Leukemia and Lymphoma Society to host “Shooting for the Cure”

The Mississippi Chapter of The Leukemia & Lymphoma Society is hosting its “inaugural” Skeet Shoot, “Shooting for the Cure”, on Saturday, April 17th 2010. The Shoot will take place at Luckett Lodge, 214 Clark Creek Road Brandon, MS., registration at 7:15am, and the shoot commencing at 8:00am with VIP catering lunch. The main event will consist of 50 targets and teams of four shooters.

Sponsorships for this event are available at three different donor levels for merchants and businesses. Donations are currently being accepted for shooter bags, raffle, beverages, or door prize drawings. Every donation helps raise money for a great cause, by providing monies for research, support and services for individuals and families of leukemia or lymphoma.

Tickets are limited to the first 75 shooters at $125 and include lunch and 50 targets for 14 stations in a beautiful serene setting, “Shooting for the Cure” t-shirts and camouflage military hats.

For information on tickets, donations, or sponsorship opportunities call Ann at 601-956-7447.

An unconstitutional solution--Powerline

Michael McConnell, a law professor at Stanford and a former judge on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Tenth Circuit, argues that the "Slaughter solution" for enacting Obamacare is unconstitutional. The argument, which appears in the Wall Street Journal, is straightforward:

The Slaughter solution cannot be squared with Article I, Section 7 of the Constitution.

Senate rules protect against majoritarian overreach by allowing a determined minority to filibuster most types of legislation. The majority needs 60 votes to override a filibuster. One exception, adopted in 1974, is legislation that makes adjustments to spending or revenues to reconcile current law to a budget resolution that has passed Congress. These are called reconciliation bills, and they require only a majority vote.

Last Christmas Eve, the Senate approved a health-care bill by 60 votes, overcoming a Republican filibuster. This is the bill that contains the so-called Cornhusker kickback, the Louisiana purchase, taxes on high-cost health insurance plans and coverage for abortions. Virtually no one now supports that version of the bill, but Senate Democrats no longer have enough votes to pass an alternative bill under ordinary procedures.

That is where reconciliation fits in. If the House passes the Senate bill and the president then signs it into law, reconciliation would permit Congress to pass new legislation making changes to that law. Reconciliation might not solve the abortion coverage problem or other nonbudgetary issues, but it would allow Democrats to correct most of the Senate bill's offensive features.

The rub is that, according to the Senate parliamentarian, reconciliation is permitted only for bills that amend existing law, not for amendments to bills that have yet to be enacted. This means that, for the Senate to be able to avoid a filibuster, House Democrats first have to vote for the identical bill that passed the Senate last Christmas Eve. That means voting aye on the special deals, aye on abortion coverage, and aye on high taxes on expensive health-insurance plans. Challengers are salivating at the prospect of running against incumbents who vote for these provisions.

Enter the Slaughter solution. It may be clever, but it is not constitutional. To become law--hence eligible for amendment via reconciliation--the Senate health-care bill must actually be signed into law. The Constitution speaks directly to how that is done. According to Article I, Section 7, in order for a "Bill" to "become a Law," it "shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate" and be "presented to the President of the United States" for signature or veto. Unless a bill actually has "passed" both Houses, it cannot be presented to the president and cannot become a law.

To be sure, each House of Congress has power to "determine the Rules of its Proceedings." Each house can thus determine how much debate to permit, whether to allow amendments from the floor, and even to require supermajority votes for some types of proceeding. But House and Senate rules cannot dispense with the bare-bones requirements of the Constitution. Under Article I, Section 7, passage of one bill cannot be deemed to be enactment of another.

The Slaughter solution attempts to allow the House to pass the Senate bill, plus a bill amending it, with a single vote. The senators would then vote only on the amendatory bill. But this means that no single bill will have passed both houses in the same form. As the Supreme Court wrote in Clinton v. City of New York (1998), a bill containing the "exact text" must be approved by one house; the other house must approve "precisely the same text."

