Grassley, C Sen

lcv: 2012 14, 23% 2013, lifetime 21% ok on water green mil http://scorecard.lcv.org/moc/chuck-e-grassley

content lost? very little here 11/17

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an 11 23

an ABC News bombshell report revealing then-Vice President Mike Pence had, at one point, decided to not preside over the January 6 joint congressional session to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election is once again bringing up questions about remarks U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley (R-IA) had made one day before the event, which some interpreted as him announcing he, and not the Vice President, would be presiding over the proceedings. Grassley later denied the claim.

The ABC News report includes conversations Special Counsel Jack Smith’s team had in closed-door sessions with Pence, including the former vice president’s notes they obtained from the National Archives.

“According to sources, one of Pence’s notes obtained by Smith’s team shows that, days before Pence was set to preside over Congress certifying the election results on Jan. 6, 2021, he momentarily decided that he would skip the proceedings altogether, writing in the note that there were ‘too many questions’ and it would otherwise be ‘too hurtful to my friend.’ But he ultimately concluded he had a duty to show up,” ABC News reported.

The report added that their “sources said, with the pressure on Pence mounting, he concluded on Christmas Eve — just for a moment — that he would follow Trump’s suggestion and let someone else preside over the proceedings on Jan. 6.”

“Speaking with Smith’s team, Pence insisted his loyalty to President Trump at the time never faltered — ‘My only higher loyalty was to God and the Constitution,’ sources described Pence as telling them.”

“‘Not feeling like I should attend electoral count,’ Pence wrote in his notes in late December. ‘Too many questions, too many doubts, too hurtful to my friend. Therefore I’m not going to participate in certification of election.'”

ABC’s report is prompting questions about U.S. Senator Grassley’s remarks on January 5, 2021, when he said he would be presiding over the Senate the following, fateful day.

Back in September, the Washington Post’s Aaron Blake revisited that event, which in 2021 sparked rumors and speculation.

“Asked whether former president Donald Trump’s legal team had any discussions about Sen. Charles E. Grassley (R-Iowa) presiding over the certification of the 2020 election on Jan. 6, 2021, rather than Vice President Mike Pence, [Trump coup memo author John] Eastman declined to answer, citing attorney-client privilege with Trump,” The Post reported, referring to Eastman’s legal testimony in a disbarment proceeding. “The moment drew renewed attention to one of the bigger unanswered questions about Jan. 6: How extensive was the effort to get Pence to step aside?”

“While Grassley has denied any outreach about whether he would preside on Jan. 6, an email obtained by the [U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack] shows that one of his staff members asked Pence’s office on Dec. 23, 2020, about such a scenario.”

“‘ … Is there any reason to believe that your boss will not preside over the electoral college vote count,’ Grassley aide James Rice wrote, as recounted in Jan. 6 committee transcripts, ‘leaving my boss in the spot as [president pro tem]?'”

“Pence aide Paul Teller responded that ‘it’s not a zero percent chance of that happening.'”

But The Post concluded, “the suggestion that this was a concerted effort to get rid of Pence remains unsubstantiated.”

In October of 2022, the Des Moines Register also looked that that event from January 5.

“As the counting of electoral votes neared, reporters asked Grassley how he planned to vote on election certification, the Iowa newspaper reported.

“’If the vice president isn’t there, and we don’t expect him to be there, I will be presiding over the Senate and obviously listening to the debate without saying anything,’ [Grassley] said on a call with agriculture reporters Jan. 5, 2021. ‘You’re asking me how I’m going to vote. I’m going to listen to that debate on what my colleagues have to say during that debate and decide how to cast my vote after considering the information before me.'”

The Register added, “Taylor Foy, a spokesperson for Grassley, quickly issued a clarification to the media the same day, saying Grassley was talking about possibly presiding over the Senate debate if Pence happened to step out. The House and Senate needed to meet separately to consider objections to the electoral count in individual states before convening a joint session of Congress.”

Regardless of the Grassley issue, many have served up sharp criticism of Pence after learning he at one point had decided to not execute his constitutional responsibilities, even if he ultimately did perform his duty.

“A regular Profile in Courage,” presidential historian Michael Beschloss sarcastically declared.

“I myself would never want to upset a good friend who wishes to see me hung by an angry armed mob,” conservative attorney George Conway said mockingly.

“The most important takeaway from the ABC News story re: Pence hedging on whether he should preside over the counting of the Electoral College votes on January 6, is that the pressure campaign on Pence to unlawfully and unilaterally upend the election was not entirely ineffective,” observed professor of law Anthony Michael Kreis.

“Remember that Mike Pence, who didn’t want to carry out the Constitutional oath he took that ended with the words ‘So Help Me God’ shamelessly titled his book about the events ‘So Help Me God.’ The man’s always been a shameless fraud,” declared political scientist David Darmofal.

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https://www.alternet.org/watch-senate-grand-old-partiers/

no lnx

Watch: Senate Grand Old Partiers pacify planet polluters at climate change cover-up hearing

Brandon Gage June 22, 2023

United States Senator Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) played defense for planet-polluting petrochemical producers in his opening statement at Wednesday's Senate Budget Committee hearing on the fossil fuel industry's shadowy propaganda.

At the heart of the Dollars and Degrees: Investigating Fossil Fuel Dark Money's Systemic Threats to Climate and the Federal Budget proceeding was Big Oil's deliberate decades-long cover-up of their own studies that unequivocally established that the burning of hydrocarbons will lead to an increase in average global temperatures through the atmospheric accumulation of heat-trapping gases: water vapor, nitrous oxide, methane, carbon monoxide, and worst of all, carbon dioxide.

Chairman Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island) spoke first, teeing up ninety-ish minutes of blistering expert testimony dissecting how the trillion-dollar extra-national energy enterprises have subjugated human civilization for fifty years.

READ MORE: 'I don't know what's going on': Chuck Grassley begs for donations as Democratic challenger closes in

The data collected since the latter half of the Nineteenth Century is an elementary example of the greenhouse effect beyond a reasonable doubt. Still, Republicans constitute the only major conservative party in the world that in its platform disputes said consensus.

But million-dollar-federal-family-farm-subsidy-benficiaryGrassley did not just dispute the science — he also accused Democrats of being the recipients of "funding from secret dark money groups" and waging political warfare against contrarians.

Other GOP senators played goalie in their own ways.

Ron Johnson of Wisconsin, for instance, claimed that it can be "hard to discern the truth" about climate change because progressive environmental organizations outspend their right-wing counterparts. But those campaigns pale in comparison to the breadth of the fraud conducted by companies such as Exxon-Mobil.

READ MORE: Climate activists are parading a Ron Johnson 'scatue' around Milwaukee: report

Meanwhile, John Kennedy of Louisiana berated former President George W. Bush's White House ethics czar, Richard Painter, on trivialities that had no clear connection with the topic at hand.

Painter was not, however, having it.

