity this unguarded moment has provided the general public. Though the 2012 campaign is long over, Paul's most stalwart supporters continue to insist that the Texas libertarian is the only politician who has the best interests of the troops at heart. This tweet would suggest otherwise. [Mediaite]
God I love Ron Paul.
I am surprised conservative journalists know his name considering they all seemed to forget it during the primary season.
Second time Paul has been chastised for correctly using Christ's teachings...golden rule anyone?
People are just unwilling to have rational tough discussions in this country, everyone needs to apologize and toe the line or else...
that’s right! Can’t we all just get together and focus on our real enemies: monogamous gays and stem cells… - Ned Flanders
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
perhaps some better tact could have been used, but the point is still valid.
I don't think anyone has ever accused Ron Paul of being tactful have they?
that’s right! Can’t we all just get together and focus on our real enemies: monogamous gays and stem cells… - Ned Flanders
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
You can't propose a law to outlaw abortion if you're not going to take responsibility for its consequences. And that means hoards of unwanted babies and kids. The state systems are already overloaded with foster kids. They are hardly sufficiently in good care, these state programs are constantly looking for foster parents.
If politicians refuse to back birth control (and republicans do) then they need to take full responsibility of the problem that will result from such a law taking effect.
I see the Democrat's war on common sense and logic continues.... Yes, it is the Republican strategy to alienate 50% of the voters in the US. In fact they want they want to get elected solely by rich white guys. If you believe that I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. You’ve fallen hook, line, and sinker for the identity politics of the left. Divide up the people in to groups, tell them they are being discriminated against, and promise to help in return for their vote.
Bringing up responsibility is ironic, because if women took responsibility for their own actions, we wouldn't be having an abortion debate. Women already have the right to choose... to choose whether they engage in an activity that could lead to pregnancy, and the choice to take precautions. Over 99% of abortions are not rape related; about 5% are due to health reasons. Thus ~94% could be avoided if women took responsibilities for their actions. You have obviously never considered that if abortions were illegal that women would take more responsibility for their actions and the need for abortions would go way down. Balance that with the fact that sometimes abortions are necessary for medical reasons or rape, and I think we could have a moderate common sense approach to it.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
Comments
So, you're going to focus on one point (the VAWA) rather than focus on it all:
And there's so much more...
•In Texas, Rep. George Lavender, R-Texarkana, has proposed a bill (House Bill 2988) that would prevent any abortion except in cases of rape, incest or the life of the mother.
• The Texas State House of Representatives has passed the Sonogram Bill (HB 15), a measure requiring women to get a sonogram before ending a pregnancy, forcing even victims of rape to have a sonogram at least 24 hours before the procedure.
• Rep. Chris Smith (R-N.J.) introduced a bill in the U.S. House of Representatives, the “No Taxpayer Funding for Abortion Act,” (HR 3) that would limit the rape exemption for abortion to “forcible rape” which would have defined many rapes, for example, statutory rape of a minor, as non-forcible and therefore not covered by federal assistance.
• Representative Joe Pitts (R-PA) introduced a bill (HR 358 – the “Protect Life Act”) would allow states to deny insurance coverage for birth control meaning hospitals could deny abortion procedures and transport to a facility that would provide a woman with an abortion even if failure to provide an abortion would mean the death of the woman.
• The U.S. House of Representatives passed (by a 234-182 vote) an amendment sponsored by Virginia Foxx (R-NC) prohibiting teaching hospitals from receiving federal funding if they teach doctors how to perform abortions. Unfortunately, as a result of this legislation new physicians will not receive the training needed to save women’s lives.
• Arizona’s House Bill 2625, which as azcentral.com reports, “would allow companies to opt out of covering contraception in their health-care plans for religious reasons,” proving once and for all that Arizona politicianss are legislating religion in violation of the Constitution, and that their religion trumps your beliefs.
my point wasn't that the ACLU is partisan in anyway, but rather they opposed the VAWA in 94 and did NOT do so because they were conducting a war on women. based on some arguments I have read, one might be led to believe that if you oppose the VAWA you only would do so because of a war on women.
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
I get what you are saying, Mike because "war" seems like a strong term but war can be subtle. If I were a woman and any group was trying to dictate my reproductive rights/choices I would feel as if a kind of war were being against me. I often notice that it's mostly men* who seem to object to this word usage.
edit * not referring to you specifically
Because for the most part Republican politicians are old white guys who can't see women as equals
Just check out their binders full of women!!
• In Iowa, House File 2298, introduced by Rep. Kim Pearson, R-Pleasant Hill, would criminalize all abortions, including those resulting from rape and incest and would make no exceptions for the life of the mother when put at risk by her pregnancy. The punishment for ending a life (excepting of course the life of a mother) would be life in prison and women who miscarry will face criminal investigation.
• In Georgia, Senate Bill 438, sponsored by Sen. Mike Crane (R-Newman), would “provide that no health insurance plan for employees of the state shall offer coverage for abortion services.”
• From Iowa state Rep. Kim Pearson: House File 2298 introduces the crime of “Fetacide”: “Any person who intentionally terminates a human pregnancy, with the knowledge and voluntary onsent of the pregnant person, after the end of the second trimester of the pregnancy where death of the fetus results, commits feticide. Feticide is a class “C” “A” felony. Any person who attempts to intentionally terminate a human pregnancy, with the knowledge and voluntary consent of the pregnant person, after the end of the second trimester of the pregnancy where death of the fetus does not result, commits attempted feticide. Attempted feticide is a class “D” “B” felony.” A class A felony is punishable by life in prison, class B by 25 years. Keep in mind abortion is legal in the United States (see Roe v. Wade).
• Georgia Republican Rep. Terry England, in support of a bill which would ban abortions after 20 weeks (HR 954), says that women should be forced to carry dead fetuses to term. Why? Because cows and pigs have to do it and that’s apparently how his god wants it. Never mind the health risk to mothers being forced to carry dead fetuses to term.
• In Tennessee, the Life Defense Act of 2012 (H.B. 3808) would reveal the names not only of doctors who perform abortions but would also identify women who have abortions, posting that information on the Internet. According to HuffPo, the information revealed would include the woman’s “age, race, county, marital status, education level, number of children, the location of the procedure and how many times she has been pregnant.” The legislation is sponsored by state Rep. Matthew Hill (R-Jonesboro) after it was suggested by Tennessee Right To Life. Since Republicans control both House and Senate, the bill will in all likelihood pass, despite the ruling of the Tennessee Supreme Court in 2000 that abortion is a right protected by the state constitution.
• Wisconsin: SB 306, “Voluntary and informed consent and information on domestic abuse services”, authored by Sen. Mary Lazich (R-New Berlin) and Rep. Michelle Litjens (R-Oshkosh). The bill also “protects” women from RU-486 (but not men from Viagra). SB 306 was signed into law by Gov. Scott Walker on April 6, 2012. As a result, Planned Parenthood has done exactly what Wisconsin Republicans desire and suspended non-surgical abortions in Wisconsin. The lesson is: TRAP (Targeted Regulation of Abortion Providers) laws work. Rose v. Wade says abortion is legal; TRAP laws make it impossible in practice.
• Wisconsin on April 6, 2012: Gov. Scott Walker signed into law SB 92 “relating to: prohibiting coverage of 2 abortions through health plans sold through exchanges.” This is an anti-Obamacare bill, pure and simple, and it states “This bill prohibits a qualified health plan offered through any exchange operating in this state from covering any abortion the performance of which is ineligible for funding from the state, a local government, or a long-term care district or from federal funds passing through the state treasury.“
• In Mississippi: “In addition to the abortion law signed by Bryant today, on Tuesday the House passed a backdoor “personhood” amendment to a bill intended to protect Mississippi children. If enacted, the amended bill could outlaw birth control, infertility treatments and all abortions — no exceptions. After passing the House, Senate Bill 2771 is now in the Senate for a concurrence vote.”
• Arguing that it is “morally wrong to take the tax dollars of millions of pro-life Americans and use them to fund organizations that provide and promote abortions,” Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind, introduced a bill (HR 217) in the U.S. House of Representatives to strip Planned Parenthood of federal funding, despite the many other services Planned Parenthood provides to both men and women, including contraception and STD testing.
• South Dakota flirted with a law to make the murder of an abortion doctor legal as self-defense.
• When South Dakota was forced to drop the idea of murdering abortion doctors, Nebraska and Iowa picked up the idea.
And finally,
• A total of 37 states mandate abstinence education while contraception falls increasingly under attack by Republican legislatures.
what do all of them have in common...let me see...ph yes, republicans hate women.
Who hates themselves more, a woman republican or a poor republican?
