White House Finally Gets the Sequester Ax: 480 Budget Office Staffers Face Furloughs

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Photo Credit: Reuters

A total of 480 employees at the White House budget office face reduced working hours as $85 billion in overall automatic federal spending cuts hit President Barack Obama’s staff, the White House said on Monday…

The staffers from the Office of Management and Budget were the only White House employees that spokesman Jay Carney would confirm as having been affected, though he acknowledged, “within the Executive Office of the President, several offices have sent furlough notices to their staff.”

The $85 billion in cuts kicked in March 1 after Democratic and Republican lawmakers failed to reach a budget agreement to avert so-called “sequestration” spending restrictions.

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Last Minute Reversal: U.S. will "Vote Yes" on UN Arms Treaty

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Photo Credit: Daily Caller

The National Shooting Sports Foundation today strongly objected to the last-minute reversal of the U.S. government position regarding the United Nations Arms Trade Treaty. In the closing hours of negotiations on Thursday, March 28, the government abandoned its previous insistence that the treaty be approved only through achieving “consensus” of all the member states. Requiring consensus had been the United States position going back to earlier administrations.

At the end of the session, a U.S. government spokesperson told reporters “It’s important to the United States and the defense of our interests to insist on consensus. But every state in this process has always been conscious of the fact that if consensus is not reached in this process, that there are other ways to adopt this treaty, including via a vote of the General Assembly.” The spokesperson went on to say that the United States would vote “yes” on the treaty in the General Assembly, regardless of the positions of other member states. By abandoning the requirement for consensus the United States is assuring passage of the treaty by the United Nations.

“This abrupt about-face on the long-standing United States requirement for ‘consensus’ illustrates that the Obama Administration wants a sweeping U.N. arms control treaty,” said Lawrence Keane, NSSF senior vice president and general counsel. “We are troubled by the timing of the Obama Administration’s decision to abandon consensus on the eve of the Senate debate on pending gun control measures. The United Nations treaty would have a broad impact on the U.S. firearms industry and its base of consumers in the U.S.”

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Lawsuit Over Health Care Tax Could Kill ‘Obamacare’

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Photo Credit: The Washington Times

“Obamacare” looks increasingly inevitable, but one lawsuit making its way through the court system could pull the plug on the sweeping federal health care law.

A challenge filed by the Pacific Legal Foundation contends that the Affordable Care Act is unconstitutional because the bill originated in the Senate, not the House. Under the Origination Clause of the Constitution, all bills raising revenue must begin in the House.

The Supreme Court upheld most provisions of the act in June, but Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. took pains in the majority opinion to define Obamacare as a federal tax, not a mandate. That was when the Sacramento, Calif.-based foundation’s attorneys had their “aha” moment.

“The court there quite explicitly says, ‘This is not a law passed under the Commerce Clause; this is just a tax,’” foundation attorney Timothy Sandefur said at a Cato Institute forum on legal challenges to the health care act. “Well, then the Origination Clause ought to apply. The courts should not be out there carving in new exceptions to the Origination Clause.”

The Justice Department filed a motion to dismiss the challenge in November, arguing that the high court has considered only eight Origination Clause cases in its history and “has never invalidated an act of Congress on that basis.”

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US Senator Says Obama Is Faking Stance on Immigration Reform, Trying to Set Up GOP in 2014

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Photo Credit: Irish Central

Texas Freshman Senator, Ted Cruz, was on the Sean Hannity radio show today talking about immigration reform efforts being pushed in the US Senate by Harry Reid and President Obama.

According to Cruz, both Reid and Obama are purposely pushing reforms designed to lose in the House of Representatives. This loss then can be used as a political sledgehammer to beat up the Republicans with in the 2014 and 2016 elections.

Two of the critical issues that are apparently a red line for many members of both the House and Senate are secure borders and pathways to citizenship.

A key issue for Senators trying to find a way to craft immigration reform is to make sure our borders are secure first, before any other issues of immigration are addressed. But it seems President Obama, Harry Reid and Chuck Schumer think our borders are secure enough and want to force an immigration package through that does not really address a verifiable secure borders provision. To many politicians that will make anything coming out of the Senate, DOA for immigration reform when it reaches the House of Representatives.

The hypocrite Senator Schumer, couldn’t have been caught at a more inopportune moment when he and Senator McCain recently stood in front of the border fence in Arizona for photo ops. Just when the pictures were being taken, an alien from Mexico climbed over the fence and entered the US illegally. This could make Schumer the poster child for non secure borders.

The latest polls also show Americans are overwhelmingly in favor of having secure borders before any immigration reform is put in place.

