Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.): Let Europe pay for its debt crisis
As seen on: thehill.com
A leading House Republican wants Europeans to be solely responsible for climbing out of the European debt crisis and is calling on the U.S. to limit its contribution to that relief effort.
Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash.) said Monday that the United States should be focusing on its own fiscal priorities and not sending billions abroad to prop up European nations via its contributions to the International Monetary Fund (IMF).
“At a time when the federal government is borrowing $5 billion every day on top of a $14 trillion national debt, we should not be funneling billions of dollars through the IMF to bail out Greece, Portugal, Ireland, and other wealthy European countries. The European Union was set up to be an economic competitor to the United States, and therefore, any bailout funds should come from the E.U., not the U.S,” she said in a statement. “We cannot take the ‘too big to fail’ philosophy to a global level.”
Saudi Arabia King Abdullah Will Allow Women to Vote in Local Elections for the First Time in 2015.
As seen on: http://www.foxnews.com
Saudi King Abdullah announced Sunday that the nation’s women will gain the right to vote and run as candidates in local elections to be held in 2015 in a major advancement for the rights of women in the deeply conservative Muslim kingdom.
In an annual speech before his advisory assembly, or Shura Council, the Saudi monarch said he ordered the step after consulting with the nation’s top religious clerics, whose advice carries great weight in the kingdom.
“We refuse to marginalize the role of women in Saudi society and in every aspect, within the rules of Sharia,” Abdullah said, referring to the Islamic law that governs many aspects of life in the kingdom.
Alabama’s first female finance director starts work
As seen on: montgomeryadvertiser.com
Alabama’s new state finance director, Marquita Davis, says she didn’t seek the job, but she accepted the challenge when Gov. Robert Bentley offered it.
The 44-year-old Davis was sworn in by the governor during a ceremony Monday at the Capitol.
She’s the state’s first female finance director, but both she and Bentley say they didn’t realize that until after she had accepted the job. Bentley said it was never a consideration.
Laurie Sanborn (NH State Rep.) Named to Leadership Team
As seen on: http://concord-nh.patch.com
House Majority Leader D.J. Bettencourt announced on Sept. 13 that he was “strengthening” his leadership team as the Legislature heads toward the opening of the 2012 session, specifically focused on job creation.
“The people of New Hampshire were exceptionally clear during the last election; people need jobs, employers need breathing room and government must be smaller, more efficient and one that actually works for the people,” he said in a press release.
One new member of the team will be state Rep. Laurie Sanborn, R-Henniker, who was named Assistant Deputy Majority Leader.
For GOP, A Fresh Voting Bloc
as seen on: washingtontimes.com
AMERICAN INDIVIDUALISM: How a new gene ratio of conservatives can save the Republican Party by Margaret Hoover
Book Reviewed by Heather Wolf
Heather Wolf is a former Bush White House aide and a John McCain presidential campaign staffer.
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With the 2012 Republican primary race well under way, I am filled with anticipation: Who is going to be the Republican nominee? If the GOP does not unite in 2012, President Obama will be a two-term president.
As a millennial – my generation was born between the Reagan-through-Clinton presidencies, now ages 18-29 – I was excited to read Margaret Hoover’s book, “American Individualism,” and it is thought provoking.
Ms. Hoover is a Fox News analyst and appears on “The O’Reilly Factor” as a “culture warrior.” She is the great-granddaughter of President Herbert Hoover. However, growing up as a Hoover was never easy for the author. Throughout her education, she listened to teachers and professors vilify her great-grandfather.
Nevertheless, when Ms. Hoover came across one of Herbert Hoover’s pamphlets published in 1922 titled “American Individualism,” she was struck by the opportunity to advance his legacy. The pamphlet is a broad and forceful statement of political philosophy and an essay on the relationship between the individual and the state. Written nearly a century ago, it applies to circumstances today.
“American Individualism” could not be coming out at a more critical time. Ms. Hoover reflects on the outcome of the 2010 midterm elections and what it means for the upcoming presidential race. Moreover, as she makes the case for how the GOP can right itself and capture the allegiance of younger voters, she challenges the up-and-coming millennial generation to take another look at the Republican Party.