It was so easy to prove too I can't believe I didn't see it before. All you had to do was show how many times they attempt to limit the same thing, which we both know means they are simply doing so because they hate women and their 'rights'
and you didn't answer the question, do you reject the idea that one could oppose VAWA and abortion without perpetrating a war on women? Or, if you are against legal abortion, does that automatically mean you are conducting a war on women?
it is as likely as me believing that the Democrats have a war on capitalism because they support the idea of a carbon tax and a windfall profits tax on oil companies...
If you are talking about abortion it is because they believe it is a person at the moment of contraception, usually on religious grounds or their belief in their own version of right and wrong.
In the form of birth control, they reject the idea that the government should tell a business they have to cover something that the business may be morally/religiously against...any number of reasons really...none of which include hatred of you because you are a woman.
I defend the GOP as rationally as possible here because they don't get a lot of that, I don't defend everything they do because I am not a republican nor am I crazy enough to believe they are infallible. I am open-minded enough to realize that they don't oppose abortion and birth control mandates because they hate women and will do whatever they can to harm them.
They certainly aren't a party that prides itself on being for individual women's rights, or even for being what they say they want, but to buy into a war on women and use that vocabulary is not useful in anyway but to obfuscate the arguments for or against a certain, individual bill...
War on Women...sounds great, makes a great head line...
As to a further more basic answer to the question in bold, I ask myself that about government every day..., my conclusion is a war on personal freedom
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
Ex-FEMA director mocks Superdome blackout on Twitter
http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/lookout/f ... 15793.html
Like plenty of people watching the power outage in the New Orleans Superdome during the Super Bowl on Sunday, Michael Brown cracked a Katrina joke on Twitter.
Unlike plenty of people, Brown, former director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency under President George W. Bush, was in charge of managing the federal response to the 2005 hurricane that killed more than 1,800 people and left thousands of residents homeless.
"Someone just told me there was fighting going on in the NOLA Superdome," Brown tweeted, adding the hash tag, "#shocked."
Brown resigned as director of FEMA in the wake of what many critics said was slow and incompetent response to Katrina’s aftermath--and just a week after President Bush, on his first post-storm visit to the region, said, “Brownie, you’re doing a heckuva job.”
His Superdome tweet also drew criticism, but Brown, now a talk radio host, did not back down.
"Come see the water line marks on the street signs by my church and see how funny Katrina/Dome tweets are," Twitter user Duris Holmes wrote.
"I saw them," Brown replied. "Blanco Nagin refused to look."
"Screen shots on iPad," he later tweeted. "Great for capturing vitriol that's later deleted from Twitter feed."
Brown added: "Blocking is quite useful, too."
It's not the first time since his FEMA resignation that Brown's been at the center of a controversy.
Last fall, Brown criticized President Obama for responding to Hurricane Sandy too early.
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
Yet they want to legislate religious preferences toward birth control. Legislating religion is in direct violation of the Constitution.
You clearly didn't read the FACTS and bills that republicans are attempting to enact, above.
http://www.gop.com/2012-republican-plat ... ing/#Item1
■Preserving and Protecting Traditional Marriage
■Creating a Culture of Hope: Raising Families Beyond Poverty
■Adoption and Foster Care
■Making the Internet Family-Friendly
■Advancing Americans with Disabilities
■Repealing Obamacare
■Our Prescription for American Healthcare: Improve Quality and Lower Costs
■Ensuring Consumer Choice in Healthcare
■Supporting Federal Healthcare Research and Development
■Protecting Individual Conscience in Healthcare
■Reforming the FDA
■Reducing Costs through Tort Reform
■Education: A Chance for Every Child
■Attaining Academic Excellence for All
■Consumer Choice in Education
■Improving Our Nation’s Classrooms
■Addressing Rising College Costs
■Justice for All: Safe Neighborhoods and Prison Reform
We are the party of independent individuals and the institutions they create – families, schools, congregations, neighborhoods – to advance their ideals and make real their dreams. Foremost among those institutions is the American family. It is the foundation of our society and the first level of self-government. Its daily lessons-cooperation, patience, mutual respect, responsibility, self-reliance – are fundamental to the order and progress of our Republic. Government can never replace the family. That is why we insist that public policy, from taxation to education, from healthcare to welfare, be formulated with attention to the needs and strengths of the family.
Preserving and Protecting Traditional Marriage (Top)
The institution of marriage is the foundation of civil society. Its success as an institution will determine our success as a nation. It has been proven by both experience and endless social science studies that traditional marriage is best for children. Children raised in intact married families are more likely to attend college, are physically and emotionally healthier, are less likely to use drugs or alcohol, engage in crime, or get pregnant outside of marriage. The success of marriage directly impacts the economic well-being of individuals. Furthermore, the future of marriage affects freedom. The lack of family formation not only leads to more government costs, but also to more government control over the lives of its citizens in all aspects. We recognize and honor the courageous efforts of those who bear the many burdens of parenting alone, even as we believe that marriage, the union of one man and one woman must be upheld as the national standard, a goal to stand for, encourage, and promote through laws governing marriage. We embrace the principle that all Americans should be treated with respect and dignity.
Creating a Culture of Hope: Raising Families Beyond Poverty (Top)
The Republican-led welfare reforms enacted in 1996 marked a revolution in government’s approach to poverty. They changed the standard for policy success from the amount of income transferred to the poor to the number of poor who moved from welfare to economic independence. We took the belief of most Americans – that welfare should be a hand up, not a hand out – and made it law. Work requirements, though modest, were at the heart of this success. That is why so many are now outraged by the current Administration’s recent decision to permit waivers for work requirements for welfare benefits, in other words, to administratively repeal the most successful anti-poverty policy in memory. Instead of undermining the expectation that low-income parents and individuals should strive to support themselves, benefit programs like food stamps must ensure that those benefits are better targeted to those who need help the most.
For the sake of low-income families as well as the taxpayers, the federal government’s entire system of public assistance should be reformed to ensure that it promotes work. Each year, this system dispenses nearly $1 trillion in taxpayer funds across a maze of approximately 80 programs that are neither coordinated nor effective in solving poverty and lifting up families. For many individuals collecting benefits from multiple categorical programs, efforts to work or earn more actually result in less money in their pocket through the resulting loss of benefits. This poverty trap would ensnare even more Americans if Obamacare were implemented. Taking a part time job, working an extra shift, or even just marrying someone who works, would result in a loss of benefits, thereby discouraging the very acts necessary to achieve the American Dream.
Adoption and Foster Care (Top)
Families formed or enlarged by adoption strengthen our communities and ennoble our nation. We applaud the Republican legislative initiatives that led to a significant increase in adoptions in recent years, and we call upon the private sector to consider the needs of adoptive families on a par with others. Any restructuring of the federal tax code should recognize the financial impact of the adoption process and the commitment made by adoptive families. The nation’s foster care system remains a necessary fallback for youngsters from troubled families. Because of reforms initiated by many States, the number of foster children has declined to just over 400,000. A major problem of the system is its lack of support, financial and otherwise, for teens who age out of foster care and into a world in which many are not prepared to go it alone. We urge States to work with the faith-based and other community groups which reach out to these young people in need.
Making the Internet Family-Friendly (Top)
Millions of Americans suffer from problem or pathological gambling that can destroy families. We support the prohibition of gambling over the Internet and call for reversal of the Justice Department’s decision distorting the formerly accepted meaning of the Wire Act that could open the door to Internet betting. The Internet must be made safe for children. We call on service providers to exercise due care to ensure that the Internet cannot become a safe haven for predators while respecting First Amendment rights. We congratulate the social networking sites that bar known sex offenders from participation. We urge active prosecution against child pornography, which is closely linked to the horrors of human trafficking. Current laws on all forms of pornography and obscenity need to be vigorously enforced.
Advancing Americans with Disabilities (Top)
We renew our commitment to the inclusion of Americans with disabilities in all aspects of our national life. In keeping with that commitment, we oppose the non-consensual withholding of care or treatment from people with disabilities, including newborns, as well as the elderly and infirm, just as we oppose euthanasia and assisted suicide, which endanger especially those on the margins of society. Because government should set a positive standard in hiring and contracting for the services of persons with disabilities, we need to update the statutory authority for the Ability One program, a major avenue by which those productive members of our society can offer high quality services. The Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) has opened up unprecedented opportunities for many students, and we reaffirm our support for its goal of minimizing the separation of children with disabilities from their peers. We urge preventive efforts in early childhood, especially assistance in gaining pre-reading skills, to help many students move beyond the need for IDEA’s protections. We endorse the program of Employment First, developed by major disability rights groups, to replace dependency with jobs in the mainstream of the American workforce.
