LAME DUCK CONGRESS--THE FINAL DAMAGE ASSESSMENT The Grinch delivered four bad bills to the nation this Christmas. Santa must have been too busy with toys to help us out. At least we are thankful that the 111th Congress is finally ending--one of the most damaging in history. The Democrat's victories were facilitated by liberal Republicans, who, with a couple of exceptions, will be back again next year to make sure the Republican Party continues to betray their Pledge to America. The Repeal of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" was facilitated by Alaska Senator Lisa Murkowski who was rejected in the primary but resurrected herself as a write-in candidate (with a little help from her friends in state government). Then there was Senator Bob Bennett of Utah who also was defeated in the primary for being too liberal. His infamous last vote in Congress was in favor of the NEW START Treaty, handing over to Russia yet more concessions as it builds a new generation of nuclear missiles while we foolishly disarm. I hope he lives long enough to see the deadly consequences of his actions. There were two major successes, for which we are grateful: 1) the defeat of the Dream Act--a poor euphemism for amnesty--and 2) the postponement of the $1.3T Omnibus Spending bill, which was loaded with pork and perks. The GOP mounted an effective filibuster to the DREAM Act, and they held Democrats to only a three-month funding resolution, ensuring Republicans will have a strong say in the budget when this expires. I don't count the passage of the Tax Bill a success because there were too many compromises that will come back to haunt us. It could have been handled next year without any compromise. As critics noted, the Dream Act really was just plain backdoor amnesty for more than just alien students--millions more. William Gheen, President of ALIPAC (Americans for Legal Immigration PAC) reveals that the bill had a fine print provision to allow it's criteria for qualification to be waived: "But now we find a waiver on page 5, line 21 of HR 5281 that allows Obama to grant Amnesty for most of the 12-20 million illegal aliens in America! Close inspection of HR 5281, which passed the house last week by a narrow margin, finds a blanket waiver provision on page 5 line 21 Sec. 6 (a)(2). Immediately following all of the promises in the bill that only illegal aliens that claim they are under 30, claim they have been in the US 5 years, and claim they were brought here by others when they were under 16, and claim they are going to college or into the military, the waiver allows all of these considerations to be dropped. "'(2) WAIVER.--With respect to any benefit under this section and sections...the Secretary of Homeland Security may waive the... ground of inadmissibility ...and the ground of deportability... for humanitarian purposes or family unity or when it is otherwise in the public interest.'" Is that broad language or what? Bryan Darling of the Heritage Foundation said it best, "It seems that the GOP snatched defeat from the jaws of victory... President Obama was on the verge of being the next Jimmy Carter, and incompetent GOP messaging and legislating has made him into a modern-day FDR." Sadly, it was worse than incompetence. It was betrayal by liberal Republicans In Name Only (RINO). Sen. Lindsey Graham, a compromising Republican from So. Carolina, claimed he was shell-shocked at the losses: "I'm amazed at what they were able to do on Wednesday. I call it capitulation. At the end of the day, our weak links were exposed." Yes, and he's often one of them. Here are the losses: Don't Ask Don't Tell Repeal: Top military brass are bending over backwards to make it appear as if this new acceptance of homosexuals in the military is going to work. They claim that commanders will accommodate requests by normal soldiers who may object to rooming with someone gay. That's a very small part of the problem, but it won't always work out. What happens in combat? What happens on shipboard when there isn't enough space to accommodate separate preferences? What about in group shower facilities? That's right--accommodation is just a pacifier for the present. What's next, segregated units? What's going to happen is men are going to be forced to accommodate their "protected status" buddies, and eventually the policy will morph into not being able to say anything negative about sexual orientation, any more than race. Any intolerance will be viewed as harassment of the poor gay man. It's going to drive a lot of heterosexuals out of the military. Integrating women into close contact with men, especially in combat or in the Navy, has also been a problem for the military, though commanders know it's their unofficial duty to not talk about it. They can always tell when there is a political agenda being foisted upon them from above. There is a huge cover up in the military about sexual harassment and rape--which are rampant. Six Republicans voted for the repeal. Mark Kirk of Illinois and Scott Brown of Massachusetts (both liberals who got