Poll: 64% Say ObamaCare Would Have Never Passed Had the Truth Been Known

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Photo Credit: Reuters A Fox News poll finds that 64% of Americans say Obamacare would have never passed if citizens knew back in 2009 what they know now about the law.

Interestingly, the somber sentiment garnered majorities from Republicans (74%), independents (68%), and Democrats (54%), who say the unpopular health care program would not have passed.

The poll also found that just 9% of Americans believe their family is better off under Obamacare.

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Archbishop: ‘The More That Gov’t Mandates Evil Actions, The More Likely Civil Disobedience Becomes’

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Photo Credit: AP Photo/Matt RourkeCalling the Obama administration “the most tone deaf to religious liberty issues in recent memory,” Philadelphia Archbishop Charles Chaput warned that religious freedom in the U.S. is “at risk,” and that “the more government mandates evil action, the more likely civil disobedience becomes.”

Last February, Chaput urged his fellow prelates to take the “right action…whatever the cost” regarding the Health and Human Services’ contraceptive mandate, which requires nearly all insurance plans under the Affordable Care Act to pay for sterilization, contraceptives, and abortion-inducing drugs.

Due to “an unfriendly political class” and believers’ own apathy, Chaput told CNSNews.com, “government pressure on religious communities has clearly increased.” Which is why, he says, that religious freedom must not be taken for granted, but be “vigorously defended” in the nation’s courts and state houses.

CNSNews.com: Gen. [William] Boykin (Ret.) recently said that ‘Given our nation’s history as a country formed in large part by communities fleeing religious persecution, the principle of religious freedom has long stood as a core national ideal, enshrined in the Bill of Rights and guaranteed to all Americans.’ Do you think that this ‘core national ideal’ is now at risk?

Archbishop Chaput: “I think President Obama’s recent prayer breakfast comments about religious freedom were interesting but also curious, because in practice, the people who staff his administration have been the most tone deaf to religious liberty issues in recent memory. There’s a very odd disconnect in praising religious freedom while the Justice Department goes after the Little Sisters of the Poor.

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Obama’s Valentine’s Day Bachelor golf Holiday Marks 23rd Vacation

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Photo Credit: APAmerica, you know how to treat a president and his family.

With another Presidents’ Day bachelor holiday planned by President Obama, this time golfing in California, and Aspen, Colo., resort reporters on the lookout for the annual first lady ski trip this weekend, the taxpayer’s tab for the first family’s vacations has topped $2.4 million.

But that’s just the start. That total is just from the skimpy documents detailing travel and security expenses obtained by the public watchdog group Judicial Watch from a handful of first family vacations.

When all of the reporting of the first family’s 22 vacations so far to Hawaii, Martha’s Vineyard, Spain, Colorado, Florida, Africa and elsewhere is added up, the estimate reaches over $18 million when hotel and resort rent, security hotel and car rentals, and airfare are included.

Concerned about the trip expenses and the administration’s lack of transparency on the trips, Judicial Watch has sought spending documents. They’ve had success on just eight trips and only received Air Force and Secret Service expense forms which total $2,417,595.47. Included is the $1 million tab for Michelle Obama’s 2011 trip to Africa, her $476,585 2010 vacay in Spain, the first couple’s 2009 New York City date night that cost $11,648 and the first lady’s 2013 trip to Aspen for Presidents’ Day costing $81,523.

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Wyoming Officials Take EPA to Court After Ruling Gives Land (including Entire City) to Tribes

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Photo Credit: Fox News Wyoming officials are taking the Environmental Protection Agency to court in a bid to reverse a sweeping agency ruling that transferred more than 1 million acres of land — including an entire city — to Native American tribes.

Wyoming Attorney General Peter K. Michael filed his state’s appeal Friday morning before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit. The state wants either the EPA to reverse, or the courts to overturn, a December ruling on a request from the Northern Arapaho and Eastern Shoshone tribes.

The tribes had sought “state status” in order to administer air quality monitoring. The EPA, in the course of reviewing the request, determined the land in question actually belongs to the Wind River Indian Reservation and has for more than a century, despite a 1905 law opening it to non-tribal members.

The decision, which encompassed the city of Riverton, caused intense controversy as officials warned about a range of disruptive consequences, including the possibility that jailed tribal members could now challenge their convictions.

Offering some relief, the EPA earlier this week agreed to put its own decision on hold at the request of the state and the tribes themselves. The state was the first to ask for a stay, calling the decision “arbitrary” and “wrong.” But the tribes followed suit, in the interest of soothing tensions.

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Dirty Dozen: 12 Senate Republicans Who Voted to Silence Ted Cruz

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Photo Credit: D.C. Clothesline Everyone knew that the debt-ceiling deal would pass through the Senate on Wednesday. Even Ted Cruz had to know it. As soon as the House passed the deal on Tuesday, the writing was on the wall.

Even so, Ted Cruz promised to fight for America once again and filibuster the legislation. Would that have changed things? More than likely it would not have changed the vote. But Ted Cruz is the voice of a lot of Americans who are fed up with the Washington D.C. “business as usual” crowd. Evidently tee times and the beltway bar scene are more important than listening to the voice of an elected representative, because 12 republicans turned on Ted Cruz Wednesday including his own Texas sidekick, John Cornyn.

This morning I feel like my own tongue was cut out, because there are few in the Senate who speak for me and Ted Cruz is one of them.

The Senate vote for cloture passed 67-31 and could not have passed without republican votes. 60 votes were needed. These are the 12 who voted to silence Ted Cruz as reported by The Hill:

The Republicans who voted in favor of ending debate were McConnell, Cornyn, Hatch, McCain, Corker and Sens. Susan Collins (Maine), Jeff Flake (Ariz.), Mike Johanns (Neb.), Mark Kirk (Ill.), John Barasso (Wyo.), Lisa Murkowski (Alaska) and John Thune (S.D.). Thune and Barasso are also members of leadership.