"So I will just say the one thing that I learned in high school debate," Painter recalled. "When you have no argument, change the subject."

Please watch the proceeding in its entirety below or at this link.

Republicans And Dems Spar At Senate Budget Committee Hearing Over Fossil Fuel Dark Money

www.youtube.com

READ MORE: Republican senator: Mexico 'would be eating cat food' without the United States

LNX

...At the heart of the Dollars and Degrees: Investigating Fossil Fuel Dark Money's Systemic Threats to Climate and the Federal Budget proceeding was Big Oil's deliberate decades-long cover-up of their own studies that unequivocally established that the burning of hydrocarbons will lead to an increase in average global temperatures through the atmospheric accumulation of heat-trapping gases: water vapor, nitrous oxide, methane, carbon monoxide, and worst of all, carbon dioxide.

Chairman Sheldon Whitehouse (D-Rhode Island) spoke first, teeing up ninety-ish minutes of blistering expert testimony dissecting how the trillion-dollar extra-national energy enterprises have subjugated human civilization for fifty years.

But million-dollar-federal-family-farm-subsidy-benficiary Grassley did not just dispute the science — he also accused Democrats of being the recipients of "funding from secret dark money groups" and waging political warfare against contrarians.

Other GOP senators played goalie in their own ways.

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'What happened to these people?' Illinois Republican scolded for claiming 'we're not having a climate crisis' ›

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an 2 23

its first hearing isn’t until Thursday but already Chairman Jim Jordan‘s Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government is being mocked after the list of witnesses was released.

NBC News’ Garrett Haake reports testifying before the committee on Thursday will be ex-Democratic Congresswoman **Tulsi Gabbard**, **U.S. Senator Ron Johnson** (R-WI), **U.S. Senator Chuck Grassley** (R-IA), and former FBI special agent Nicole Parker.

Gabbard left the Democratic Party and is now an independent and a Fox News contributor. In 2019, Hillary Clinton suggested she was a Russian asset being groomed for a third-party presidential run. She sued the former Democratic presidential nominee and former U.S. Secretary of State but later dropped the defamation lawsuit.

Also, Gabbard “shared false information,” Forbes reported last year, “about U.S. involvement in Ukraine biological laboratories … giving credence to an unfounded Russian-backed conspiracy theory the U.S. has warned could serve as justification for Russia to use biological and chemical weapons against Ukraine.”

Sen. Johnson, who narrowly won re-election after being among the top promoters of Donald Trump’s “Big Lie,” is a conspiracy theorist who uses his Senate seat to spread false information about COVID and a host of other crises.

CNN’s Chris Cillizza branded Johnson the “Senate’s leading conspiracy theorist” just one year ago. The Washington Post reported last May that Sen. Johnson “expressed openness” to “a fervent anti-vaccination” commentator’s “idea that maybe the coronavirus vaccines are a conduit for deliberately giving people AIDS.”

Sen. Grassley has come under fire for his racist remarks about COVID-19, dangerously false claims about the IRS, and apparent falsehoods about the January 6 insurrection and its participants.

Last year The American Independent reported Grassley told a constituent “what you said is accurate.” According to The Independent, the constituent said during a town hall: “Knowing that the FBI and Capitol Police were complicit in Jan. 6, what have you done to get the political prisoners being held in gulag conditions out on bail?”

Some were quick to mock Chairman Jordan’s choice of witnesses to testify before his subcommittee’s first hearing.

“Johnson actively pushed the WI legislature & the VP to overturn the election. Tulsi used her perch in Congress to secretly meet with Assad & whitewash his war crimes. so in a sense, they are indeed experts on weaponizing gov’t.,” mocked former Hillary Clinton foreign policy spokesperson Jesse Lehrich.

Jim Manley, a top aide to then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, described the panel as “low energy.”

NBC News Justice reporter Ryan J. Reilly pre-deflated Parker’s possible contributions, citing her as saying: “’I was never asked to participate in anything that was political,’ Nicole Parker said in one of her Fox News hits (Hannity, specifically).”

Even CNN did not hide its skepticism, beginning its reporting with this line: “The GOP-led House select subcommittee on so-called weaponization of the federal government will draw upon a prominent ex-Democrat, two of their Republican Senate colleagues, and a former FBI agent in their first public hearing to discuss how they believe the government has been weaponized against conservatives, multiple sources familiar with the plans tell CNN.”

https://www.alternet.org/2020/05/obamas-office-slams-two-gop-senators-for-promoting-russian-disinformation-in-letter-to-national-archives/

no lnx doc

Alex Henderson May 6, 2020

Former President Barack Obama generally kept a low profile during the Ukraine scandal and the impeachment trial of President Donald Trump, preferring to let other prominent Democrats such as House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff do the talking. But according to BuzzFeed News reporter Emma Loop, Obama’s office — in a March 13 letter — slammed Republican senators for trying to link Ukraine and former Vice President Joe Biden to interference in the United States’ 2016 presidential election.

A far-right conspiracy theory claims that it was the Ukrainian government, not the Russian government and President Vladimir Putin, that interfered in the 2016 election — and that Ukraine interfered on behalf of Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton. That debunked claim, according to former special counsel Robert Mueller, has no validity. But many Trump supporters have promoted that conspiracy theory anyway, as have Putin allies in the Russian media. And in November 2019, two Republican senators (Chuck Grassley and Ron Johnson) tried to link the Obama Administration, including Biden, to the Ukrainian government.

Emma Loop

@LoopEmma

Scoop: In a letter to the National Archives, former president Barack Obama blasted the Senate GOP investigation into Joe Biden and alleged Ukrainian election interference, calling it an effort to "to give credence to a Russian disinformation campaign."https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/emmaloop/obama-records-biden-ukraine-russian-disinformation …

View image on TwitterView image on Twitter

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2:32 PM - May 5, 2020

Loop reports that Grassley and Johnson “have been investigating matters related to Democrats and Ukraine since the fall, when Trump was impeached for his interactions with Ukraine. Grassley and Johnson…. asked the National Archives for records on meetings between the Obama Administration and Ukrainian officials, as well meetings between Obama officials and Alexandra Chalupa, the Democratic operative at the heart of the debunked Ukrainian election interference narrative.”

In a March 13 letter — which was addressed to David S. Ferreiro of the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) in Washington, D.C. — the office of Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama asserted that a November 19, 2019 records request from Grassley and Johnson was “not a proper use of” NARA’s resources.

Anita Decker Breckenridge, a records specialist in the Obamas’ office, told Ferreiro, “The request for early release of presidential records in order to give credence to a Russian disinformation campaign — one that has already been thoroughly investigated by a bipartisan congressional committee — is without precedent…. This use of the special access process serves no legitimate purpose.”