These constitutional rules set forth in Article I are not mere exercises in formalism. They ensure the democratic accountability of our representatives. Under Section 7, no bill can become law unless it is put up for public vote by both houses of Congress, and under Section 5 "the Yeas and Nays of the Members of either House on any question . . . shall be entered on the Journal." These requirements enable the people to evaluate whether their representatives are promoting their interests and the public good. Democratic leaders have not announced whether they will pursue the Slaughter solution. But the very purpose of it is to enable members of the House to vote for something without appearing to do so. The Constitution was drafted to prevent that.

McConnell's argument seems unassailable. A legal challenge, including a petition to the Supreme Court if necessary, represents another obstacle to Obamacare in the event that the House employs the Slaughter solution.

The Big Wind-Power Cover-Up--Investors Business Daily

Spain exposed the boondoggle of wind power in 2009, discrediting an idea touted by the Obama administration. In response, U.S. officials banded with trade lobbyists to hide the facts.
It was a cold day at the Energy Department when researchers at King Juan Carlos University in Spain released a study showing that every "green job" created by the wind industry killed off 4.27 other jobs elsewhere in the Spanish economy.

Research director Gabriel Calzada Alvarez didn't object to wind power itself, but found that when a government artificially props up this industry with subsidies, higher electrical costs (31%), tax hikes (5%) and government debt follow. Fact is, these subsidies have the same "Cuisinart" effect on jobs as wind-generating propeller blades have on birds. Every green job costs $800,000 to create and 90% of them are temporary, he found.

Alvarez made no bones about the lessons of Spain for the Obama administration, which has big plans for "green jobs." His report warned of "considerable employment consequences" from "self-inflicted economic wounds." It forecast that the U.S. could lose 6.6 million jobs if it followed Spain, and it "should certainly expect its results to follow such a tendency."

Investors Business Daily

WSJ: How Democrats may 'deem' ObamaCare into law, without voting.

We're not sure American schools teach civics any more, but once upon a time they taught that under the U.S. Constitution a bill had to pass both the House and Senate to become law. Until this week, that is, when Speaker Nancy Pelosi is moving to merely "deem" that the House has passed the Senate health-care bill and then send it to President Obama to sign anyway.

Under the "reconciliation" process that began yesterday afternoon, the House is supposed to approve the Senate's Christmas Eve bill and then use "sidecar" amendments to fix the things it doesn't like. Those amendments would then go to the Senate under rules that would let Democrats pass them while avoiding the ordinary 60-vote threshold for passing major legislation. This alone is an abuse of traditional Senate process.

But Mrs. Pelosi & Co. fear they lack the votes in the House to pass an identical Senate bill, even with the promise of these reconciliation fixes. House Members hate the thought of going on record voting for the Cornhusker kickback and other special-interest bribes that were added to get this mess through the Senate, as well as the new tax on high-cost insurance plans that Big Labor hates.

So at the Speaker's command, New York Democrat Louise Slaughter, who chairs the House Rules Committee, may insert what's known as a "self-executing rule," also known as a "hereby rule." Under this amazing procedural ruse, the House would then vote only once on the reconciliation corrections, but not on the underlying Senate bill. If those reconciliation corrections pass, the self-executing rule would say that the Senate bill is presumptively approved by the House—even without a formal up-or-down vote on the actual words of the Senate bill.

Wall Street Journal

JSU Takes On MSU In NIT 1st Round

Game Tuesday In Starkville

It's not the tournament either team had planned to play in, but Jackson State University and Mississippi State University will face off Tuesday night in Starkville in the first round of the National Invitational Tournament.

Both the Tigers and Bulldogs had hopes of playing in the NCAA Tournament this year. JSU went 17-1 in the SWAC regular season, and MSU lived on the bubble for two weeks leading up to selection Sunday.

WAPT

Obama to Dem fencesitters: "Time to Pick"

The backscratching has begun and the Chicago politics is in full force in DC according to Greg Sargent. Looks like the Dems have painted themselves into a corner here. A "YES" vote will get them axed in some of the more moderate districts, a "NO" vote means they will be cannabilized by there own party. If "all is fair in love and war" then Democrats just need to decide which they prefer.

