Conservative Happenings

Thursday, June 25, 2015

Huckabee: SCOTUS Obamacare Decision ‘Out-of-Control Act of Judicial Tyranny’

As soon as the news of the King v. Burwell decision broke, 2016 GOP candidate Mike Huckabee published his reaction on his official blog. And just in case not enough people were paying attention, he decided to get a little ranty on Twitter as well.

The first indication of Huckabee’s impending opinion came in the form of a 139-character attack on the current Supreme Court justices and the judicial branch at large.

‏@GovMikeHuckabee

There isn't a 'do-over’ provision in our Constitution that allows unelected, SCOTUS judges power to circumvent Congress & rewrite bad laws.

Of course, his “do-over” jab wasn’t going to be enough, so he wrote a much longer blog post about it. From the very beginning, Huckabee makes his stance clear when he calls the King v. Burwell decision “an out-of-control act of judicial tyranny.” He then spends the rest of the first paragraph nit-picking the SCOTUS’s announcement, but quickly leaves it behind for a second paragraph filled with a “what I will fix as president” campaign message:

Everywhere I go, I talk to American families who keep getting punched in the gut with outrageous insurance premiums and infuriating hospital bills. ObamaCare was railroaded through Congress to ‘solve’ our healthcare problems, but five years later, American families are getting railroaded by runaway mandates, big government bureaucracy, and out-of-control healthcare costs. ObamaCare is a $2.2 trillion Washington disaster that raided billions from Medicare and did nothing to fix our broken system of ‘sick care,’ which rewards irresponsibility and penalizes commonsense. As President, I will protect Medicare, repeal ObamaCare, and pass real reform that will actually lower costs, while focusing on cures and prevention rather than intervention. The status quo is unfair, unaffordable, unsustainable, and completely un-American.

But this is all part of a campaign, so of course the Huckster wasn’t done.

‏@GovMikeHuckabee

#SCOTUS has NO authority to rescue Congress from creating bad law. #Burwell ruling is an out-of-control act of judicial tyranny. #ObamaCare

Not gonna lie. I kind of miss Fox News’ Huckabee. Kind of.

Via: Mediaite

Eric Holder Calls Charleston Shooting “Domestic Terrorism” . . . Still Labels Ft. Hood Islamic Terror Attack “Workplace Violence”…

Why do retired democrats feel the need to open up there traps!!!!

Via: Weasel Zippers

Continue Reading....

[VIDEO] Watchdog reveals evidence was destroyed during probe of IRS targeting

WASHINGTON – The lead government watchdog for the IRS revealed Thursday that computer evidence was erased during the investigation into the agency's targeting scandal, months after the IRS was told to preserve documents.

J. Russell George, the Treasury inspector general for tax administration, testified to the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee that IRS employees erased computer backup tapes shortly after officials discovered thousands of emails related to the tax agency's Tea Party scandal had been lost.

As many as 24,000 emails were lost because 422 backup tapes were "magnetically erased" around March 4, 2014.

George said his office found no direct evidence the tapes were destroyed to hide information from Congress or law enforcement. But the destruction nevertheless defied a preservation order, and is sure to raise suspicions over motive.

"We have been misled. There has been evidence that has been destroyed," committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, said Thursday.

George said those tapes "likely contained" 2010 and 2011 emails to and from former IRS official Lois Lerner, who has emerged as a central figure in congressional investigations. He said they will "most likely never be recovered."

A source familiar with the matter told Fox News the evidence was destroyed 10 months after a preservation order for the emails; seven months after a subpoena; and one month after IRS officials realized there were potential problems locating certain emails.

Via: Fox News

[BREAKING NEWS] SUPREME COURT UPHOLDS NATIONWIDE HEALTH CARE LAW SUBSIDIES

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the nationwide tax subsidies under President Barack Obama's health care overhaul, in a ruling that preserves health insurance for millions of Americans.

The justices said in a 6-3 ruling that the subsidies that 8.7 million people currently receive to make insurance affordable do not depend on where they live, under the 2010 health care law.