Repealing Obamacare (Top)
The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act – Obamacare – was never really about healthcare, though its impact upon the nation’s health is disastrous. From its start, it was about power, the expansion of government control over one sixth of our economy, and resulted in an attack on our Constitution, by requiring that U.S. citizens purchase health insurance. We agree with the four dissenting justices of the Supreme Court: “In our view the entire Act before us is invalid in its entirety.” It was the high-water mark of an outdated liberalism, the latest attempt to impose upon Americans a euro-style bureaucracy to manage all aspects of their lives. Obamacare has been struck down in the court of public opinion and is falling by the weight of its own confusing, unworkable, budget-busting, and conflicting provisions. It would tremendously expand Medicaid without significant reform, leaving the States to assume unsustainable financial burdens. If fully implemented, it could not function; and Republican victories in the November elections will guarantee that it is never implemented. Congressional Republicans are committed to its repeal; and a Republican President, on the first day in office, will use his legitimate waiver authority under that law to halt its progress and then will sign its repeal. Then the American people, through the free market, can advance affordable and responsible healthcare reform that meets the needs and concerns of patients and providers. Through Obamacare, the current Administration has promoted the notion of abortion as healthcare. We, however, affirm the dignity of women by protecting the sanctity of human life. Numerous studies have shown that abortion endangers the health and well-being of women, and we stand firmly against it.
Our Prescription for American Healthcare: Improve Quality and Lower Costs (Top)
We believe that taking care of one’s health is an individual responsibility. Chronic diseases, many of them related to lifestyle, drive healthcare costs, accounting for more than 75 percent of the nation’s medical spending. To reduce demand, and thereby lower costs, we must foster personal responsibility while increasing preventive services to promote healthy lifestyles. We believe that all Americans should have improved access to affordable, coordinated, quality healthcare, including individuals struggling with mental illness.
Our goal is to encourage the development of a healthcare system that provides higher quality care at a lower cost to all Americans while protecting the patient-physician relationship based on mutual trust, informed consent, and privileged patient confidentiality. We seek to increase healthcare choice and options, contain costs and reduce mandates, simplify the system for patients and providers, restore cuts made to Medicare, and equalize the tax treatment of group and individual health insurance plans. For most Americans, those who are insured now or who seek insurance in the future, our practical, non-intrusive reforms will promote flexibility in State leadership in healthcare reform, promote a free-market based system, and empower consumer choice. All of which will return direction of the nation’s healthcare to the people and away from the federal government.
To return the States to their proper role of regulating local insurance markets and caring for the needy, we propose to block grant Medicaid and other payments to the States; limit federal requirements on both private insurance and Medicaid; assist all patients, including those with pre-existing conditions, through reinsurance and risk adjustment; and promote non-litigation alternatives for dispute resolution. We call on State officials to carefully consider the increased costs of medical mandates, imposed under their laws, which may price many low-income families out of the insurance market. We call on the government to permanently ban all federal funding and subsidies for abortion and healthcare plans that include abortion coverage.
To achieve a free market in healthcare and ensure competition, we will promote price transparency so that consumers will know the actual cost of treatments before they undergo them. When patients are aware of costs, they are less likely to over-utilize services. We support legislation to cap non-economic damages in medical malpractice lawsuits, thereby relieving conscientious providers of burdens that are not rightly theirs and addressing a serious cause of escalating medical bills. We will empower individuals and small businesses to form purchasing pools in order to expand coverage to the uninsured. Individuals with pre-existing conditions who maintain continuous insurance coverage should be protected from discrimination. We support technology enhancements for medical health records and data systems while affirming patient privacy and ownership of health information.
Ensuring Consumer Choice in Healthcare (Top)
Consumer choice is the most powerful factor in healthcare reform. Today’s highly mobile work force requires portability of insurance coverage that can go with them from job to job. The need to maintain coverage should not dictate where families have to live and work. Putting the patient at the center of policy decisions will increase choice and reduce costs while ensuring that services provide what Americans actually want. We must end tax discrimination against the individual purchase of insurance and allow consumers to purchase insurance across State lines. While promoting “co-insurance” products and alternatives to “fee for service,” government must promote Health Savings Accounts and Health Reimbursement Accounts to be used for insurance premiums and should encourage the private sector to rate competing insurance plans. We will ensure that America’s aging population has access to safe and affordable care. Because seniors overwhelmingly desire to age at home, we will make home care a priority in public policy. We will champion the right of individual choice in senior care. We will aggressively implement programs to protect against elder abuse, and we will work to ensure that quality care is provided across the care continuum from home to nursing home to hospice.
Supporting Federal Healthcare Research and Development (Top)
We support federal investment in healthcare delivery systems and solutions creating innovative means to provide greater, more cost-effective access to high quality healthcare. We also support federal investment in basic and applied biomedical research, especially the neuroscience research that may hold great potential for dealing with diseases and disorders such as Autism, Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s. If we are to make significant headway against breast and prostate cancer, diabetes, and other killers, research must consider the special needs of formerly neglected groups. We call for expanded support for the stem-cell research that now offers the greatest hope for many afflictions – with adult stem cells, umbilical cord blood, and cells reprogrammed into pluripotent stem cells-without the destruction of embryonic human life. We urge a ban on human cloning and on the creation of or experimentation on human embryos. We support restoring the Drug Enforcement Administration ban on the use of controlled substances for physician-assisted suicide. We oppose the FDA approval of Mifeprex, formerly known as RU-486, and similar drugs that terminate innocent human life after conception.
Protecting Individual Conscience in Healthcare (Top)
No healthcare professional or organization should ever be required to perform, provide for, withhold, or refer for a medical service against their conscience. This is especially true of the religious organizations which deliver a major portion of America’s healthcare, a service rooted in the charity of faith communities. We do not believe, however, that healthcare providers should be allowed to withhold services because the healthcare provider believes the patient’s life is not worth living. We support the ability of all organizations to provide, purchase, or enroll in healthcare coverage consistent with their religious, moral or ethical convictions without discrimination or penalty. We likewise support the right of parents to consent to medical treatment for their children, including mental health treatment, drug treatment, and treatment involving pregnancy, contraceptives and abortion. We urge enactment of pending legislation that would require parental consent to transport girls across state lines for abortions.
Reforming the FDA (Top)
America’s leadership in life sciences R&D and medical innovation is being threatened. As a country, we must work together now or lose our leadership position in medical innovation, U.S. job creation, and access to life-saving treatments for U.S. patients. The United States has led the global medical device and pharmaceutical industries for decades. This leadership has made the U.S. the medical innovation capital of the world, bringing millions of high-paying jobs to our country and life-saving devices and drugs to our nation’s patients. But that leadership position is at risk; patients, innovators, and job creators point to the lack of predictability, consistency, transparency and efficiency at the Food and Drug Administration that is driving innovation overseas, benefiting foreign, not U.S., patients. We pledge to reform the FDA so we can ensure that the U.S. remains the world leader in medical innovation, that device and drug jobs stay in the U.S., that U.S. patients benefit first from new devices and drugs, and that the FDA no longer wastes U.S. taxpayer and innovators’ resources because of bureaucratic red tape and legal uncertainty.
Reducing Costs through Tort Reform (Top)
Frivolous medical malpractice lawsuits have ballooned the cost of healthcare for the average American. Physicians are increasingly practicing defensive medicine because of the looming threat of malpractice liability. Moreover, some medical practitioners are avoiding patients with complex and high-risk medical problems because of the high costs of medical malpractice lawsuits. Rural America is hurt especially hard as obstetricians, surgeons, and other healthcare providers are moving to urban settings or retiring, causing a significant healthcare workforce shortage and subsequently decreasing access to care for all patients. We are committed to aggressively pursuing tort reform legislation to help avoid the practice of defensive medicine, to keep healthcare costs low, and improve healthcare quality.
Education: A Chance for Every Child (Top)
Parents are responsible for the education of their children. We do not believe in a one size fits all approach to education and support providing broad education choices to parents and children at the State and local level. Maintaining American preeminence requires a world-class system of education, with high standards, in which all students can reach their potential. Today’s education reform movement calls for accountability at every stage of schooling. It affirms higher expectations for all students and rejects the crippling bigotry of low expectations. It recognizes the wisdom of State and local control of our schools, and it wisely sees consumer rights in education – choice – as the most important driving force for renewing our schools.
Education is much more than schooling. It is the whole range of activities by which families and communities transmit to a younger generation, not just knowledge and skills, but ethical and behavioral norms and traditions. It is the handing over of a personal and cultural identity. That is why education choice has expanded so vigorously. It is also why American education has, for the last several decades, been the focus of constant controversy, as centralizing forces outside the family and community have sought to remake education in order to remake America. They have not succeeded, but they have done immense damage.
Attaining Academic Excellence for All (Top)
Since 1965 the federal government has spent $2 trillion on elementary and secondary education with no substantial improvement in academic achievement or high school graduation rates (which currently are 59 percent for African-American students and 63 percent for Hispanics). The U.S. spends an average of more than $10,000 per pupil per year in public schools, for a total of more than $550 billion. That represents more than 4 percent of GDP devoted to K-12 education in 2010. Of that amount, federal spending was more than $47 billion. Clearly, if money were the solution, our schools would be problem-free.