Ms. Hoover nails down the way the millennial generation is trending – politically, culturally and spiritually – predominantly in moderate- and independent-voting areas of the country. In fact, the GOP presidential campaigns should apply some of Ms. Hoover’s insights when the candidates address younger voters.
Ms. Hoover believes that the GOP is uniquely positioned to offer solutions for the most pressing problems facing America – skyrocketing debt, crises in education and immigration, a war against Islamic extremism – but she argues that it is held back by the outsized influence of certain factions within the party. She describes the steps the party must take to become home to the millennial generation.
Ronald Reagan was the last leader who led with the big-tent approach. He understood that if someone is conservative on 8 to 10 major conservative principles, that was sufficient to secure their vote. Reagan managed to link neoconservatives, anti-communists and national security conservatives with social conservatives.
In 2008, Sen. Barack Obama had a similar approach with liberals, blue dogs and independents. Mr. Obama electrified the millennial base and they came out in droves to the polls. However, now in 2011, all millennials can remember from the Obama campaign is “change.” As a result of Mr. Obama’s fiscal mismanagement, Republicans have an opportunity to make headway with younger voters.
Millennials are natural go-getters. In college many are involved in extracurricular activities and internships to prepare for future employers. Now, however, they are unable to find jobs, and many must still live at home with their parents. Their unemployment rate is currently 37 percent. With fewer fiscally responsible Democrats in office, this dire circumstance leaves an opening for Republicans.
In 1936, Herbert Hoover said, “Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt.” Ms. Hoover writes that a Hoover growth plan would channel his business instincts: Stop printing money. Get our fiscal house in order. Balance the budget. Reform entitlement spending. Stop runaway spending in Congress.
That will make sense to younger voters, too, who know the economy they are being given will give them a lower standard of living than their parents. Millennials understand that poor economic growth and our unsustainable spending is generational theft.
Republicans are running out of time to connect with the next generation. Partisan identification solidifies after three presidential cycles. Millennials voted decisively for John F. Kerry in 2004 and Barack Obama in 2008. Politicians have 16 months to make inroads with this generation – the largest voting bloc in history, which will make up 24 percent of the votes in 2012, and which made all the difference in Mr. Obama’s election.
Youth voted overwhelmingly for Ronald Reagan in 1980 and 1984, and it can happen again. With a conservative pro-growth economic agenda that puts the millennial generation to work and brings millennials into the GOP, the future is ours.
Bachmann Addresses Perry’s HPV Mandate in Debate
As seen on politico.com
| Bachmann attacks Perry on HPV By: Alexander Burns, September 12, 2011 |
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| Michele Bachmann accused Rick Perry of using sixth-grade girls as profit engines for a drug company at the CNN/Tea Party Express debate, lacing into the Texas governor for having attempted to mandate the HPV vaccine for young teenagers.
“To have innocent little 12-year-old girls be forced to have a government injection through an executive order is just wrong,” Bachmann said. “Little girls who have a negative reaction to this potentially dangerous drug don’t get a mulligan.” The Minnesota congresswoman went even further, accusing Perry of handing out favors to a company, Merck, represented by his former top aide, Mike Toomey. “There was a big drug company that made millions of dollars because of this mandate,” Bachmann said. “The governor’s former chief of staff was the chief lobbyist for this drug company.” Perry pushed back hard against Bachmann, but seemed flustered as the attacks on HPV intensified. “At the end of the day, this was about trying to stop a cancer,” Perry said. “At the end of the day, I am always going to err on the side of life.” When Bachmann suggested he mandated the vaccine as a favor to a campaign contributor, Perry responded: “I raised $30 million and if you’re saying I can be bought for $5,000, I’m offended” Bachmann shot back: “I’m offended for all the little girls and parents who didn’t have a choice.” |
Martha Zoller To Run for New Georgia Congressional Seat
As seen on dailycaller.com
Talk radio host Martha Zoller will mount a campaign for a newly created congressional seat in Georgia, she told The Daily Caller in an interview.
