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IRS is NON Political – They Will Go After Anyone!

Yesterday the New York Times reported that the former Planned Parenthood Golden Gate–umbrella organization to seven Planned Parenthood clinics in the San Francisco area–is now under investigation by the criminal division of the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). According to the story, a former employee of the organization lodged a complaint with the IRS regarding an inappropriate financial relationship between Planned Parenthood and its political arm.

Meanwhile, as we begin Labor Day 2010, the national group overseeing its affiliates, Planned Parenthood Federation of America, still has not published the annual report from July, 2008-July, 2009. The report, which includes information such as the number of abortions that were performed during that time and the dollar amount received in government funding, is typically made public every April. Interestingly, this report will be the first summary of how the group has fared during the Obama Administration. What might they be hiding?

What we do know is that the non-profit is profiting quite nicely since the Obamas came to D.C. In Planned Parenthood’s IRS 990 form from July, 2008-July, 2009, they had a net profit of over $106 million dollars (and President Obama had only been in office for six months!) For more information on Planned Parenthood’s financials and other interesting facts about the organization that everyone should know, see FRC’s newly released pamphlet, Planned Parenthood: What Every Parent, Teacher, Woman, Community Leader and Elected Official Needs to Know.

Family Research Council

Response to Barbara Boxer’s Form Letter

Here is a form e-mail letter I received from Barbara Boxer today. My comments are in [brackets].

September 02, 2010
Dear Friend:

As I keep working to help pull California out of the worst recession since the Great Depression, my top priority has been to create jobs and get our economy moving again. [Note: First off, I am not your friend. Your idea of creating jobs is creating government jobs. What you should be doing is cutting regulations and lowering taxes so investors will feel comfortable investing in the private sector again and pull the COUNTRY out of its recession!]

At the same time, we must begin attacking the federal budget deficit. Though economic growth and job creation are the best tools to reduce the deficit, we must take additional steps to eliminate the long-term budget deficit and protect future generations from a staggering burden of debt. [True though you have gone along with Obama and the Democrats on every spending bill since you took over the House and Senate!]

We did it before, and we can do it again. When President Bill Clinton and I first took office, the nation was suffering under a recession and a massive federal budget deficit. Eight years later, we had created 23 million jobs and the biggest budget surplus in history: $236 billion. Unfortunately, the failed policies of the last administration left us with a $1.3 trillion deficit and an economy in shambles. [If you remember, it was a Republican Congress that made this happen, not Democrats! And stop blaming the past administration and man-up. It's YOUR economy now!]

Here are some measures we could take right away to cut the federal deficit:

Adhere to “pay-as-you-go” (PAYGO) rules requiring any new federal investments to be offset by corresponding budget cuts – I have voted for PAYGO rules eight times since 2003; [Does anyone else remember a speech by Obama not that long ago saying we were going to be using PAYGO??? This is a NEW idea??? How about just living up to the original promise???]

Cut $36.5 billion over the next ten years in tax breaks for oil and gas companies; [Again with Big Oil. What about your Big Government salaries? And what happens when energy prices skyrocket?]

Cut $15 billion over ten years in tax breaks for companies that ship jobs overseas; [Who gave it to them in the first place and made it impossible to do business in the US?]

Cut $100 billion over ten years from the federal government’s travel budget, which rose by 75 percent during the Bush era; [Does this include the Michelle Obama trips with 40 of her friends or the Imam who is traveling overseas on our dime for an "outreach" program?]

Save $1.1 trillion over ten years by bringing the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to a close; [Oh sure, the one thing the Constitution says the government CAN do, you want to shut down our national defense. Our spending for 7 years of wars is a drop in the bucket compared to all the stimulus and other spending you guys have done.]

Cut $500 billion over ten years in wasteful payments made by the Federal government; [Starting with your salary, health care and retirement pension???]

Save hundreds of billions of dollars by allowing some of the Bush tax cuts to expire – even just those for millionaires. [Why target the rich? I have never gotten a job from anyone who is standing on a street corner. It is the rich who are providing the jobs by investing in the economy. If the rich are made poor how does that help anyone?]

