You probably aren’t aware George W. Bush is no longer president. You’re likely shocked to discover he’s no longer in the oval office, not influencing congress – he’s not even in the rose garden. Listening to President Obama blame George W., you would think former President Bush is calling all the shots, involved in every decision. After 18 months of Obama in office, this is odd behavior. Obama is continuously shirking responsibility, blaming the former president for a multitude of issues Bush has little or nothing to do with. Could there be a larger plan at work? Why would Obama keep blaming Bush when it’s clear this is an outdated, weak and overwhelmingly ridiculous suggestion? If you accepted a job and upon starting blamed your struggles on your predecessor, how would your boss react? After 6 months, once you continued to place fault on the person who came before you, when would you begin to look incompetent? After a year, would it be fair to continue to blame the problems you’re encountering on someone who hasn’t set foot in your office for 365 days? Obama thinks so.
Eighteen months into his presidency,the Bush blame game is the most popular hobby of Obama. The deficit? Obama inherited it from Bush; it’s not his fault! Yet, the $1.3 trillion dollars Obama accumulatedin 2009 had nothing to do with Bush. Unemployment? It’s a result of the Bush administration policies and the reckless abandon of Wall Street during Bush’s presidency! Forget the fact Obama promised passing the stimulus bill would keep unemployment at 8 percent and it instead rose to 10 percent...Obama has. Is it possible Obama is using the blame game to divert attention from the legislation he’s hoping to pass during a lame duck session? When does the Obama administration take responsibility for its failures? At what point does this become Obama’s presidency? The smokescreen of Bush blame is wearing thin. We’re beginning to see the lame duck Congress lurking around the corner.
The lame-duck Congress will be called back into session between the elections this November and the swearing-in of the 112th Congress next January. This lame duck session will give members the ability to vote on anything, pushing issues through for which many will no longer be responsible. The three pivotal issues include Cap and Trade, Card Check and Immigration. With a Republican sweep expected, the lame duck session will be filled with dozens of Democrats who have lost re-election and are willing to pass initiatives at any cost. With nothing to lose, the lame duck session threatens to pass a bevy of bills that go against the will of the American people. If you think it’s too scary of a scenario, consider the public backlash to Obamacare and the extraordinary lengths they went to in getting it passed. The treachery of jamming bills through during a lame duck session creeps closer every day. Let’s take a closer look at the impending peril:
Cap and Trade has long been in the cross hairs of the Obama administration.
White House energy advisor Carol Browner explains, "We’re deeply disappointed we haven’t been able to get clean energy legislation." She added they could "potentially" pass an energy bill during a lame duck session. After all, leading the "[global] clean energy revolution" will be difficult without such a bill. The American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 is a 1,428 page bill with devastating consequences. The bill gives the federal government power over local building codes, requiring them to be 50 percent more efficient by 2016. But that’s just the government; how would the bill affect you?
Spooky side effects include electricity rates raised 90 percent, gas prices raised 58 percent, natural gas prices raised 55 percent and the average family’s energy bill raised by $1,241. Make no mistake about it, this is an unbridled tax bill focused on separating you from your money. As the Heritage Foundation explains, "[it] is clear that cap and trade is very expensive and amounts to nothing more than an energy tax in disguise. The bottom line is that cap and trade works by raising the cost of energy high enough so that individuals and businesses are forced to use less of it. Inflicting economic pain is what this is all about."
A tax on productivity during the worst economy since the Great Depression? Cap and trade, coming to a lame duck session near you.