More money alone does not necessarily equal better performance. After years of trial and error, we know what does work, what has actually made a difference in student advancement, and what is powering education reform at the local level all across America: accountability on the part of administrators, parents and teachers; higher academic standards; programs that support the development of character and financial literacy; periodic rigorous assessments on the fundamentals, especially math, science, reading, history, and geography; renewed focus on the Constitution and the writings of the Founding Fathers, and an accurate account of American history that celebrates the birth of this great nation; transparency, so parents and the public can discover which schools best serve their pupils; flexibility and freedom to innovate, so schools can adapt to the special needs of their students and hold teachers and administrators responsible for student performance. We support the innovations in education reform occurring at the State level based upon proven results. Republican Governors have led in the effort to reform our country’s underperforming education system, and we applaud these advancements. We advocate the policies and methods that have proven effective: building on the basics, especially STEM subjects (science, technology, engineering, and math) and phonics; ending social promotions; merit pay for good teachers; classroom discipline; parental involvement; and strong leadership by principals, superintendents, and locally elected school boards. Because technology has become an essential tool of learning, proper implementation of technology is a key factor in providing every child equal access and opportunity.
Consumer Choice in Education (Top)
The Republican Party is the party of fresh and innovative ideas in education. We support options for learning, including home schooling and local innovations like single-sex classes, full-day school hours, and year-round schools. School choice – whether through charter schools, open enrollment requests, college lab schools, virtual schools, career and technical education programs, vouchers, or tax credits – is important for all children, especially for families with children trapped in failing schools. Getting those youngsters into decent learning environments and helping them to realize their full potential is the greatest civil rights challenge of our time. We support the promotion of local career and technical educational programs and entrepreneurial programs that have been supported by leaders in industry and will retrain and retool the American workforce, which is the best in the world. A young person’s ability to achieve in school must be based on his or her God-given talent and motivation, not an address, zip code, or economic status.
In sum, on the one hand enormous amounts of money are being spent for K-12 public education with overall results that do not justify that spending. On the other hand, the common experience of families, teachers, and administrators forms the basis of what does work in education. We believe the gap between those two realities can be successfully bridged, and Congressional Republicans are pointing a new way forward with major reform legislation. We support its concept of block grants and the repeal of numerous federal regulations which interfere with State and local control of public schools.
The bulk of the federal money through Title I for low-income children and through IDEA for disabled youngsters should follow the students to whatever school they choose so that eligible pupils, through open enrollment, can bring their share of the funding with them. The Republican-founded D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program should be expanded as a model for the rest of the country. We deplore the efforts by Congressional Democrats and the current President to kill this successful program for disadvantaged students in order to placate the leaders of the teachers’ unions. We support putting the needs of students before the special interests of unions when approaching elementary and secondary education reform.
Because parents are a child’s first teachers, we support family literacy programs, which improve the reading, language, and life skills of both parents and children from low-income families. To ensure that all students have access to the mainstream of American life, we support the English First approach and oppose divisive programs that limit students’ ability to advance in American society. We renew our call for replacing “family planning” programs for teens with abstinence education which teaches abstinence until marriage as the responsible and respected standard of behavior. Abstinence from sexual activity is the only protection that is 100 percent effective against out-of-wedlock pregnancies and sexually-transmitted diseases including HIV/AIDS when transmitted sexually. It is effective, science-based, and empowers teens to achieve optimal health outcomes and avoid risks of sexual activity. We oppose school-based clinics that provide referrals, counseling, and related services for abortion and contraception. We support keeping federal funds from being used in mandatory or universal mental health, psychiatric, or socio- emotional screening programs.
We applaud America’s great teachers, who should be protected against frivolous litigation and should be able to take reasonable actions to maintain discipline and order in the classroom. We support legislation that will correct the current law provision which defines a “Highly Qualified Teacher” merely by his or her credentials, not results in the classroom. We urge school districts to make use of teaching talent in business, STEM fields, and in the military, especially among our returning veterans. Rigid tenure systems based on the “last in, first out” policy should be replaced with a merit-based approach that can attract fresh talent and dedication to the classroom. All personnel who interact with school children should pass background checks and be held to the highest standards of personal conduct.
Improving Our Nation’s Classrooms (Top)
Higher education faces its own challenges, many of which stem from the poor preparation of students before they reach college. One consequence has been the multiplying number of remedial courses for freshmen. Even so, our universities, large and small, public or private, form the world’s greatest assemblage of learning. They drive much of the research that keeps America competitive and, by admitting large numbers of foreign students, convey our values and culture to the world.
Ideological bias is deeply entrenched within the current university system. Whatever the solution in private institutions may be, in State institutions the trustees have a responsibility to the public to ensure that their enormous investment is not abused for political indoctrination. We call on State officials to ensure that our public colleges and universities be places of learning and the exchange of ideas, not zones of intellectual intolerance favoring the Left.
Addressing Rising College Costs (Top)
College costs, however, are on an unsustainable trajectory, rising year by year far ahead of overall inflation. Nationwide, student loan debt now exceeds credit card debt, roughly $23,300 for each of the 35,000,000 debtors, taking years to pay off. Over 50 percent of recent college grads are unemployed or underemployed, working at jobs for which their expensive educations gave them no training. It is time to get back to basics and to higher education programs directly related to job opportunities.
The first step is to acknowledge the need for change when the status quo is not working. New systems of learning are needed to compete with traditional four-year colleges: expanded community colleges and technical institutions, private training schools, online universities, life-long learning, and work-based learning in the private sector. New models for acquiring advanced skills will be ever more important in the rapidly changing economy of the twenty-first century, especially in science, technology, engineering, and math. Public policy should advance the affordability, innovation, and transparency needed to address all these challenges and to make accessible to everyone the emerging alternatives, with their lower cost degrees, to traditional college attendance.
Federal student aid is on an unsustainable path, and efforts should be taken to provide families with greater transparency and the information they need to make prudent choices about a student’s future: completion rates, repayment rates, future earnings, and other factors that may affect their decisions. The federal government should not be in the business of originating student loans; however, it should serve as an insurance guarantor for the private sector as they offer loans to students. Private sector participation in student financing should be welcomed. Any regulation that drives tuition costs higher must be reevaluated to balance its worth against its negative impact on students and their parents.
Justice for All: Safe Neighborhoods and Prison Reform (Top)
The most effective forces in reducing crime and other social ills are strong families and caring communities supported by excellent law enforcement. Both reinforce constructive conduct and ethical standards by setting examples and providing safe havens from dangerous and destructive behaviors. But even under the best social circumstances, strong, well-trained law enforcement is necessary to protect us all, and especially the weak and vulnerable, from predators. Our national experience over the last several decades has shown that citizen vigilance, tough but fair prosecutors, meaningful sentences, protection of victims’ rights, and limits on judicial discretion can preserve public safety by keeping criminals off the streets.
Liberals do not understand this simple axiom: criminals behind bars cannot harm the general public. To that end, we support mandatory prison sentencing for gang crimes, violent or sexual offenses against children, repeat drug dealers, rape, robbery and murder. We support a national registry for convicted child murderers. We oppose parole for dangerous or repeat felons. Courts should have the option of imposing the death penalty in capital murder cases.
In solidarity with those who protect us, we call for mandatory prison time for all assaults involving serious injury to law enforcement officers. Criminals injured in the course of their crimes should not be able to seek monetary damages from their intended victims or from the public.
While getting criminals off the street is essential, more attention must be paid to the process of restoring those individuals to the community. Prisons should do more than punish; they should attempt to rehabilitate and institute proven prisoner reentry systems to reduce recidivism and future victimization. We endorse State and local initiatives that are trying new approaches, often called accountability courts.
Government at all levels should work with faith-based institutions that have proven track records in diverting young and first time, non-violent offenders from criminal careers, for which we salute them. Their emphasis on restorative justice, to make the victim whole and put the offender on the right path, can give law enforcement the flexibility it needs in dealing with different levels of criminal behavior. We endorse State and local initiatives that are trying new approaches to curbing drug abuse and diverting first-time offenders to rehabilitation.
Public authorities must regain control of their correctional institutions, for we cannot allow prisons to become ethnic or racial battlegrounds. Persons jailed for whatever cause should be protected against cruel or degrading treatment by other inmates. In some cases, the institution of family-friendly policies may curtail prison violence and reduce the rate of recidivism, thus reducing the enormous fiscal and social costs of incarceration. Breaking the cycle of crime begins with the children of those who are prisoners. Deprived of a parent through no fault of their own, these youngsters should be a special concern of our schools, social services, and religious institutions. Thirty years ago, President Reagan’s Task Force on Victims of Crime, calling the neglect of crime victims a “national disgrace,” proposed a Constitutional amendment to secure their formal rights. While some progress has been made to rectify that situation, the need for national action still persists in the unacceptable treatment of innocent victims. We call on the States to make it a bipartisan priority to protect the rights of crime victims, who should also be assured of access to social and legal services; and we call on the Congress to make the federal courts a model in this regard for the rest of the country.