In addition to these steps, I look forward to evaluating the recommendations of the bipartisan deficit reduction commission recently established by President Obama. I have voted to establish a bipartisan deficit reduction commission whose recommendations would get fast-track authority for Congressional approval, and I am glad President Obama took the initiative to establish a commission. [Make no mistake. The theory is that this bi-partisan commission is going to recommend a VAT tax... with us in the middle of a recession! Are you trying to send us into a DEPRESSION?]

Working together, I know we can put America on the road to a balanced budget and sustained economic growth. We did it before. We can do it again. [Working together we are going to retire you in November and put some real solution-oriented people to work on solving our fiscal problems.]

Sincerely,
Barbara Boxer

[Your "Friend"
FedUpEditor]

Our Monetary System

Something for Nothing… and Sometimes Even Less – OPINION

Sometimes it is hard to get excited about living in Northern California. Though I love being here I have begun to have “battered conservative syndrome”. Residing in the area has certain perks. We are in relatively warm weather most of the time yet near the snow if we want winter activities or surf if we want to see the ocean. What I am talking about is not our wonderful mountains, sea and weather, it is the people… liberals, to be specific. Everywhere I look from advertising in print or on television or bumper stickers on the backs of beat up Honda Civics, etc., all I see are liberal platitudes about environmental issues and slogans of peace and love.

Question: how does having the word “peace” stuck on a bumper sticker achieve the goal? Shouldn’t these people be going to countries where human rights are in jeopardy? I say, “Shut up and go do something.” But I digress…

On three out of four corners of Camino Alto and Blithedale and the south bound freeway exit in Mill Valley we now have various races of homeless people begging for money. One of these days I am going to buy an hour of one of the more coherent of them and find out how much money and services they are getting from all the welfare programs available to them; federal, state, county and city. I’ll bet it’s a lot when you add up subsidized housing, food programs, health programs, etc. These people are in their situation, not because there is no opportunity in the US. It is because of other problems like mental illness or drug and alcohol abuse. Very few of them are there because of life circumstances, and of those, rarely do they find themselves permanently in the ranks of the homeless.

Don’t get me wrong. Many of us have problems. Every third commercial on the conservative radio stations is about legally discharging debt while keeping the goodies that got them there. Tax attorneys are advertising about how they can get the government to forgive all or part of a tax liability. Nobody seems to have any responsibility any more. It’s sad when you think about it. Even during the depression, people took make-work jobs because they were too proud to receive hand-outs. Oh, if only that sentiment existed today. Now the Obama government is talking about forcing lenders to forgive any home loan that is underwater where people are unable to pay their mortgage. What about those of us who are struggling to make our payments to keep our credit in good stead? It’s catastrophic what will happen to the housing market if Obama does this as his October surprise. Talk about chaos!

In the meantime, many of us are banging our heads to secure new employment or renegotiate contracts to keep the work we have. How long before we too give up? After all, why should we pull the cart while so many freeloaders are piling on? What’s our incentive? After all, aren’t we conservatives the bad guys even when we are paying the bills to keep the lights on? And what happens when the rest of us stop pulling and jump in the cart with the rest of the country? Do yo think those rich people running Congress and the Senate will have to start putting money in to keep the scam going? Will it be government workers who are now being paid more than their private sector counterparts? Doubtful. Government will probably just print or borrow more money.

But wait! Don’t jump off the bridge yet! Here’s why I have hope. Most people in the United States don’t want a handout from the government. The prevailing sentiment is that we still live in the greatest country in the world, even if the news media is telling us otherwise. Tea Parties and other protests are continually springing up all over the country put on by people who don’t normally go out and do this. All predictions for the elections in the fall say Republicans (mostly conservatives) will win handily.

A word of caution: winning the election is just the beginning. Once elected, we must insist they govern like conservatives. Will this happen, or will the old “John McCain” return? Right now I see 4 Republicans who stand in the way of real victory: Lindsey Graham, John McCain, Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins. Of course there are others like Charles Grassley who could throw a spanner in the works. But make no mistake; the shift is starting to happen. And that gives me hope.

