Homeless in Arizona

Arizona Originals: Persistent | Kyrsten Sinema

Kyrsten Sinema is the Arizona State Senator who tried to flush Arizona's medical marijuana laws down the toilet by passing a 300 percent tax on medical marijuana. Needless to say Kyrsten Sinema is pretty well hated by the folks that want to end the insane unconstitutional "war on drugs".

Of course the police and police unions LOVE Kyrsten Sinema and for as as I can remember her political signs have always said that she was endorsed by the police unions. If you want a bigger better police state vote for Kyrsten Sinema. If you love cops Kyrsten Sinema is the woman to vote for.

Currently Kyrsten Sinema is a US Congresswoman in Washinton D.C.

Source

Arizona Originals: Persistent | Kyrsten Sinema

By Jane Larson Special for the Republic|azcentral.com Mon Jul 8, 2013 10:40 AM

Kyrsten Sinema, 36, jumped into the fray early — she started accumulating college credits in high school and earned a bachelor’s degree in social work from Brigham Young University when she was 18. [despite going to BYU she figured out God is make believe and is now an atheist] She has earned a master’s degree in social work, a law degree and a Ph.D in justice studies from Arizona State University in the years since. She has held positions as a social worker, an attorney and as an adjunct ASU instructor in social work.

“I always like doing things fast,” she said in a 2007 interview with The Arizona Republic.

Sinema, who was born in Tucson, has overcome notable odds to accomplish her goals. For a couple of years, she says, her family lived in an abandoned gas station with no electricity or running water. [I bet she uses that story as often as John McCain uses his story about being a down trodden POW in North Vietnam. Hey, anything to get a few extra votes to get elected] She became a social worker to help struggling families. Her involvement in politics grew as she realized that their problems — poverty, homelessness, job loss, abuse — were common to many people, and that solving these problems meant thinking bigger than one family at a time.

Since her early 20s, she has been active in political causes [I know here from when she was an anti-war protester against the Iraq war], winning election to the Arizona House of Representatives in 2004 and to the Arizona Senate in 2010. In 2012, she won a hard-fought race against former Paradise Valley Mayor Vernon Parker for the congressional seat. She is the first openly bisexual person elected to Congress. [And she is one of the few atheists I know in Congress despite the fact that she doesn't advertize the fact that she is an atheist and only says she doesn't have a church]

Her work on two statewide ballot initiatives, including one against a ban on gay marriage, shows her ability to mobilize voters. She helped organize a massive immigrant-rights march, supports the Dream Act and same-sex-marriage legislation, and recently took her seat on the influential House Financial Services Committee, which affects housing, insurance and other issues important to Arizona.

Businesses expanding in the district and the jobs they generate are on Democrat Sinema’s mind as a new member of the House committee, and its housing, insurance and oversight subcommittees. She’s looking at ways the committee’s work can help businesses and wage earners in Arizona. [If you ask me Kyrsten Sinema seems to have sold us anti-war folks out and now supports the military industrial complex]

“Every time I meet with a business, particularly some of these guys who are doing such innovative work in science, technology and biotech, the passion is evident,” she says. “And when we’re talking about technological advancement, you’ve got to have both patience and persistence because you hit so many bumps before you hit the eureka.”

Sinema represents a district that starts in north-central Phoenix, home to much of the state’s financial-services industry, and runs east and south to include defense contractors such as Honeywell Inc. in Phoenix and General Dynamics Corp. [formerly Motorola] in Scottsdale, tech startups in Tempe and high-tech manufacturing giant Intel Corp. in Chandler. [Those are the corporations in the military industrial complex Kyrsten Sinema seems to want to help out with corporate welfare.] The district also has ideas incubating on Arizona State University’s campus and along the Price Road corridor through Tempe and Chandler.

One subcommittee is examining how to strengthen the Federal Housing Administration, which insures home mortgages, and Sinema hopes the work will help stabilize Arizona’s housing market and get more middle-class families back into homes. The panel also is considering reforms to the government-controlled mortgage companies Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

“Now that many folks in our community are getting their lives back on track … we’re going to help them get back into home ownership,” Sinema says. “We know that home ownership is good for the whole local economy. [Yea and home ownership is even better when you can get the somebody in the government like Congresswoman Kyrsten Sinema to force the taxpayers to pay for your home] When people have stable jobs, they’re investing and they’re spending their money with local businesses.”

As implementation of 2010’s Dodd-Frank financial reform act continues, Sinema also wants to make sure that the regulations don’t overburden Arizona’s community banks. [This must be a mistake. The Kyrsten Sinema I know seems to LOVE government bureaucracys!!!!] And she hears small businesses’ pleas for Congress to stop governing by crisis and start creating a stable, predictable business climate.