The outcome is the second major victory for Obama in politically charged Supreme Court tests of his most significant domestic achievement. It came the same day the court gave the administration an unexpected victory by preserving a key tool the administration uses to fight housing bias.

Chief Justice John Roberts again voted with his liberal colleagues in support of the law. Roberts also was the key vote to uphold the law in 2012. Justice Anthony Kennedy, a dissenter in 2012, was part of the majority on Thursday.

"Congress passed the Affordable Care Act to improve health insurance markets, not to destroy them," Roberts wrote in the majority opinion.

In a dissent he summarized from the bench, Justice Antonin Scalia said, "We should start calling this law SCOTUS care." Using the acronym for the Supreme Court, Scalia said his colleagues have twice stepped in to save the law from what Scalia considered worthy challenges.

Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas joined the dissent, as they did in 2012.

Nationally, 10.2 million people have signed up for health insurance under the Obama health overhaul. That includes the 8.7 million people who are receiving an average subsidy of $272 a month to help pay their insurance premiums.

Via: AP

Tax Scofflaws Get Millions In Contract Awards From IRS

J. Russell George after a hearing before the House Ways and Means Committee. Alex Wong/Getty Images.

Corporations that owed back taxes illegally received nearly $19 million from contracts with the Internal Revenue Service in 2012 and 2013, a government watchdog reported Wednesday.

What do you think?

The IRS is prohibited from contracting with corporations that owe the government taxes, but that didn’t stop the agency from awarding 17 delinquent companies $18.8 million for 57 contracts, according to a Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration report.

What do you think?

“Federal contractors who abuse the tax system cause significant loss of tax revenue, while at the same time benefitting from taxes paid by compliant individuals and corporations,” the report said. “When the IRS conducts business with contractors that do not pay their federal taxes, it conveys a conflicting message in relation to its mission to ensure compliance with tax laws.”

What do you think?

One corporation also received three contracts worth more than $67,000 even though it had a felony conviction.

The Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2012 “prohibited the IRS from using appropriated funds to enter into a contract with a corporation that has certain federal tax debt and/or felony convictions,” the report said.

What do you think?

IRS officials told the inspector general they either didn’t remember receiving the guidance the Department of the Treasury issued on Feb. 2, 2012, regarding the new law, or they didn’t understand it “because they received no training on these new requirements.”

What do you think?

In any case, “TIGTA found that the IRS did not have effective controls in place to prevent the award of contracts to corporations with certain federal tax debt and/or felony convictions,” the report said.

What do you think?

Investigators estimated that the IRS didn’t require corporations to report tax debt or felony convictions for 94 percent of all awarded contracts. In fact, the IRS doesn’t have a definition for federal tax debt and doesn’t proactively check to ensure prospective contractors are in compliance with appropriation law, investigators found.

Via: Daily Caller

Guns, race remain Obama’s biggest missed opportunities

President Barack Obama, with Vice President Biden, leaves after making a statement at the White House regarding the church shootings in Charleston, S.C., on June 18, the day after the massacre. (Alex Wong/Getty Images)

The killing of nine black worshipers at a church in South Carolina has compelled President Obama to look back with anger, then melancholy and finally some distance at the two most intractable issues he has faced as president: guns and race.

In the White House briefing room, at a fundraiser at the home of a movie star, before a roomful of the country’s mayors and in a garage in Pasadena, Calif., Obama has reflected not only on the Charleston shootings but also on the missed opportunities and unfinished business of his presidency.

“Increasingly, I’ve spent my time thinking about how do I try to break out of these old patterns that our politics have fallen into,” Obama said in Pasadena, where he recorded a podcast interview that was released Monday. He wondered how to have a normal conversation that’s “not this battle in a steel cage between one side and another.”

The pain laid bare by Charleston has led Obama to an unusually frank assessment of his presidency and an acknowledgment that he hasn’t been the unifying, transformational figure that many hoped he would be.

On Friday, he will travel to Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston to deliver another eulogy, this time for a pastor who was one of the earliest supporters of the movement that in 2008 propelled Obama to the White House. That campaign’s most enthusiastic backers believed that a newly mobilized and enthusiastic citizenry could radically improve the nature of the political debate in Washington.