Late last week, a source says, President Obama summoned a key undecided House Democrat, New York Rep Scott Murphy, for a one-on-one meeting at the White House — a sign that he’s beginning to lavish direct personal attention on individual members of Congress to persuade them to vote for the Senate bill.


According to a source familiar with the meeting, the President asked Murphy what he needed in the bill in order to support it. Murphy is being closely watched right now because he voted No last time, and flipping him to Yes would be a key get for Dem vote-counters.

“It was, `What are you looking for in the bill?’” the source says, describing the President’s request. “Scott was pressing him on the need for cost control. Medicare fraud came up. Scott said we need to step up — what we did in the House last time was not enough.”

The meeting is interesting because it suggests that on-the-fence Dems such as Murphy are seriously in the hunt for something to give them the cover they need to support the bill. That’s because the pressure on them to vote Yes is excrutiatingly intense.

Health Care Reconciliation Bill Markup live on CSPAN now

Watch it live.

Reconciliation Bill Markup now going on in Budget Committee

CQ Political News: House Faces Pivotal Votes on Health Care

Democrats are entering a critical week in the health care debate, as party leaders close in on the 216-vote threshold they need for the House to clear a Senate-passed overhaul bill.

But they still are trying to resolve at least two important issues: making Medicaid funding equitable to all states and addressing Hispanic lawmakers’ concerns about immigration. A third issue, abortion, has been set aside, Democrats say.

Despite holdouts in different quarters of her caucus, Speaker Nancy Pelosi sounded confident on March 12 that she would have the votes to finish the health care overhaul.

“We stand ready to stay as long as it takes to pass the bill,” Pelosi, D-Calif., told reporters. “I think members are eager to pass the bill. . . . It won’t be long before we’ll be making a real difference in the lives of the American people.”

Democrats will use an elaborate series of parliamentary procedures to try to accomplish the task. House Democratic leaders are preparing to clear the Senate-passed bill by the end of the week or soon thereafter. It will be considered with a companion bill, to be sent to the Senate, that would amend the Senate measure with changes demanded by House Democrats.

The companion bill will probably be combined with a student loan proposal that some Democrats believe could attract additional votes in the House. The proposal would make the federal government the sole originator of the student loans, which Democrats contend is less costly to taxpayers than subsidizing banks to loan money to students.

The House passed such legislation last year, but proponents say it would be easier to pass the bill in the Senate using expedited reconciliation rules to avoid a Republican filibuster.

The House Budget Committee is scheduled to start the process Monday by marking up a reconciliation bill containing proposals previously submitted by three panels with jurisdiction over health care issues — Energy and Commerce, Ways and Means, and Education and Labor. The bill will also contain the student loan measure.

Later in the week, the House Rules Committee is expected to replace the health care language in the reconciliation bill with the bill the House wants to use to amend the Senate-passed health care bill. The Rules Committee is scheduled to meet March 17.

Congressional Quarterly

Are You Watching The Shell Game?

Next Steps: How The Health Bill Could Move Forward


Democrats are still wrangling support for the health bill in the House, but leading Democrats say it could pass the House as soon as this coming weekend. Here's a look at the steps needed to move the bill forward:





Monday, March 15: House Budget Committee Meets

• — This meeting is largely a formality.
• — House Budget Committee marks up a "shell" health bill (which will be replaced by the real reconciliation bill) and sends it to the House Rules Committee.
• — Budget Committee may not make substantive changes to the bill, but it can make recommendations to the Rules Committee, which will develop the reconciliation bill.
• — At least 48 hours must pass between the Budget Committee's completing its markup and the Rules Committee's taking up a bill.
• — Monday afternoon or Tuesday, the CBO may release the cost estimates for the real reconciliation bill.