Breckinridge, who sent copies of the letter to Johnson and Grassley, went on to say that “in the interest of countering the misinformation campaign underlying this request,” the Obamas’ office was “prepared” to give “access to the records” that were requested — and added, “In doing so, we emphasize that abuse of the special access process strikes at the heart of presidential confidentiality interests and undermines the statutory framework and norms that govern access to presidential records.”

https://theintercept.com/2020/04/14/one-nation-pfizer-lobbyist-drug-prices/

one NATION, ONE of the dark-money groups spending the most to back Republican candidates for Senate, added a former Pfizer lobbyist and U.S. Chamber of Commerce board member to its board of directors at the end of 2019. One Nation has spent $1.7 million already this year on ads praising the efforts of Republican senators, including the push for lower drug prices, a cause both Pfizer and the Chamber have lobbied against.

The group is part of the network of conservative fundraisers — under the “Crossroads” umbrella — launched by Karl Rove and Ed Gillespie after the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United. Former staffers for Crossroads GPS, the 501(c)(4) wing of Rove and Gillespie’s Super PAC, American Crossroads, started One Nation in 2015 after a yearslong fight with the Internal Revenue Service for tax-exempt status. Crossroads eventually received that status in 2016. Although the group has been relatively dormant since 2014, it maintains fundraising efforts and ended 2019 with $35.5 million cash on hand.

Ken W. Cole,who has long worked in government relations for companies like General Motors and Honeywell, as well as the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, joined the board of One Nation last year. The group listed Cole as a director on its latest annual report, filed to the Virginia State Corporation Commission in March, but he’s not yet listed publicly on its website.

Cole lobbied on behalf of Pfizer as senior vice president of government relations from 2010 to February 2018, on issues including drug pricing and drug shortages. Pfizer has placed the blame for high drug prices on health care providers and insurers, while it has fought recent legislative efforts aimed at reducing drug prices. Since at least 2014, Cole has also served on the board for the Chamber of Commerce, which has similarly opposed legislative efforts to cut drug costs or allow the government to fine companies for inflating prices.

Pfizer and the Chamber of Commercehave collectively spent just under $1 billion on lobbying over the last decade, with Pfizer typically spending around $10 million each year, and the Chamber spending more than $60 million. In recent years, that included efforts to kill legislation aimed at lowering the cost of prescription drug prices, including a bipartisan prescription drug-pricing bill put forward last September by Iowa Republican Sen. Chuck Grassley and Oregon Democratic Sen. Ron Wyden. President Donald Trump has praised the bill and earlier this year called on Congress to pass legislation to address rising drug costs. The Senate bill, which Grassley has accused Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell of sabotaging, remains deadlocked, while a companion bill in the House, which Pfizer and the Chamber also lobbied against, passed last year. The Chamber, meanwhile, supported a separate drug-pricing bill from Idaho Republican Sen. Mike Crapo, saying that it “would help reduce drug prices without resorting to destructive price controls,” citing “inflation cap penalties” in the Grassley-Wyden bill and “government negotiation provisions” in the House bill.

Cole is currently the CEO and managing director of Cactus Consulting LLC, a firm registered in January 2019 in the District of Columbia, with principal offices based in Florida.

One Nation defended its board appointment of Cole, claiming that his work for Pfizer was not a conflict since he left the company early last year. “Ken has been a respected leader in a variety of different companies and industries. After he retired, we sought him out for his breadth of management experience and judgment,”One Nation President Steven Lawsaid in a statement to The Intercept. “Our boards provide guidance on macro issues like financial controls, budgets, compensation and management policies. They do not direct day-to-day activities.”

Law, the CEO of Crossroads GPS, American Crossroads, Senate Leadership Fund, and One Nation, is also a former chief of staff to McConnell and a former legal officer for the Chamber of Commerce.

AS A 501(C)(4) GROUP, One Nation is not required to disclose its donors, but voluntary disclosures from a number of interest groups shed light on its funds. The dark-money group received major contributions of $1 million in 2016 and 2017 from Andeavor, an oil company bought in 2018 by an Ohio petroleum conglomerate. In 2018, One Nation also received $50,000 from the American Petroleum Institute, and another $50,000 from the Real Estate Roundtable in 2017.

**One Nation**is the single largest group contributing to the Senate Leadership Fund, the McConnell-aligned Super PAC backing Republican Senate candidates. It’s the political action committee’s second-largest donor overall this cycle, after Blackstone CEO Stephen Schwarzman. It has also contributed to conservative groups working on policy issues like abortion and gun rights, like the National Rifle Association and the Susan B. Anthony List:{, an anti-abortion group. The group has spent more than$1 million already this year backing Maine Sen. Susan Collins, including }:{ in}:January:{, }:February:{, and }:March:{ highlighting “Collins’ effort to lower the price of insulin.” Democrats note that Collins — like almost every other Republican — }:voted repeatedly against:{ the }:Affordable Care Act:{ and closing the Medicare Part D coverage gap. Collins has taken }:$431,604:{ from the pharmaceutical industry throughout her career. }:

Collins, whose chances of securing a fifth term became less certain after her vote to confirm Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh in 2018 and increased criticism over her stance on abortion rights, is facing a challenge from Maine House Speaker Sara Gideon, backed by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, and Betsy Sweet, backed by Justice Democrats. In the wake of Collins’s vote to confirm Kavanaugh, activist Ady Barkan helped raise more than $4 million to support whoever wins the state’s Democratic primary in July.

In addition to Collins, One Nation is backing Iowa Sen. Joni Ernst:{and started running }:{ supporting her last year.}: On March 18, One Nation announced another $970,000:{ in television, radio, and digital ads praising Ernst as a champion for lower drug prices. Ernst said she supported, but did not sponsor, the Wyden-Grassley bill that Pfizer and the Chamber lobbied against, but voted against a 2017 }:bill:{ that would have allowed the U.S. to import cheaper drugs from Canada. }:

Ernst in 2018 co-sponsored a Republican-led bill as part of a party effort to assuage fears among its base after its successful repeal of parts of the Affordable Care Act. Republicans said the bill would protect people with preexisting conditions, but it would still have allowed insurers to discriminate against patients for other reasons, or sell policies that don’t cover other medical problems, HuffPost reported.

Critics say it’s unsettling, if not unsurprising, that a McConnell-aligned dark-money group would add a former pharmaceutical lobbyist to its board while running ads celebrating Republican senators for pushing lower drug prices, a cause McConnell himself has stymied in Congress.

“One Nation’s mission is to make sure that Republicans hold their majority in the Senate. They are going to craft their message around that,” said Robert Maguire, research director at Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington. “It does not mean that One Nation has staked out that policy. They think that voters in Maine want to hear that.”

no lnx

https://www.alternet.org/2020/02/how-the-gop-controlled-senate-is-putting-the-pensions-of-1-3-million-americans-at-risk/

How the GOP-controlled Senate is putting the pensions of 1.3 million Americans at risk

Image via Wikimedia Commons.

Written by Independent Media Institute February 12, 2020

by Tom Conway

Glen Heck spent 28 years sweating in a Campti, Louisiana, paper mill that he likes to say was “hotter than nine kinds of hell.”