FedUpEditor

Guess Who Is Paying for Lawyers to Sue Themselves?

The federal government spends about the same amount of money funding environmental lawyers as it does to protect endangered species according to an investigation conducted by a Wyoming lawyer who defends farmers and ranchers involved in environmental lawsuits.

According to the Capital Press, Karen Budd-Falen was curious how much money the federal government paid the lawyers who initiated cases against her clients and uncovered more than $4.7 billion in taxpayer money that the government paid to environmental law firms between 2003 and 2007.  That represents an average of $940 million a year, compared to $922 million spent directly on the 986 endangered and threatened species, according to the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s annual report.

According to her research, Budd-Falen found that three environmental groups—Western Watersheds Council, Forest Guardians and the Center for Biological Diversity—filed more than 700 lawsuits against the U.S. government between 2000 and 2009.

“That money is not going into programs to protect people, wildlife, plants and animals,” Budd-Falen told the Capital Press, “but to fund more lawsuits.”

According to Budd-Falen, environmental groups are eligible for government funds under the Equal Access to Justice Act, which provides for the award of attorney fees to “prevailing parties” in cases against the government.  The firms also are accessing government funds through the Judgment Fund, which is a line-item appropriation in the federal budget used for paying claims against the government.

“We tried to track the fees paid to environmental groups in certain federal courts. These guys are charging between $350 and $450 an hour in legal fees.” Budd-Falen told Now Public.

“If you just look at the raw number and say ‘why in the world is the United States paying a million dollars bankrolling them to sue us,’ well that’s what congress set up through EAJA. That’s the law, we’re bound by it,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Mark Haws of Boise told Now Public.

Read the entire article here:

Note: Your tax dollars at work… paying lawyers to sue ourselves? WTF??? – FedUpEditor

Letdown? OPINION

It seems to me there has been a bit of a let down in the intensity of the conservative movement lately. Maybe it’s just me. It could be because I had to go back to work and have not had time to opine like had been doing. But \it could also be because people only have so much emotional reserves. Unlike liberals who seem to get up every morning frothing at the mouth about every political topic under the sun, we on the other side have to make a living to support those who can’t or won’t!

One of the articles I have in the works is an opinion piece called “Something for Nothing… or Even Less” which will be about how lucrative it is to continue to stay unemployed. After all, the cruel United States of America has provided all sorts of safety nets for its disadvantaged, so much so that it almost pays to be a bum… sorry, I mean homeless person. Unfortunately, I was stuck in the welfare system back when I moved here from Iowa. But the benefits were so little that I had to find work… and quick! Now, I can almost make as much not working as I can in an entry level minimum wage job. Not to mention the additional benefits of health and dental care paid for by the taxpayers. How sad is that? I even contemplated going on unemployment when my census stint ended. Who knows how long they will extend the benefits?

But back to the emotional intensity issue. Perhaps people are having a letdown after the primaries. Although they didn’t put as many conservatives on the ballot as we would like. For example, there’s no way I will ever vote for Abel Moldonado for Lt. Governor… or anything for that matter. But the “moderates” who made it (Fiorina and Whitman, for example) have a good chance of winning in California’s political climate. The alternative Democrat choices (Boxer and Brown) are disasters we’ve already seen in action and have a proven track record of failure. Then we have Jim Judd for Congress and Robert Louis Stephens for Assembly who stand a good chance of winning according to a generic poll I just saw today.

On the down side, the Marin County Republican Central Committee was unable to remove the “moderate” Chair, Sashi McEntee, from her position, even though there was an apparent sentiment of anger over her choosing to openly back open primaries with a newspaper editorial. Regardless of the outcome, we have shown that grass roots groups like the Marin Conservative Forum and the North Bay and Bay Area Patriots actually can have as much or more influence than the local Republican Party. If they clean house next year that could change, but I wouldn’t hold my breath.

