DeMint to Newsmax: Defund Obamacare, No Matter the Risk

Heritage Foundation President and former U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint tells Newsmax that the House should defund Obamacare no matter what the risk to the Republican Party, even if it leads to a government shutdown.

The South Carolina Republican also says the Affordable Care Act will do more damage to the nation "than anything I've seen pass in my lifetime."

And he insists that a path to citizenship for illegals constitutes amnesty and opposing immigration reform won't necessarily hurt the GOP.

DeMint served in the Senate from 2005 until he resigned in January of this year. He took over the helm of the Heritage Foundation, an influential conservative think tank, in April.

DeMint was one of the most outspoken critics of Obamacare while he was in the Senate, but he said when he resigned that he could be more effective on issues like this from outside Congress.
In an exclusive interview with Newsmax TV on Thursday, DeMint says "I sure am" finding that to be the case.

"The key to saving our country, to turning things around and really putting the government on the right track, is getting people informed, engaged all over the country. If Americans decide that they want to stop this unfair and unaffordable bill called Obamacare, they can do it, but the congressmen and senators themselves will not do it. They'll not take that kind of risk unless the American people rise up and effectively tell them that's what they want to do.

"I've been to about 45 cities, meeting with a lot of advocates, a lot of tea party folks, independent groups, just talking about what we need to do as a people to turn our country around, but we're going to focus on this Obamacare bill, which increasingly people know is unfair. Congress is getting special favors — big unions, big corporations are getting waivers, and it looks like it's the little guy that's going to get stuck with the bill.

Via Newsmax

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‘I have no information’: Jay Carney’s ongoing employment continues to astound

Last Friday’s White House briefing was canceled due to a chance of questions about those Benghazi survivors who say they’re being intimidated into silence, but Carney did at last address CNN’s bombshell report today. It turns out he has no information on the subject.

The briefings do serve some purpose. Carney used one recently to clarify exactly which of the many scandals plaguing the president are the phony ones. What else do you people want?

Via: Twitchy.com

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IRS AGENT: AGENCY IS STILL TARGETING TEA PARTY

Excerpted from WASHINGTON SECRETS – In a remarkable admission that is likely to rock the Internal Revenue Service again, testimony released Thursday by House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Dave Camp reveals that an agent involved in reviewing tax exempt applications from conservative groups told a committee investigator that the agency is still targeting Tea Party groups, three months after the IRS scandal erupted..

In closed door testimony before the House Ways & Means Committee, the unidentified IRS agent said requests for special tax status from Tea Party groups is being forced into a special “secondary screening” because the agency has yet to come up with new guidance on how to judge the tax status of the groups.

In a transcript from the committee provided to Secrets, a Ways & Means investigator asked: “If you saw — I am asking this currently, if today if a Tea Party case, a group — a case from a Tea Party group came in to your desk, you reviewed the file and there was no evidence of political activity, would you potentially approve that case? Is that something you would do?”The agent said, “At this point I would send it to secondary screening, political advocacy.”

The committee staffer then said, “So you would treat a Tea Party group as a political advocacy case even if there was no evidence of political activity on the application. Is that right?” The agent admitted, “Based on my current manager’s direction, uh-huh.”

Camp called the renewed targeting of Tea Party groups “outrageous.”

Added a committee aide, “In plain English, the IRS is still targeting Tea Party cases.”

During 2010-2012 period when the anti-Obama Tea Party groups faced special scrutiny from the president’s IRS, agents used a “be on the lookout,” or BOLO, list which said groups with words like “Tea Party” in their title should face special, secondary screening for political activities that might hamper their special tax status.

Via: Pat Dollard

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MSNBC Guests Visibly Perturbed By GOP Rep. Reminding Them ObamaCare ‘Never Been Popular’

Rep. Tom Cole (R-OK) appeared on MSNBC’sNow with Alex Wagner on Thursday where he repeatedly reminded the panel guests that, in spite of claims and protestations to the contrary over the course of more than three years, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act of 2010 has never been popular. The MSNBC hosts and guests were frustrated that Cole would not admit that, after full implementation in 2014-2015, the law might eventually become popular. 

Cole, an opponent of the plan advanced by some Republicans to shut down the government as a means of de-funding the law, shifted gears early in his interview by dismissing that internal GOP debate as being “tactical.” He noted that all Republicans agree with most of the country and some Democrats that the ACA as presently constituted is unworkable.

“This idea that somehow what the president has done is to put us in a box,” Cole said, “on the road to…”

“I think you guys put yourself in a box,” interrupted MSNBC host and former Democratic National Committee spokeswoman Karen Finney.

“I don’t think so. It is a bad law,” Cole replied. “And if it were a good law, the Democrats wouldn’t have lost the majority as decisively as they did in 2010, or would have certainly recaptured it when the president won the presidency in 2012.”

Wagner pressed Cole, noting that even some conservatives are afraid the ACA will become popular once it is fully in effect.

