More Bad News for Democrat Mid-Term Prospects

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Photo Credit: Fox NewsBy Chris Stirewalt.

For a second straight week, Democrats find themselves explaining why it’s a good thing for fewer Americans to be employed. Last week, it was a Congressional Budget Office report that said millions would leave the U.S. workforce in order to obtain ObamaCare benefits. This week, the CBO says that the centerpiece of the Obama Democrats midterm campaign pitch, a call to increase the federal minimum wage by 40 percent, will cost as many as 1 million jobs.

Democrats aren’t much disputing the finding from the nonpartisan green-eyeshade brigade, but are instead trying to explain why less work is a good thing. Again. The argument is that while those low-wage jobs would be wiped out, the enhanced incomes of those still working will pay dividends in the years to come. It’s a similar argument as last week’s: Fewer people will work, but their being “freed” from unsatisfying employment will create new opportunities and raise overall living standards.

Read more this story HERE.

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Dems side with GOP over Medicare cuts

By Jonathan Easley.

Nineteen Democratic senators signed a letter Tuesday to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services warning of the dire consequences for seniors if cuts to Medicare Advantage go through as expected later this month.

The letter was signed by party heavyweights, including Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.), as well as vulnerable Democrats facing reelection, such as Sens. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) and Mary Landrieu (D-La.).

Twenty-one Republicans also signed the letter. The GOP has sought to make cuts to Medicare Advantage an election-year issue.

“We write to raise serious concerns about the Medicare Advantage (MA) 2015 rate notice and the impact further cuts may have on the millions of individuals enrolled in the program,” the senators write. “We are strongly committed to preserving the high quality health plan choices and benefits that our constituents receive through the MA program. Given the impact that payment policies could have on our constituents, we ask that you prioritize beneficiaries’ experience and minimize disruption in maintaining payment levels for 2015.”

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FCC Commissioner’s Accusation: Fed. Govt. ‘Monitors’ Could be Used to Curtail Freedom of Press

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Photo Credit: ACLJThe Obama Administration’s Federal Communication Commission (FCC) is poised to place government monitors in newsrooms across the country in an absurdly draconian attempt to intimidate and control the media.

Before you dismiss this assertion as utterly preposterous (we all know how that turned out when the Tea Party complained that it was being targeted by the IRS), this bombshell of an accusation comes from an actual FCC Commissioner.

FCC Commissioner Ajit Pai reveals a brand new Obama Administration program that he fears could be used in “pressuring media organizations into covering certain stories.”

As Commissioner Pai explains in the Wall Street Journal:

Last May the FCC proposed an initiative to thrust the federal government into newsrooms across the country. With its “Multi-Market Study of Critical Information Needs,” or CIN, the agency plans to send researchers to grill reporters, editors and station owners about how they decide which stories to run. A field test in Columbia, S.C., is scheduled to begin this spring.

Read more this story HERE.

Ryan Anderson to Kirsten Powers: Government Should Protect Christians’ Constitutional Rights

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Photo Credit: David McNew/Getty ImagesLiberal-leaning commentator Kirsten Powers strays from a common understanding of faith in asserting that Christians who support protections for religious views on marriage “are essentially arguing for homosexual Jim Crow laws,” Heritage Foundation scholar Ryan T. Anderson writes in a National Review Online column.

Powers makes the comparison in her column in today’s USA Today, attacking a Kansas measure that proponents say would prevent government from forcing citizens to honor same-sex marriage when it’s against their religion. In a rebuttal, Anderson writes at NRO that “the government shouldn’t enshrine Powers’s theology into law.” Legislation such as the Kansas bill, he explains, actually aims to prevent the kind of coercion that occurred under the South’s old Jim Crow regime by protecting freedom of association, freedom of contract and freedom of religion.

Powers appears to dismiss the religious convictions of florists, bakers, photographers and other business owners who don’t choose to join in celebrations of same-sex unions. “Christianity doesn’t prohibit serving a gay couple getting married,” writes the Fox News Channel regular. “Christians serve unrepentant murderers through prison ministry. So why can’t they provide a service for a same-sex marriage?”

Anderson, who as Heritage’s William E. Simon Fellow has written extensively about the marriage debate, counters that Powers misses the point:

“But many of these professionals understand their professions differently – being a wedding photographer is not simply being ‘a vendor,’ but utilizing God-given talents to tell the story of a particular couple and their relationship. Likewise, many of these professionals understand their obligation to witness to the truth differently –celebrating a same-sex relationship as a marriage affirms that relationship. It is understandable why some religious believers would not want the government coercing them into doing that. The government shouldn’t enshrine Powers’s theology into law and then coerce those who have a different understanding of what their faith requires.”

This story was produced by The Foundry’s news team. Nothing here should be construed as necessarily reflecting the views of The Heritage Foundation.

This article appeared originally at Heritage.com and is re-published in full hear with the Heritage Foundation’s permission.

DHS Contracted to Purchase 704 Million Rounds of Ammo Over Next 4 Years: 2,500 Rounds Per Officer

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Photo Credit: APThe Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is contracted to purchase 704,390,250 rounds of ammunition over the next four years, which is equal to a total of about 2,500 rounds per DHS agent per year, according to a January 2014 Government Accountability Office (GAO) report entitled Ammunition Purchases Have Declined Since 2009.

“If DHS were to purchase all 704 million rounds over the next four years, and if they were used by 70,000 DHS agents and officers, it would be roughly 2,500 rounds per agent per year,” David Maurer, author of the GAO report, told CNSNews.com.

“That would be higher than what we saw in past years at DHS and higher than the average annual number of rounds per agent or officer at the Department of Justice (DOJ),” he said.