I, for one, am getting worn out with all the bad news coming out of this administration. It seems like there is a daily effort to undermine the Constitution, and none of our elected leaders seem to challenge Obama about it. Why do we even have a legislative body when many of the mandates the President is handing down are not privileges given to the Executive Branch? The recent health care mandate to demand insurance companies provide FREE services to their customers is a perfect example of Executive overreach. How is that even legal? These orders bypass the very congressmen and senators who were elected to pass laws. Yet Ms. Pelosi is mum about the usurpation of her powers by our President. Maybe because they are of the same mind and political party? I hardly see her standing still if Bush were trying to do the same thing. But that argument requires intellectual honesty; something liberals seem to lack.

Look at the race issue with the election tampering in Philadelphia. If that had been white people intimidating black people in front of the polls instead of the other way around, that’s all we would be hearing about on the mainstream media. Instead, about the only place we can hear about the incident is in alternative media or on Fox news. That is a sad commentary on the state of race relations in the United States. Watch the movie Invictus (whether factual or not) and tell me that Obama is following the same prescription that Mandela did in bringing his country together. Mandela, at least in the movie, was a man of principle and intellectual honesty. He knew that the law had to be color blind before race relations would improve. Instead, Obama is allowing the New Black Panthers to disobey the election laws which can only the, that is if people actually hear about it!

During the day I listen to shows like Hannity and Limbaugh when I can and am amazed at the people who call into the show supporting the administration’s handling of the incident… which is basically ignoring it. Again, no intellectual honesty. And in my opinion, this constant barrage of negativity leads to a let down to those of us who are pulling the cart. I’m sure that is the goal. By wearing us down, it’s easier to get us to stay with the status quo.

The perfect example came from my accountant who is a conservative. He said, “When it all comes down to it, Republican or Democrat, they are all the same!” Then he used an expletive.

Are they?

FedUpEditor

Rep. Lynn Woolsey [clueless]: Fighting Childhood Obesity at School

Note: We are going to add comments in the body of the blog article to refute what she is saying. – Editor

It’s been 30 years since the regulations limiting junk food sales in schools were updated, despite big changes in nutrition science.‪ Today, 23 million children and adolescents are obese or overweight.‪  Obesity rates for children between 6 and 11 years old have more than tripled over the last 40 years. [Note: so has this ban helped? NO! Liberals think that by limiting something they can change people's behavior, but obesity is on the RISE! Take a look in the mirror, Lynn. You're getting up there yourself!]‪

Throughout their lives, these children are at greater risk for heart disease, Type 2 Diabetes, stroke, cancer, and social and psychological problems.‪ One of the most important ways to help fight this epidemic is to ensure that higher quality, more nutritious foods are sold throughout the day in our schools.‪ [Note: This will not solve the problem. What it will take is a change in mindset!]

This is why I have introduced H.R. 1324, the Child Nutrition Promotion and School Lunch Protection Act, which requires that all foods sold in schools throughout the entire school day are based on the most current nutrition science.‪ [Note: More nanny state government bureaucracy! We're too stupid to think for ourselves!]

This bill has 170 cosponsors and has been endorsed by over 90 public health, school, food and beverage industry, and nutrition groups, including the American Beverage Association, General Mills, and the American Heart Association.‪ I am pleased that this language has been included in Chairman George Miller’s (D-CA) H.R. 5504, the Improving Nutrition for America’s Children Act. [Note: And if everyone said it was a good idea to jump off the Golden Gate Bridge, would you do it, Lynn? (Please say yes!}]

This provision does not affect school parties or foods sold during sporting events or band concerts in which parents are present. It only regulates foods sold in schools, and allows USDA to exempt foods sold as part of fundraisers. It’s also important to realize that schools that are switching to selling healthier foods and are not losing revenue.‪

Studies by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the Centers for Disease Control, and the Center for Weight and Health at U.C. Berkeley found that the majority of schools switching to healthier foods in their vending machines and a la carte lines actually increased their total revenues.

‪In other words, it is a win-win situation for schools—healthier students and a healthier bottom line as well‪‪.

[Note: This is a lose-lose for our schools since kids will now go off campus to the 7/11 or Safeway to buy their junk, leaving less time for studies. Lynne Woolsey, you are a loser! Resign now and let the grown ups run the government!]