“You know, I’ve been hearing that for four years; that sooner or later it was gonna be popular,” Cole replied. “It’s never been popular.”

RELATED: GOP Governors Warn Republicans Against Government Shutdown: ‘How Much Blood’ Is Obamacare Worth?

Wagner turned to Medicaid expansion and asked if Cole was worried about the dynamic where one state might provide the expansion whereas a neighboring state would not. The GOP legislator shot back that the vast majority of states – 34 – have declined to participate in the Medicaid expansion. He said that he would not opine on what was a state issue.

“For some people it is life and death,” Finney said prefacing a question. “Why would the strategy not be to continue to work on making the law better instead of this ridiculous repeal?”

“At some point, is there not a moral obligation to people?” she asked

“Well, of course, there is a moral obligation to people,” Cole replied. “And if you think that the policies pursued are ultimately destructive, and self-defeating, and frankly bankrupting, then you have an obligation to continue to oppose.”

Watch the segment below via MSNBC:

Via: Mediaite

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Why America's youth aren't finding jobs

FORTUNE – What it is to be young and unemployed in America has been widely reported, butJuly's report on the health of the jobs market offers a new snapshot of the scale of the problem.

The July employment report shows that the job market for 16- to 24-year olds is worse than you think, and it could have long-term effects for the economy.

Some economists have argued youth unemployment isn't as bad as it's made out to be, since many enrolled in school or college are neither employed nor looking for a job and therefore aren't counted as part of the workforce. Of all other months, July provides one of the more accurate pictures of what young people face today -- it's a time when most are taking a break from school and looking for work.

During the Great Recession, the share of 16- to 24-year-olds who were neither enrolled in school nor working full-time fell. Unlike the rest of the population, the decline hasn't improved much: In July, 36% of young people worked full-time, 10% less than the same month in 2007 before the economic downturn. To be sure, July is a time when young people have taken on summer internships, and so the statistics reflect those with paid internships, as well as those with unpaid internships but have taken part-time jobs.

"They're not in school, so what are they doing?" asks Diana Carew, economist at Progressive Policy Institute, who studies youth unemployment. She points out that July's jobs report shows that the share of unemployed 16- to 24-year-olds not in school stood at 17.1%, compared with 11% six years ago. And while workers in general have been leaving the labor force, partly because they're aging into retirement, it's especially worrisome when young people drop out: In July, 8.4 million 16- to 24-year-olds stopped looking for work altogether, a rise from 6.8 million a year earlier.

MORE: July's jobs bummer: Want fries with that?

However slowly the economy has been creating jobs, it's still surprising why so many young people, particularly those who aren't in school, are still having a tough time. The bulk of jobs created in July were in retail, restaurants, and bars. These certainly aren't the highest-paying gigs, but they demand fewer skills and would naturally attract those with less education. What's played out is what Carew calls "The Great Squeeze," where the dearth of middle-skilled jobs have forced many workers to settle for whatever they can get, taking lower-skilled jobs for less pay and therefore squeezing those with less education and experience out of the workforce.

Via: CNN Money

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AP: Small businesses look at axing family coverage when ObamaCare hits

As the ObamaCare mandates approach — even those purportedly postponed — employers are looking for ways to get around the ballooning costs of insurance for their employees.  Larger employers can spread the costs out better and negotiate lower rates, but smaller businesses have fewer options for retaining their benefits.  The Associated Press reports thatmany smaller businesses may abandon paid dependent coverage, forcing employees to bear the whole cost, especially for spouses:

One casualty of the new health care law may be paid coverage for families of people who work for small businesses.

Insurance companies have already warned small business customers that premiums could rise 20 percent or more in 2014 under the Affordable Care Act. That’s making some owners consider not paying for coverage for workers’ families, even though insurance is a benefit that helps companies attract and retain top talent. If more small business owners decide to stop paying for family coverage, it will accelerate a trend that started as the cost of health insurance soared in recent years. …

Premiums have been soaring for years because of the rising cost of medical care. But the ACA also has requirements that may drive premiums higher, including a tax on insurance companies that is expected to be passed along to employers. Shoop’s insurer has warned that the tax could send his premiums up more than 20 percent a year from now.

“It’s going to be very significant,” Shoop says. “We’re really going to have to do a juggling act, and so are our employees.”

The ACA requires businesses with 50 or more employees provide coverage to their workers — but family coverage is a different matter.  The mandate requires that employers offerinsurance coverage for dependent children (now through age 26, which may be a driver of the increase as well), but does not require employers to cover the cost of that insurance.  Spouses don’t even get that much; the law does not require employers to include them at all, even at the full cost to the employee.  That will send them into the individual exchanges, if employers have to restrict their expenditures enough — and that means more federal outlays for subsidies, and a quicker pace to the barrels of red ink that ObamaCare will produce.

Via:Hot Air

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