Conservative Blogger
Thursday, August 6, 2015
Obama urged to retract statement comparing members of Congress to Iranian hardliners
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell called for President Obama to retract a statement he made Wednesday saying members of Congress who opposed the Iran nuke deal had something in common with Iranians who chanted “Death to America” in the streets of Tehran.
Obama made the comments in a speech at American University in Washington while going after critics of the deal, who he said were “selling a fantasy” to the American people. He added that Iranian hardliners chanting "Death to America" don't represent all of Iran.
"In fact, it's those hardliners who are most comfortable with the status quo," Obama said. "It's those hardliners chanting "Death to America" who have been most opposed to the deal. They're making common cause with the Republican caucus."
McConnell, R-Ky., called the comments “bizarre and preposterous” in a statement released Wednesday afternoon, adding that “supporters and defenders” of the proposed deal should reject the president’s “offensive rhetoric.”
“Members of both parties have serious and heartfelt concerns about the Iran deal,” he said in a statement. “These Democrats and Republicans deserved serious answers today, not some outrageous attempt to equate their search for answers with supporting chants of 'Death to America.'”
The president's remarks were part of an intense lobbying campaign by the White House ahead of Congress' vote next month to either approve or disapprove the international agreement. Opponents of the agreement have streamed to Capitol to make their case, and have spent tens of millions of dollars on advertisements.
The White House is preparing for the likelihood that lawmakers will vote against the deal next month and is focusing its lobbying efforts on getting enough Democrats to sustain a presidential veto. Only one chamber of Congress is needed to sustain a veto and keep the deal in place.
Obama needs 146 Democrats in the House or 34 in the Senate to sustain a veto. As of Wednesday afternoon, 16 House Democrats and 11 senators had publicly declared their support for the deal.
The White House has said it is confident it can sustain a veto at least in the House.
Louisiana police officer dies in shooting, manhunt underway for suspect
A Shreveport, La. police officer has died after being shot while on duty, and a manhunt for the suspect is underway, authorities say.
Shreveport Police Cpt. Marcus Hines told a press conference late Wednesday that the officer, whose name has not been released, was shot at around 9:15 p.m. local time while responding to a report of a suspicious person inside a home. Hines says an armed man was apparently inside the residence, threatening to harm people.
Hines didn’t elaborate on the officer’s injuries and initially only said that he was in “very serious” condition at a hospital. Hines later told KTAL that the officer had died.
Hines said the Shreveport police, Caddo Parish deputies and canines are searching for a male suspect.
"Last night, we lost one of our brave, uniformed officers in the line of duty. Our hearts are saddened," Shreveport Mayor Ollie Tyler told KTBS. "We ask for the community’s prayers for this officer’s family and SPD as we grieve the loss of one of our own who paid the ultimate sacrifice while serving and protecting the citizens of this city."
The Shreveport Times and KTBS reported officers had surrounded a house near the shooting scene where they believed a suspect may be hiding. KTBS reported that police were searching cars and restricting access to the area.
The station reported that the last fatal shooting of a Shreveport police officer took place in October 2010. Shreveport is the third-largest city in Louisiana with a population of around 200,000 people. It is located in the so-called Ark-La-Tex region, where the borders of Arkansas, Louisiana, and Texas meet.
With Trump at center stage, GOP candidates ready to rumble at 1st debate
The spotlight is shining on Donald Trump right now, but nine other GOP presidential candidates are poised and eager to seize it from him as they head into Thursday night's prime-time debate in Cleveland.
While Trump's high poll numbers landed him the top slot -- and a center-stage position -- at the Fox News debate, the lead-off showdown carries high risk and reward for the billionaire businessman.
Trump has by most accounts done a masterful job dominating media coverage over the last several weeks, and flipping the script on pundits who predicted his incendiary remarks -- about illegal immigrants, about Sen. John McCain -- would torpedo his bid.
But he's never been on the debate stage.
