John Boehner Fed Up With ‘Ridiculous’ Tea Party Intransigence on Budget

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Photo Credit: ABC News

Photo Credit: ABC News

House Speaker John Boehner blasted outside groups for their criticism of the bipartisan budget deal, delivering an unusually sharp rebuke today to tea party and conservative activists while signaling he has had just about enough of their intransigence.

“They’re using our members and they’re using the American people for their own goals,” Boehner said, his voice rising with anger during a news conference at the Capitol today. “This is ridiculous. Listen, if you are for more deficit reduction, you are for this agreement.”

From Boehner, it was a rare and pointed public dressing-down of Club for Growth, Heritage Action, the Koch Brothers and other conservative groups that have urged Republicans to oppose the budget deal. Boehner openly questioned the motives of such groups, demonstrating a far more aggressive posture than he usually takes.

In response to Boehner’s comments, Club for Growth President Chris Chocola said his group will still stand with lawmakers who oppose the deal.

“We stand with Marco Rubio, Ted Cruz, Tom Coburn, Rand Paul, members of the Republican Study Committee and every other fiscal conservative who opposes the Ryan-Murray deal,” Chocola said in a statement.

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Budget Deal a Step Backward: Opposing View

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Photo Credit: T.J. Kirkpatrick, Getty Images

Photo Credit: T.J. Kirkpatrick, Getty Images

While imperfect, the sequester has proved to be an effective tool in reducing base discretionary spending. Nonetheless, conservatives have expressed a willingness to alter the budget caps established by the 2011 debt ceiling deal in exchange for immediate and substantive structural reforms that significantly reduce spending and address the real drivers of our debt.

Unfortunately, the budget agreement struck by Rep. Paul Ryan and Sen. Patty Murray is a step backward:

First, it represents an immediate increase in federal spending. Under the deal, discretionary spending would rise to $1.012 trillion in 2014 and $1.014 trillion in 2015, a $63 billion total increase (though it does little to provide a real and sustained fix for President Obama’s mismanagement of defense). This is a significant achievement for the president, who believes that government spending is a panacea to America’s economic woes.

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U.S. Suspends Aid to Syrian Rebels

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Mideast Syria_660_APThe Obama administration is cutting off aid to rebels in northern Syria amid concerns that it could fall into the hands of Al Qaeda-tied militants.

The White House confirmed Wednesday that the U.S. has suspended delivery of non-lethal assistance to rebels in the north. Britain reportedly has followed suit.

White House spokesman Josh Earnest cited concerns about reports that Islamist fighters seized buildings belonging to Syria’s Supreme Military Council.

“We’re obviously concerned by those reports,” he said.

Earnest said the U.S. government is consulting with the Supreme Military Council, and humanitarian aid will continue. Earnest stressed that the administration’s policy is to support “elements of the opposition that are moderate, that are committed to respecting basic human rights.”

He said: “That has been a challenge from the very beginning, both to identify the moderate elements of the opposition and to provide them the support that they need.”

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Congressional Staffers Told Not to Trust ObamaCare Site Info

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Photo Credit: Fox News

Photo Credit: Fox News

Congressional staffers were warned Wednesday not to rely on information provided by the ObamaCare exchange website, in an email alert informing them they might not be enrolled for coverage even if they technically signed up.

The “very important” message, sent to Capitol Hill officials Wednesday afternoon, is the latest sign that the government has concerns about the reliability of the system. Despite improvements in the basic operation of the exchange websites, and increased enrollment, there are lingering concerns about whether those signing up will actually be covered on Jan. 1.

“Please DO NOT ASSUME you are covered unless you have seen the Confirmation Letter from the Disbursing Office!” the email to staffers said.

The email urged staffers who have signed up via the DC Health Link — the health care exchange for the District of Columbia — to double check with the office that they’re enrolled.

“Do NOT rely on your ‘My Account’ page or other correspondence from DCHL,” the message said.

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Yale University “Beyond Human Personhood” Symposium: Christian Worldview is “Abominable”

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Photo Credit: LifeSite News

Photo Credit: LifeSite News

I am here at Yale University for the last day of the “Beyond Human Personhood” Symposium. As National Field Director for Personhood USA, I was asked by my superiors to attend to see if I could garner any insight in how a leftist worldview approaches the effort of convincing our culture to accept personhood for non-human actors such as: elephants, dolphins, great apes, artificial intelligences and extra-terrestrials.

I was a little surprised to find a modicum of common ground as I observed their intense passion to promote their worldview. I can admire their sacrifice and commitment to what they hold as the true nature of things. But I was wholly unprepared for the moral revulsion I felt as they described their overall agenda. They openly admitted that their goal is to “animalize” mankind as just another animal in the zoo we call earth. Their godless evolutionary pre-suppositions demand this. “Speciesism” was mentioned quite often—rightly accusing the Christian worldview of elevating all mankind as being “created in the image of God” and setting man apart from the other creatures of earth by placing all of God’s creation under mankind to act as steward “over the garden”.

Countless speakers decried human exceptionalism and Christianity’s role in promoting a worldview that demoted animals to a status under man’s “dominion.” As I mentioned earlier, I was struck by the sheer number of references to the early church fathers and various quotes from Christian theologians. This was a crowd who knew their church history and had made a conscious decision to reject the good news of Christ’s incarnation, death and resurrection for our soul’s sakes. And yes … there was a discussion on ensoulment and the fact that Christians denied ensoulment to non-humans. Again, I want to emphasize how unprepared I was to encounter such a high level of theological content, not to mention that it was all directed at me.