But now, Heck’s sacrifice may have been for nothing because his multiemployer pension plan is one of about 150 nationwide set to go broke. If that happens, the 78-year-old Heck will have to find a cheaper, lower-quality health plan and keep the beef herd he’s itching to sell.

The Democratic-controlled House passed—with bipartisan support—a commonsense plan to save Heck’s pension and those of another 1.3 million workers, retirees, and widows. But Republican leaders in the Senate refuse to consider it.

In the meantime, the futures of workers and retirees like Heck hang in the balance. Many face retirement with fear instead of anticipation.

Multiemployer pension plans like Heck’s include workers from two or more companies in industries such as transportation, entertainment, construction and paper. Employers make contributions for workers as part of their compensation. Heck and others often give up wage increases or other benefits to fund those plans.

Many of the 1,400 plans nationwide are still healthy. But through no fault of workers or retirees, about 150 are struggling.

Recessions in 2001 and 2008 cut the plans’ investment earnings, and some corporations used bankruptcies to evade pension obligations. Deregulation forced less-competitive companies out of business, straining the plans’ resources.

Now, they owe more money to beneficiaries than they have coming in, and they’re at risk of collapsing. The PACE Industry Union-Management Pension Fund (PIUMPF)—Heck’s plan—is one of them. According to recent projections, the fund will be insolvent in as few as 10 years.

Under the bill passed by the House, the Butch Lewis Act, the Treasury Department would loan money to troubled plans. The plans would use the money to meet their obligations to retirees, and they would repay the loans over 30 years.

The federal government already has an agency, the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC), to pay benefits to retirees when multiemployer plans crumble. But it’s no substitute for the Butch Lewis Act.

PBGC provides only a fraction of the benefits beneficiaries earned. Also, so many plans are imperiled that the PBGC’s insurance program itself is at risk of collapse.

If plans fail, workers and retirees will lose as much as 98 percent of their benefits. The Butch Lewis Act would ensure that they receive the money they earned, not pennies on the dollar.

Heck, a former officer with United Steelworkers (USW) Local 13-1331 in Campti, knows widows of paper workers—one with a small child—who’d be financially devastated without their late husbands’ pensions. He knows a retiree with major health problems who’d have no way of paying medical bills without his pension checks.

“He’s just worried to death about it,” said Heck, who worked at the paper mill under a handful of operators, including current owner International Paper.

Cedric McClinton, president of Local 13-1331 and a technician at the paper mill, said pensions are the main source of retirement income for many workers and retirees. If those benefits get cut, there’s no easy way to make up the difference.

“You’re either looking at working longer—and who wants to work until you’ve got one foot in the grave and the other on a banana peel—or you’re looking at making concessions after you’ve worked all that time,” McClinton said.

Workers worry about downsizing their homes, giving up travel plans and going on government assistance programs.

“We talk about these things all the time,” McClinton said. “It’s real.”

Instead of passing the Butch Lewis Act to fix the pension crisis, Senate Republicans introduced legislation that would make the problem worse.

Sens. Chuck Grassley of Iowa and Lamar Alexander of Tennessee want to increase the premiums that retirement plans pay PBGC—something that would push currently healthy plans into financial ruin and put more workers’ retirements in jeopardy. The added costs also would propel some employers into bankruptcy, costing workers their jobs.

Grassley and Alexander also want to increase taxes on pensions, taking a bigger slice of the benefits workers earned and imposing a greater burden on retirees unable to afford it.

Workers and retirees didn’t create the pension crisis. But Grassley and Alexander want them to pay for it.

“That’s mind-boggling,” fumed Travis Birchfield, who’s lobbied for the Butch Lewis Act on behalf of Evergreen Packaging workers represented by USW Local 507 in Canton, North Carolina. “We’ve done bailouts and tax cuts for millionaires and billionaires, and then working people can’t get a damn loan?”

Uncertainty gnaws at Birchfield’s coworkers. Some in their 60s are thinking about retirement, but hesitate because of the pension crisis.

“They’ll ask us, ‘what do you think is going to happen?’ We can’t answer those questions,” Birchfield said.

McClinton and Birchfield pounded the halls of the Capitol to share members’ stories and concerns. But Senate Republicans fail to get the message.

Pensions aren’t perks or “extras.” Workers earned these benefits, and they rely on that money being there during their golden years, just as members of Congress count on receiving taxpayer-subsidized pensions when they leave office.

Failing to pass the Butch Lewis Act means consigning 1.3 million Americans to meager retirements. Some will fall into poverty after supporting themselves all of their lives. Many already see their dreams slipping away.

These hardworking men and women deserve immediate Senate passage of a responsible bill that safeguards their futures.

“Nobody’s trying to get rich here,” Birchfield stressed. “We’re just trying to get our retirements.”

Tom Conway is the international president of the United Steelworkers Union (USW).

This article was produced by the Independent Media Institute.

magnitsky ltr browder fusion gps rinat a:

Executive Summary 1. There is an ongoing lobbying campaign to repeal the Magnitsky Act (the “Campaign”) and rewrite the history of the Magnitsky story. This campaign has been conducted by the following entities A. Prevezon Holdings Limited (“Prevezon”) - a Russian owned Cyprus registered company B. The Human Rights Accountability Global Initiative Foundation (“HRAGIF”) - a Delaware NGO created on 18 February 2016. 2. To assist them in the Campaign, based on information and belief, the following people have been hired to lobby on their behalf: A. Rinat Akhmetshin – Russian national living in Washington D.C. B. Robert Arakelian C. Chris Cooper – CEO Potomac Square Group D. Glenn Simpson - SNS Global and Fusion GPS E. Mark Cymrot – Partner, Baker Hostetler F. Ron Dellums - Former Republican Congressman G. Howard Schweitzer – Managing Partner of Cozen O’Connor Public Strategie

Farm-state Republican senator blasts Trump administration: ‘They screwed us’

Sen. Chuck Grassley, Iowa’s Republican senior senator, blasted the Trump administration Friday…

GreenTech Automotive investigation

The Franklin Center published a series of articles that raised questions about GreenTech Automotive and its presumed chairman, Governor of Virginia Terry McAuliffe. The investigation exposed the company’s reliance on a controversial fundraising program, EB-5, that has been criticized for its lax oversight and subject to abuse.^[36] The investigation also revealed that McAuliffe’s public projections, starting back in 2010, of how many cars would be built and jobs created had not come to fruition.^[37] In April 2013, it was revealed that McAuliffe had left the green energy car-maker in December of the previous year.^[38]