 Wednesday, March 17: House Committee On Rules Meets

• — The Rules Committee writes a reconciliation bill, possibly incorporating the ideas recommended by the Budget Committee, and replacing the shell bill the Budget Committee is expected to have approved Monday.
•  — House Dems will attempt to pass the Senate health bill at the same time the House approves the rule for debate on the reconciliation bill. 

 End Of The Week/Weekend: House Could Vote

•   When the House leadership thinks it has the votes together, it will schedule the reconciliation vote on the House floor. This may be as early as Thursday, more likely Friday or Saturday.

 Possibly Next Week

• — If the House succeeds in passing the reconciliation bill, it goes to the Senate. The Senate parliamentarian may require the reconciliation bill to go through committee markups.

Then What?

• — If the Senate passes the House reconciliation bill with no changes, it goes to the president for signature. If the Senate makes any changes, the bill must go back to the House again for approval. The Senate is likely to vote on the bill late next week.

NPR

Morocco Rejects Criticism for Expelling Christians Accused of Proselytizing Abandoned Muslim Children

The government of Morocco has launched a public relations effort to fend off criticism about its decision to expel 20 foreign Christian aid workers it accuses of trying to convert Muslims.

The expulsion order affected Christians who ran a center that has been taking in and fostering abandoned Moroccan children for 10 years.

The group issued a statement denying the accusations, and describing the wrench of 33 children being forced to say goodbye, with no prior warning, to the only parents they had known

CNS News

Ryan knows his stuff, and he knows how to articulate it.

What happened to the Tenth Amendment?

The New York Times is reporting 

The Obama administration on Saturday called for a broad overhaul of President George W. Bush’s No Child Left Behind law, proposing to reshape divisive provisions that encouraged instructors to teach to tests, narrowed the curriculum, and labeled one in three American schools as failing.

Announcing that he would send his education blueprint to Congress on Monday, President Obama returned to a campaign promise to repair the sprawling federal law, which affects each of the nation’s nearly 100,000 public schools. His plan strikes a careful balance, retaining some key features of the Bush-era law, including its requirement for annual reading and math tests, while proposing far-reaching changes.

Seems like more Federal power grabbing to me. Bush was wrong in assuming the authority and so is Obama. 

Scrambling for votes, Dems face uphill climb to pass health reform

By Bob Cusack

House Democratic leaders don’t have the votes to pass healthcare reform. At least not yet.

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has expressed confidence that when push comes to shove, healthcare reform will pass Congress. But there will be plenty of pushing in the days ahead.

Pelosi is clearly down in the vote count. Thirty-four House Democrats are either firm no votes or leaning no, according to The Hill’s whip list. Dozens more are undecided.

The list of Democratic members who haven't committed ranges widely, from liberal Reps. Michael Capuano (Mass.) and Anthony Weiner (N.Y.) to centrist Reps. Jason Altmire (Pa.) and Chris Carney (Pa.).

Two committee chairmen -- Reps. Ike Skelton (D-Mo.) and Collin Peterson (D-Minn.) -- say they are firm nos and three others, Reps. John Spratt (D-S.C.), Nick Rahall (D-W.Va.) and Jim Oberstar (D-Minn.), are undecided.

If every House member votes and all Republicans reject the bill as expected, Pelosi can only afford 37 Democratic defections. That breakdown of the votes would lead to a 216-215 tally.

Of the 34 no votes/leaning no votes, eight of them backed the House-backed bill in November. Meanwhile, nine Democrats who voted no last fall are publicly on the fence.

Friday’s decision by Democratic leaders to forge ahead without the backing of anti-abortion rights Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.) has dealt a blow to the chances the lower chamber can pass a health bill.

Lacking votes last November, Pelosi struck a deal with Stupak and the House measure subsequently passed, 220-215.

On Tuesday, Stupak told the Associated Press that he was “more optimistic” that a deal on the health bill’s provisions on abortion would be reached.

But after days of discussions, Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said on Friday such a compromise is unlikely.

Like Pelosi, Hoyer expressed confidence that the votes will be there when the bill hits the floor, which could be within a week.