Just hours after the June 17 shootings in Charleston, Obama stood before the cameras in the White House briefing room and spoke mournfully of the Rev. Clementa Pinckney and the eight other parishioners killed during an evening Bible study.

Obama was thinking about the dead. But his frustration and disgust in that moment sprang just as much from the killing of 20 elementary school students in Connecticut three years earlier, his aides said.

Obama has described the Newtown massacre as the “worst day” of his presidency and Congress’s inability to pass gun control legislation as his most stinging defeat.

Via; Washington Post

Obama can't pass buck on health insurance

(CNN)The Obama administration has had plenty of advance notice about the King v. Burwell decision and the potential outcomes, but it seems the President's only plan is to continue pointing his finger at the states for a problem he created. In fact, when testifying recently about Obamacare implementation and the upcoming court decision, Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Mathews Burwell refused to give concrete answers to basic questions about the administration's contingency plan or willingness to work with Congress on a fix.

Just last week, Secretary Burwell was in Wisconsin. She could have used the opportunity to tell Wisconsin residents how the federal government is going to solve its Obamacare mess, but instead she promoted the use of "free" Obamacare services. Free for who? According to data gathered by the Manhattan Institute, individual insurance premiums in Wisconsin for a 40-year-old male climbed 83% compared with pre-Obamacare numbers, and 38% for a 40-year-old woman. For a 27 year-old, the hike was even greater. It seems that P.J. O'Rourke was frighteningly accurate when he said: "If you think health care is expensive now, wait until you see what it costs when it's free."

When the federal government pushed Wisconsin to expand Medicaid, holding out the promise of millions in federal funds in 2013, we said "No thank you." We knew trusting the federal government to follow through on its promises would end with Wisconsin taxpayers on the hook. Forced to accept the confines of Obamacare, our goal was to chart a path to protect those in Wisconsin who needed Medicaid the most, while moving people toward true independence.

Wisconsin is the only state that didn't accept the Medicaid expansion funds and that has no gap in coverage, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. For the first time in state history, everyone living in poverty has access to coverage. But despite our best efforts to mitigate the damage of Obamacare, the consequences of the law have been profound as employers have cut hours, while some workers lost their insurance altogether and are struggling to pay the dramatic premium increases. Meanwhile, even many families that have Obamacare coverage can't afford the deductible and doctor fees, while others can no longer see trusted doctors.

It's clear Obamacare must be repealed and replaced with a plan that puts patients and their families back in charge.

From the beginning, the President's implementation of Obamacare has been called into question, and in the next week, the Supreme Court is expected to rule on King v. Burwell, deciding a central component of Obamacare's structure: Can the federal government subsidize healthcare plans purchased on the federal exchange?

If the high court rules in favor of the administration, Obamacare will continue, unchanged. And that means the Republican House and Senate must redouble the fight to repeal and replace Obamacare.

Via: CNN

[VIDEO] OPM HEAD UNSURE OF FILES IT MAINTAINS, HOW MANY PEOPLE’S INFORMATION EXPOSED

Office of Personnel Management Director (OPM) Katherine Archuleta was unsure of how many employees and retirees’ information her agency oversees and might have been breached in testimony before the House Oversight Committee on Wednesday.

Archuleta was asked by Chairman

Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-UT)

80%

how many federal employees and retirees her agency has personally identifiable information for. She responded, “We have 2.7 individuals who are full-time employees, and 2.4 who are –” before Chaffetz cut her off to say, “No, I asked you — you have personal, identifiable information for how many employees and retirees?”

Archuleta continued, “The number I just gave you includes the number of employees and retirees, and personally identifiable information within those files depends on whether they’ve had a background investigation or whether their personnel file –” Chaffetz again cut in, asking, “How many records do you have?”

Archuleta then told Chaffetz she will ask someone else, he told Archuleta that as the head of the agency, she should know. He then read a letter she wrote the Appropriations chairs in the House and the Senate that said her agency had the personal, identifiable information for 32 million federal employees and retirees. Chaffetz then asked, “Are you here to tell me that that information is all safe or is it potentially 32 million records that are at play here?”