GreenTech Automotive filed an $85 million libel lawsuit against Franklin Center on April 8, 2013 in a Mississippi court.^[39] Franklin Center described the suit as “intimidation” and pledged to continue investigating GTA and McAuliffe.^[40][41] In July 2014, a federal judge in Mississippi dismissed GreenTech's case. GreenTech filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy in 2018, stating that articles from Watchdog.org “negatively affected governmental, investor and public perception of GreenTech” and led to investigations by the SEC and the Department of Homeland Security. GreenTech also blamed U.S. Sen. Chuck Grassley, who had raised concerns about the company's use of a visa program, among others.^[42]

c street

terry g js

... Museveni in Uganda. Before him, their key man for Africa was a guy named Siad Barre of Somalia, for whom Chuck Grassley became a kind of defacto lobbyist as the United States pumped up his military, which he then used to absolutely destroy his country to such an effect that Somalia has never recovered and today is a haven for al-Qaida, for terrorism, for piracy. It's a lawless nation. The Family says that's part of God's plan.

see distraction

https://www.alternet.org/2019/04/trio-of-republican-senators-demand-doj-hand-over-information-on-clinton-email-probe-as-ag-barr-prepares-for-release-of-redacted-mueller-report/

As Attorney General William Barr prepares the release of a redacted version of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation report, Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) is reportedly recruiting other Republican senators help with a separate endeavor. As MSNBC reports, “a trio of top Republican senators” are demanding the Justice Department “hand over information on the handling of the probe into Hillary Clinton’s private email server.”

Graham, along with Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) and Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) sent a letter to Barr on Tuesday requesting documents pertaining to the department’s investigation of the former secretary of state.

The document request comes despite federal investigators clearing Clinton of criminal wrongdoing, and a separate Justice Department inspector general examination that reviewed the department’s probe. According to Politico, the trio of senators have requested a “classified briefing on steps the Justice Department plans to take in light of its inspector general’s 2018 report,” according to Politico.

“Now that the Special Counsel’s investigation has concluded, we are unaware of any legitimate basis upon which the Department can refuse to answer the Judiciary Committee’s inquiries,” Graham, Johnson and Grassley — who chair the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee and Senate Finance Committee, respectively — wrote in their letter to Barr.

The lawmakers also claimed a portion of the inspector general’s report “raises significant issues associated with the FBI’s failure to review certain highly classified information in support of its Midyear investigation.”

As Politico notes, Graham has likewise pledged to investigate whether the DOJ and FBI attempted to influence the 2016 to stop Donald Trump from becoming president.

According to a report at Politico, Sen, Chuck Grassley (R-IUA) is conducting a war with President Donald Trump’s White House over their refusal to turn over information related to Russia.

The report states that Grassley “is accusing the Trump administration of stonewalling him over a request for documents related to the Russia investigation,” so he is holding up the nomination of a key Trump appointee.

According to Politico, “The Iowa Republican’s demand for Justice Department documents on its probe of possible links between the Trump campaign and Moscow has left William Evanina’s nomination to head the National Counterintelligence and Security Center in limbo for the past year, frustrating the nation’s top intelligence leaders and even some fellow Senate Republicans.”

The report notes that Grassley is specifically seeking documents related to DOJ official Bruce Ohr, “who became a conduit between former British spy Christopher Steele and the FBI.”

In a statement submitted to the Congressional Record, Grassley wrote, “The administration’s continued, ongoing, and blatant lack of cooperation has forced my hand.”

Grassley has placed the blame for the lack of cooperation on Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats and was highly critical of how he is being treated.

...

Senate Judiciary Chairman Begs Constituents To Stop Asking Him About Brett Kavanaugh at Town Hall

By Matthew Chapman, AlterNet

Sen. Chuck Grassley really does not want to talk about the right-wing takeover of the Supreme Court

bizzare/unprecendented:

https://www.alternet.org/brett-kavanaugh-may-have-committed-perjury-gop-suppressing-evidence

One of the top concerns of Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee regarding President Donald Trump's Supreme Court Nominee, Judge Brett Kavanaugh, is whether he knew anything about, authorized, or advised the Bush administration on their torture program for detainees in the War on Terror while he served as White House staff secretary.

In 2006, during his confirmation to the D.C. Circuit, Kavanaugh told senators, under oath, that he was "not involved in the questions about the rules governing detention of combatants," and had no knowledge of issues about "the legal justifications or the policies relating to the treatment of detainees," according to NBC News. However,Sens. Patrick Leahy (D-VT), Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), and Dick Durbin (D-IL) assert that multiple documents and email chains show Kavanaugh was briefed on the issue, implying he was not honest with the Senate.

Some of the documents Judiciary Democrats say prove Kavanaugh's knowledge of the torture program, and potentially even suggest that he perjured himself in his earlier confirmation, have been marked "Committee Confidential" by Senate Judiciary Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA) — meaning that even most senators are not allowed to review them.

Also of concern is whether the White House is playing any role in steering document requests. On Friday, Leahy submitted a letter to White House Counsel Don McGahn, demanding to know what was discussed at a meeting between him and Judiciary Republicans regarding Kavanaugh.

According to a press release from Leahy, prior to the meeting on July 24, Republicans were prepared to ask the National Archives to release documents produced during Kavanaugh's time as White House Staff Secretary for former President George W. Bush. But after the meeting, Republicans refused to do so, allowing a limited release of documents curated by "a lawyer representing the former president."

"In the 44 years I have served in the United States Senate, I have seen 19 nominations to the Supreme Court, including the nomination of every current member of the Court," said Leahy. "I have never before seen the White House, under either a Republican or Democratic president, usurp or direct the parameters of the Judiciary Committee’s document request regarding a Supreme Court nominee. I find it troubling that the White House and Judiciary Committee Republicans are stifling transparency rather than working together to provide the necessary documents for the Senate to do its work. The American people deserve the unvarnished truth about Judge Kavanaugh."

McGahn has played a critical role in getting Trump's parade of far-right judicial nominees waved through the Senate, and has expressed his avowal to put two Supreme Court justices on the bench before leaving his role in the White House.

In addition to pressuring Judiciary Republicans to release the full set of documents,Senate Democrats have also filed a Freedom of Information Act request, and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) has threatened to sue the National Archives to make them public.

promised to release secet collus testmony then 180?

Republican House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes is actively blocking his own committee’s investigation, refusing to subpoena Trump’s financial records or compel new testimony from key witnesses like Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Donald Trump Jr, despite new information emerging.

Republican Senators Chuck Grassley and Lindsey Graham are doing the White House’s bidding by calling for a criminal investigation -- not against those who worked with the Russians to interfere in the 2016 election, but against a whistleblower who compiled a research document exposing that interference.

seems to be popping up end of 2017?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chuck_Grassley

Charles Ernest Grassley (born September 17, 1933) is an American politician serving as the senior United States Senator from Iowa since 1981. A member of the Republican Party, he previously was elected to the United States House of Representatives (1975–1981) and to the Iowa House of Representatives (1959–1975). He was chairman of the Senate Finance Committee from January to June 2001, as well as from January 2003 to December 2006, and is now the current chairman of the Judiciary Committee of the 115th Congress.

