Rubio Works on Selling Conservative Skeptics on 'Secret' Immigration Bill

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Photo Credit: Andrew Harnik

Immigration draft lays out contentious points plan to reward, select immigrants

By Stephen Dinan and David Eldridge. The immigration reform bill that senators are writing in secret would move U.S. policy to a points-based system that would reward immigrants who are taking care of disabled parents at the same level as those who have earned master’s degrees in high-tech fields, according to a draft of the legislation reviewed by The Washington Times.

The eight senators writing the bill plan to announce provisions this week, ahead of a major hearing in the SenateJudiciary Committee on Wednesday, but some details already have been leaked. Among them is the points system to select immigrants.

Sen. Marco Rubio, Florida Republican, said his plan would make illegal immigrants wait years to gain citizenship. Republican leaders are counting on Mr. Rubio to sell the plan to skeptical conservatives.

“This is not amnesty. Amnesty is the forgiveness of something,” Mr. Rubio said on “Fox News Sunday.” “We’re going to create an alternative that says, ‘OK, you want to stay here, you’ll have to wait more than 10 years, you’ll have to pay this fine, you’ll have to pay your registration fee, you’ll have to be gainfully employed, you won’t qualify for any federal benefits, and then after all of that you don’t get to apply for anything until the enforcement mechanisms are in place.’”

Mr. Rubio made the rounds of all of the major Sunday political talk shows to pitch the legislation. His appearances marked what one immigration rights advocate called “opening day” for what is expected to be a bruising fight on Capitol Hill. Read more from this story HERE.

Rubio: Illegal immigrants won’t get welfare

By Joel Gehrke. Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said that the gang of eight’s immigration proposal will not allow legalized immigrants to receive federal benefits such as welfare or the Obamacare coverage.

“[T]hey don’t qualify for any federal benefits,” Rubio said on Fox News Sunday of the current illegal immigrants slated for legalization under the proposal he helped write. “This is an important point. No federal benefits, no food stamps, no welfare, no ObamaCare. They have to prove they’re gainfully employed. They have to be able to support themselves, so they’ll never become a public charge.”

Republicans on the Senate Budget Committee had suggested that the proposal would add trillions in federal spending because “there is nothing in the framework to apply federal public charge law to those in the country illegally before they are granted legal status.” The committee staff also recalled that Immigrations and Custom Enforcement union president Chris Crane said that officers “are not permitted to enforce that statute.” Read more from this story HERE.

Senators Uncertain how Vote on Gun Bill Will Swing; Co-Sponsors Look for GOP Support

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Lawmakers on both sides of a proposal to expand gun-purchase background checks to sales online and at gun shows said Sunday that they don’t know whether it will pass — a hurdle that, if not cleared, likely would kill the prospects of significant gun control legislation on Capitol Hill.

The circumspect posturing underscores the sensitivity of negotiations on the issue and flies in the face of a long tradition of predetermined outcomes on Capitol Hill, even on high-profile legislation.

“I think it’s an open question as to whether or not we have the votes,” Sen. Patrick J. Toomey, Pennsylvania Republican and co-sponsor of the amendment, said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “I think it’s going to be close.”

Senate Majority Whip Richard J. Durbin, Illinois Democrat, said his party hasn’t started formally counting votes on the measure, which was crafted by Mr. Toomey and Sen. Joe Manchin III, West Virginia Democrat.

“We haven’t whipped it,” Mr. Durbin said on “Fox News Sunday.” “I can tell you this: When it gets down to it, we’ve got to ask the basic question, ‘Should we try to keep guns out of the hands of felons and people so mentally unstable they shouldn’t own a firearm?’ If the answer is ‘yes,’ Manchin-Toomey is a step in that direction.”

Read more from this story HERE.

Abortionist's Case Raises Troubling Questions

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Photo Credit: Washington Examiner

Until late last week, almost nobody outside of Philadelphia or the pro-life activist community had heard of Gosnell or his trial, which began two weeks ago. The New York Times had one story at the start of the trial in March, and then nothing.

Conservative media critic Mollie Hemingway of the blog GetReligion spent a good part of last week asking reporters who normally cover such issues why they were clamming up on this trial. Washington Post writer Sarah Kliff, who covers abortion extensively, responded that she didn’t cover “local crime.”

Many conservatives noted that the Newton, Conn., school massacre and the killing of Trayvon Martin could be described as “local crime,” yet they warranted national media attention. Why not an alleged serial-killing abortionist?

