- For info on the faulty science behind
the legislation, please see the
following piece by Jonah Goldberg and
Kim Strassel: "The Shrinking Consensus."
- For info on the even faultier
economics behind the legislation,
please see the following piece by Guy
Benson from National Review Online:
"Cap and Trade Doesn't Work."
- Voted AGAINST the right of
workers to a secret ballot
when voting on whether to
unionize (ACU-6).
- Voted FOR a 2009 bill to
double SCHIP spending
(ACU-17). This insurance entitlement
provides free coverage for enrollees
whose incomes can be as high as
triple the poverty level—and the vote
was viewed as an important step
toward the kind of nationalized health
care that was passed in March 2010.
Also notable, the CBO estimated that
nearly 80% of the children who were
given free insurance under SCHIP
already had private policies (Carter—
NRO). To pay for the swelling program,
Lobiondo’s vote included a tax hike.
- Voted TO OVERRIDE
Bush’s 2007 veto of the
State Children’s Health
Insurance Program (SCHIP)
expansion (ACU-6). This program
was created in 1997 only to provide
insurance to children from uninsured
families who were narrowly above
poverty. But 10 years later, the Dems
moved to expand the program--and,
as always, the devil was in the details.
By joining forces with the Dems,
Lobiondo chose to do the following:
- Re-define "children" to mean "21-year-old
adults."
- Re-define "just above poverty" to mean "$80,000
income."
- Let some taxpayers pay for other taxpayers'
insurance (even if the former make less than the
latter and purchase their own insurance).
- Give incentives for states to “recruit” new
enrollees and thus make this big program even
bigger. (Carney-1).
- Voted FOR the 2009
omnibus bill that meant an
additional 8% increase in
spending, on top of the
stimulus (ACU-17).
- Voted AGAINST speeding
up construction on the
border fence (ACU-6).
- Voted FOR Cash for
Clunkers (ACU-17).
- Voted AGAINST off-shore
drilling in 06 (ACU-4).
- Voted AGAINST off-shore
drilling in 07 (ACU-6).
- Voted AGAINST easing
McCain / Feingold
restrictions on political
speech in the weeks before
an election (1 of only 10 in the
GOP)
- Voted FOR Pelosi's "light-
bulb ban" that, as the ACU
explains, regulates "lights and
appliances (including a ban on the
incandescent light bulb), creating
new programs for alternative
energy sources, imposing more
regulations on energy companies
and mandating vastly increased
use of ‘renewable’ energy” (ACU 6).
- Voted FOR Barney Frank’s
Housing Trust Fund of 2007
(ACU-5), which Speaker Pelosi
boasted as “the largest expansion
in federal housing programs in
decades” (Pelosi 1) and which the
Bush administration opposed as
“a duplicate program” that “would
create an undue and
counterproductive reliance on
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac”
(Woolley & Gerhard 1) .
- Voted FOR the Democrat's
2007 Energy Policy that
mandated reliance on biofuels
while not allowing oil supplies to
increase. The policy also stiffened
regulations and raised taxes $2
billion (ACU-6).
- Voted FOR applying
McCain / Feingold to
grassroots organizations (ACU-
4) NOTE: Undoubtedly, in this
instance, the dems were the good
guys. This was GOP-sponsored
and nearly ALL republicans voted
for it. However, we at Remove the
Rinos believe there is no excuse
for voting against the 1st
Amendment no matter how many
republicans do so and no matter
how reprehensible George Soros’
527s are. And if John McCain
were to jump off a bridge…..??
- Voted AGAINST a 2006
conservative budget
alternative that would have
extended Bush’s tax cuts while
trimming more than 300 billion
dollars of discretionary spending,
done away with close to 150
programs, and increased funds for
the military and for veterans. It
also would have opened ANWR for
drilling (ACU-4) .
- Voted AGAINST drilling in
ANWR in 2005 (ACU 2).
- Voted AGAINST drilling in
ANWR in 2006 (ACU-4) .