She answered, “As I mentioned to you earlier in my testimony, Mr. Chairman, we’re reviewing the number, and the scope of the breach and the impact to all of the records.” Chaffetz asked, “So, it could be as high as 32 million? Is that right?” He was told that Archuleta “will not give a number that is not completely accurate.”

Chaffetz continued to press the issue, stating he was only asking for a range, not an exact number and wondering if 32 million people’s information could be exposed. “I’m not going to give you a number that I am not sure of.”

Chaffetz then asked, “And when they fill out the SF86, that would include other people that identified within those forms, correct?” Archuleta answered that this was correct. He then asked if there was an average number of people who are identified on an SF86, to which he was told that there is no average that Archuleta knows of.

The questioning concluded with Chaffetz asking, “When you asked for $32 million more in your budget request, it was because you had 32 million federal employees identified, and former employees, correct?” Archuleta answered, “That — the number of employees that we have, yes, we’re asking for support for our cybersecurity –

Via: Breitbart

Regulatory Taking on an Unprecedented Scale

The Fifth Amendment’s “takings clause” stipulates that “private property [shall not] be taken for public use, without just compensation.” Many state constitutions provide additional limitations on eminent domain, such as California’s, which stipulates that such compensation must be “ascertained by a jury unless waived.”

The courts recognize that takings extend beyond the physical seizure of property. Takings also occur when government regulations restrict the use or alter the value of property. Yet such regulatory takings have become increasingly common as federal agencies turn a blind eye to the Constitution.

Now the Obama administration has announced a diversity policy that constitutes regulatory taking on an unprecedented scale. With HUD’s Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing rule, the administration plans to fund the construction of low-income housing within middle-class neighborhoods across the country. This placement of subsidized housing projects within affluent neighborhoods constitutes a taking, because the property values and usefulness of existing homes will be reduced and curtailed.

The damage will include but not be limited to financial loss. HUD’s rule change undermines the fundamental right of homeowners to live in a safe, quiet, well-maintained neighborhood.

It is hard to underestimate the insidiousness of HUD’s unconstitutional expansion of the Fair Housing Act of 1968. The new initiative employs a taxpayer’s own money to fund the reduction of his property values and to strip him of his rights as a homeowner. And it does so in order to provide subsidized or no-cost housing to welfare clients of the state who in many cases have never worked.

Once HUD’s low-income housing has been built, suburban families will find their crime rates increasing – not just the number of burglaries and thefts, but drug sales, gang activity, and murders as well. Every survey of crime statistics has revealed the same fact: criminal activity, and violent activity in particular, occurs at a much higher rates in proximity to public housing.

Via: American Thinker

USA Sovereignty Ends?

In 2008, we warned you about Obama. Over and over again, we presented material documents showing that Obama had worked with and still worked with the enemies—many like Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn who did so with extreme violence—of the USA, its people…and, ultimately, every area where liberty lived. However, not willing to bother with any and/or all facts but, preferring the super-charged emotion of the dictator-to-be moment, too many Americans voted for him anyway. Besides, many US citizens had to prove they weren’t racist—so they voted for a Democrat-advertised half-black man who had only recently begun a career in politics. But, he had a winning way about him, a great smile and could give a rousing speech. Hmmm. Seems there was at least one other leader in the 1930s who fit that description. But…I digress.

By 2012, the ObamaGov had already shown many of its stripes. Only a few of its attacks against Americans include the following. It passed ObamaCare—which was designed to destroy the US Healthcare System and has been effecting a terrific job in doing so—behind closed doors by Democrats alone and without the American people and their Republican “leaders” knowing what was in it. He also began bringing illegals—some of them Islamist terrorist-“sympathizers”—into the country during his first 4-year reign.

Obama began his wide-open Southern border policy during the first four years…an extension of his “let all Muslims in without questioning them” policy that followed the ultimate course of replacing US citizens with illegal voters. These were and remain tyrannical acts against America and its people (Article III the Constitution states: “Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort.”). Obama, also, began his amnesty for illegals programs in his attempt to speed up the replacement of current US voters with his—and Democrats’—voters. But, still, Americans voted him in for a second time…this time with the help of between 3-4 million conservative voters who stayed home because they wouldn’t vote for Romney.