The resources of the federal government’s law enforcement and judicial systems have been strained by two unfortunate expansions: the over-criminalization of behavior and the over-federalization of offenses. The number of criminal offenses in the U.S. Code increased from 3,000 in the early 1980s to over 4,450 by 2008. Federal criminal law should focus on acts by federal employees or acts committed on federal property – and leave the rest to the States. Then Congress should withdraw from federal departments and agencies the power to criminalize behavior, a practice which, according to the Congressional Research Service, has created “tens of thousands” of criminal offenses. No one other than an elected representative should have the authority to define a criminal act and set criminal penalties. In the same way, Congress should reconsider the extent to which it has federalized offenses traditionally handled on the State or local level.
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
It'a shocking what this idiot did or didn't do during Katrina
it's shocking what he said last night
It's shocking that this conservative republican idiot lives in one of the most liberal, progressive, democratic parts of the country (Boulder, CO)
:fp:
http://www.gop.com/2012-republican-plat ... ing/#Item1
■Saving Medicare for Future Generations
■Strengthening Medicaid in the States
■Security For Those Who Need It: Ensuring Retirement Security
■Regulatory Reform: The Key to Economic Growth
■Protecting Internet Freedom
■A Vision for the Twenty-First Century: Technology, Telecommunications and the Internet
■Protecting the Taxpayers: No More “Too Big to Fail”
■Judicial Activism: A Threat to the U.S. Constitution
■Restructuring the U.S. Postal Service for the Twenty-First Century
■Protecting Travelers and their Rights: Reforming the TSA for Security and Privacy
■The Rule of Law: Legal Immigration
■Honoring Our Relationship with American Indians
■Preserving the District of Columbia
■Modernizing the Federal Civil Service
■America’s Future in Space: Continuing this Quest
■Honoring and Supporting Americans in the Territories
We are the party of government reform. At a time when the federal government has become bloated, antiquated and unresponsive to taxpayers, it is our intention not only to improve management and provide better services, but also to rethink and restructure government to bring it into the twenty-first century. Government reform requires constant vigilance and effort because government by its nature tends to expand in both size and scope. Our goal is not just less spending in Washington but something far more important for the future of our nation: protecting the constitutional rights of citizens, sustainable prosperity, and strengthening the American family.
It isn’t enough to merely downsize government, having a smaller version of the same failed systems. We must do things in a dramatically different way by reversing the undermining of federalism and the centralizing of power in Washington. We look to the example set by Republican Governors and legislators all across the nation. Their leadership in reforming and reengineering government closest to the people vindicates the role of the States as the laboratories of democracy.
Our approach, like theirs, is two-fold. We look to government – local, State, and federal – for the things government must do, but we believe those duties can be carried out more efficiently and at less cost. For all other activities, we look to the private sector; for the American people’s resourcefulness, productivity, innovation, fiscal responsibility, and citizen-leadership have always been the true foundation of our national greatness.
For much of the last century, an opposing view has dominated public policy where we have witnessed the expansion, centralization, and bureaucracy in an entitlement society. Government has lumbered on, stifling innovation, with no incentive for fundamental change, through antiquated programs begun generations ago and now ill-suited to present needs and future requirements. As a result, today’s taxpayers – and future generations – face massive indebtedness, while Congressional Democrats and the current Administration block every attempt to turn things around. This man-made log-jam – the so-called stalemate in Washington – particularly affects the government’s three largest programs, which have become central to the lives of untold millions of Americans: Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security.
Saving Medicare for Future Generations (Top)
The Republican Party is committed to saving Medicare and Medicaid. Unless the programs’ fiscal ship is righted, the individuals hurt the first and the worst will be those who depend on them the most. We will save Medicare by modernizing it, by empowering its participants, and by putting it on a secure financial footing. This will be an enormous undertaking, and it should be a non-partisan one. We welcome to the effort all who sincerely want to ensure the future for our seniors and the poor. Republicans are determined to achieve that goal with a candid and honest presentation of the problem and its solutions to the American people.
Despite the enormous differences between Medicare and Medicaid, the two programs share the same fiscal outlook: their current courses cannot be sustained. Medicare has grown from more than 20 million enrolled in 1970 to more than 47 million enrolled today, with a projected total of 80 million in 2030. Medicaid counted almost 30 million enrollees in 1990, has about 54 million now, and under Obamacare would include an additional 11 million. Medicare spent more than $520 billion in 2010 and has close to $37 trillion in unfunded obligations, while total Medicaid spending will more than double by 2019. In many States, Medicaid’s mandates and inflexible bureaucracy have become a budgetary black hole, growing faster than most other budget lines and devouring funding for many other essential governmental functions.
The problem goes beyond finances. Poor quality healthcare is the most expensive type of care because it prolongs affliction and leads to ever more complications. Even expensive prevention is preferable to more costly treatment later on. When approximately 80 percent of healthcare costs are related to lifestyle -smoking, obesity, substance abuse-far greater emphasis has to be put upon personal responsibility for health maintenance. Our goal for both Medicare and Medicaid must be to assure that every participant receives the amount of care they need at the time they need it, whether for an expectant mother and her baby or for someone in the last moments of life. Absent reforms, these two programs are headed for bankruptcy that will endanger care for seniors and the poor.
The first step is to move the two programs away from their current unsustainable defined-benefit entitlement model to a fiscally sound defined-contribution model. This is the only way to limit costs and restore consumer choice for patients and introduce competition; for in healthcare, as in any other sector of the economy, genuine competition is the best guarantee of better care at lower cost. It is also the best guard against the fraud and abuse that have plagued Medicare in its isolation from free market forces, which in turn costs the taxpayers billions of dollars every year. We can do this without making any changes for those 55 and older. While retaining the option of traditional Medicare in competition with private plans, we call for a transition to a premium-support model for Medicare, with an income-adjusted contribution toward a health plan of the enrollee’s choice. This model will include private health insurance plans that provide catastrophic protection, to ensure the continuation of doctor-patient relationships. Without disadvantaging retirees or those nearing retirement, the age eligibility for Medicare must be made more realistic in terms of today’s longer life span.
Strengthening Medicaid in the States (Top)
Medicaid, as the dominant payer in the health market in regards to long-term care, births, and individuals with mental illness, is the next frontier of welfare reform. It is simply too big and too flawed to be managed in its current condition from Washington. Republican Governors have taken the lead in proposing a host of regulatory changes that could make the program more flexible, innovative, and accountable. There should be alternatives to hospitalization for chronic health problems. Patients could be rewarded for participating in disease prevention activities. Excessive mandates on coverage should be eliminated. Patients with long-term care needs might fare better in a separately designed program.
As those and other specific proposals show, Republican Governors and State legislatures are ready to do the hard work of modernizing Medicaid for the twenty-first century. We propose to let them do all that and more by block-granting the program to the States, providing the States with the flexibility to design programs that meet the needs of their low income citizens. Such reforms could be achieved through premium supports or a refundable tax credit, allowing non-disabled adults and children to be moved into private health insurance of their choice, where their needs can be met on the same basis as those of more affluent Americans. For the aged and disabled under Medicaid, for whom monthly costs can be extremely high, States would have flexibility to improve the quality of care and to avoid the inappropriate institutional placing of patients who prefer to be cared for at home.
Security For Those Who Need It: Ensuring Retirement Security (Top)
While no changes should adversely affect any current or near-retiree, comprehensive reform should address our society’s remarkable medical advances in longevity and allow younger workers the option of creating their own personal investment accounts as supplements to the system. Younger Americans have lost all faith in the Social Security system, which is understandable when they read the non- partisan actuary’s reports about its future funding status. Born in an old industrial era beyond the memory of most Americans, it is long overdue for major change, not just another legislative stopgap that postpones a day of reckoning. To restore public trust in the system, Republicans are committed to setting it on a sound fiscal basis that will give workers control over, and a sound return on, their investments. The sooner we act, the sooner those close to retirement can be reassured of their benefits and younger workers can take responsibility for planning their own retirement decades from now.
Unlike Social Security, the problems facing private pension plans are both demographic and ethical. While pension law may be complicated, the current bottom line is that many plans are increasingly underfunded by overestimating their rates of return on investments. This in turn endangers the integrity of the Pension Guaranty Benefit Corporation, which is itself seriously underfunded. In both cases, the taxpayers will be expected to pay for a bailout. As the first step toward possible corrective action, we call for a presidential panel to review the private pension system in this country of only those private pensions that are backed by the Pension Guaranty Benefit Corporation and to make public its findings.