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Court Overturns Concealed-Carry Rule in Blow to California Gun Law

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Photo Credit: ReutersBy Dan Whitcomb.

A federal appeals court on Thursday struck down a requirement by San Diego County that residents show “good cause” to carry a concealed firearm, a ruling that could force local governments across California to revisit the way they license handguns.

A three-member panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, acting on a 2009 lawsuit, ruled in a 2-1 decision that San Diego County’s restrictions amounted to an unconstitutional infringement on citizens’ Second Amendment rights to bear arms.

Coupled with a California state law that largely bans the open carrying of firearms in public, San Diego County’s “good cause” rules on concealed weapons effectively bar residents from carrying a gun altogether, the panel said.

“In California, the only way that the typical, responsible, law-abiding citizen can carry a weapon in public for the lawful purpose of self-defense is with a concealed carry permit. And, in San Diego County, that option has been taken off the table,” Justice Thomas O’Scannlain wrote in the 77-page opinion for the majority.

California, which has enacted some of the nation’s strictest gun laws, allows residents to carry a concealed weapon if they meet several requirements, including completing a training course, demonstrating good moral character and establishing “good cause” to have the gun.

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Photo Credit: ReutersCalif. concealed weapon law tossed by fed appeals court

By Associated Press.

A divided federal appeals court on Thursday struck down California’s concealed weapons rules, saying they violate the Second Amendment right to bear arms.

By a 2-1 vote, the three-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said California was wrong to require applicants to show good cause to receive a permit to carry a concealed weapon.

“The right to bear arms includes the right to carry an operable firearm outside the home for the lawful purpose of self-defense,” Judge Diarmuid O’Scannlain wrote for the majority.

Judge Sidney Thomas dissented, writing that the good cause requirement limited the number of people carrying concealed handguns in public to those legitimately in need.

“It limits the risk to public safety by reducing the number of guns in public circulation, but allows those who will most likely need to defend themselves in public to carry a handgun,” Thomas wrote.

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Alaska Tops Standard of Living Index

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Photo Credit: Jessica Lynn Culver / Getty ImagesResidents of Alaska are the more satisfied with and optimistic about their standard of living than Americans in any other state, while people in West Virginia are the least satisfied, according to a new poll.

The Gallup survey released Thursday put Alaska in first on a broad measure of satisfaction. Throughout 2013, the pollster asked almost 180,000 adults in all 50 states two questions: how satisfied they are with their standard of living and whether they feel that standard is getting better or worse. Out of a maximum score of 100—achieved only if 100 percent of respondents say they’re happy with their standard and it’s getting better—Alaska came in first at 53, followed closely by the oil-rich land of North Dakota and the sunny state of Hawaii. Residents of West Virginia scored a last-place 22, followed by glum Maine at 31 and gloomy Rhode Island at 32.

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Stockman’s Reasons for Challenging Cornyn: ObamaCare, Cruz, Rubio, and Miller (+video)

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Photo Credit: WND The GOP establishment has targeted him. But Rep. Steve Stockman, R-Texas, has a strategy to knock off the second-most powerful Republican on Capitol Hill, Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas. It’s the same strategy that propelled big underdog Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, to victory in 2012: Keep the entrenched incumbent below 50 percent in the primary election; then knock him off in a runoff…

His voice rising to demonstrate his conviction, Stockman declared, “I gave up my safe U.S. House seat to run against John Cornyn for U.S. Senate because I don’t want to see the Obamacare repeal movement defeated. I am willing to risk everything to see Obamacare repealed.”

The congressman maintained it is one thing to face a Democrat as a clearly defined opponent, but quite another when you have a Republican who consistently works against other Republicans, saying that Cornyn worked against Sen. Marco Rubio in Florida, Senate candidate Joe Miller in Alaska and even against his fellow Texas senator, Cruz.

In fact, when Stockman broke the news to WND in December that he would challenge Cornyn, the congressman cited as his top reason how the incumbent GOP senator “undermined Sen. Ted Cruz’s fight to stop Obamacare.”

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Vulnerable Dems Seek More Aggressive IRS Crackdown on Conservative Groups for 2014 Elections

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Photo Credit: AP/Jacquelyn MartinEven with so many unanswered questions still surrounding the Internal Revenue Service targeting scandal, Democrats are demanding the tax agency be even more aggressive in monitoring spending from outside groups going into the 2014 midterm elections.

“There are two things you don’t want in political money, in the fundraising world and expenditure world,” Sen. Mark Pryor (D-Ark.) told The Hill newspaper. “You don’t want secret money, and you don’t want unlimited money, and that’s what we have now.”

Pryor is considered among the most endangered Senate Democrats up for re-election this year.

But that’s no reason to attack the First Amendment rights of citizen groups, said Washington attorney Cleta Mitchell, who is suing on behalf of several conservative organizations given extra scrutiny by the IRS in the 2012 election cycle.

“It is absolutely outrageous that these elected officials are distressed about having a citizens group discuss their voting records – and then calling on the IRS or any agency of government to ‘protect’ them from having to explain, justify or defend their voting records in Congress,” Mitchell told TheBlaze.

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Roker’s Forecast For NYC Mayor de Blasio: ‘1 Term’

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NBC Today Show Weatherman Al Roker went on a Twitter tirade Thursday against New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio over his handling of the snowstorm and school closures in the city.

Photo Credit: Al Roker Twitter Page

Late Thursday morning Roker made his own Twitter forecast especially for de Blasio, “Talk about a bad prediction. Long range DiBlasio (sic) forecast: 1 term.”

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