- Voted FOR raising CAFE
standards (ACU-2) For a look at the
link between higher CAFE standards
and increased traffic fatalities, as well
as the folly of the economic
justifications for higher standards, see
what Dennis Kneale has to say: "New
CAFE" (CNBC-1).
- Voted AGAINST an
amendment that would
keep government funds
from being used to enforce
trigger-lock regulations (ACU
4). Critics argue these regulations
have little value in promoting gun
safety and are primarily punitive in
design, adding cost and red tape
to gun ownership. Still worse,
these trigger locks would hamper,
if not outright nullify, a gun-owner's
ability to use the weapon in self-
defense. This suggests another
Machiavellian gun-control strategy: if
you can't make a gun illegal, do the
next best thing--make it useless.
- Voted AGAINST a bill
protecting property owners
from eminent domain
abuses. The bill would
guarantee access to the federal
court so that citizens could sue to
stop the government from taking
their property.
- Voted AGAINST an
amendment to cut
discretionary spending by
2% while protecting the
Bush tax cuts (ACU 2).
- Voted AGAINST the 2005
Republican Budget
Resolution that, according to
the ACU, established "broad
spending and revenue targets for
five years, limiting discretionary
spending to $843 billion in fiscal
2006, and requiring $70 billion in
tax cuts and $34.7 billion in
savings" (ACU 2).
- Voted FOR banning 50-
caliber rifle exports (ACU 2).
According to the NRA-Institute for
Legislative Action (NRA-ILA 1), this
bill, which was sponsored "by
notoriously anti-gun
Representative James Moran,"
outlawed exports of .50-caliber
rifles, and it marked the first
congressional vote on any kind of .
50-caliber ban.
- Voted FOR raising min-
imum wage after the Dems
rejected tax cuts that would
have protected entry-level
workers and small
businesses (ACU-6) . For insights
into the harmful effects the
measure, in its House form, would
have meant to workers and small
businesses, National Review
Online consulted with four leading
economists. All four economists
agreed that only politicians stood
to gain from the measure : "At
Minimum…Should Republicans fight back against a
minimum-wage increase?"
- Voted AGAINST reforming
the Endangered Species Act
(ACU 2). to reimburse property
owners for losses suffered from
not being able to develop their
land. It also clarified species
designations, better protecting
the species in need of protection
and better targeting the properties in
need of oversight (Marano and
Lieberman).
- Voted AGAINST the Online
Freedom of Speech bill,
which would have prevented e-
mail and blogs from being
regulated by the Federal Election
Commission (ACU 2). In essence, this
bill's defeat leaves open the
possibility that McCain/Feingold
could reach its way dramatically
into the Internet (Hayward).
- Voted FOR a 700% increase
in funding for the HOPE VI
Public Housing Program,
even as $2 billion remained in the
coffers, unspent. This was a program
that Bush had marked for elimination
(ACU-8).
- Voted AGAINST the 2008
Republican budget
resolution that, according to the
ACU, "would have made the Bush
tax cuts permanent, capped
discretionary spending at $973
billion, reduced mandatory
spending by $12 billion over five
years, and imposed a moratorium
on pork barrel 'earmarks'” (ACU-8).
- Voted AGAINST a 2008
motion to allow drilling in
ANWR, the Outer-
Continental Shelf, and other
territories in the West (ACU-8).
- Voted FOR permanently
raising taxes on businesses
while temporarily extending tax
credits on “green” initiatives. This
was presented to the American
people as "tax relief" (a deed that
the ACU appropriately describes
as "legislative sleight-of-hand")
(ACU-8).
- Voted FOR penalizing
energy producers. As part of
an ongoing assault on the energy
sector at a time when we most
needed to encourage exploration
and drilling, Diaz-Balart voted with
the democrats on a bill that, as the
ACU explains, would have placed
"new requirements and penalties
on holders of federal oil and gas
leases" (ACU-8).
- Voted AGAINST lifting the
ban on oil and gas
production in the Gulf of
Mexico. Introduced in September
08, this measure would have given
states the power to choose whether to
allow production off their own coasts
(ACU-8).
- Voted FOR the economic
stimulus bill of September
2008 (ACU-8).
|