The situation of public pension systems demands immediate remedial action. The irresponsible promises of politicians at every level of government have come back to haunt today’s taxpayers with enormous unfunded pension liabilities. Many cities face bankruptcy because of excessive outlays for early retirement, extravagant health plans, and overly generous pension benefits. We salute the Republican Governors and State legislators who have, in the face of abuse and threats of violence, reformed their State pension systems for the benefit of both taxpayers and retirees alike.
Regulatory Reform: The Key to Economic Growth (Top)
The proper purpose of regulation is to set forth clear rules of the road for the citizens, so that business owners and workers can understand in advance what they need to do, or not do, to augment the possibilities for success within the confines of the law. Regulations must be drafted and implemented to balance legitimate public safety or consumer protection goals and job creation. Constructive regulation should be a helpful guide, not a punitive threat. Worst of all, over-regulation is a stealth tax on everyone as the costs of compliance with the whims of federal agencies are passed along to the consumers at the cost of $1.75 trillion a year. Many regulations are necessary, like those which ensure the safety of food and medicine, especially from overseas. But no peril justifies the regulatory impact of Obamacare on the practice of medicine, the Dodd-Frank Act on financial services, or the EPA’s and OSHA’s overreaching regulation agenda. A Republican Congress and President will repeal the first and second, and rein in the third. We support a sunset requirement to force reconsideration of out-of-date regulations, and we endorse pending legislation to require congressional approval for all new major and costly regulations.
The bottom line on regulations is jobs. In listening to America, one constant we have heard is the job-crippling effect of even well-intentioned regulation. That makes it all the more important for federal agencies to be judicious about the impositions they create on businesses, especially small businesses. We call for a moratorium on the development of any new major and costly regulations until a Republican Administration reviews existing rules to ensure that they have a sound basis in science and will be cost-effective.
Protecting Internet Freedom (Top)
The Internet has unleashed innovation, enabled growth, and inspired freedom more rapidly and extensively than any other technological advance in human history. Its independence is its power. The Internet offers a communications system uniquely free from government intervention. We will remove regulatory barriers that protect outdated technologies and business plans from innovation and competition, while preventing legacy regulation from interfering with new and disruptive technologies such as mobile delivery of voice video data as they become crucial components of the Internet ecosystem. We will resist any effort to shift control away from the successful multi-stakeholder approach of Internet governance and toward governance by international or other intergovernmental organizations. We will ensure that personal data receives full constitutional protection from government overreach and that individuals retain the right to control the use of their data by third parties; the only way to safeguard or improve these systems is through the private sector.
A Vision for the Twenty-First Century: Technology, Telecommunications and the Internet (Top)
The most vibrant sector of the American economy, indeed, one-sixth of it, is regulated by the federal government on precedents from the nineteenth century. Today’s technology and telecommunications industries are overseen by the Federal Communications Commission, established in 1934 and given the jurisdiction over telecommunications formerly assigned to the Interstate Commerce Commission, which had been created in 1887 to regulate the railroads. This is not a good fit. Indeed, the development of telecommunications advances so rapidly that even the Telecom Act of 1996 is woefully out of date. An industry that invested $66 billion in 2011 alone needs, and deserves, a more modern relationship with the federal government for the benefit of consumers here and worldwide.
The current Administration has been frozen in the past. It has conducted no auction of spectrum, has offered no incentives for investment, and, through the FCC’s net neutrality rule, is trying to micromanage telecom as if it were a railroad network. It inherited from the previous Republican Administration 95 percent coverage of the nation with broadband. It will leave office with no progress toward the goal of universal coverage – after spending $7.2 billion more. That hurts rural America, where farmers, ranchers, and small business manufacturers need connectivity to expand their customer base and operate in real time with the world’s producers. We encourage public-private partnerships to provide predictable support for connecting rural areas so that every American can fully participate in the global economy.
We call for an inventory of federal agency spectrum to determine the surplus that could be auctioned for the taxpayers’ benefit. With special recognition of the role university technology centers are playing in attracting private investment to the field, we will replace the administration’s Luddite approach to technological progress with a regulatory partnership that will keep this country the world leader in technology and telecommunications.
Protecting the Taxpayers: No More “Too Big to Fail” (Top)
For more than a century, the U.S. was the world leader in financial services. The visionary management of capital was the lifeblood of the entire economy. By giving responsible access to credit, it helped small businesses grow, created jobs, and made Americans the best-housed people in history. By funding innovation, financial services underwrote our future. Then came the financial collapse of 2008 and a critical reassessment of the role and condition of financial institutions – most of which, it must be said, were responsible and healthy, especially those closest to their investors and borrowers.
In cases of malfeasance or other criminal behavior, the full force of the law should be used. But in all cases, this rule must apply: No financial institution is too big to fail. The taxpayers must never again be on the hook for the losses of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The public must never again be left holding the bag for Wall Street giants, which is why we decry the current Administration’s record of over-regulation and selective intervention, which has already frozen investment and job creation and threatens to make financial institutions the coddled wards of government.
A far better approach – protecting consumers and taxpayers alike – is institutional transparency. Banks need to know that they could be at risk, and investors need clear rules that are not subject to political meddling. The same holds true for the equity market regulated by the Securities and Exchange Commission. We propose reasonable federal oversight of financial institutions, practical safeguards for consumers, and – what is crucial for this country’s economic rebound – sound spending, tax, and regulatory policies that will allow those institutions to once again become the builders of the next American century. We strongly support tax reform; in the event we do not achieve this, we must preserve the mortgage interest deduction.
Judicial Activism: A Threat to the U.S. Constitution (Top)
Despite improvements as a result of Republican nominations to the judiciary, some judges in the federal courts remain far afield from their constitutional limitations. The U.S. Constitution is the law of the land. Judicial activism which includes reliance on foreign law or unratified treaties undermines American law. The sole solution, apart from impeachment, is the appointment of constitutionalist jurists, who will interpret the law as it was originally intended rather than make it. That is both a presidential responsibility, in selecting judicial candidates, and a senatorial responsibility, in confirming them. We urge Republican Senators to do all in their power to prevent the elevation of additional leftist ideologues to the courts, particularly in the waning days of the current Administration. In addition to appointing activist judges, the current Administration has included an activist and highly partisan Department of Justice. With a Republican Administration, the Department will stop suing States for exercising those powers reserved to the States, will stop abusing its preclearance authority to block photo-ID voting laws, and will fulfill its responsibility to defend all federal laws in court, including the Defense of Marriage Act.
Restructuring the U.S. Postal Service for the Twenty-First Century (Top)
The dire financial circumstances of the Postal Service require dramatic restructuring. In a world of rapidly advancing telecommunications, mail delivery from the era of the Pony Express cannot long survive. We call on Congress to restructure the Service to ensure the continuance of its essential function of delivering mail while preparing for the downsizing made inevitable by the advance of internet communication. In light of the Postal Service’s seriously underfunded pension system, Congress should explore a greater role for private enterprise in appropriate aspects of the mail-processing system.
Protecting Travelers and their Rights: Reforming the TSA for Security and Privacy (Top)
While the aftermath of the 2001 terrorist attacks brought about a greater need for homeland security, the American people have already delivered their verdict on the Transportation Security Administration: its procedures – and much of its personnel – need to be changed. It is now a massive bureaucracy of 65,000 employees who seem to be accountable to no one for the way they treat travelers. We call for the private sector to take over airport screening wherever feasible and look toward the development of security systems that can replace the personal violation of frisking.
The Rule of Law: Legal Immigration (Top)
The greatest asset of the American economy is the American worker. Just as immigrant labor helped build our country in the past, today’s legal immigrants are making vital contributions in every aspect of our national life. Their industry and commitment to American values strengthens our economy, enriches our culture, and enables us to better understand and more effectively compete with the rest of the world. Illegal immigration undermines those benefits and affects U.S. workers. In an age of terrorism, drug cartels, human trafficking, and criminal gangs, the presence of millions of unidentified persons in this country poses grave risks to the safety and the sovereignty of the United States. Our highest priority, therefore, is to secure the rule of law both at our borders and at ports of entry.
We recognize that for most of those seeking entry into this country, the lack of respect for the rule of law in their homelands has meant economic exploitation and political oppression by corrupt elites. In this country, the rule of law guarantees equal treatment to every individual, including more than one million immigrants to whom we grant permanent residence every year. That is why we oppose any form of amnesty for those who, by intentionally violating the law, disadvantage those who have obeyed it. Granting amnesty only rewards and encourages more law breaking. We support the mandatory use of the Systematic Alien Verification for Entitlements (S.A.V.E.) program – an internet-based system that verifies the lawful presence of applicants – prior to the granting of any State or federal government entitlements or IRS refunds. We insist upon enforcement at the workplace through verification systems so that jobs can be available to all legal workers. Use of the E-verify program – an internet-based system that verifies the employment authorization and identity of employees – must be made mandatory nationwide. State enforcement efforts in the workplace must be welcomed, not attacked. When Americans need jobs, it is absolutely essential that we protect them from illegal labor in the workplace. In addition, it is why we demand tough penalties for those who practice identity theft, deal in fraudulent documents, and traffic in human beings. It is why we support Republican legislation to give the Department of Homeland Security long-term detention authority to keep dangerous but undeportable aliens off our streets, expedite expulsion of criminal aliens, and make gang membership a deportable offense.