It’s a good question, especially because the policy debate Gosnell stirs up could give ammunition to either side. Abortion defender Katha Pollitt, for instance, wrote after Gosnell’s arrest last year, “What fueled Gosnell’s business were the very restrictions the legislature was so keen on passing. …”

On the other side, Gosnell’s crimes are also relevant to President Obama’s abortion record. As a state senator, Obama repeatedly voted against legislation requiring hospitals to care for babies born during abortions. Such laws might somehow be used in the future to infringe on abortion’s legality, Obama argued.

Read more from this story HERE.

Turncoat: Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms Endorses Compromise Gun Control Bill

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Photo Credit: Gage Skidmore

In anticipation of Senate votes this week on a proposed expansion of criminal background checks for firearms sales, one gun rights organization broke with the powerful National Rifle Association on Sunday to urge support for a compromise drafted by Sens. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.) and Patrick J. Toomey (R-Pa.).

The endorsement by the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms — which calls itself the second-largest gun rights organization in the country, behind the NRA, claiming 650,000 members and supporters — is one of several moves over the past few days that have provided a boost to the hopes of proponents of background checks.

While leading gun-control advocates — including President Obama and New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg (I) — back the bipartisan proposal, the announcement of support Sunday from the Citizens Committee reveals that substantial parts of the bill are viewed as “wins” for the gun lobby, including provisions that would prohibit a government registry of gun ownership and make it easier to transport and market weapons across state lines.

Though news of a split in the usually unified gun lobby cheered gun-control advocates, the gun lobby can count other probable wins in the current debate, such as the likely defeat of legislation to limit military-style assault weapons and high-capacity ammunition magazines. Now, an expansion of background-check requirements for gun sales is considered the most likely major achievement.

Initially, gun-control advocates hoped for a requirement for background checks of individuals purchasing a gun under most any circumstance. Currently, background checks are conducted only for purchases made from licensed gun dealers. The compromise measure, drafted by Toomey and Manchin, would require background checks for currently exempt online and gun-show sales but not for most other private transactions.

Read more from this story HERE.

'DC Intervention': Tea Party Group to Pressure Rubio on Immigration, Toomey on Guns

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The Tea Party Patriots organization is planning protests on Tuesday at the home state offices of several Senators that the group argues are in need of an “intervention” for being sucked up into inside-the-Beltway politics, including Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Sen. Pat Toomey (R-PA).

The group is targeting Rubio on immigration reform and Toomey on gun control.

“Two Senators in particular are facing Tea Party pressure, as they should–Senators Marco Rubio (R-FL) and Pat Toomey (R-PA),” Tea Party Patriots said in a release. “Both of these men were elected thanks to Tea Party support, yet Senator Rubio is the star spokesman for a secretive, small group working on a bill that purports to address illegal immigration and the entire US immigration system as a whole. This bill is already 1,500 pages and no one outside the small working group has read it, meaning legislation that will affect our security, spending, taxes, culture, education, welfare, jobs, etc. is being crafted without input from most of our Senators or the American people. Not only might the legislation be bad policy, it has already gone outside of the normal process.”

“Meanwhile, Senator Toomey is the man who gave opponents of the 2nd Amendment the best chance they’ve had in decades to violate the Constitution,” Tea Party Patriots added.

Read more from this story HERE.

Labor Secretary Nominee Accused of 'Quid Pro Quo' Deal

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Thomas Perez, President Obama’s nominee for Labor secretary, “manipulated” federal law as assistant attorney general by negotiating a so-called “quid pro quo” deal in which he persuaded a Minnesota city to drop a Supreme Court lawsuit in exchange for the Justice Department staying out of whistleblower cases brought against the city, according to a joint congressional Republican report.

In the report obtained by Fox News, Republican investigators conclude Perez “manipulated the rule of law and pushed the limits of justice to make this deal happen.”

The 67-page report also states that the Justice Department opting out of the cases resulted in taxpayers paying nearly $200 million in un-recouped damages.

The cases dropped by the agency were against the city of St. Paul and alleged the city received millions in Department of Housing and Urban Development fund, but failed to file the requisite paperwork regarding the hiring of low-income workers.

In exchange, St. Paul dropped its appeal to the Supreme Court in an unrelated case in which property owners said the city made extraordinary efforts, through strict code enforcement, to condemn their properties.

Read more from this story HERE.

Wealth Tax to Pay for EU Bail-Outs

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Senior advisers to Chancellor Angela Merkel are pushing for better-off households to pay towards the cost of any future bail-outs for the weaker members of the single currency.