“We need people that are not professional politicians,” said Zoller, who hosts a daily syndicated show across Georgia.
Zoller — who has appeared as a pundit on Fox News, CNN and MSNBC — will run for a new congressional district seat recently drawn by the Georgia state legislature.
She lives in Gainesville, located within the district, and is a proud conservative.
“We made a lot of progress in the last election with the 87 new Republicans, but we need reinforcement for those guys,” Zoller told TheDC, “and we need to have more of a conservative base in Congress.”
As for the issues she’ll emphasize in her campaign, Zoller mentioned jobs, the economy and how illegal immigration affects the economy and hurts people getting jobs.
Zoller is close to GOP presidential candidate Herman Cain, another Georgian who left the world of talk radio to run for office. In fact, she’s responsible for getting Cain on the air as a radio host for the first time.
“When Herman lost the primary in 2004, for the United States Senate,” Zoller recalled, “I called him up within a couple of days, and said ‘I’m going to take a few days off. How would you like to fill in for me?’ So he filled in for me a few times.”
After that, Cain had his own show, Zoller said.
Zoller said she considers Cain a friend, but she’s not allowed to endorse candidates under her radio contract. She said Cain sends her flowers every time he makes “a better step or made a step in radio.” He gave up his show to run for president.
As for Zoller, she said she doesn’t plan to give up her radio show immediately.
“The company attorneys have taken a look at FEC laws and their interpretation is that you are not a candidate until you qualify and in Georgia you don’t qualify until May of next year,” she said.
“I fully expect my opponents — and I suspect there will be a few of them — to try to get me off the air,” Zoller said. “Now we may have to change. Not the direction of the show, but I may not talk so directly about the district or that kind of thing.”
She said she’ll see how it plays out.
“Obviously, I’m going to follow the law, whatever the law requires me to do.”
Conservatives Fighting “Baby Palin” Label
as seen on: CNN.com
As conservative women step into the political area more and more, the debate heats up. Click here to hear three conservative women discuss a recent article featured in Elle Magazine.
To read the original article, click here .
The White House ‘a hostile workplace’ to women
Posted by ProjectGoPink on September 17, 2011 · Leave a Comment
as seen on politico.com
by Ben Smith
The White House ‘a hostile workplace’ to women
If there was any allegation that got under the skin of President Obama’s staff early in his term, it was that he had a gender problem — a claim that Hillary Clinton and even John McCain pushed about Obama’s campaign, and which has been a source of quieter grumbles about the Administration.
Since then, a long list of women in senior posts have cycled through the Administration and left for other jobs — Anita Dunn, Ellen Moran, and Linda Douglass in the communications shop; Neera Tanden and Mona Sutphen and at the top Christina Romer in senior policy jobs. They’ve gone on to senior posts elsewhere, but relatively few have advanced to positions of substantive influence on the inside. The names of women who remain tend to be absent from the key tick-tocks and the Oval Office photos — with some obvious exceptions: Samantha Power is a senior voice at the NSC; Romer was certainly heard, though she lost, in arguments over stimulus.
And Dunn just blew the issue wide open to Ron Suskind, Mike Allen reports:
“‘The president has a real woman problem’ was the assessment of another high-ranking female official. ‘The idea of the boys’ club being just Larry and Rahm isn’t fair. He [Obama] was just as responsible himself.’ …’[L]ooking back,’ recalled Anita Dunn, when asked about it nearly two years later, ‘this place would be in court for a hostile workplace … Because it actually fit all of the classic legal requirements for a genuinely hostile workplace to women.’”
The Post has various attempted walkbacks.
UPDATE: And Dunn is pushing back hard on the interpretation of her words. She emails, “He asked me and I said the direct opposite. Challenging environment yes. Hostile workplace no.”
It is, a colleague suggests, time for Obama to bring Domestic Policy Council director Melody Barnes for another round of golf.
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