With Cap and Trade complete, what overbearing bill will the administration unleash next? It’s known as the Employee Free Choice Act, better known as "card check." Card check denies workers access to a secret ballot when voting on whether to unionize, effectively outing those opposed to joining. Stewart Acuff, from the Utility Workers Union of America was asked, "[are] you so keen to get card check through that you would push card check through a lame duck session in defiance of what voters want and what public opinion wants?" Stewart responded, "[we] will push the Employee Free Choice Act any time we can and at every opportunity. . ." Who else on the left admits to their intention of using the lame duck session to push card check through? In the House, Arizona Rep. Raul Grijalva, co-chairman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, told reporters, "The lame duck would be the last chance, quite honestly, for the foreseeable future." The lame duck session is their last opportunity, their last push to make these unwanted, ill conceived bills reality. Iowa Sen. Tom Harkin, chair of the Senate committee overseeing labor issues, told Bill Press, "[we’re] still trying to maneuver" a way to pass some parts of the bill before the next Congress is sworn in.
What would federally mandated unions mean for you? For starters, say goodbye to negotiating your salary, benefits and working conditions. You’ll now be forced to rely on a union as your exclusive "bargaining agent" for these purposes. Not to worry, you might be able to negotiate yourself – after you get the labor boss’s permission. Union organizers would effectively take control of tens of millions of once upon a time independent employees. According to the National Institute for Labor Relations, "Considerable evidence suggests that a new federal law promoting monopoly unionism would actually lower real earnings and household incomes, hinder job creation, increase poverty, and reduce the availability of important job benefits like health insurance." But you didn’t want any control over your pursuit of happiness anyway, did you?
With new energy taxes and intimidation from unions passed, President Obama will tackle one of the most controversial issues – immigration reform. Earlier this year, the justice department sued Arizona over the state’s new immigration law. Mexico is in the middle of a bloody drug war that recently took the lives of over 28,000 people. Sixty-eight percent of Americans support building a Mexican border fence. Seventy-nine U.S. citizens were killed in Mexico in 2009, up from 35 in 2007. Three people linked to the U.S. consulate were ambushed and murdered. Criminal gangs have killed 915 municipal police officers, 698 state police and 463 federal agents. Yet, Obama is planning to provide a pathway to legal status for over 11 million illegal immigrants. Relentlessly accused of being "all talk" on immigration reform – this is an issue Obama needs to pass in order to save face.
Beyond your security and looming drug warfare bleeding into our country, what’s the big deal? In Arizona alone, illegal immigrants take $1.6 billion from Arizona’s education system, $694.8 million from health care services, $339.7 million in law enforcement and court costs, $85.5 million in welfare costs and $155.4 million in other general costs (according to the Federation for American Immigration Reform). Consider the 60 percent of illegal immigrants who are uninsured, relying on emergency-room services, forcing local hospitals to take the hit for illegal immigrants’ emergency care. Beyond the possibility of losing your job and salary to someone in America illegally, paying for illegals’ healthcare and being victimized by crimes they commit while subsidizing them with your tax dollars, we can’t figure out why this is controversial. The lame duck session is the answer.
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It’s clear passing any of these issues would go against the will of the American people. The consequences from these bills passing are chilling. Passing all three? Crippling. A slumping economy will not be improved by penalizing individuals for productivity, as cap and trade aims. Scaring people into unionizing is not an effective way to improve worker’s rights, as card check intends. Disregarding the safety of Americans and ignoring the border crisis is not effective governing. Filing a government lawsuit against a state that actually takes action to safeguard its citizens is insulting. This is not an appropriate way to pursue immigration. These are not bills that should even be considered. Yet, these are the issues they will try to pass during a lame duck session. They have made clear their willingness to pass these bills at any cost. The Democrats have more than hinted, they have assured us they will do everything in their power to make these bills a reality.
War, recession, increasing unemployment–America is experiencing great uncertainty. We don’t need to be taxed into oblivion, we don’t deserve to have our security threatened and we shouldn’t be intimidated into organizing unions. By voting on these bills during a lame duck session, some members will be exercising votes for which they have no responsibility. No responsibility, who can they have learned this strategy from? Members will vote at the insistence and with the support of Obama while resting on the same lack of responsibility Obama has been imploring for the last 18 months. The lame duck session is closing in; are we too late to stop it?
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