Cruz was adamant the type of immigration reform with path to citizenship Reid and Obama were pushing, would be unfair to the millions of legal immigrants who play by the rules. Cruz said that would be a slap in the face to legal immigrants and a tacit wink that it is OK to disrespect the nations laws.

Cruz went on to say if President Obama was serious about immigration reform, he would take pathway to citizenship out of the proposed immigration reform, then reform could easily pass…Perhaps a pathway to work permits

According to Cruz even a pathway to a Green Card would be unfair since that could lead to citizenship in five years and it would be considered a reward for illegal behavior.

Many Americans are also disturbed about the reported number of illegal immigrants in this country. That number was reported to be up to 20 million towards the end of 2012. But as soon as the Obama administration started proposing immigration reform, the number suddenly shrank to only 11 million. What are we to believe?

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Ed Farnan is the conservative columnist at IrishCentral, where he has been writing on the need for energy independence, strong self defense, secure borders, 2nd amendment, smaller government and many other issues. His articles appear in many publications throughout the USA and world. He has been a guest on Fox News and a regular guest on radio stations in the US and Europe.

China-Australia Pact Could Lead to Dollar's Collapse

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Photo Credit: Zero Hedge

[T]he Australian [is] reporting that the land down under is set to say goodbye to the world’s “reserve currency” in its trade dealings with the world’s biggest marginal economic power, China, and will enable the direct convertibility of the Australian dollar into Chinese yuan, without US Dollar intermediation, in the process “slashing costs for thousands of business” and also confirming speculation that China is fully intent on, little by little, chipping away at the dollar’s reserve currency status until one day it no longer is.

That said, this latest development in global currency relations should come as no surprise to those who have followed our series on China’s slow but certain internationalization of its currency over the past two years…

And while previously the focus was on Chinese currency swap arrangements, the uniqueness of this weekend’s news is that it promotes outright convertibility of the Yuan: something China has long said would happen but many were skeptical it ever would. That is no longer the case, and with Australia setting the precedent, expect many more Asian countries (at first) to follow in Australia’s footsteps, because while the developed world is far more engaged in diluting its currency as a means to spur “growth”, Asian and developing world nations are still engage in real, actual trade, where China is rapidly and aggressively becoming the world’s hub…

Why is this so very critical? For the simple reason that the free lunch the US has enjoyed ever since the advent of the US dollar as world reserve currency, may be coming to an end as other, more aggressive alternatives – both fiat, and hard-asset based – to the USD appear. And since there is no such thing as a free lunch, all the deferred pain the US Treasury Department has been able to offset thanks to its global currency monopoly status will come crashing down the second the world starts getting doubts about the true nature of just who the real reserve currency will be in the future.

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Two Texas District Attorneys Now Murdered, Link With Colorado Prison Chief Murder Previously Probed

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Photo Credit: REUTERS

The killing of a Texas district attorney and his wife, in the same county where an assistant prosecutor was shot dead outside a courthouse in January, does not appear to be random, a local official said on Sunday.

Kaufman County District Attorney Mike McLelland and his wife, Cynthia, were found with fatal gunshot wounds at their home near the town of Forney, Texas, on Saturday, two months after Assistant District Attorney Mark Hasse was gunned down.

“In my view it appears that it was not random. It was a targeted attack,” Forney Mayor Darren Rozell told CNN.

“We’re obviously sad and shocked but there’s some outrage too,” said Rozell. He did not elaborate on a possible motive for the double murder, but neither he nor Kaufman County Sheriff David Byrnes ruled out a link between the killings.

Hasse was shot and killed the same day the U.S. Department of Justice released a statement saying the Kaufman County District Attorney’s Office was involved in a racketeering case against the Aryan Brotherhood white supremacist group.

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Mark Kelly Warns that GOP Efforts to Block Gun Control Legislation Will Hurt Reelection Efforts; GOP's Flake Disagrees

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photo credit: R0Ng

By Fox News. Senate Democrats recently removed bans on semi-automatic weapons from pending gun-control legislation in apparent hopes of passing the more politically acceptable universal background checks — even referring to the checks as the “sweet spot” of the proposal.

But the issue has turned into the new sticking point in Congress with a top Republican saying Sunday the plan is “going nowhere” and Democrats and other gun-control advocates pressing the issue.

South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham repeated the argument among gun-rights advocates that the federal government should not add new checks when existing ones are not enforced.

“The current system is broken,” he said on CNN’s “State of the Union.” “Why in the world would you expand that system if you’re not enforcing the law that exists today. … So I think that legislation is going nowhere.”