The current Administration’s approach to immigration has undermined the rule of law at every turn. It has lessened work-site enforcement – and even allows the illegal aliens it does uncover to walk down the street to the next employer – and challenged legitimate State efforts to keep communities safe, suing them for trying to enforce the law when the federal government refuses to do so. It has created a backdoor amnesty program unrecognized in law, granting worker authorization to illegal aliens, and shown little regard for the life-and-death situations facing the men and women of the border patrol.
Perhaps worst of all, the current Administration has failed to enforce the legal means for workers or employers who want to operate within the law. In contrast, a Republican Administration and Congress will partner with local governments through cooperative enforcement agreements in Section 287g of the Immigration and Nationality Act to make communities safer for all and will consider, in light of both current needs and historic practice, the utility of a legal and reliable source of foreign labor where needed through a new guest worker program. We will create humane procedures to encourage illegal aliens to return home voluntarily, while enforcing the law against those who overstay their visas.
State efforts to reduce illegal immigration must be encouraged, not attacked. The pending Department of Justice lawsuits against Arizona, Alabama, South Carolina, and Utah must be dismissed immediately. The double-layered fencing on the border that was enacted by Congress in 2006, but never completed, must finally be built. In order to restore the rule of law, federal funding should be denied to sanctuary cities that violate federal law and endanger their own citizens, and federal funding should be denied to universities that provide in-state tuition rates to illegal aliens, in open defiance of federal law.
We are grateful to the thousands of new immigrants, many of them not yet citizens, who are serving in the Armed Forces. Their patriotism should encourage us all to embrace the newcomers legally among us, assist their journey to full citizenship, and help their communities avoid isolation from the mainstream of society. To that end, while we encourage the retention and transmission of heritage tongues, we support English as the nation’s official language, a unifying force essential for the educational and economic advancement of – not only immigrant communities – but also our nation as a whole.
Honoring Our Relationship with American Indians (Top)
Based on both treaty and other law, the federal government has a unique government-to-government relationship with and trust responsibility for Indian Tribal Governments and American Indians and Alaska Natives. These obligations have not been sufficiently honored. The social and economic problems that plague Indian country have grown worse over the last several decades; we must reverse that trend. Ineffective federal programs deprive American Indians of the services they need, and long-term failures threaten to undermine tribal sovereignty itself.
American Indians have established elected tribal governments to carry out the public policies of the tribe, administer services to its tribal member constituents, and manage relations with federal, State, and local governments. We respect the tribal governments as the voice of their communities and encourage federal, State, and local governments to heed those voices in developing programs and partnerships to improve the quality of life for American Indians and their neighbors in their communities.
Republicans believe that economic self-sufficiency is the ultimate answer to the challenges confronting Indian country. We believe that tribal governments and their communities, not Washington bureaucracies, are best situated to craft solutions that will end systemic problems that create poverty and disenfranchisement. Just as the federal government should not burden States with regulations, it should not stifle the development of resources within the reservations, which need federal assistance to advance their commerce nationally through roads and technology. Federal and State regulations that thwart job creation must be withdrawn or redrawn so that tribal governments acting on behalf of American Indians are not disadvantaged. It is especially egregious that the Democratic Party has persistently undermined tribal sovereignty in order to provide advantage to union bosses in the tribal workplace.
Republicans recognize that each tribe has the right of consultation before any new regulatory policy is implemented on tribal land. To the extent possible, such consultation should take place in Indian country with the tribal government and its members. Before promulgating and imposing any new laws or regulations affecting trust land or members, the federal government should encourage Indian tribes to develop their own policies to achieve program objectives, and should defer to tribes to develop their own standards, or standards in conjunction with State governments.
Republicans reject a one-size-fits-all approach to federal-tribal-State partnerships and will work to expand local autonomy where tribal governments seek it. Better partnerships will help us to expand economic opportunity, deliver top-flight education to future generations, modernize and improve the Indian Health Service to make it more responsive to local needs, and build essential infrastructure in Indian country in cooperation with tribal neighbors. Our approach is to empower American Indians, through tribal self-determination and self-governance policies, to develop their greatest assets, human resources and the rich natural resources on their lands, without undue federal interference.
Like all Americans, American Indians want safe communities for their families; but inadequate resources and neglect have, over time, allowed criminal activities to plague Indian country. To protect everyone – and especially the most vulnerable: children, women, and elders – the legal system in tribal communities must provide stability and protect property rights. Everyone’s due process and civil rights must be safeguarded.
We support efforts to ensure equitable participation in federal programs by American Indians, including Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiians and to preserve their culture and languages that we consider to be national treasures. Lastly, we recognize that American Indians have responded to the call for military service in percentage numbers far greater than have other groups of Americans. We honor that commitment, loyalty, and sacrifice of all American Indians serving in the military today and in years past and will ensure that all veterans and their families receive the care and respect they have earned through their loyal service to America.
Preserving the District of Columbia (Top)
The nation’s capital city, a special responsibility of the federal government, belongs both to its residents and to all Americans, millions of whom visit it every year. Congressional Republicans have taken the lead in efforts to foster homeownership and open access to higher education for Washington residents. Against the opposition of the current President and leaders of the Democratic Party, they have fought to establish, and now to expand, the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program, through which thousands of low-income children have been able to attend a school of their choice and receive a quality education.
D.C.’s Republicans have been in the forefront of exposing and combating the chronic corruption among the city’s top Democratic officials. We join their call for a non-partisan elected Attorney General to clean up the city’s political culture and for congressional action to enforce the spirit of the Home Rule Act assuring minority representation on the City Council. After decades of inept one-party rule, the city’s structural deficit demands congressional attention.
As the center of our government, the District contains many potential targets for terrorist attacks. Federal security agencies should work closely with local officials and regional administrations like the Washington Area Metropolitan Transit Authority. A top priority must be ensuring that all public transportation, especially Metro rails, is functioning in the event of an emergency evacuation. Also, to ensure protection of the fundamental right to keep and bear arms, we call on the governing authority to pass laws consistent with the Supreme Court’s decisions in the District of Columbia v. Heller and McDonald v. Chicago cases, which upheld the fundamental right to keep and bear arms for self-defense.
We oppose statehood for the District of Columbia.
Modernizing the Federal Civil Service (Top)
The federal workforce bears great responsibilities and sometimes wields tremendous power, especially when Congress delegates to it the execution of complicated and far-reaching legislation. We recognize the dedication of federal workers and the difficulty of their thankless task of implementing poorly drafted or open-ended legislation.
Under the current Administration, the civil service has grown by at least 140,000 workers, while the number making at least $150,000 has doubled. At a time when the national debt has increased to over $15.9 trillion under the current Administration, this is grossly irresponsible. The American people work too hard and too long to support a bloated government. We call for a reduction, through attrition, in the federal payroll of at least 10 percent and the adjustment of pay scales and benefits to reflect those of the private sector. We must bring the 130-year old Civil Service System into the twenty-first century. The federal pay system should be sufficiently flexible to acknowledge and reward those who dare to innovate, reduce overhead, optimize processes, and expedite paperwork.
Delinquency in paying taxes and repaying student loans has been too common in some segments of the civil service. A Republican Administration will make enforcement among its own employees a priority and, unlike the current Administration, will name to public office no one who has failed to meet their financial obligations to the government and fellow taxpayers.
America’s Future in Space: Continuing this Quest (Top)
The exploration of space has been a key part of U.S. global leadership and has supported innovation and ownership of technology. Over the last half-century, in partnership with our aerospace industry, the work of NASA has helped define and strengthen our nation’s technological prowess. From building the world’s most powerful rockets to landing men on the Moon, sending robotic spacecraft throughout our solar system and beyond, building the International Space Station, and launching space-based telescopes that allow scientists to better understand our universe, NASA science and engineering have produced spectacular results. The technologies that emerged from those programs propelled our aerospace industrial base and directly benefit our national security, safety, economy, and quality of life. Through its achievements, NASA has inspired generations of Americans to study science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, leading to careers that drive our country’s technological and economic engines.
Today, America’s leadership in space is challenged by countries eager to emulate – and surpass – NASA’s accomplishments. To preserve our national security interests and foster innovation and competitiveness, we must sustain our preeminence in space, launching more science missions, guaranteeing unfettered access, and maintaining a source of high-value American jobs.