Early life and career

Grassley was born in New Hartford, Iowa, the son of Ruth (née Corwin) and Louis Arthur Grassley,^[1] and graduated from the town high school. At Iowa State Teachers College (now the University of Northern Iowa), he earned a B.A. in 1955 and an M.A. in 1956. During his time as a student, Grassley joined the social-professional Alpha Gamma Rho Fraternity.^[2] Also during the 1950s, Grassley farmed and worked in factories in Iowa, first as a sheet metal shearer and then as an assembly line worker. He pursued a Ph.D. in political science at the University of Iowa, but ultimately did not complete the degree. From 1967–1968, Grassley taught at Charles City College.^[3]

Grassley represented parts of Butler County in the Iowa House of Representatives from 1959 until 1975.^[3] He then served in the United States House of Representativesfrom 1975 to 1981.^[4]

United States Senate

Committee assignments

As a senior member of the Senate Finance Committee, Grassley has spearheaded many probes into alleged misuse and lack of accountability of federal money. In July 2007, a Grassley-commissioned report was released claiming that more than US$1 billion in farm subsidies were sent to deceased individuals.^[5] Grassley was called a "Taxpayer Super Hero" in 2014 by the Council for Citizens Against Government Waste, for his efforts to protect taxpayers. He received a 100 percent rating from the group that year and has a lifetime rating of 78 percent.^[6] Grassley was ranked as the 5th most bipartisan member of the U.S. Senate during the 114th United States Congress(and the third most bipartisan member of the U.S. Senate from the American Midwest after Indiana Senator Joe Donnelly and Ohio Senator Rob Portman) in the Bipartisan Index created by The Lugar Center and the McCourt School of Public Policy that ranks members of the United States Congress by their degree of bipartisanship (by measuring the frequency each member's bills attract co-sponsors from the opposite party and each member's co-sponsorship of bills by members of the opposite party).^[7]

Tenure

On June 28, 2006, Grassley proposed legislation^[8][9] intended to curb sex trafficking and sex slavery in the United States by means of strict enforcement of tax laws, for example by requiring a W-2 form be filed for each prostitute managed by a pimp or other employer.

In March 2009, amid a scandal that involved AIG executives receiving large salary bonuses from the taxpayer-funded bailout of AIG, Grassley suggested that those AIG employees receiving large bonuses should follow the so-called 'Japanese example', resign immediately or commit suicide. After some criticism, he dismissed the comments as rhetoric.^[13][14][15]Since 1976, Grassley has repeatedly introduced measures that increase the level of taxation on American citizens living abroad, including retroactive tax hikes. Grassley was eventually able to attach an amendment to a piece of legislation that went into effect in 2006, which increased taxes on Americans abroad by targeting housing and living incentives paid by foreign employers and held them accountable for federal taxes, even though they did not currently reside in the United States. Critics of the amendment felt that the move hurt Americans competing for jobs abroad by putting an unnecessary tax burden on foreign employers. Others felt that the move was only to offset the revenue deficit caused by domestic tax cuts of the Bush Administration.^[10][11][12]

In May 2009, Grassley cosponsored a resolution to amend the US Constitution to prohibit flag-burning.^[16]

When President Barack Obama and the Democratic Party proposed a health reform bill featuring mandated health insurance, Grassley opposed the health insurance mandate, saying that it was a deal breaker.^[17] In response to an audience question at an August 12, 2009, meeting in Iowa, about the end-of-life counseling provisions in the House health care bill, H.R. 3200, Grassley said people were right to fear that the government would "pull the plug on grandma."^{[18][19][20][21]} Grassley had previously supported covering end-of-life counseling, having voted for the Medicare Prescription Drug, Improvement, and Modernization Act of 2003, which stated: "The covered services are: evaluating the beneficiary's need for pain and symptom management, including the individual's need for hospice care; counseling the beneficiary with respect to end-of-life issues and care options, and advising the beneficiary regarding advanced care planning."^[22] In December 2009, he voted against the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (commonly called ObamaCare or the Affordable Care Act).

Grassley opposed the Manchin-Toomey gun control amendment, and instead proposed alternative legislation to increase prosecutions of gun violence and increase reporting of mental health data in background checks.^[23]

As of December 2013, Grassley has cast 6,806 consecutive roll call votes,^[24] placing him second behind the all-time consecutive vote record holder, Senator William Proxmire (D-Wis). Grassley has not missed a roll call vote since 1993, when he was touring Iowa with President Bill Clinton to survey flood damage. He has, as of July 2012, cast almost 11,000 votes and had at that time only missed 35 votes in his Senate career.^[25]

In June 2015, Grassley introduced legislation to help protect taxpayers from alleged abuses by the Internal Revenue Service. The legislation was proposed in response to recent events involving alleged inappropriate conduct by employees at the IRS but was opposed by Democrats.^[26]

Since first taking office in 1981, Grassley has held public meetings in all of Iowa's 99 counties each year, even after losing honorarium payments for them in 1994.^[27] This has led to the coinage of the term "full Grassley," to describe when a United States presidential candidate visits all 99 counties of Iowa before the Iowa caucuses.^[28]

Political positions

Abortion

Grassley has stated that he considers himself to be pro-life and has expressed concern regarding the potential for abortions to be paid for with federal funds.^[29]

Energy and environment

Grassley has expressed concern about the impact of regulations by the Environmental Protection Agency on farming.^[30]

In September 2015, Grassley received the Dr. Harold D. Prior "Friend of Iowa Wind Energy" award from the Iowa Wind Energy Association for his commitment to supporting wind energy development in Iowa. Also in 1992, Grassley authored the federal wind energy tax credit.^[31] Grassley supports federal ethanol subsidies.^[32]

Estate taxes

“	I think not having the estate tax recognizes the people that are investing, as opposed to those that are just spending every darn penny they have, whether it’s on booze or women or movies.	”
— Chuck Grassley, The Hill^[33]	— Chuck Grassley, The Hill^[33]	— Chuck Grassley, The Hill^[33]

Grassley is in favor of repealing the estate tax, which is a tax on inherited assets above $5.5 million for individuals and $11 million for couples.^[34] Grassley has argued that the estate is potentially ruinous for farmers and small business owners.^[35] According to the Des Moines Register, Grassley's argument does not "match the reality found in federal tax data – particularly for Iowa. The estate tax applies to around 5,000 taxpayers across the entire country each year, and very few of them come from Iowa. Of the Iowans subject to the tax, only a fraction are actually farmers, and a vanishingly small number of them face a tax bill requiring them to sell off farmland or other assets... The number of small businesses impacted by the estate tax is similarly small... about 94 estates annually that hold half or more of their assets in a small business that heirs will continue to operate after the owners die. And fewer than half of these don’t have the cash on hand to pay the tax."^[35]

Gun law

Grassley has an "A" rating from the National Rifle Association (NRA) for his consistent support of NRA-supported gun-related laws and ongoing sponsoring and authoring of legislature.^[36]

Grassley is a staunch believer that gun laws will not prevent gun deaths or gun-related violence without improved mental health care.^[37]