Lynn Woolsey’s Arrogance Shows Again

Hey, Lynn! The Marin taxpayers own half the Golden Gate Bridge if anyone does. Our tolls keep it open! – FedUpEditor

I am Lynn Woolsey, congresswoman from Marin and Sonoma Counties in California, which means that I own half of the Golden Gate Bridge, so that makes me perfectly situated to talk about poor people, right? No, but I am perfectly prepared because I was one, a person in need of a lot of the discussion that you have in your volume that I am going to participate in and I was honored to be able to contribute to the volume about how culture shapes the way people in poverty live. I mean, we have to think about that, don’t we? What a concept. Values, norms, beliefs play very important roles in the way people meet the challenges of poverty, and as one of the essays in your volume illustrates, they also play important roles in shaping how lawmakers choose to address poverty issues. And it is a shame, a lot of people that make these decisions around here have never lived through anything but a really comfortable, easy life. But you know what? There are also a lot of members, even though they have not, that they get the picture. Our speaker [Nancy Pelosi] is one; I mean, she has had a very nice life. She understands and she cares very much about people who have less. So you do not have to have lived the life that I went through with my children at one point when we were on welfare to really get the picture. But, unfortunately, too many don’t and you can see it when all of a sudden the light goes on because they have got a grandchild with a disease, diabetes let us say, or something that they are facing – oh my goodness, this does happen. I am going on about my colleagues, but it is very important that even if they have not lived through something that you help them see and this volume that I participated in I hope they will read. The lesson I take from all of this is that those of us in Congress must constantly re-examine the way we frame problems on Capitol Hill. We have to see if we are keeping up with the changing reality on the ground.

In my commentary, I examined one area where lawmakers’ thinking and legislating has not kept pace at all, and that is the relationship between work and family. We are just starting to talk about that now, but it has been clear for many years now that the typical American family has changed. We used to be a nation of predominantly nuclear families, complete with one breadwinner, usually the male, and one at-home, full-time parent, 99.9 percent the female, home with the children, after school, what a nice way to live, Ozzie and Harriet. For the first time in history now women make up one-half of the workforce. Today four in five families with children still at home do not consist of the traditional male worker and the female homemaker. In addition, nearly four in ten mothers are primary breadwinners – primary breadwinners – for their families, while nearly two-thirds are breadwinners or co-breadwinners, bringing home at least a quarter of their family’s earnings. While there is a growing cultural awareness of this change, the laws governing work-life balance have not kept up. In fact, our country, the wealthiest country on this globe, ranks at the bottom of industrialized nations when it comes to such issues as paid sick and maternal and paternal leave, access to affordable childcare, policies that promote flexible workplaces. Lawmakers have been slow to recognize that the traditional distinctions between home and work and between sole breadwinner and stay-at-home mom have collapsed. The worlds of work and home have become interdependent and our legislation needs to reflect this. I mean, we have a society-and we are very responsible for that as legislators-we have a society where if a child is lucky enough to have two parents, both of those parents are in the workforce, not always but usually, and if the child has one parent, that parent certainly is in the workforce. So we need steps to integrate our laws in a more holistic way of seeing the relationship between family and work. Most notably, the Family Medical Leave Act [FMLA] with its provisions for unpaid, protected leave. A bill I have introduced and reintroduced and reintroduced, called The Balancing Act, will carry us much further in the direction we need to go. It is comprehensive legislation, it is a package that includes bills introduced by other members of Congress; it is an omnibus bill, it is huge. And when I talk in front of Kiwanis and Rotary Clubs I watch the women business people at it, I watch the older businessmen – this is a surprise – who have daughters and in the workforce now-get it, and then there is the group in between who say, “Well, Congresswoman, this is all very nice but we cannot afford it,” and all I say is we cannot afford not to do this. Figure it out. The Balancing Act would provide paid family medical leave for workers to care for family members – so that they can bond with new children at the birth, and then not just the mother, the father too – or for recovering from an illness or helping a parent, there is this sandwich generation, I am looking around at you, a lot of you in this room are going to be taking care of your parents as well as taking care of children. So we would expand FMLA to cover more workers, to provide leave for children’s extracurricular activities, to allow workers time to cope with the effects of domestic violence. I mean right now, domestic violence – you do not get paid time off or you do not get protected if you have to take time off from your job. So the package also provides grants to build childcare centers and for schools to offer hot breakfasts, as well as to expand before- and after-school activities, and for voluntary universal preschool – so you can see it is huge. It has provisions to give part-time workers benefits – what a concept – and the bill would also encourage employers to allow their employees to telecommute and it supports flexible work schedules. There are other bills that recognize the new reality for American families, including efforts to permit employees to request flexible hours, expand the Family Medical Leave Act to cover domestic partners, and allow breast-feeding in the workplace. The fact that these bills have been introduced shows that more and more lawmakers are recognizing the new reality of the American family. The fact that none of these bills has passed shows that we still have a very, very long way to go. So your efforts here are not wasted on most of us; it will be good I think to make sure that we get that out to all members of the House and the Senate so they cannot pretend like they have not seen it and it will not be the first time they have heard about these issues but maybe they can concentrate on one or two of them. And staff, staff are very important, so make sure that legislative staff know that you have put together this wonderful, wonderful piece of work. So, I thank you all. I do not know if you want questions and answers or for me to just go away, I will do whatever you want.