elected in Democratic districts), George Voinovich of Ohio (a neocon conservative who often contradicts his stands as he did here-with no consequences since he's retiring), Lisa Murkowski of Alaska (a liberal who plays conservative enough to fool some) and Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, both of Maine (who never pretend to be anything but liberals), Sens. Richard Burr of North Carolina (a weak conservative who can be rolled by insider pressure) and John Ensign of Nevada (guilty of sexual misconduct himself). We'll hear more from these RINOs in other betrayals. Second: NEW START Treaty Passage: We've covered the issues before in the WAB so our readers should know why this treaty is bad. The top 3 reasons are: 1) It perpetuates the myth that we have effective verification and inspections. We do not, and this treaty restricts where inspectors can verify even more than before. 2) It does nothing to reduce tactical nuclear weapons where Russia has a 10:1 advantage (that we know about) and tactical nukes are all that are necessary to wage war with NATO someday. 3) Russia is flat out cheating and still building more advanced ICBMs while we disarm. It is telling that the Russians were adamant that there be no tinkering with the language. It was all or none for them. That can only mean that it was lopsided toward the advantage of the Russians who never sign any treaty that isn't to their advantage--and they cheat even on those! There was an interesting interplay between those who commented on the Wall Street Journal article announcing that passage was imminent: David Anderson: "Why do we need this treaty? How will it help our strategic position in the world?" Omoge Ediho (a naive liberal): "Remember the First START and its effect on the Soviet Union? The Soviet Union Collapsed, making America much stronger as the Global lone superpower. In Global Capitals, morale authority matter no less than actual military might." Howell Lynch (a realist): "What is morale authority? Actually, military might, and the will to use it, is all the matters. China understands this." Andrew Malone: "START had nothing to do with the Soviet collapse but Star Wars did [actually, nobody collapsed the Soviet Union--it was a fraud perpetrated by the Communists, and they are rearming again in earnest for the strike]." John Lee: "Being as Russia likes this treaty that should tell us that it would not be good for the US. But being as Obama's quest [actually, his globalist handlers] is to destroy this nation he will have his pen ready." Here's the dishonor roll of the duped 13 Republican Senators who defied the warnings of conscience to vote for this one-sided treaty: Sen. Robert Bennett (R-UT), Sen. George V. Voinovich (R- OH) [Two Lame Ducks: How they vote when they don't have to face the voters is more telling than all the former votes], Scott Brown (R-MA), Lisa Murkowski (R-AK), Susan Collins (R-ME), Olympia Snowe (R-ME), Richard Lugar (R-IN) [5 reliable GOP liberals], and non-thinkers Sen. Bob Corker (R-TN), Lamar Alexander (R-TN), Thad Cochran (R-MS), Judd Gregg (R-NH), Jonny Isakson (R-GA), and Mike Johanns (R-NE) Three: The Tax bill: We've also covered this in detail before. In short review, it contained some poisonous compromises that were totally unnecessary to accept given that this could have been taken up in January without the Democrats, passed without compromises, and made retroactive to Jan. 1st. Part of the deal was the passage on December 17th, of the extension of unemployment benefits until the end of 2011. This means that the unemployed will now be eligible for up to 99 weeks again, after having been on the dole for over a year now. This is just the type of mechanism we warned about relative to hyperinflation--the ability of the government to inject money directly into the pockets of consumers. It's not here yet, but this is the type of structural benefit corruption that is dangerous to inflation. The other deal was the resurrection of the dreaded Death Tax-an evil form of double taxation. That should never have been on the table. The last deal was secret--an agreement by Mitch McConnell to back the Omnibus Spending Bill through Sept 2011. That part got knocked down when it became known. McConnell reneged and proposed a 3 month extension instead. We'll have to watch McConnell. The PTB may well still expect him to make good on this through hook or by crook next year. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- -- APFN-1 YahooGroups: Subscribe: http://groups.yahoo.com/group/apfn-1/join Unsubscribe: [email protected] APFN MSG BOARD: `In a time of universal deceit, telling the truth is a revolutionary act.' http://disc.yourwebapps.com/Indices/149495.html APFN CONTENTS PAGE: http://www.apfn.org/old/apfncont.htm APFN TWITTER http://twitter.com/signup?follow=APFN1 Find elected officials, including the president, members of Congress, governors, state legislators, local officials, and more. http://congress.org/congressorg/dbq/officials/ SUPPORT APFN: PMB 206, 7549 W. CACTUS RD. #104, PEORIA, AZ 85381