In 2016, one month after the Orlando nightclub shooting, Grassley proposed legislature to state-to-state expand access to background check data and to make it illegal for government officials to sell criminals guns as part of sting operations. Both proposals were rejected by the Senate.^[38] Additionally, he voted against the Democrat's Feinstein Amendment, which would make it illegal to sell guns to individuals on the terror watchlist and a Republican sponsored bill that expanded funding for background checks.^[39]

In early 2017, Grassley sponsored legislation that expanded access to mentally disabled individuals, claiming that the previous ban against mentally ill individuals purchasing guns "mistreats disabled Americans."^[40]

In response to the 2017 Las Vegas shooting, Grassley stated that it was unlikely that gun laws would change in the wake of the shooting due to Congress being Republican dominated.^[41]

Health care

Grassley has been critical of the Affordable Care Act but does not believe the law can be completely repealed. He believes some degree of bipartisanship will be necessary to make changes to the law. He believes a solution will likely involve removing unpopular aspects of the law, like the individual mandate, while keeping popular aspects of it that deal with pre-existing conditions and the ability for children to remain on their parents' plans longer.^[42] Grassley believes that the Senate's version of the AHCA (the repeal of the ACA passed by the House), will provide health insurers certainty. Asked if not passing legislation would also provide certainty, he replied that it would, but at higher premiums. He said that with the proposed legislation premiums "maybe wouldn't go up or would go up a heck of a lot less than they would without a bill."^[43]

Marijuana

In 2015, Grassley voiced his opposition to a bipartisan senate bill, The Compassionate Access, Research Expansion, and Respect States Act, that would move cannabis from Schedule I to Schedule II. This bill would allow states with medical cannabis laws to legally prescribe it and allow for much easier research into its medical efficacy.^[44]

Other

Grassley was given the American Legion's distinguished public service award for his support of a "strong national defense, service members, veterans and the American flag", primarily due to his support for a flag protection amendment.^[45]

Russian interference in 2016 presidential election

Main article: Russian interference in the 2016 United States elections

In February 2017, Grassley said that while Russian interference in U.S. elections was "bothersome", the United States did not have clean hands and had, for instance, interfered with the 1948 Italian election.^[46]

After President Trump fired FBI Director James Comey, Grassley advised people suspicious of the Trump administration to "Suck it up and move on."^[47] On October 31, 2017, while facing questions from reporters concerning recent indictments, Grassley refused to answer and instead fled the area.^[48]

Whistleblowers

The author of the Whistleblower Protection Act of 1989, Grassley has campaigned to increase protection and provide support for "whistleblowers". He has supported a number of FBI whistleblowers, including Coleen Rowley, Sibel Edmonds, and Jane Turner, although not supporting Department of Defense whistleblower Noel Koch.^[49]

Grassley received a lifetime achievement award on May 17, 2007 from the National Whistleblower Center. In April 2014, Grassley announced plans to create a caucus in the Senate dedicated to strengthening whistleblower protections.^[50]

Investigations

Religious organizations

On November 5, 2007, Grassley announced an investigation into the tax-exempt status of six ministries under the leadership of Benny Hinn, Paula White, Eddie L. Long, Joyce Meyer, Creflo Dollar, and Kenneth Copeland by the United States Senate Committee on Finance.^[51] In letters to each ministry, Grassley asked for the ministries to divulge specific financial information to the committee to determine whether or not funds collected by each organization were inappropriately utilized by ministry heads.^[52] By the December 6, 2007 deadline, only three of the ministries had shown compliance with the Finance Committee's request. On March 11, 2008, Grassley and Finance Chairman Max Baucus sent follow-up letters to Kenneth Copeland, Creflo Dollar and Eddie Long, explaining that the Senate reserved the right to investigate the finances of their organizations under federal tax laws.^[53]

Medical research

Grassley also began an investigation about unreported payments to physicians by pharmaceutical companies. Grassley led a 2008 Congressional Investigation which found that well-known university psychiatrists, who had promoted psychoactive drugs, had violated federal and university regulations by secretly receiving large sums of money from the pharmaceutical companies which made the drugs.^[54] The New York Times reported that Dr. Joseph Biederman of Harvard University had failed to report over a million dollars of income that he had received from pharmaceutical companies.^[55] Weeks later, Business Week reported that Grassley alleged that Alan Schatzberg, chair of psychiatry at Stanford University, had underreported his investments in Corcept Therapeutics, a company he founded.^[56] Dr. Schatzberg had reported only $100,000 investments in Corcept, but Grassley stated that his investments actually totalled over $6 million. Dr. Schaztberg later stepped down from his grant which is funded by the National Institutes of Health (NIH).^[57]

Similarly, Dr. Charles Nemeroff resigned as chair of the psychiatry department at Emory University after failing to report a third of the $2.8 million in consulting fees he received from GlaxoSmithKline. At the time he received these fees, Nemeroff had been principal investigator of a $3.9 million NIH grant evaluating five medications for depression manufactured by GlaxoSmithKline.^[58]

In 2008, for the first time, Grassley asked the American Psychiatric Association to disclose how much of its annual budget came from drug industry funds. The APA said that industry contributed 28% of its budget ($14 million at that time), mainly through paid advertising in APA journals and funds for continuing medical education.^[59]

Political campaigns...

According to the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics in 2010, the industries that have been the largest contributors to Grassley during his political career are health professionals ($1 million in contributions), insurance industry ($997,674), lawyers/law firms ($625,543) and pharmaceuticals/health products ($538,680). His largest corporate donors have been Blue Cross Blue Shield insurance, Amgen biotech company and Wells Fargo bank.^[64]

hillary bs deflection

Senators are getting in on the act as well. Senate Judiciary Committee chair Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, wants Deputy FBI Director Andrew McCabe fired because his wife is a Democrat and he's suspected of having been hostile to Trump during the election (which apparently translates into him covering up Hillary Clinton's crimes). Meanwhile, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., has become downright hysterical:

Senator Rand Paul

@RandPaul

Time to investigate high ranking Obama government officials who might have colluded to prevent the election of @realDonaldTrump! This could be WORSE than Watergate!

https://www.alternet.org/economy/3-noxious-myths-about-poor-republicans-are-using-slash-social-safety-net

Republicans continue to use long-debunked myths about the poor as they defend lower taxes for the richand deep cuts to the social safety netto pay for them. In so doing, they are essentially expressing scorn for working class and low-income Americans.

Sen. Chuck Grassley,for example, recently justified reducing the number of wealthy families exposed to the estate tax as a way to recognize “the people that are investing, as opposed to those that are just spending every darn penny they have, whether it’s on booze or women or movies.”

Similarly, Sen. Orrin Hatchraised concerns about funding certain entitlement programs. “I have a rough time wanting to spend billions and billions and trillions of dollars to help people who won’t help themselves, won’t lift a finger and expect the federal government to do everything,” he said.