"My sort of my whole life has been a debate, but I have never debated before," he told Fox News' Bill O'Reilly.
In the run-up to the debate, Trump is trying to play that factor as an asset and part of his appeal as an outsider.
"I think you have to be yourself," Trump said.
While the unscripted approach may work for Trump, the other candidates reportedly are preparing intensely, in a bid to prevent the forum from becoming the Trump show and capture some momentum from him.
Republican strategist Ron Bonjean said Trump's past positions -- once describing himself as pro-choice, donating to the Clinton Foundation and other actions -- indeed provide an opening to his primary opponents.
"The other Republicans on stage have an opportunity to challenge his conservative credentials," Bonjean told FoxNews.com's "Strategy Room."
There will be two debates on Thursday. The debates, hosted by Fox News and Facebook in conjunction with the Ohio Republican Party, will be held at the Quicken Loans Arena in Cleveland, Ohio.
The 9 p.m. ET debate will include the top 10 candidates in an average of recent national polls. They are Trump; former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker; former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee; retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson; Texas Sen. Ted Cruz; Florida Sen. Marco Rubio; Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul; New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie; and Ohio Gov. John Kasich.
Kasich, who leads the state where the debate is being held, said in a statement, "As governor, I am glad to welcome my fellow debate participants to our great state and I look forward to discussing the issues facing our country with them on Thursday."
The seven who did not make the top 10 will be invited to a 5 p.m. ET debate. They are: former Texas Gov. Rick Perry; former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum; Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal; former HP head Carly Fiorina; South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham; former New York Gov. George Pataki; and former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore.
Huckabee, speaking with Fox News, said it'll be important to prepare -- brush up on "the numbers, the figures" -- but also to "be authentic."
"I'm not going to spend all day Thursday, you know, focused on the materials. I am going to go to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, I'm going to keep my mind free and loose," Huckabee said.
Texas Sen. Ted Cruz rapped any candidates running toward "the mushy middle" and gave a preview of his approach Thursday.
"Every time we run as Democrat light, we lose. I'm convinced 2016 is going to be an election very much like 1980 and that we are going to win by following Reagan's dictum of painting in bold colors and not pale pastels," he said.
While Cruz has been one of the few Republican candidates not tangling publicly with Trump, the senator denied that he and Trump struck any deal to lay off each other. Cruz, though, said other candidates are "frightened" by what Trump is saying.
"Not only have I refused to [attack him] but I have commended Donald for having the courage to speak out and in particular to shine the light on the problem of illegal immigration," he said.
16 states ask Obama admin to put power plant rules on hold
WASHINGTON – The campaign to stop President Barack Obama's sweeping emissions limits on power plants began taking shape Wednesday, as 16 states asked the government to put the rules on hold while a Senate panel moved to block them.
West Virginia Attorney General Patrick Morrisey, who is leading the charge against the rules, banded together with 15 other state attorneys general in a letter to Environmental Protection Agency Gina McCarthy requesting that the agency temporarily suspend the rules while they challenge their legality in court. The letter called for the EPA to respond by Friday.
The EPA and the White House both said they believe the limits are legal and have no plans to put them on hold. But by submitting the formal request anyway, the attorneys general are laying the groundwork to ask the courts to suspend the emissions limits instead.
"These regulations, if allowed to proceed, will do serious harm to West Virginia and the U.S. economy," Morrisey said. "That is why we are taking quick action to bring this process to a halt."
The 16 states and a handful of others are preparing to sue the Obama administration to block the rules permanently by arguing they exceed Obama's authority. Bolstered by a recent Supreme Court ruling against the administration's mercury limits, opponents argued that states shouldn't have to start preparing to comply with a rule that may eventually get thrown out by the courts.
The speedy opposition from the states came two days after Obama unveiled the final version of the rules, which mark the first time the U.S. has ever limited carbon dioxide emissions from existing power plants. Obama's revised plan mandates a 32 percent cut in emissions nationwide by 2030, compared to 2005 levels — a steeper cut than in his earlier proposal.