Via: Canada Free Press

[VIDEO] Stone-Faced During Trial, Boston Bomber Tsarnaev Invokes Allah, Says He's 'Sorry' As He's Sentenced to Death

Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who was sentenced to death for his role in the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, told a federal court Wednesday that he is sorry for those he killed in the attack and the suffering he caused.

Though Tsarnaev, who sat stone-faced during his trial, was given the option to address the court at the formal sentencing, legal experts initially did not expect him to because he had little to gain since the judge was required to impose the jury's death sentence.

Tsarnaev admitted that he was guilty in the bombing and told the court that he prays to Allah about the victims and that they are able to heal. He also told the court that he asks Allah to have mercy on him and his brother.

"All those who got up on that witness stand and that podium relayed to us, to me — I was listening — the suffering that was and the hardship that still is, with strength, with patience, with dignity," he

Via Fox News

Rhode Island Hikes Minimum Wage for the Fourth Time in Four Years

Rhode Island lawmakers have approved legislation that will raise the state’s minimum wage.

The Ocean State will increase its hourly wage from $9 to $9.60 starting on Jan. 1, 2016. According to NECN, the increase will be Rhode Island’s fourth minimum wage hike in four years.

Gov. Gina Raimondo, D-R.I., signed the bill into law on Monday.

“We’re going to give a chance to Rhode Islanders who work hard and it’s just a start, you know. Just even at $9.60, you know, it’s very challenging working full-time at $9.60, it’s still a huge challenge but it’s a start. It’s a step in the right direction,” Raimondo said during the bill signing ceremony.

In a statement, President Obama praised Rhode Island’s decision. “Since I first called on Congress to increase the federal minimum wage in 2013, 17 states have acted on their own, which will grow the paychecks of millions of American workers,” he said.

“This year, more than half of our states guarantee their workers a wage higher than the federal minimum, but despite this progress we still have work to do,” Obama added. “I continue to encourage states, cities, counties and companies to lift their workers’ wages, and I urge Congress to finally do the right thing and give America a raise.”

Opponents say that a minimum wage hike places an additional burden on employers, particularly small businesses, and that it will reduce the number of available jobs.

“What we should be doing is lowering the burden, lowering the regulations on employers in the state and that’s the only way we’re ever going to see rapid growth,” Mike Stenhouse, the CEO of the Rhode Island Center for Freedom and Prosperity, told WPRI.

Via: The Daily Signal

DHS to free illegal immigrant families

Homeland Security will begin releasing more illegal immigrant families from detention, Secretary Jeh Johnson announced Wednesday as he bowed to political pressure from activists and members of Congress who’d called the conditions inhumane for families.

Despite offering amenities for the illegal immigrants ranging from flat-screen televisions in every suite, classrooms and ball fields at their disposal and 24-hour access to snacks and sodas, Mr. Johnson said he’s concluded things are still too harsh.

He said illegal immigrant parents and children who claim they fear for their lives back home will now have the chance to post a “reasonable and realistic” bond that will earn them the right to be released into the U.S., with the hope that they eventually return for their deportation hearings.

“In substance — the detention of families will be short-term in most cases,” he said in a statement announcing the changes.

It’s a major reversal for Mr. Johnson, who just a year ago pointed to detaining families as one of the key steps he was taking to push back against the surge of illegal immigrant children and families from Central America.

It also comes as new data shows those released from detention almost never show up for their court hearings or to be deported, meaning that any of those families later deemed deportable will likely be difficult to round up.

Mr. Johnson’s move met with praise from immigrant-rights advocates, who called it a “first step” but said they still want to see the detention centers shut down altogether, and all families released out into the community.

Top congressional Republicans, meanwhile, said Mr. Obama is only making illegal immigration worse.

“By refusing to detain unlawful immigrants until their claims are proven legitimate, the Obama administration is practically guaranteeing that they will disappear into our communities and never be removed from the United States,” said Rep. Robert W. Goodlatte, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee.

Via: Washington Times

Thursday, June 25, 2015

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