Mr. Speaker Cartoon

Big ticket: Cost to protect Gov. Christie rises 1,800 percent

No matter who pays for Chris Christie’s ticket to today’s Dallas Cowboys vs. Green Bay Packers football game, the New Jersey governor will be running up the score on taxpayers.
The travel costs of state police troopers assigned to protect the governor are 18 times higher than when Christie took office, a New Jersey Watchdog investigation found.
New Jersey spent nearly $1 million on travel expenses for its state police Executive Protection Unit during Christie’s four years and nine months as governor, according to documents obtained under the Open Public Records Act. Last year, Christie traveled out-of-state on more than 100 days while visiting 36 states, Mexico and Canada, primarily on personal and political trips that were not official state business.
The current average monthly travel costs to protect Christie for a single month are 50 percent more than former Gov. Jon Corzine’s entire final year in office, according to state records. For 2009, EPU’s expenses were only $21,704 – compared to $32,933 per month for the first three quarters of 2014.
Spokesmen for Christie did not respond to New Jersey Watchdog’s requests for comment.
The governor announced Friday he will pay for his own travel and ticket to today’s game in Green Bay. Last week, Christie acknowledged Cowboys owner Jerry Jones paid for him, his wife and their four children to fly to Dallas on a private charter jet plus their VIP seats at the Jan. 4 game against the Detroit Lions – an admission that stirred controversy about ethics and gifts to the governor.

Hoeven says Senate still needs four votes to pass veto-proof Keystone legislation

The Senate still needs four votes to pass veto-proof legislation to build the Keystone XL oil pipeline, Sen. John Hoeven, who sponsored the legislation, said Sunday.
Hoeven, R-N.D., told “Fox News Sunday” the GOP-controlled Senate remains shy of the 67 votes needed to override a presidential veto.
All of the chamber's 54 Republicans and nine Democrats are expected to support the legislation, which needs a two-thirds majority to override a veto.
“But we're going to the floor with an open amendment process, trying to foster more bipartisanship,” Hoeven said.
He also suggested Senate Republicans might attach the bill to other legislation that would get 67 votes.
The upper chamber could hold a preliminary vote on the legislation as early as Monday.
The Obama administration early last week repeated that President Obama intends to veto the legislation should it reach his desk before a State Department study on the issue is completed.
Hoeven suggested that Obama has stalled the project since shortly after taking office in 2009, through repeated State Department studies.
“He’s delayed this project for more than six years. America won World War II in less than six years, so clearly he’s trying to defeat the project with endless delays,” he told Fox.
The GOP-led House last week passed legislation to build the pipeline.
The administration also objects to the legislation because it takes the decision about Keystone away from the executive branch.
One of the administration’s other principal arguments for not approving completion of the pipeline, which would carry crude Canadian oil through the heartland to Gulf Coast refiners, was resolved Friday.
The Nebraska Supreme Court cleared the way for the pipeline to be built in that state.
Both sides have argued about whether the pipeline would indeed be a jobs creator. Supporters refer to a State Department report stating it would create roughly 42,000 jobs, while critics argue many of those jobs will be temporary.

North Carolina city removes sculpture of soldier kneeling before cross

Until a few days ago, a war memorial in a public park in North Carolina included a metal sculpture depicting a soldier kneeling in prayer before a cross. But city officials voted to remove the sculpture to settle a lawsuit claiming the artwork promoted Christianity.
King, a small city of about 6,000 people 15 miles north of Winston-Salem, dedicated the memorial about a decade ago. But the statue was removed Tuesday night, immediately after The King city council voted 3-2 to end the lawsuit. Now, an empty hole can be seen where the statue once stood.
MyFox8 in Winston-Salem, reporting on the controversy the other day, said the memorial is on city-owned land but was paid for through private donations.
“Both sides in this matter wish to avoid further costs, and this agreement will ensure that the City of King will not spend additional taxpayers’ funds to continue litigation in federal court,” the city said in a statement after the vote.
As part of the agreement, the King City Council also said it would stop flying the Christian flag over the memorial and would pay $500,000 to Americans United for Separation of Church and State for the legal costs the group incurred bringing the lawsuit on behalf of local Afghanistan War veteran Steven Hewett.
Hewett explained his reasons for suing in November, the Christian News Network reported Saturday. His lawsuit claimed violations of his constitutional rights.
“I proudly served alongside a diverse group of soldiers with a variety of different religious beliefs,” he said in a news release. “The City of King should be honoring everyone who served our country, not using their service as an excuse to promote a single religion.”
The settlement calls for Hewett to be paid $1 in nominal damages.
The Stokes News reported that King’s elected officials were worried about losing the lawsuit and facing higher legal bills, as much as $2 million by one estimate. The city’s insurer also was insisting on a settlement.
“I feel this city has been sabotaged and bullied by folks who don’t believe in what this community stands for,” the newspaper quoted City Councilman Wesley Carter as saying when he voted against the settlement. “I feel like we have been pressured by insurance companies and attorneys who have never been to King. They don’t know what we are about and what this community stands for.”
King’s elected officials incensed veterans groups, churches and others in the city in 2010 when they ordered the removal of the Christian flag from the memorial. As part of a protest, the Christian flag started flying everywhere else in the town, including barbecue joints and hair salons. Eventually the city passed a law establishing a lottery system in which citizens could choose what flag they wanted flown over the memorial, including the Christian flag.
City officials say they will now draw up plans for a new kneeling soldier sculpture that does not include a cross, and will ask residents for their input.