Honoring and Supporting Americans in the Territories (Top)
We honor the extraordinary sacrifices of the men and women of the territories who protect our freedom through their service in the U.S. Armed Forces. We welcome their greater participation in all aspects of the political process and affirm their right to seek the full extension of the Constitution, with all the rights and responsibilities it entails. U.S. territories face serious economic challenges as they struggle to retain existing industries and develop new ones. Development of local energy options is crucial to reduce their dependence on imported fuel and promote economic stability. The Pacific territories should have flexibility to determine the minimum wage, which has seriously restricted progress in the private sector. A stronger private sector can raise wages, reduce dependence on public sector employment, and lead toward local self-sufficiency. All unreasonable economic impediments must be removed, including unreasonable U.S. customs practices.
We support the right of the United States citizens of Puerto Rico to be admitted to the Union as a fully sovereign state if they freely so determine. We recognize that Congress has the final authority to define the constitutionally valid options for Puerto Rico to achieve a permanent non-territorial status with government by consent and full enfranchisement. As long as Puerto Rico is not a State, however, the will of its people regarding their political status should be ascertained by means of a general right of referendum or specific referenda sponsored by the U.S. government.
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
http://www.gop.com/2012-republican-platform_home/
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
you are taking my saying there isn't a war on women and turning it into "YOU are OK with the GOP prioritizing a fetus's health ahead of a woman's" further proving my point that there is no middle ground. You either agree with me or you are against my cause because you hate the group that it would affect.
I am not for the GOP doing anything in regards to limiting abortion, but I understand their motivation is to end abortion rather than to deliberately take away rights of a woman because she is a woman.
You side stepped my question again.
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
still didn't see war on women anywhere in the platform, which is what you were talking about when you said it was in the platform right? If that wasn't what you were referring to there I am sorry, I went back a ways to catch up on the thread but maybe I just didn't go back far enough.
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
Of course he is. The right wing media machine spins on and on...
"...I changed by not changing at all..."
I would like to be 100% clear. I certainly don't agree with any one party on every issue. That would be pretty crazy and as far as I can see the only people that do get paid to do so.
Defunding of planned parenthood wasn't because they don;t like women that use contraception.
Criminalizing abortions after rape.... I get that the fetus is innocent, etc but certainly going to far. There end goal is no abortions and they are running out of playing space so they are panicking and unfortunately playing where they have left to play.
50% of aborted babies are women. Your "pro-women's rights" question....what rights are those exactly?
One could argue that over 50% of the people in the world barely resemble a human being.
It only seems that way, Cincy. Most people are just ordinary folks trying to get by. But I get what you're saying.
look like people, they are people. I won't post one because it is sensitive and sad.
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
Ron Paul's puzzling critique of murdered SEAL Chris Kyle
http://news.yahoo.com/ron-pauls-puzzlin ... 00026.html
In 140 characters, the newly retired congressman reminds us why he — and maybe his son — won't top the GOP presidential ticket
When news started spreading that Chris Kyle, a former SEAL and author of the best-selling autobiography American Sniper, was shot dead with a friend over the weekend — allegedly at the hands of a PTSD-suffering former Marine he was trying to help by taking him shooting at a hunting range — conservatives were incensed over the callous tweets of "some on the anti-gun Left." And then this happened:
"Chris Kyle's death seems to confirm that "he who lives by the sword dies by the sword." Treating PTSD at a firing range doesn't make sense"
— Ron Paul (@RonPaul) February 4, 2013
And just like that, the three-time Republican presidential candidate's tenuous coalition of pro-gun libertarians, anti–Federal Reserve goldbugs, and foreign policy non-interventionists crumbled. Paul is an opponent of gun control — saying after December's Newtown, Conn., grade school massacre that "more guns equals less crime" and that "private gun ownership prevents many shootings" — but also of U.S. military adventurism. Kyle, also an outspoken gun-rights advocate, earned a reputation in Iraq as one of the deadliest snipers in U.S. military history. With Twitter erupting in outrage over his comment, Paul took to Facebook to explain himself:
As a veteran, I certainly recognize that this weekend's violence and killing of Chris Kyle were a tragic and sad event. My condolences and prayers go out to Mr. Kyle's family. Unconstitutional and unnecessary wars have endless unintended consequences. A policy of non-violence, as Christ preached, would have prevented this and similar tragedies. -REP
That not-quite-apology didn't quell the anger or the virtual yelling. "You really are vile," tweeted GOP strategist Rick Wilson; Commentary's John Podhoretz said Paul's tweet was "appalling." The newly liberated Paul "is more callous than ever, with an extra helping of sanctimony and a healthy dollop of anti-military sentiment," say the editors of Michelle Malkin's Twitchy. Not content with just "dancing on the grave of a military hero," Paul poured fuel on the fire by invoking Jesus to justify his "ghoulish" views. Even Paul's son, Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) — rumored to have presidential ambitions himself — rushed out a statement to Breitbart.com: "Chris Kyle was a hero like all Americans who don the uniform to defend our country. Our prayers are with his family during this tragic time."
Et tu, Rand? says Ryan W. McMaken at Lew Rockwell's LRC Blog. Yes, "every American soldier is a hero, just like the Bronze-Star-winning Timothy McVeigh and the Marine Lee Harvey Oswald." But Rand isn't the only "sycophantic" conservative throwing Ron Paul under the bus for "truth-telling about the tragic outcomes that are sure to come from time spent in a military where rape, suicide, domestic abuse and general killing are widespread."
Who can be surprised that conservatives... have been falling all over themselves to condemn Ron Paul for quoting Jesus — in correct context, by the way — to note that the violence wrought by over a decade of nonstop war in America leads to tragedy on the home front?... The most transparent were the conservatives who claimed to be former supporters of Paul who must now go support some more "patriotic" politician: One who doesn't actually question anything the military does.... This is what it comes down to for most conservatives, of course. All that stuff about laissez faire and freedom and free markets has never been more than an act and an affectation.... Among conservatives, Ron Paul has only ever had minority support, for in the end, conservatives love government, as exhibited by their latest outrage. They just love it in a slightly different way from the left liberals. [Lew Rockwell]
Well, for better of for worse, this is the genuine Ron Paul, says BuzzFeed's Rosie Gray. Paul has started sending off his own tweets "since he left office," according to a spokeswoman, so "get used to off-the-cuff Twitter activity from the former presidential candidate." Paul's "remarkably offensive 140 character eulogy" is certainly a good reminder why politicians are "protected from scrutiny by both aides trained in press relations and friendly journalistic outlets," says Noah Rothman at Mediaite.
Paul has long opposed American military action... but the former veteran has begun to conflate the missions that he opposes with the men and women who carry those missions out. The sentiment Paul broadcast in this tweet betrays a contempt for Kyle that is, at best, ill-timed.... Paul would be smart to apologize for this insensitive remark, but his political opponents should be thankful for the clarity this unguarded moment has provided the general public. Though the 2012 campaign is long over, Paul's most stalwart supporters continue to insist that the Texas libertarian is the only politician who has the best interests of the troops at heart. This tweet would suggest otherwise. [Mediaite]
"Well, you tell him that I don't talk to suckas."
"...I changed by not changing at all..."
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14
God I love Ron Paul.
I am surprised conservative journalists know his name considering they all seemed to forget it during the primary season.
Second time Paul has been chastised for correctly using Christ's teachings...golden rule anyone?
People are just unwilling to have rational tough discussions in this country, everyone needs to apologize and toe the line or else...
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
I don't think anyone has ever accused Ron Paul of being tactful have they?
It is terrifying when you are too stupid to know who is dumb
- Joe Rogan
I see the Democrat's war on common sense and logic continues.... Yes, it is the Republican strategy to alienate 50% of the voters in the US. In fact they want they want to get elected solely by rich white guys. If you believe that I have a bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. You’ve fallen hook, line, and sinker for the identity politics of the left. Divide up the people in to groups, tell them they are being discriminated against, and promise to help in return for their vote.
Bringing up responsibility is ironic, because if women took responsibility for their own actions, we wouldn't be having an abortion debate. Women already have the right to choose... to choose whether they engage in an activity that could lead to pregnancy, and the choice to take precautions. Over 99% of abortions are not rape related; about 5% are due to health reasons. Thus ~94% could be avoided if women took responsibilities for their actions. You have obviously never considered that if abortions were illegal that women would take more responsibility for their actions and the need for abortions would go way down. Balance that with the fact that sometimes abortions are necessary for medical reasons or rape, and I think we could have a moderate common sense approach to it.
Not today Sir, Probably not tomorrow.............................................. bayfront arena st. pete '94
you're finally here and I'm a mess................................................... nationwide arena columbus '10
memories like fingerprints are slowly raising.................................... first niagara center buffalo '13
another man ..... moved by sleight of hand...................................... joe louis arena detroit '14