Politics and Government in America

Today in the Huffington Post, Barney Frank wrote about the “Republican amnesia.” In that op-ed, he wrote: “In recent weeks, my friends across the aisle have expended a lot of breath proclaiming that the Democrats caused the present financial crisis by failing to pass legislation to regulate financial services companies in the years 1995 through 2006. There is only small one problem with this story — throughout this entire period the Republicans were in complete charge of the House and for the most critical years they controlled the House, the Senate, and the Presidency.”Meanwhile, Barney Frank and other Democrats continue to push the idea that they have no responsibility for the one trillion dollar deficit that we current are dealing with. Perhaps it is Congressman Frank who is dealing with amnesia, since the Democrats held control of the Senate from 2001-2003 and that they filibustered nearly 40% of the time when they were in the minority during the rest of that period. Among those bills the Senate Democrats filibustered were the reform bills the Congressman Frank says they had no control over.

Congressman Frank also seems to forget that one of the first people to accuse congressional Democrats of blocking these bills was not a Republican at all. It was former President William Jefferson Clinton, a Democrat.Of all the people who has no love for congressional Republicans from that era, it is President Clinton.

Amazingly though, in his rush to shove Republicans under the bus, he forgot to warn his own party to get out of the way. By claiming that the Democrats had no power when they were in the minority, he is by default arguing that the current budget deficit rests squarely on the shoulders of the Democrats in Congress. Furthermore, he is telling the American people that when things don’t get any better, the Republicans cannot be blamed for it.

Barney Frank was so eager to protect his opwn posterier that he didn’t realize that he has just painted the biggest target in the world on the backs of the Democrat Party. What is good for the goose is good for the gander.  Take a look at this little nugget that Congressman Frank wrote:

“I in fact worked together with my Republican colleague Michael Oxley, then Chairman of the Financial Services Committee, to write a bill to increase regulation of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. We passed the bill out of committee with an overwhelming majority — every Democrat voted in favor of the legislation. However, on the House floor the Republican leadership added a poison pill amendment, which would have prevented non-profit institutions with religious affiliations from receiving funds. ” I thought that according to Democrats, the Republican Party was trying to impose a theocracy on our country.  Now it was their disregard for religious groups that drew Congressman Frank’s ire. Does anyone believe this?

This is just one more example of how the Democrats are trying to rewrite history. they wish to absolve themselves of any responsibility so that they can mantain their power. Meanwhile, nobody is talking about the fact that Barney Frank and Chris Dodd rewrote the stimulis bill to specifically allow AIG to pay out the bonuses that they are now up in arms about. Republicans need to stand up and return to the Reagen roots. barney Frank, Chris Dodd, and the entire Democrat Party has given them everything they need to show the American people the truth. The Obama administration is a long list of broken promises, and we haven’t even hit the 100 day mark yet. It’s time for us to take back the country and put it back on the right track.

Democrats in congress have been fuming for the past several days over big bonuses payed to AIG executives. They are angry because AIG received taxpayer money in the bailout and are now paying bonuses to their executives. The problem is that all of this outrage is entirely bogus.

It turns out that the Democrats knew about the bonuses before they were ever payed out. The fact that AIG was legally obligated to pay these bonuses was disclosed to Congress in the paperwork that AIG was required to file to get the bailout money. The Congressional Democrats either knew about the bonuses and didn’t say anything until it was politically expedient, or they didn’t know about them because they have been doing a poor job of managing the taxpayer’s money.

Either way, the Democrats are showing that they are an opportunistic bunch. They are now crafting a bill that would tax bonuses up to one hundred percent on bonuses given to companies that receive bailout money. This is going on at the same time that they are also working on legislation that would force companies to take bailout money, even if they don’t want it. They have already forced banks like Wells Fargo to take millions of dollars of bailout money that they didn’t want, and then used that to force them into doing things the Democrats wanted.