Most of the attorneys general signing the letter Wednesday are Republicans. Yet they were joined by Jack Conway of the coal-producing state of Kentucky. Conway and Kentucky Gov. Steve Beshear are both Democrats, but have joined the state's Republican leaders in denouncing Obama's power plant limits, which form the centerpiece of his plan to fight climate change.
Although the most serious threat to Obama's power plant rules is in the courts, lawmakers in Congress are also pursuing legislative means to stop them. The first vote came Wednesday in the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, where a bill blocking the rules passed the GOP-controlled panel by a voice vote — but not without a bit of drama.
Over the protests of boycotting Democrats, the Senate GOP-controlled panel approved legislation designed to block the Obama administration from implementing the tough new standards.
Democrats walked out of the committee meeting in protest of a separate bill about pesticides, arguing it should have been the subject of a fact-finding hearing. Lacking the necessary quorum for a vote, Republican Chairman Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma reconvened the meeting in a lunchroom just off the Senate floor, where the aroma of a just-completed GOP lunch was still wafting in the air.
The voice vote approving the bill sends it to the full Senate, where a filibuster battle awaits. Obama has vowed to veto any such legislation, and Republicans have yet to prove they can muster the votes to override his veto.
Wednesday, August 5, 2015
Republicans introduce legislation opposing Iran deal, teeing up White House showdown
House Republicans on Tuesday introduced legislation opposing the recently struck Iranian nuclear deal, launching a battle with the White House that could end in a veto showdown this fall.
House Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Ed Royce, R-Calif., unveiled the legislation, saying the deal "gives up too much, too fast, to a terrorist state -- making the world less safe, less secure, and less stable."
A day earlier, House Republicans said they had the 218 GOP votes lined up for a so-called resolution of disapproval.
President Obama, meanwhile, is working to secure the backing of Democrats in both chambers. He won key endorsements on Tuesday, with Sen. Time Kaine, D-Va., and Bill Nelson, D-Fla., coming out in favor.
If both the House and Senate vote against the deal, Obama is certain to veto -- but foes would need to muster a two-thirds majority in Congress to override.
Though the United Nations is moving forward on many aspects of the nuclear agreement regardless, Congress would have leverage over U.S. sanctions, which Royce called "the most powerful economic sanctions in the world."
"The agreement gives Iran permanent sanctions relief, but in exchange only temporarily restrains Iran's nuclear program," he said in a statement. "If this agreement goes through, Iran gets a cash bonanza, a boost to its international standing, and a lighted path toward nuclear weapons."
But Kaine, in announcing his support, said it is a "dramatic improvement over the status quo in improving global security. The agreement takes a nuclear weapons program that was on the verge of success and disables it for many years through peaceful diplomatic means with sufficient tools for the international community to verify whether Iran is meeting its commitments."
On the sidelines, the lobbying grew in intensity on Tuesday, as Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu made dueling appeals to the American Jewish community.
Netanyahu made his case in a live webcast with more than 10,000 participants, according to the U.S. Jewish groups that organized the event. The prime minister railed against the agreement to curb Iran's nuclear program in exchange for billions of dollars in sanctions relief, calling it a "bad deal" that leaves Tehran on the brink of a bomb.
"The nuclear deal with Iran doesn't block Iran's path to the bomb," he said. "It actually paves Iran's path to the bomb."
Netanyahu, one of the fiercest critics of the nuclear accord, also disputed Obama's assertion that opponents of the diplomatic deal favor war. He called that assertion "utterly false," saying Israel wants peace, not war.
Obama was to hold a private meeting at the White House later Tuesday with Jewish leaders -- some who support the deal, some who oppose it, and others whose organizations are undecided.
The White House is preparing for the likelihood that lawmakers will vote against the deal and is focusing its lobbying efforts on getting enough Democrats to sustain a veto.
Only one chamber of Congress is needed to sustain a veto.