Kerry announces planned Paris trip, says criticism for missing march 'quibbling'

Secretary of State John Kerry called criticism that no top U.S. officials attended Sunday's massive march against terrorism in Paris "quibbling" Monday, even as he announced a trip to the French capital later this week for talks on countering Islamist violence. 
Kerry announced his plans at a press conference in the Indian city of Ahmedabad, where he had made a long-scheduled appearance at an international investment conference Sunday ahead of President Barack Obama's planned visit to that country later this month. 
"I would have personally very much wanted to have been [in Paris]," Kerry said, "but couldn't do so because of the commitment that I had here and it is important to keep these kinds of commitments."
When asked about criticism directed at the Obama administration for not sending a high-ranking official to take part in the march, Kerry said, "I really think that this is sort of quibbling a little bit in the sense that our Assistant Secretary of State Victoria Nuland was there and marched, our ambassador [to France Jane Hartley] was there and marched, many people from the embassy were there and marched."
Nuland, in fact, attended a march in Washington.
Kerry also said at a news conference that U.S. officials, including himself and President Barack Obama, had been "deeply engaged" with French authorities almost immediately after the first attack occurred Wednesday and had offered intelligence assistance.
More than 40 world leaders, along with more than a million ordinary French citizens, marched arm in arm through the streets of Paris Sunday to rally for unity and freedom of expression and to honor the 17 victims killed in three separate terror attacks last week. 
Among the world leaders who did march, under heavy security, were French President Francois Hollande, British Prime Minister David Cameron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas. Attorney General Eric Holder did not take part, despite being in Paris for meetings on counterterrorism.
 Kerry said he is going to France to reaffirm U.S. solidarity with America's oldest ally. He said as soon as he heard about the march, he asked his team what the earliest time was that he could go.
"That is why I am going there on the way home and to make it crystal clear how passionately we feel about the events that have taken place there," he said. "I don't think he people of France have any doubt about America's understanding about what happened, about our personal sense of loss and our deep commitment to the people of France in this moment of trial."
Kerry will arrive in Paris on Thursday after stops in Sofia, Bulgaria and Geneva, Switzerland. In Geneva, on Wednesday Kerry will he meeting with Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammed Javad Zarif to discuss the status of nuclear negotiations that are to resume the following day.
Kerry will be the highest-ranking U.S. official to visit France since the terrorist attacks on a French newspaper and a kosher supermarket. Authorities say one of those involved in the attacks pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group in a video. He and two other suspected extremists were killed during police raids.
"I want to emphasize that the relationship with France is not about one day or one particular moment," Kerry said. "It is an ongoing longtime relationship that is deeply, deeply based in the shared values, and particularly the commitment that we share to freedom of expression."
"No single act of terror, no two people with  a AK-47s, no hostage-taking at a grocery store is ever going to prevent those who are committed to the march for freedom to continue to march and to ultimately see all people enjoy their rights, to be able to enjoy the protections that come with that freedom," he added.