Meanwhile, Andrew Cuomo is in New York investigating whether the payment of the bonuses were done fraudulently under New York law. In the meantime, no one is investigating whether or not Mr. Cuomo could be criminally liable in the collapse of the housing market and in pushing the government to allow people who could not pay for them to receive mortgages. It was the housing collapse that kicked off this current economic crisis, but we are still allowing the people who created the problem to run the show. Now they are investigating others for misconduct, while successfully hiding their own role in the problem. If there were any genuine outrage in Washington D.C. it would be directed at those who are telling us everyday just how outraged they are.

Obama economic advisor Larry Summers was on ABC’s This Weekdefending the president’s economic plans. When he was asked about the Republican concerns that President Obama’s budget “spends too much, taxes too much, and borrows too much,” Mr. Summers said that Obama was eager to see the Republicans concrete alternatives and that the president had inherited a one trillion dollar deficit from “a Republican president and a Republican congress.” With that statement, Mr. Summers made two serious errors that cannot be allowed to go unaddressed.

First off, as Mr. Summers and the president should know, members of congress have no Constitutional authority to write a budget proposal. They only have the authority to approve or reject the budget proposed by the president. This means that if members of the Republican caucus were to write and present an alternative budget, they would be overstepping their authority. It also means that by saying that the president is waiting for the Republicans to present an alternative plan, they are engaged in an active effort to confuse and mislead the American people. This is just a trick, designed to make the American people think the Republicans don’t have any other ideas, when in fact they do not have the authority to present an alternate plan.

The second lie that Mr. Summers told is that there was a Republican congress in power when President Obama took office. The Republicans had not been in control of Congress for two years prior to the election of Barack Obama.  Therefore, the blame for a trillion dollar deficit lays squarely on the shoulders of Democrats. I know earlier I said that Congress cannot present a budget, but I also said that they have the power to reject the budget presented by the president. That is how we got the much talked about balanced budgets and budget surpluses of the Bill Clinton years. The Republicans in Congress forced Bill Clinton to present fiscally sound budgets by refusing to pass any that was not balanced or contained a surplus. Thus the Clinton era economy has more to do with Republicans standing up for their principles then any thing Bill Clinton did, despite what Democrat pundits are saying today.

President Obama had promised to have the most honest and transparent administration in history. Yet so far all we have seen is a growing list of lies, half truthes, partisan bickering and tax cheats. America needs to hold Barack Obama accountable for his actions, but it is unlikely to happen. Barack Obama is so skilled at manipulating the public that the American people will never realize that they have been lied to. It’s time that those of us who are immune to the Obamagic wake up, stand up, and remind America why this guy was elected. He was supposed to bring change and honesty to Washington D.C., but so far we have seen very little of either.

Near the end of the Bush administration, the president established what is called “the conscience rule.” This rule says, in essence, that no doctor or medical practitioner can be held libal for refusing to perform a procedure that goes against their religious or moral beliefs. Now the Obama administration has signeled that they are about to put an end to this.

This decision is clearly aimed at attacking people of faith and pushing a pro-abortion, anti-religion agenda.  By forcing people to decide between their livelihood and their faith, President Obama is hoping to create a situation where any doctor that might have opposition to the more radical elements of his health care plan. I can’t help but wonder at this moment if it is just coincidence that this is coming at the same time as the president is pushing his electronic medical record plan.

So, what does this mean for America? It is just one more example of how Barack Obama and his administration view the Constitution. The First Ammendment is as plain as can be on it’s wording, “Congress shall make no law respecting the establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof…” By requiring doctors to perform procedures that go against their religious beliefs, the Obama administration has signaled that they only intend to respect the Constitution when it is in line with their ideology. When ideology and the Constitution are in conflict, the Obama White House has now announced that ideology will win out.

This is becoming reality across the country among liberals. Yesterday gay rights activists convinced the California state supreme court to look at overturning the constitutional amendment that bans gay marriage in that state. The role of the Supreme Court is only to rule on the constitutionality of laws and by amending the Constitution, the voters of California have made outlawing gay marriage constitutional. However, liberals are now trying to use a court system that they have a monopoly on to not just interpret the Constitution of California but to re-write it. If this does not make you scared, it should. The same type people who appointed these justices, that feel it is their job to answer to some nebulous higher power than the Constitution, are the same type of people who will be filling our nation’s courts for the next four years.