Editor’s note: Remember, Democrats have been working on poverty since before FDR and have not solved the problem yet. As long as Woolsey thinks she can keep her job talking about solving the problem, she’ll appease everyone. Jim Judd, on the other hand, is a business man who has actually created jobs and wealth in his community of Cotati instead of talking about it. A vote for him will go a long way to putting Woolsey out to pasture where she belongs!

California Legislators Pelosi, Boxer and Feinstein Wealthiest Lawmakers in Washington…

Kind of makes you wonder why they want to tax the rich although they are not giving up THEIR money! Democrat voters are stupid to believe these lying liars! – Editor

Lynn Woolsey Killing Jobs Again!

Editor’s note: This is not about protecting workers. This is about Congress getting its grubby mitts on 1099 employees’ salaries so they can steal the taxes! Don’t fall for this. About the only place employment is growing is contracting because companies can not afford to hire full time. If business is forced to hire them as employees, it will stifle the job creation. Woolsey needs to be removed before she kills all new job growth.  

On Thursday, June 17, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee held a hearing on preventing employers from misclassifying employees as independent contractors. The hearing focused on the Employee Misclassification Prevention Act (EMPA), a recently introduced bill intended to reduce instances of worker misclassification through new record-keeping requirements, notice requirements, and the imposition of civil penalties for employer violations.

Chairman Harkin (D-IA) opened the hearing by arguing that independent contractors are not afforded sufficient protections under the labor law, such as those provided by minimum wage standards, overtime requirements, unemployment compensation, workers’ compensation, safety and health laws and antidiscrimination provisions. Harkin asserted that a few “unscrupulous” employers thus make economic challenges “even more difficult for their workers by intentionally misclassifying them as ‘independent contractors’ to gain an advantage over their law-abiding competitors.” Harkin also argued employee misclassification costs federal and state governments “billions of dollars in unpaid revenues.” For example, it deprives governments of the payments that support unemployment and workers’ compensation systems, as employers are only required to make these payments on behalf of employees and not independent contractors. Accordingly, Harkin posited that while employer misclassification laws are currently in place in several states, a federal legislative response is necessary.

Read the entire article here.

• Recent Posts

  • IRS is NON Political – They Will Go After Anyone!
  • Response to Barbara Boxer’s Form Letter
  • Our Monetary System
  • API Sponsors Job Rallies – Where are our Politicians?
  • Ethanol 15 – Coming soon to a neighborhood near you!
  • Something for Nothing… and Sometimes Even Less – OPINION
  • API President says Senate leaders took right step to shelve flawed spill bill
  • Guess Who Is Paying for Lawyers to Sue Themselves?
  • Letdown? OPINION
  • API Sounds Off on the Drilling Moratorium… The Second One!

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