Radical Islam Cartoon

Gas tax, infrastructure funding puts some daylight between GOP House, Senate leaders

Falling gasoline prices have sparked congressional debate about increasing the federal gas tax to help fund upcoming infrastructure projects and have set up a potential disagreement among House and Senate Republicans.
The federal gas tax primarily pays for transportation projects but has stayed at 18.4 cents a gallon for roughly two decades, helping create the funding gap.  
In addition, increasing construction costs combined with less revenue from the gas tax, in large part because of more fuel-efficient vehicles, have further contributed to the estimated $16 billion funding gap over the past several years.
Though Congress has managed to find money elsewhere in the federal budget to cover the shortages, lawmakers say the country needs more than a stop-gap solution.
However, House Speaker John Boehner suggested Thursday that getting a gas-tax increase passed in the now-Republican-controlled House and Senate seems unlikely.
“When the Democrats had total control of the Congress they couldn't find the votes,” he told reporters. “It's doubtful the votes are here to raise the gas tax again. … I’ve never voted to raise the gas tax. We'll have to work our way through it.”
But at least four Senate Republicans -- Bob Corker, Tenn.; James Inhofe, Okla.; Orrin Hatch, Utah; and John Thune, S.D. -- appear open to the idea of increasing the tax.
Last week, Thune, the third-ranking Senate Republican, told “Fox News Sunday” that he didn’t “favor increasing any tax, but I think we have to look at all of the option.”
Gas prices are now $2.50 a gallon, which some economic experts argue now gives Americans enough money to absorb such a tax increase.
The federal highway bill expires at the end of May. And there is a roughly $100 billion shortfall on funding the agency’s Highway Trust Fund at its current levels.
Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, has suggested lawmakers have little choice but to at least consider an increase, in light of the state of the fund and the country’s crumbling roads and bridges.
Corker, who is backing a proposal for a 12-cent-a-gallon increase in the gas tax over the next two years, says such a hike would be offset by other taxes that Americans now pay.
“At least it would put our infrastructure on strong footing,” he said. “And that second component seems to get left out of the conversation most of the time. But, yes, I believe that's what we should do.”
Democrats including Sen. Barbara Boxer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, both of California, have urged Congress to increase the tax or find other ways to better fund infrastructure projects.
“If there's ever going to be a time to raise the gas tax, the time when gas is so low is the time to do it,” Pelosi said last week.

Sledding on ice: Fear of lawsuits makes Dubuque latest city to ban winter rite

DES MOINES, Iowa –  Yet another city is pulling kids from city-owned sledding hills and slapping hefty fines on anyone trying to use the public property, but it might be more for fear of lawsuits than for kids' safety.
The City Council in Dubuque, Iowa, voted Jan. 7 to ban sledding in 48 of its 50 public parks. The new ordinance, which council members acknowledged was put in place to protect the city from expensive lawsuits, provides for $750 fines for repeat offenses.
According to council members during the Monday night meeting and an editorial in U.S. News and World Report by Dubuque Mayor Roy Buol, sledding injury lawsuits are real concern for the city. A lawsuit in Boone, Iowa, cost that city $12 million after a woman hit a concrete block on public property and claimed negligence on the part of the city. And in Omaha, Neb., a sledding collision with a tree paralyzed a young girl and cost the city $2 million. Still another case, in Sioux City, Iowa, saw a man win a $2.75 million settlement after he struck a city sign and sued.
Buol said the city did not want to restrict sledding, but was forced to because state lawmakers have not moved on legislation that would protect cities from what he called frivolous lawsuits. In Iowa, someone cannot sue a city if they are injured while doing activities like biking on public property. But sledding is not covered under that law and leaves cities open to lawsuits.
In his editorial in U.S News and World report, Buol wrote, “Our legal counsel advises us we limit our liability for negligence, which is the failure to exercise reasonable care to maintain a park safe for sledding…Safe sledding areas require inspections, ongoing evaluation and maintenance throughout the season, and we do not have the resources to do that for our other 47 parks.”
According a report that looked at sledding injuries from 2000-2007 by the Center for Injury Research and Policy at Nationwide Children’s Hospital, 20,000 children are injured in sledding incidents each year. These could be injuries from minor scraps, to broken bones and more serious injuries.
In a counter editorial piece in U.S. News and World Report to Buol’s, Nicole Kaeding of the Cato Institute says kids should be allowed to be kids, which includes getting bumps and bruises.
“The quest for safety doesn’t mean that we eliminate all the fun in childhood. Kids should be kids. As parents, we should teach our children to look, understand, listen and access their surroundings,” wrote Kaeding, adding, “Banning sledding is just another absurd item fostered by overzealous safety experts.”
Cities all over the country are banning sledding on public property. And others, like Des Moines, are trying to avoid all-out bans by posting signs that warn sledders of the risk. However, it doesn’t completely get cities legally off the hook.
The Mayor and City Council said that if anyone has a problem with the new ordinance they should direct their frustration towards their state-elected officials in the capital. Who they say, can enact laws that would cut down on the lawsuits. The Mayor also wrote in his editorial that if more funding becomes available, they can ensure safety at more parks and open more hills for sledding.