News and Views is a twice-weekly column containing an assortment of interesting state, national and international political and financial information, opinions, candidate reviews, scheduled events, Tea Party information, meetings and press releases that we hope will interest you. We will now offer a special section segregating media bias and Hollywood bias to give the reader a better idea of how prevalent it is.
Ask Peter: Avoiding the Fiscal Cliff and Preventing Tax Increases
WASHINGTON – Congressman Peter Roskam (IL-06) released the latest installment of Ask Peter, a frequent video conversation with Sixth District residents about issues important to them. In this segment, Congressman Roskam responded to an email from Gerald White in Oak Brook about the fiscal cliff and what the House will do to prevent the upcoming tax increases.
To watch the video, click here .
Book Promoting Lesbian Parenting Creating Furor in Utah School District
What do you do if your kindergarten child came home from school one day carrying a library book that praised a pair of lesbians raising a family while at the same time portraying someone who opposed them as afraid and uninformed?
That’s exactly what happened to a mother in Kaysville, Utah, about twenty minutes north of Salt Lake City. After reading through the book, In Our Mothers’ House, that told the story of a pair of lesbian parents and how wonderful their household is. When a neighbor of the lesbian pair tells them that she does not appreciate what the couple is, they explain to their kids that the neighbor is full of fear and that she just doesn’t understand them.
The Utah parent complained to the Windridge Elementary School about the book and then collected twenty-five signatures from other parents who were against the book. The matter went before a parent-teacher board who then voted 6-1 to keep the book in the school’s library, but to place it behind the counter where only a parental permission would allow a student to check the book out. In making their decision, the board said that state law forbids the avocation of homosexuality in any school curriculum.
The Davis School District had added the book to five school libraries, including Windridge Elementary School because they had learned that a student at the school was being raised by a lesbian couple. Now the American Civil Liberties Union has gotten involved in the case. They believe that a library book does not equate to curriculum and thus the book should not be restricted from student access. They also site the First Amendment rights of the students to free speech.
Trouble Brewing In Iran, Stirred By Sanctions: As the United States and its European allies continue to impose sanctions on Iran, the Mideast country is becoming more defiant and combative. European companies will no longer be involved in insuring Iranian oil. The latest measures come on top of previous sanctions levied by the United States and the West that have already hit Iran’s economy.
The United States imposed a new round of sanctions on Thursday, targeting financial institutions of any country that buys Iranian oil. Twenty economies are exempt from the sanctions for a period of 180 days. As an EU oil embargo took effect on Sunday, Iranian leaders said the country was beginning a new round of war games that would involve firing missiles at models of foreign air bases. The nation’s National Security and Foreign Policy Committee also drafted a bill calling for Iran to attempt to stop oil tankers from shipping crude through the Strait of Hormuz — a key oil shipping route — to countries that support sanctions, a committee member reportedly said on Monday
What the Hell are the Democrats Doing?
- I-635, a feeder from I-35 to I-45, in Texas is being rebuilt at a cost of over $5 billion and the work is contracted to a CHINESE firm! $5 billion of out toll and tax dollars!
Diane Sawyer reporting on U.S. bridge projects going to the Chinese…. NOT Americans. The bridges are right here in the U.S. and yet Obama has approved for Chinese contractors to come in and do the work. What about jobs for Americans?
Watch the video below. It doesn’t take long to view.
This one should be tough for the supporters of the current regime to swallow. AND it comes from ABC NEWS U.S.A. Bridges and Roads Being Built by Chinese Firms
Shocking to say the least! This video is a jaw-dropper that will make you sick.
(It was also shocking that ABC was actually reporting this story.)
The lead-in with Obama promising jobs in the U.S. by improving our infrastructure is so typical of all his promises! Our tax dollars are at work – for CHINA. We hope all the unemployed see this and cast their votes accordingly in 2012!
CLICK here: U.S. Bridges, Roads Being Built by Chinese Firms | Video – ABC News
Taliban Morality Squads: An Ominous Sign for Afghanistan
Emboldened by the news that NATO combat troops will soon leave Afghanistan, the Taliban has established morality squads in some remote Afghan provinces, sending a signal that it wants to reestablish its draconian religious rule over the entire country. Unfortunately for the West, it has the potential to achieve this goal.
Rep. Robert Dold (R-10thIL)
I believe one of the most important things Congress can do right now is empower job creators so they can continue to innovate and invest right here in America. Regardless of political party, we can all agree on the need to jumpstart our economy and encourage job growth.
As part of my Main Street Jobs Agenda, I believe that one way we can work together to promote job creation is by investing in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) education. That is why I am proud to be an original co-sponsor of the Startup Act 2.0. This bipartisan bill has a broad base of support in both the House and the Senate.
Startup Act 2.0 is a jobs bill that is proof Congress can work together and get things done. Click on the image below to watch a floor speech I recently gave on the importance of finding common ground and passing this legislation.
- Startup Act 2.0 invites foreign born students who are pursuing advanced degrees in STEM fields to stay in the United States and create new jobs. On average, for every foreign-born individual in this field that stays in America after they graduate, 2.6 new jobs are created.