The proposals, from members of Germany’s council of economic experts, raise the prospect of taxes being imposed on property in a country like Spain if its government was forced to seek a bail-out.

The council, known as the “Five Wise Men”, is often used to test new policies that are later adopted officially.

The German suggestion is the latest sign that Berlin is intent on imposing even tougher rules on weaker southern euro members in exchange for using its economic might to support their finances.

As well as inflaming tensions between Germany and its smaller southern partners, the suggestion could also mean that Britons with holiday homes are dragged deeper into the eurozone crisis.

Read more from this story HERE.

Here Come Obama's Middle-Class Tax Hikes

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President Obama’s budget spin-meisters at the Office of Management and Budget deserve nomination for the Biggest Whopper of 2013 Award, thanks to their claim that the chief executive’s 2014 budget proposal “represents more than $2 in spending cuts for every $1 of new revenue from closing tax loopholes and reducing tax benefits for the wealthiest.” Sounds like smart budgeting, but is that statement true? As the Heritage Foundation’s Morning Bell put it, “In a word, no.”

Look beyond the rhetoric at the concrete numbers in the Obama budget — which, let it not be forgotten, was submitted two months late and after both the Senate and House adopted their own versions of 2014 spending blueprints — and what becomes clear in three ways is that the president and his key advisers are intrigued by the figure $1.1 trillion. First, remember the sequestration budget cuts that were supposed to produce Armageddon if actually implemented? Those cuts totaled — can you guess? — $1.1 trillion over 10 years.

Second, as Morning Bell ably notes, the Treasury Department calculates that the Obama 2014 budget proposal contains new tax increases totaling $1.1 trillion. Third, remember the 2011 Grand Bargain That Never Was? That was when House Speaker John Boehner insisted on a lengthy list of spending cuts and conceded to $800 billion in new revenues by closing tax loopholes? It never happened because at the last minute Obama demanded another $400 billion in new revenues, which Boehner wisely rejected. Well, now Obama is endorsing Boehner’s spending cuts, which just happen to total $1.1 trillion.

Read more from this story HERE.

Study Finds New Way to Clear Cholesterol from Blood

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Scientists led by Prof David Ginsburg of the University of Michigan’s Howard Hughes Medical Institute inhibited the action of a gene responsible for transporting a protein that interferes with the ability of the liver to remove cholesterol from the blood in mice. Trapping the destructive protein where it couldn’t harm receptors responsible for removing cholesterol preserved the liver cells’ capacity to clear plasma cholesterol from the blood, but did not appear to otherwise affect the health of the mice.

In the research, scientists found that mice with an inactive SEC24A gene could develop normally. However, their plasma cholesterol levels were reduced by 45 percent because vesicles from liver cells were not able to recruit and transport a critical regulator of blood cholesterol levels called proprotein convertase subtilisin/kexin type 9 (PCSK9).

PCSK9 is a secretory protein that destroys the liver cells’ receptors of low-density lipoprotein (LDL, the so-called ‘bad cholesterol), and prevents the cells from removing the LDL.

“Inhibiting SEC24A or PCSK9 may be an alternative to statins, and could work together with statins to produce even greater effects,” said first study author Dr Xiao-Wei Chen from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute. “Also, they might be effective on patients who are resistant to or intolerant of statins.”

Initial studies of anti-PCSK9 therapies in humans have shown that eliminating PCSK9 can lower cholesterol dramatically and work with statins like Lipitor to lower it even further. The new study points to a new area for study: rather than inhibiting PCSK9 itself, perhaps future therapies could block the transport mechanism that allows the destructive protein to reach the LDL receptors.

Read more from this story HERE.

Sen. Mike Lee: Gun Bill Contains ‘Tomorrow’s Loopholes’

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Republican Sen. Mike Lee, of Utah, said Sunday he will not support the gun-control legislation being authored in the Senate because it contains loopholes and imposes limits on law-abiding gun owners.

Lee, appearing on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” said despite the national tragedy at Sandy Hook Elementary School in December of 2012, politicians’ efforts to do the right thing have resulted in a flawed approach.

“Following the tragedy at Sandy Hook, Americans have been rightfully focused on how to prevent such tragedies from occurring in the future,” he said. “But unfortunately, the proposals we’ve seen would serve primarily to limit the rights of law-abiding citizens while doing little, if anything, to actually prevent tragedies like this from occurring in the future.”

Lee said he “can’t support” the bill named after Pennsylvania Sen. Pat Toomey and West Virginia Sen. Joe Manchin.

Read more from this story HERE.