Stupak has long said he and 11 other members who voted yes the first time will reject the final bill if it does not include strong anti-abortion language.

The Hill

Pelosi says Health Care Reform will be Historic

New BZP Drug looks like candy

Mississippi can use Medicaid money to reimburse Memphis hospital

The Associated Press

Mississippi can use supplemental Medicaid payments to reimburse the Regional Medical Center at Memphis for the cost of treating Mississippi residents.

The Commercial Appeal reports Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius told U.S. Rep. Steve Cohen about the decision in a letter on Thursday.

As a regional trauma center on the border of three states, The Med receives many patients from Mississippi and Arkansas. It has been in financial distress for years.

The supplement Medicaid payments are for hospitals that serve disproportionate numbers of charity cases. Arkansas was approved to send some of its Medicaid money to The Med last May.

The Med’s vice president for government relations, Letisha Towns, said figures for how much Mississippi will actually pay will be released Wednesday.

Repaving under way

Highland Colony's potholes targeted

Improvements to Highland Colony Parkway have been a year in the making but are expected to be finished quickly.

Madison and Ridgeland started planning last April to use federal stimulus funds to make improvements to portions of the roadway. By late April or early May, officials in the two cities expect to see work crews putting a smooth riding surface down by repairing the roadway base and adding new top coats.

"We were ready for them to start, like, yesterday," said Denson Robinson, public works director for Madison. "It took a long time, longer than anticipated. With federal money, sometimes is takes longer."

The money for the Highland Colony rehabilitation work comes from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funds. The two cities, along with Madison County, Canton and Flora equally split the $2.2 million in federal money last April. Each local government got $451,699 but the Mississippi Department of Transportation is getting 15 percent from each for oversight of the projects.

"With ARRA money, there are various rules and regulations," Ridgeland public works director Mike McCollum said about the start-to-finish time. "There is a lot of paperwork, a lot of approvals to get."

Once the work starts, though, McCollum said drivers won't have to wait long for the job, stretching a little over half a mile, to be finished. "Ten days tops," he said.

Madison County Herald

Judge orders Washington to resume funding ACORN

Associated Press


NEW YORK - A federal judge who found it unconstitutional that Congress tried to cut funding to the activist group ACORN has rejected a government request to change her mind and has ordered government agencies to make it clear the funding isn't blocked.

In a written ruling Wednesday, U.S. District Judge Nina Gershon made permanent her conclusion last year that the cutoff of funding was unconstitutional. She ordered all federal agencies to put the word out about it.

The Brooklyn judge said ACORN was punished by Congress without the enactment of administrative processes to decide if money had been handled inappropriately. She said the harm to ACORN's reputation continues because the government never rescinded its advice to withhold funding after it was distributed to "hundreds, if not thousands, of recipients."

ACORN, or the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, describes itself as an advocate for low-income and minority home buyers and residents. Critics of the group say it has engaged in voter registration fraud and embezzlement and has violated the tax-exempt status of some of its affiliates by engaging in partisan political activities.

Last year, a series of videos filmed at ACORN offices around the country sparked a national scandal and helped drive the organization to near ruin. In one video, ACORN employees were shown apparently advising a couple posing as a prostitute and her boyfriend to lie about her profession and launder her earnings; Brooklyn prosecutors said they did not commit a crime.

In this One News Now report Senator Roger Wicker (R-Mississippi), who voted for the amendment, says the vote to cut off federal funding to ACORN is a win for taxpayers who do not want their hard-earned money funneled to organizations who have no respect for the rule of law. (Listen to audio)


"We've tried this in the past, [in] both the House and Senate, and we haven't been quite so successful," he admits. "But in the past we didn't have the videotape, which just screamed out about the tax evasion that they were scheming [along] with the criminal activity including prostitution, the human trafficking.

"Every time the person doing the investigation ratcheted up the criminality that he was supposedly proposing, the ACORN employee didn't bat an eye," the senator remarks. "They had an answer for everything."