- Startup Act 2.0 offers targeted tax breaks to small businesses so that they can grow. It creates a research and development tax credit for early-stage startups and allows exemptions from capital gains taxes on investment in startups that are held for at least 5 years.
- Startup Act 2.0 would require the government proposed regulations that could have greater than a $100 million impact on our economy. This is important so that we are only implementing smart regulations, and not job-crushing red tape that prevents businesses from growing.
Should you have any questions about this legislation, please do not hesitate to call your Washington office at 202-225-4835. You can also learn more about my Main Street Jobs Agenda on my website, by visiting my Facebook page, or by following me on Twitter.
Mali: Islamists Set Out to Destroy Treasure of Timbuktu
Islamist militants have tightened their grip on northern Mali and are destroying ancient Muslim sites in Timbuktu — some that date to the fifteenth century — that the militants hold to be a violation of true Islam. The Islamists are also likely to invite like-minded jihadists into the region, giving them safe haven while accepting their contributions of weapons. The longer the Islamists have to consolidate their position in northern Mali at the edge of the Sahara desert, the more likely that any attempt to remove them will be bloody and protracted.
India: Military Modernization to Benefit US Firms
Recent announcements provide proof of India’s increasing commitment to defense modernization, and give some insight into India’s military priorities. Strategic capabilities such as nuclear missile technology (both land and submarine-launched), a blue-water navy, and space technology will likely see some of the largest funding increases and are areas that could pose a real challenge to other major powers in Asia in the near future.
Media & Hollywood Bias
ABC Skips Its Own Footage of the Supreme Court Contradicting Obama on Tax Increase: In the wake of the Supreme Court ruling that Obamacare is constitutional as a tax, a number of media outlets played the now-embarrassing clip of Barack Obama insisting the law isn’t a tax. Despite the footage coming from a 2009 interview on This Week, ABC’s journalists studiously avoided highlighting their own footage. CBS, however, played it. Even The Daily Show on Comedy Central highlighted the September 20, 2009 interview. On CBS This Morning, Jan Crawford played the clip of Obama telling George Stephanopoulos: “For us to say that you’ve got to take a responsibility to get health insurance is absolutely not a tax increase.” On Friday’s Good Morning America, Jake Tapper tried to remind Stephanopoulos of the moment.
CNN Cherry Picks Numbers in favor of Obamacare: CNN’s Soledad O’Brien cherry picked from one poll to argue that the American public favors ObamaCare, when five polls from the last two weeks show more Americans opposing the law than favoring it. On Friday’s Starting Point, O’Brien challenged Gov. Bob McDonnell’s (R-Va.) premise that “about 60 percent” of Americans oppose the ObamaCare mandate. She cited “the latest poll” from Bloomberg showing a majority of respondents wanting the law to remain mostly or completely intact. However, at least four polls released days after the Bloomberg poll show more voters opposing the law than supporting it.
CBS’s O’Donnell Lets Schumer Defend ObamaCare, Challenges Coburn’s Criticism : On Sunday’s Face the Nation, fill-in host Norah O’Donnell simply let Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) air his Democratic talking points on ObamaCare while she challenged Republican Senator Tom Coburn (Okla.) over criticisms he made of the law.
O’Donnell asked simple questions of Schumer like “What’s your reaction?” to Republican criticisms of ObamaCare, and “Mitt Romney says he is going to repeal this on day one of his presidency. Can he actually do that?”
Meanwhile, the CBS host challenged Sen. Coburn’s facts about the deficit, saying the CBO scored ObamaCare as saving millions of dollars in the long-run. “[T]he CBO has scored this as not just deficit-neutral but actually saving taxpayers a hundred billion dollars,” she claimed after Coburn said the bill would cost $1.9 trillion over ten years.
“This bill costs $1.6 trillion minimum. It’s going to cost more than that with the changes that the Supreme Court made in terms of the optionality of Medicaid for the states,” Coburn responded.
NY Times Movie Critic Blames ‘Reagan Years’ for Decline of American Movies: New York Times movie critics Manohla Dargis and A.O. Scott held their annual joyless, political summer movie conversation, focusing on the glut of superhero movies. Dargis managed to make a villain out of President Reagan, while Scott chimed in by complaining that movie superheroes are “avatars of reaction” and that the last X-Men movie was insufficiently attentive to the civil rights movement (really). Dargis: “The media consolidation that traces back to the Reagan years has had enormous deleterious consequences on American movies.”
CNN Anchor Tells Bill Nye He’s Losing to Conservative ‘Politicizing’ the Climate: CNN’s Carol Costello told guest Bill Nye “The Science Guy” on Monday that climate change skeptics are “politicizing this issue” and “winning.” Of course, the two did not admit to the possibility of man-made climate change believers doing the exact same thing. “But the people who are politicizing this issue, they seem to be winning because not much is being done on the issue of climate change even though President Obama promised that, you know, back in the day, 2008,” Costello said.
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