These statements, the likes of which I expect we’ll all hear more of in coming months, reinforce three harmful narratives about low-income Americans: People who receive benefits don’t work, they don’t deserve help and the money spent on the social safety net is a waste of money.

Based on my research and 20 years of experience as a clinical law professor representing low-income clients, I know that these statements are false and only serve to reinforce misconceptions about working class and poor Americans.

Food participants get an average of $125 a month, hardly enough to feed a family without earning money as well.

Most welfare recipients are makers not takers

The first myth, that people who receive public benefits are “takers” rather than “makers,” is flatly untrue for the vast majority of working-age recipients.

Consider Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program benefits, formerly known as food stamps, which currently serve about 42 million Americans. At least one adult in more than half of SNAP-recipient households are working. And the average SNAP subsidy is $125 per month, or $1.40 per meal – hardly enough to justify quitting a job.

As for Medicaid, nearly 80 percent of adults receiving Medicaid live in families where someone works, and more than half are working themselves.

In early December, House Speaker Paul Ryan said, “We have a welfare system that’s trapping people in poverty and effectively paying people not to work.”

Not true. Welfare – officially called Temporary Assistance to Needy Families – has required work as a condition of eligibility since then-President Bill Clinton signed welfare reform into law in 1996. And the earned income tax credit, a tax credit for low- and moderate-income workers, by definition, supports only people who work.

Workers apply for public benefits because they need assistance to make ends meet. American workers are among the most productive in the world, but over the last 40 years the bottom half of income earners have seen no income growth. As a result, since 1973, worker productivity has grown almost six times faster than wages.

In addition to wage stagnation, most Americans are spending more than one-third of their income on housing, which is increasingly unaffordable. There are 11 million renter households paying more than half their income on housing. And there is no county in America where a minimum wage worker can afford a two-bedroom home. Still, only 1 in 4 eligible households receive any form of government housing assistance.

To be sure, there are recipients of public benefits who do not work. They are primarily children, the disabled and the elderly – in other words, people who cannot or should not work. These groups constitute the majority of public benefits recipients.

Society should support these people out of basic decency, but there are self-interested reasons as well. To begin with, all working adults have been children, will someday be old and, at any time, might face calamities that take them out of the workforce. The safety net exists to rescue people during these vulnerable periods. Indeed, most people who receive public benefits leave the programs within three years.

Moreover, many public benefits pay for themselves over time, as healthier and financially secure people are more productive and contribute to the overall economy. For example, every dollar in SNAP spending is estimated to generate more than $1.70 in economic activity.

Similarly, Medicaid benefits are associated with enhancing work opportunities. The earned income tax credit contributes to work rates, improves the health of recipient families and has long-term educational and earnings benefits for children.

The current federal minimum wage is hardly enough to feed a family. AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato

What the needy deserve

10/23

https://www.thedailybeast.com/three-weeks-after-las-vegas-legislation-to-ban-bump-stocks-has-stalled-out-in-congress

Three weeks after the deadliest mass shooting in modern American history, efforts to pass even scaled-down gun-control legislation have effectively stalled on Capitol Hill.

Congressional aides and issue advocates say they see no viable path for passing even the most promising bill: an effort to ban the manufacturing and sale of bump stocks, which were used by the Las Vegas shooter to essentially turn his semi-automatic weapons into fully automatics ones.

“Depressing but not surprising,” is how one senior House Democratic aide put it.

“It’s pathetic,” said another.

The failure of lawmakers to move bump stock legislation comes despite the willingness of several House Republicans to sign on to the measure. A bill introduced by Reps. Carlos Curbelo (R-FL) and Seth Moulton (D-MA) has 20 co-sponsors in total—ten Democratic and ten Republican. But aides say that there is no indication that the House Judiciary Committee is going to consider that bill, or a similar one signed by 173 Democrats. Democrats are expected to ask the Committee’s chairman, Bob Goodlatte (R-VA), to address the matter in the week ahead.

Prospects look bleak in the Senate too. Sen. Dianne Feinstein’s (D-CA) bill banning bump stocks has 39 Democratic co-sponsors but not one Republican, though an aide said that she is still hopeful that she can convince one to sign on to the measure. Even were she to find a GOP co-sponsor there is no guarantee that the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Chuck Grassley (R-IA), would bring the bill up for consideration.

A committee spokesman for Grassley told The Daily Beast that the committee has been briefed about “regulatory and technical issues involving bump stocks” and that they are “evaluating potential regulatory and legislative proposals.”

omg 180

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/15/opinion/congress-says-let-the-mentally-ill-buy-guns.html For all their dysfunction, the Republican Senate and House have managed to act with lightning speed in striking down a sensible Obama administration rule designed to stop people with severe mental problems from buying guns.President Trump, who championed the National Rifle Association agenda as a candidate, is expected to sign the regressive measure. This, despite the Republican mantra that tighter control of mentally troubled individuals — not stronger gun control — is the better way to deal with the mass shootings and gun carnage that regularly afflict the nation.The Senate voted Wednesday to join the House in revoking the rule. It would have required the Social Security Administration to add about 75,000 people, currently on disability support, to the national background check database and deny them gun purchases. These individuals suffer schizophrenia, psychotic disorders and other problems to such an extent that they are unable to manage their financial affairs and other basic tasks without help.allowing them to buy guns poses an inordinate and needless risk to public safety. An existing law bars gun purchases to people “adjudicated as a mental defective” or involuntarily committed to a mental institution. But enforcement of that law has been spotty, because medical records often aren’t added to the federal databases — thus prompting the Obama administration to create the Social Security rule. Congress struck down the rule with Republican majorities — and some Democrats notably up for re-election next year — contending that the Second Amendment rights of these troubled, disabled individuals have to be the prime concern.Senator Charles Grassley, Republican of Iowa, envisioned people with “an eating disorder” being barred from buying a gun. To the contrary, the rule was focused narrowly on disabled individuals who require a trustee for personal management. They would have had the right to appeal. Senator Grassley himself noted last year the flaws in the background check database when he proposed greater cooperation among federal agencies with relevant information.“The Republicans are so hypocritical on this issue,” said Senator Christopher Murphy, Democrat of Connecticut. He has fought for both stronger gun controls and better mental health care in the aftermath of the 2012 school massacre in Newtown, Conn. A mentally troubled individual used a legally purchased assault weapon and shot to death 20 children and six school workers. The disability rule was a response to that tragedy after Congress refused to tighten gun safety laws.“I hope something truly awful doesn’t happen because of this,” Senator Murphy said of Congress’s repeal of the new rule. Americans can only join in that hope while Congress continues to bend to the will of the gun industry. =Similarly, Ole Anthony wrote very critically of televangelists in 1994.[12]A proportion of their methods and theology are held by some to be conflicting with Christian doctrine taught in long existing traditionalist congregations. Many televangelists are featured by "discernment ministries" run by other Christians that are concerned about what they perceive as departures from sound Christian doctrine