Leading gun-control advocate Mark Kelly warned Republican senators that trying to block a vote on new firearms legislation that includes universal background checks could hurt their re-election efforts. Read more from this story HERE.

Sen. Jeff Flake: Universal background checks ‘a bridge too far’

By David Sherfinski. Sen. Jeff Flake, Arizona Republican, said Sunday that universal background checks on all gun sales are “a bridge too far for most of us” as Democrats try to cobble together a package that can win 60 votes in the Senate.

“We do need to strengthen the background check system, but universal background checks, I think, is a bridge too far for most of us,” Mr. Flake said on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “The paperwork requirements alone would be significant.”

Mr. Flake — along with Sen. Lindsey Graham, South Carolina Republican, and Democratic Sens. Mark Begich of Alaska and Mark L. Pryor of Arkansas — has introduced legislation intended to clarify issues surrounding mental illness and which people are legally barred from buying or owning a firearm.

Sen. Charles E. Schumer, New York Democrat, has introduced a bill that would require near-universal background checks for all gun sales, but said he’s still hunting for a measure that can get 60 votes in the Senate. His bill passed the Senate Judiciary Committee on a straight party-line vote after bipartisan talks on compromise legislation broke down over the issue of record-keeping on gun sales. Read more from this story HERE.

Google Celebrates Leftist Leader Cesar Chavez, Not Easter, On Religious Holiday As Some Christians Call For Boycott

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Photo Credit: Daily Mail

The internet is alight today with stories of faith, confections, and one very famous egg roll, but the biggest web destination of them all has opted to honor a leftist labor activist instead of the Easter holiday.

Several times per year, and sometimes per month, internet search behemoth Google shakes things up on its incredibly high-traffic homepage by changing its logo to celebrate a memorable day in history like a famous person’s birthday or world-changing event.

This past February 6, for instance, the company honored what would have been famed anthropologist Mary Leakey’s 100th birthday.

Earlier in the year, Google gave nods to the birthdays of baseball legend Jackie Robinson, Dr. Martin Luther King, and, true to the company’s quirky form, pioneering ice resurfacer Frank Zamboni.

The ‘Google Doodles’ began as a way for Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin to leave a sort of ‘Out of the Office’ message when they placed a stick figure within their logo before taking off for Nevada’s Burning Man festival in 1998.

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Beef With the Sequester? At Least One Federal Program Was Able to Beat It

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Photo Credit: Evan Vucci

The sequester was supposed to be something new in Washington: a budget cut you couldn’t beat. Once it hit, it hit. The money was gone, and nobody could get it back.

That turned out to be true—for about 3 weeks. Then somebody beat it. Last week, President Obama signed a spending bill that gave the Agriculture Department’s food inspectors what everybody else wanted: a get-out-of-the-sequester card. Their program got $55 million in new money, which replaced almost all of what the sequester took.

There’s a story there, about how power and lobbying can still make money appear in Washington, even in this age of austerity. It started with sharp political theater.

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack insisted that the sequester would force him to shut down all U.S. meat production on at least 11 days. The inspectors union didn’t believe that. Neither did many in the powerful meat lobby. But they were too worried not to help Vilsack anyway. After an extensive campaign, the Senate gave Vilsack the money.

So the sequester can be hacked. Now, other interest groups are waiting: police officers, airport executives, Border Patrol agents. The question is: Can it be hacked again?

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Defense Department Opposes Giving Purple Hearts to Fort Hood Survivors

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Photo Credit: Minnesota National Guard

Legislation that would award the injured from the 2009 Fort Hood shooting the Purple Heart would adversely affect the trial of Maj. Nidal Hasan by labeling the attack terrorism, according to a Defense Department document obtained by Fox News.

The document comes following calls from survivors and their families for the military honor, because they say Fort Hood was turned into a battlefield when Hasan opened fire during the November 2009 attack. Fox News is told that the DoD “position paper” is being circulated specifically in response to the proposed legislation.

The document reads in part: “Passage of this legislation could directly and indirectly influence potential court-martial panel members, witnesses, or the chain of command, all of whom exercise a critical role under the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ). Defense counsel will argue that Major Hasan cannot receive a fair trial because a branch of government has indirectly declared that Major Hasan is a terrorist — that he is criminally culpable.”

A source with knowledge of the position paper told Fox News that DoD is putting on a full-court press by sending senior officials, including generals, to meet with lawmakers in an effort to block support.

But Neal Sher, counsel for the Fort Hood families involved in a federal lawsuit against the department, told Fox News that the document — an “official Army response” to the request for Purple Heart status — is “an utter outrage” and that it was not surprising given it comes from the same department which labeled the attack “workplace violence.”

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