PUTTING AMERICANS BACK TO WORK

JOBS - it should be job number one for Congress when it returns to its job in September. It is a job, I fear, that will go wanting while Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid still hold the gavel of congressional leadership.
What is needed?
This is not rocket science.
Lower corporate tax rates and provide incentives and loan guarantees to small businesses to expand and hire more workers. Institute incentives to bring industry outsourced to Mexico (like the recently closed Whirlpool plant in Evansville, IN) and China back to America. Close tax loopholes that allow such outsourcing in the first place.
Immediately lift the Obama-imposed ban on drilling in the Gulf and put the estimated 18-25 thousand workers back on payrolls and off unemployment rolls.
Lift the ban on drilling in Alaska's Anwr refuge and allow drilling on 1.5 million of the refuge's nearly 20-million acres on the north coast of that state. Anwr holds an estimated six to sixteen billion barrels of oil.
What about the Caribou calving areas so sacred to the environmentalists who have blocked drilling in Anwr for more than a quarter century? Endangering caribou was the same argument used to try and block oil drilling in Prudhoe Bay. When drilling began in Prudhoe Bay more than a quarter century ago, caribou native to that area numbered about 3,000. Today the herd is estimated at 23,000.
Case closed!
Drilling in Anwr would put up to a half-million Americans back to work - at top wages - and bring in tens of millions annually to Alaska and the U. S. Treasury from royalties for the drilling rights.
Anwr could supply up to 20-percent of America's oil needs. We could then cease doing business with Saudi Arabia, from whom we import 14.3-percent of our oil and put a big dent in oil imports from Venezuela, which supplies 12-percent of our annual petroleum needs.
Without the need for oil from those two despotic nations we could thumb our nose at Chavez and begin to finally cut-off the money rolling into this country from Saudi Arabia to fund mosques that teach the radical theology of Wahhabism, which calls for Jews to be eradicated and considers Christians and other non-Muslims infidels.
Does that word sound familiar?
Saudi money makes its way into this country through Muslim charity fronts - fronts that build mosques and madrassas - schools where Muslim children are indoctrinated with the radical Wahhabi teachings, which include stoning women who commit adultery (most men get by with flogging or no punishment at all); and upholds honor killings by male family members of any female family member who dares to offend the strict behavior and dress codes inflicted on females in this male dominated society.
In Saudi Arabia, Wahhabism's Sharia law requires married women cover their faces in public; all women must cover their heads; women are not permitted to vote, drive a car, or go anywhere without being accompanied by a male family member.
Gays must also fear for their lives in Saudi Arabia. If caught they can be stoned, flogged and at best, imprisoned.
Tolerance in any form is lacking in Saudi society. While members of the Muslim faith should be welcomed and respected by all Americans, the barbaric religious practices of Saudi Arabia should be confined to that country and not exported to America through charitable fronts. Wahhabism is offensive to American values of personal freedom and more humane punishment.
The development of Anwr is key to cutting off oil imports from Saudi Arabia and ultimately to our national and economic security.
As we approach the tenth anniversary of 9/11, let us remember 15 of the 19 terrorists who attacked America were from Saudi Arabia.
And please, let me never see another American President holding the hand of, or bowing to, the King of that despotic country. Such a sight is offensive and denigrates a document signed in 1776 by a brave band of patriotic brothers who pledged their lives, their fortunes and their sacred honor to not have to bow to a despotic King of England.
Put Gulf workers back to work. Develop Anwr on a priority basis. Drilling for oil in American waters and on American soil are good first steps to righting our upside down economy.

GOING RED

The Commonwealth of Massachusetts changed it political color Tuesday night from blue to red. The Republican won - decisively. That may put a blue pall over the White House and leave a few faces red with embarrassment. President Obama's for one. The senator-elect from the Bay state, Scott Brown, put it best in his exuberant acceptance speech when he said Air Force One made an "emergency" landing in Massachusetts to no avail for loser Martha Coakely.

More important, the Democrat thrashing in Massachusetts already has left so-called blue dog Democrats like Evan Bayh finding excuses to back away from the monstrosity of a healthcare bill, that up until the Massachusetts rout, Bayh had steadfastly supported, even though he admitted in a December 21 statement, "The health reform debate epitomizes all that frustrates the American people, including me, about Congress and Washington D. C....the national interest has been held hostage to personal and parochial concerns."

Duh!!!!

But Bayh dutifully cast his vote anyway, concluding in his milk toast statement the bill would lower the deficit, keep insurance companies from dropping coverage, and help small business; benefits disputed by the Congressional Budget Office and small business representatives.

Now that Brown's election has caused a major political earthquake in Washington, Bayh is trying to find safe ground to protect his own reelection chances in November. He noted ignoring the message sent by Massachusetts voters could be "catastrophic."

Senator Bayh appears to be finally suffering from a mild case of cold reality.

Fellow blue dog, Sen. Jim Webb, D-VA., who also dutifully voted for the Senate version of healthcare in December, took a different tact, calling for a suspension of any votes on healthcare until Brown is seated. I salute him for that because it is the right and fair thing to do.

On the surface it would appear Bayh and Webb have overdosed on Boniva to strengthen their political spines. It is not hard to get a spine when you know your majority leader and the White House are considering the nuclear option (also known as reconciliation), a maneuver requiring only a simple majority of 51 votes to pass the bill one final time. It is a tactic that might not sit well with most Americans or the Republican opposition, but might offer the spineless likes of Bayh and Webb political cover since their votes may not be needed to approve a bill that threatens to eviscerate the American healthcare system and our pocketbooks.

Bayh had his chance to show courage in December. A bill with which he claimed to find so many faults was, in his words, still better than doing nothing.

Well, doing nothing is what the American public seems to prefer in light of skyrocketing deficits.

I have to wonder if Senator Bayh doesn't regret not doing what we suggested in an earlier blog - that he be the one Democrat to cast the 41st vote against healthcare. Unfortunately for Bayh, Reid, Pelosi and Obama, Scott Brown does promise to be that 41st vote against healthcare, that is, if Harry Reid and company fail at invoking the nuclear option.

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