At first I thought that surely there were those in the audience that might question some of the presuppositions that were being openly proclaimed, perhaps a philosophy student with an inquiring mind who could connect the dots—particularly in the area of relegating man to the same level as other animals, thereby denigrating human life and dignity. Sadly, I didn’t find a single individual in a crowd of a 100 who spoke out against the obvious policy implications that these ideas have.

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Studies: Some Cancer Treatments Can be Skipped

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Photo Credit: AP Photo/Gerry Broome

Photo Credit: AP Photo/Gerry Broome

Tens of thousands of women each year might be able to skip at least some of the grueling treatments for breast cancer – which can include surgery, heavy chemo and radiation – without greatly harming their odds of survival, new research suggests.

The research is aimed at curbing overtreatment, a big problem in cancer care. Treatments help many women beat the disease, but giving too many or ones that aren’t really needed causes unnecessary expense, trauma and lifelong side effects, such as arm swelling and heart troubles. Radiation can even raise the risk of new cancers.

Several studies presented Wednesday at the San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium, an international conference on the disease, identify groups of patients who might be able to safely forgo certain treatments.

One found that many older women can skip radiation after surgery for early-stage tumors. Two others suggest that surgery may not help patients whose cancer has already spread widely. A fourth study tested a “light chemo” combination that could become a new standard of care.

The trend is “less and less therapy” for certain cancer types, said one conference leader, Dr. C. Kent Osborne of Baylor College of Medicine.

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Socialism Viewed Positively by 36% of Americans

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adolf_hitlerMore than one-third of Americans (36%) have a positive image of “socialism,” while 58% have a negative image. Views differ by party and ideology, with a majority of Democrats and liberals saying they have a positive view of socialism, compared to a minority of Republicans and conservatives.

“Socialism” was one of seven terms included in a Jan. 26-27 Gallup poll. Americans were asked to indicate whether their top-of-mind reactions to each were positive or negative. Respondents were not given explanations or descriptions of the terms.

Americans are almost uniformly positive in their reactions to three terms: small business, free enterprise, and entrepreneurs. They are divided on big business and the federal government, with roughly as many Americans saying their view is positive as say it is negative. Americans are more positive than negative on capitalism (61% versus 33%) and more negative than positive on socialism (36% to 58%).

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India’s Supreme Court Upholds Law Against Homosexual Conduct

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Photo Credit: AP Photo/Tsering Topgyal

Photo Credit: AP Photo/Tsering Topgyal

India’s Supreme Court struck down a 2009 lower court decision to decriminalize homosexual conduct, dealing a blow Wednesday to gay activists who have fought for years for the chance to live openly in India’s deeply conservative society.

The judges said only lawmakers and not the courts could change a colonial-era law that bans homosexual acts and makes them punishable by up to a decade in prison.

The lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community across India reacted to the surprise decision with defiance.

“We cannot be forced back into the closet. We are not backing off from our fight against discrimination,” said Gautam Bhan, an activist who had petitioned the court.

After the ruling, dozens of activists outside the court began crying and hugging each other in consolation.

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Romanian State TV Airs Christmas Carol About Burning Jews

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Photo Credit: photo credit: www.dortransilvan.startr.ro

Photo Credit: photo credit: www.dortransilvan.startr.ro

A Romanian public broadcaster aired a Christmas carol celebrating the Holocaust.

TVR3 Verde, a television channel for rural communities, presented the carol on December 5 during its maiden transmission.

Sung by the Dor Transilvan ensemble, it featured the lyrics: “The kikes, damn kikes, Holy God would not leave the kike alive, neither in heaven nor on earth, only in the chimney as smoke, this is what the kike is good for, to make kike smoke through the chimney on the street.”

In a statement, TVR3 (Romanian Public Television Channel 3) distanced itself from the broadcast, saying it did not select the carol but only broadcast songs that were chosen and compiled by the Center for Preservation and Promotion of Traditional Culture, which belongs to the eastern county of Cluj.

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Under Obama, Troops Forced to Rely on Welfare, Holiday Charity to Make Ends Meet (+video)

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Photo Credit: Masterfile/Radius Images

Photo Credit: Masterfile/Radius Images

Jamie Boling and her husband, Joseph, know that providing for a military family can be trying — waiting for orders, often living on a single income, and, in especially tough cases, supporting a spouse wounded in the line of duty.

Around the holidays, the challenges — especially the financial ones — can tax families already struggling to make ends meet.

The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a nonprofit D.C.-based think tank, estimates that as many as 340,000 veterans rely on federal or state rental assistance. About 900,000 veterans live on food stamps, and an additional 5,000 active-duty service members are food stamp recipients.

The nonprofit groups Operation Homefront and Fisher House Foundation stepped in Monday to provide the Bolings and about 300 other military families in the D.C. area with grocery bags filled with the fixings for a holiday meal.

“My husband medically retired in October, and it’s a big transition to go from active duty to medical retirement,” said Mrs. Boling, 29, of Gaithersburg. “It gets hard around this time of year. My husband is making about 30 percent of what he used to be making. You have to start stretching dollars. This literally puts food on the table.”

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