“The 704,390,250 number of rounds is like a ceiling or credit limit which DHS wouldn’t have to fully execute,” said Maurer. “It’s there to use over the next four years until fiscal year 2018, if DHS needed to purchase those rounds.”

In Appendix III of the GAO report, “Department of Homeland Security Ammunition Contracts, as of October 1, 2013,” it states that “the 29 existing DHS ammunition contracts extend over the next 4 fiscal years and have a remaining contract limit of approximately 704 million rounds (for various ammunition types) if every option for purchasing ammunition were exercised into fiscal year 2018.”

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Rep. Louie Gohmert Launches Conservative PAC to Defend Candidates Against Establishment Republican Attacks

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Photo Credit: REUTERS/Joshua RobertsRepublican Texas Rep. Louie Gohmert is launching a new political action committee to help defend Houseconservatives from 2014 attacks from mainstream Republican PACs, Gohmert announced exclusively to The Daily Caller.

The new GOH Conservative PAC, inspired by the Senate Conservatives Fund, “defends conservative Republicans from the attacks that come from the mainstream,” Gohmert told TheDC. “That’s been a problem, we’ve seen in some races, where we’ve had leadership come and play and there was no counterbalance. So I’m going to do something about it.”

Gohmert detailed a long history of struggle and a do-nothing spirit within the Republican caucus, and the “depression” conservative House members felt when Speaker John Boehner conceded that Republicans shut down the government, a statement that must have been based on “reading the mainstream media and failing to read the record.”

“There’s a war against the tea party. There’s a war against conservatives, we’re told. If somebody declares war on me I’m not just going to lie down and take it. I’m going to fight,” Gohmert told TheDC. ”You’ve got to have money to fight opposition. The leaders in the party raise money so that [makes congressmen] feel they have to stay close to them. If we raise money on our own we can take a stand.”

Read more this story HERE.

US Warns of Airline Shoe-Bomb Threat

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Photo Credit: AFP Photo/Spencer PlattUS security officials warned Wednesday about a potential shoe-bomb threat on international flights to the United States, local media reported.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) issued a warning to airlines based on “very recent intelligence” considered credible that assailants would try to attack passenger jets using explosives hidden in shoes, NBC television reported.

Officials told NBC that passengers may be subjected to enhanced security screenings and airlines will pay more attention to passengers’ shoes.

Some airports already require passengers to take off their shoes for security after Richard Reid tried to detonate explosives stashed in his shoes during a Paris-Miami flight just three months after the September 11, 2001 attacks.

Read more this story HERE.

White House Adviser: Obamacare Didn’t Kill Jobs Because People Have Been Hired Since It Passed

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Photo Credit: AP Photo/Charles DharapakWhite House health care adviser Phil Schiliro maintains that Obamacare can’t be bad for jobs because some jobs have been created since it passed.

“You can’t say the Affordable Care Act has killed job growth,” Schiliro told an audience at a Kaiser Family Foundation presentation Wednesday. “In the 46 months since it passed, over 8 million jobs have been created… No one would say the Affordable Care Act created those jobs, but you can’t say the ACA has killed job growth.”

Schiliro’s comparison presumes that were Obamacare damaging at all, it would have stopped job growth entirely — including any recovery from the financial crisis in late 2008.

The Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that the financial crash and resulting recession lost the U.S. economy 8.8 million jobs, Schiliro’s estimate still leaves the economy.

Read more this story HERE.

Woman Dragged to Jail for Recording Cop (+video)

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Photo Credit: WND“Get off of me! You are breaking the law!” shouts a South Florida woman as a Broward County Sheriff’s deputy enters her car and drags her out, all because she was recording her traffic stop on Interstate 95.

Now, the police agency is facing serious legal action for alleged battery, false arrest and false imprisonment.

The saga of single mother Brandy Berning began last March when she was driving alone in the HOV carpool lane, which is designed for vehicles carrying more than one passenger during rush hour.

She was pulled over by Broward Sheriff’s Lt. William O’Brien, who told Berning about her traffic infraction. That’s when she then informed him she was recording audio of their conversation on her cell phone.

“Oh, I forgot to tell you I was recording our conversation,” Berning said on the recording.

Read more this story HERE.

2 Former Navy SEALs Found Dead on ‘Captain Phillips’ Ship

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Photo Credit: AnonymousTwo security officers have been found dead aboard the Maersk Alabama container ship, the same vessel portrayed in the movie “Captain Phillips,” police said Wednesday.

The men, both former Navy SEALs, were found on Tuesday while the ship was moored in the Seychelles, Fox News reported.

“A postmortem will be carried out this week in order to establish the cause of their sudden deaths while the police investigates the possible circumstances which led to these incidents,” police in the Seychelles said.

Read more this story HERE.

Poll: Only 79 Percent of Obama Voters Would Choose Him Again; Loses Support in Key Demos

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Given a chance to do it all over again, only 79 percent of those who voted for President Obama would vote for him again and 71 percent of Obama voters now inclined to vote for somebody else “regret” their vote to reelect the president, according to a new poll.

The Economist/YouGov.com poll found that Obama would lose enough votes in a rematch with Mitt Romney that the Republican would win. “90 percent of people who voted for Romney would do it again, compared to only 79 percent of Obama voters who would,” said the poll…

It also found that among Obama voters interested in voting for somebody else, 71 percent regret their vote. After Secrets posted a story about that finding, YouGov.com noted that the sample for the question was small and recharacterized the sample as “those who reported voting for Barack Obama in 2012 but would vote for someone else if the election were held again” from “those who voted for Barack Obama in 2012.”

Read more from this story HERE.