Obama spokesman Josh Earnest said Monday that the White House is confident it can sustain a veto "at least in the House."
Planned Parenthood official: Abortion procedures, prices altered to meet demand
In the nearly 16-minute, edited video, the fifth released by Center for Medical Progress, a woman identified as Melissa Farrell, director of research for Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, discusses pricing for specimens -- ranging from intact fetuses to tissue and organs -- for outside tissue procurement companies.
“Yeah, and so if we alter our process, and we are able to obtain intact fetal cadavers, then we can make it part of the budget, that any dissections are this, and splitting the specimens into different shipments is this,” Farrell said. “I mean it’s all just a matter of line items.”
"If we alter our process, and we are able to obtain intact fetal cadavers, then we can make it part of the budget"Altering abortion procedures to procure fetal tissue, delivering intact fetuses and selling fetal tissue for profit are all against federal law.
- Melissa Farrell, Planned Parenthood official
GRAPHIC CONTENT: Click to see latest undercover Planned Parenthood video
However, Farrell tells undercover investigators from the center multiple times that abortion doctors can change a procedure in order to procure intact specimens.
“And you know, when it matters, you know in the cases of when it’s mattered, you know, physicians also need an intact specimen, they can make it happen,” said Farrell, noting that some of the clinic’s doctors have research projects of their own for which they’re collecting specimens.
“So they do it in a way that they get the best specimens,” Farrell said. “So I know it can happen.”
The video’s revelations stand in stark contrast to public statements made recently by top officials of the Planned Parenthood regional affiliate.
The head of Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast denied the organization sold or donated fetal tissue in a July 24 letter to Louisiana Dept. of Health and Hospitals Secretary Kathy Kliebert.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, who is also running for the Republican presidential nomination, directed the DHH to investigate Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, which was seeking to open a New Orleans facility.
In her letter to Kliebert, President and CEO of Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, Melaney A. Linton, specifically addressed the fetal tissue issue.
“Do any Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast facilities, or any affiliates, subsidiaries or associates thereof, sell or donate any unborn baby organs or body parts? Answer: No.” Linton wrote.
Related Image
Melissa
Farrell, the Director of Research for Planned Parenthood Gulf Coast, is
featured in the latest release by an anti-abortion group. (Center for Medical Progress)
“The latest video showing Planned Parenthood’s treatment of unborn children in a Houston clinic is repulsive and unconscionable," Abbott said in a statement. "Selling baby body parts is the furthest thing imaginable from providing women’s healthcare, and this organization’s repeated and systematic disrespect for human life is appalling. The State of Texas is aggressively investigating this matter and must use all available legal remedies to address this depraved conduct.”
CMP has been the target of two restraining orders by federal judges banning them from releasing some of their recordings. The orders, however, have so far been limited to videos made at meetings of the National Abortion Federation and those dealing with a tissue procurement company, StemExpress.
Tuesday’s release, purely reliant on video taken inside a Planned Parenthood clinic, would not seem to violate either order.
At the end of the video, CMP investigators film a segment in what they say is the abortion clinic’s pathological laboratory. Farrell and two unidentified Planned Parenthood workers demonstrate the “quality” of fetal body parts, including intact arms, legs, lungs, intestines and eyeballs.
The CMP investigators ask to see any intact specimens, but one of the unidentified female workers begins laughing.
“We had a really long day and they’re all mixed up together in a bag,” she says.
The “Just a Matter of Line Items” video is the fifth release from CMP. Like the first four, it contains undercover video of Planned Parenthood officials and associates.
CMP has yet to release the full footage of its latest video. But a preliminary link for "full footage" exists on its website, and the organization has in the past typically released unedited video several hours after the edited video has been released
The videos have brought investigations of Planned Parenthood's policies on aborted fetuses by three Republican-led congressional committees and three states.
The Senate failed Monday evening to advance a Republican-led measure to halt federal aid to Planned Parenthood. The vote to bring debate on the bill was 53-46, shy of the 60 votes needed to move on.
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