Wicker says as more and more Americans realize what ACORN is up to, more and more Americans are demanding that Congress not appropriate anymore money for this organization.

The Associated Press reports that in asking the judge to reconsider her December ruling, the government cited a Dec. 7 report written by Scott Harshbarger, former attorney general for Massachusetts. It said the report "reinforces Congress' purpose in preventing fraud, waste and abuse" by describing ACORN's long-standing management problems.

The report concluded that ACORN leadership at every level was thin, the government noted.

The judge, however, wrote that it was "unmistakable that Congress determined ACORN's guilt before defunding it." She said Congress is entitled to investigate ACORN but cannot "rely on the negative results of a congressional or executive report as a rationale to impose a broad, punitive funding ban on a specific, named organization."

She said the Code of Federal Regulations establishes a formal process for deciding when federal contractors can be suspended or debarred. She added that "the existence of these regulations militates against the need for draconian, emergency action by Congress."

The government planned to review the judge's ruling and consider whether to appeal, spokesman Robert Nardoza said.
The legal director of the Center for Constitutional Rights, which says it's dedicated to protecting the rights guaranteed by the U.S. Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, welcomed Wednesday's decision.

"The judge's ruling is a complete rebuke to the right wing's smear tactics that unfortunately Congress fell for," legal director Bill Quigley said. "This is why we have a system of checks and balances."

Flora Resident Sees Jesus In Pecan Tree

I've looked at that picture a few times now and Jesus is still not coming into view. Maybe I can't see Jesus because I'm such a pitiful sinner, or maybe it's because I don't particularly like pecans.

He Says Image Appeared Weeks Ago

A Flora resident said he can see the image of Jesus in his pecan tree.

Timothy Vincent said the image miraculously appeared a few weeks ago in his backyard. He said one day he saw an odd woodpecker on his tree and when the bird few away, the face of Jesus was there.

WAPT

Potential Slaughter Rule has Congress in an uproar. Will moderate Dems really dare go along with this?

Dems are trying to push through Obamacare by any means necessary. Are they really this out of touch? They will lose big in November anyway. Surely they know that now, and are willing to try passage of the controversial legislation by using the kamikaze effort now being touted as the Slaughter Solution.

As some obviously still believe Health Care Legislation will never be overturned, and will be widely accepted once enacted, you might say they are willing to become martyrs for the cause.

The Slaughter Solution is explained briefly in this Washington Examiner article published on 3/10/10:

Would House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her fellow House Democratic leaders try to cram the Senate version of Obamacare through the House without actually having a recorded vote on the bill?

Not only is the answer yes, they would, they have figured out a way to do it, according to National Journal's Congress Daily:

"House Rules Chairwoman Louise Slaughter is prepping to help usher the healthcare overhaul through the House and potentially avoid a direct vote on the Senate overhaul bill, the chairwoman said Tuesday.

"Slaughter is weighing preparing a rule that would consider the Senate bill passed once the House approves a corrections bill that would make changes to the Senate version.

"Slaughter has not taken the plan to Speaker Pelosi as Democrats await CBO scores on the corrections bill. 'Once the CBO gives us the score, we'll spring right on it,' she said."

Each bill that comes before the House for a vote on final passage must be given a rule that determines things like whether the minority would be able to offer amendments to it from the floor.

In the Slaughter Solution, the rule would declare that the House "deems" the Senate version of Obamacare to have been passed by the House. House members would still have to vote on whether to accept the rule, but they would then be able to say they only voted for a rule, not for the bill itself.

Now comes Republican Senator's, including Mississippi Senator Roger Wicker to warn House Democrats that reconciliation in the Senate will be fought tooth and nail.

President Obama's Final March is in full effect, and Republican Congressman's switchboards are lighting up after Obama and the DNC put out an email this week asking supporters who have signed up to the Democrat's Organizing For America emails to call their Congressman, even going so far as to provide phone numbers.


As Thomas Paine said, "These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman."

Or as my grandfather used to say, "stand for something, or fall for anything."