Beyond those needs, she’s also concerned about the “Valley of Death,” where good inventions are said to die because their creators either don’t have the skills or the financing to convert their knowledge into marketable products. Sinema hopes Congress has room to support crowd-sourcing, a type of financing in which multiple investors put minimal sums into startups, although she adds that any action needs to protect both those who invest and those who receive funds.

“We’re always looking for opportunities to figure out how to make it easier for people to invest,” she says, “and to choose Arizona as a creative outpost.”

Standing up for alternative ideas is what Sinema does. In 2007, she introduced a bill that would have equated Minutemen, a citizens group monitoring illegal immigration at the Mexico border, with domestic terrorists. [Looks like Kyrsten Sinema also flip flopped on this issue. The Kyrsten Sinema I used to know was against the police state. Or at least I though she was]

Sinema stood up for her proposal as the kidnapping and rape threats piled up and as the blogosphere buzzed with personal attacks. In the Legislature, she proposed dozens of other ideas, including repealing the death penalty and requiring Arizona to significantly slash its greenhouse-gas emissions.

“I’m not afraid to take a stand on the issues that are important,” Sinema said in the 2007 interview.

Sinema collects $1.6 million a year in bribes, no campaign contributions

Let's face it government isn't about being a public servant, it's extracting cold hard cash from the people you rule over. Campaign contributions in exchange for government pork. While officially they are called "campaign contributions" most of us call them for what they are - "bribes".

Kyrsten Sinema job as a Congressman or Congresswoman gets paid a nice $174,000 a year. Something only most of the people she rules over can only dream about.

But if her current rate of campaign contributions, something the rest of us call bribes, continues she will be pulling in $1.6 million a year, almost 10 times the amount of her cushy $174,000 salary.

Last for those of you who don't keep up with the news, Kyrsten Sinema is the Arizona Senator who tried to slap a 300 percent tax on medical marijuana in an attempt to flush Arizona's medical marijuana laws down the toilet.

Source

Sinema a leader in campaign donations

By Rebekah L. Sanders The Republic | azcentral.com Tue Jul 16, 2013 10:50 PM

U.S. Rep. Kyrsten Sinema, D-Ariz., in her first year in Congress has vaulted to the top echelon of fundraisers nationwide, according to campaign-finance reports released this week.

Sinema, whose district includes parts of Phoenix and Tempe, raked in nearly $400,000 from April through June [for a year that would be $1.6 million], with major money coming from labor unions, Arizona State University employees and Democratic leadership groups. Her total surpassed House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi and roughly 90 percent of other House members, according to Federal Election Commission records.

Sinema ended the second quarter with $550,000 on hand.

The numbers show how important fundraising has become for incumbents like Sinema, especially those who represent competitive districts, said Bruce Merrill, a longtime political scientist and professor emeritus at Arizona State University.

Sinema’s fellow Democrats in hot seats for 2014 — Rep. Ann Kirkpatrick of northern Arizona and Rep. Ron Barber of southern Arizona — raised significant amounts as well: about $300,000 each.

Kirkpatrick ended the quarter with $452,000 on hand, while Barber kept $330,000 in the bank.

“Whether it’s right or wrong, raising money is one of the principle components of American electoral politics,” Merrill said. “It’s kind of like a poker game: Do you have the ante to sit at the table and play?”

Sinema, Kirkpatrick and Barber, whose districts are closely split between Republican and Democratic voters, are likely to face tough re-election campaigns. Lining their war chests this early could deter potential challengers and prepare them for battle. The incumbents each spent more than $2 million in their 2012 campaigns.

Incumbents in safe Arizona districts raised smaller amounts:

Rep. Matt Salmon, a Republican from Mesa, hauled in $165,000 and kept $243,000 on hand.

Rep. David Schweikert, a Republican from Fountain Hills, raised $163,000 and was left with $123,000.

Rep. Paul Gosar, a Republican from Prescott, took in $79,000 and had $83,000 in the bank.

Rep. Raúl Grijalva, a Tucson Democrat, and Rep. Ed Pastor, a Phoenix Democrat, each hauled in $65,000. Pastor had $1.3 million on hand compared with Grijalva’s $58,000.

The least successful fundraiser of Arizona’s delegation was Rep. Trent Franks, a Glendale Republican, who took in $25,000, even after putting out a plea for donations last month following furor over his comments regarding the incidence of pregnancy from rape.

The plea seems not to have made a ripple among pro-life activists. After his comments, only two donations came in from donors who were not corporations or from Washington political and legal firms. At the end of the quarter, he had less than $10,000 in the bank.

Only two candidates seeking to run for Congress next year spent the quarter fundraising seriously. Both are Republicans hoping to unseat Sinema in her brand-new Phoenix district.

Wendy Rogers, a retired Air Force pilot who lost last year’s Republican primary, raised $128,000 and had $206,000 on hand. Andrew Walter, a former ASU quarterback and first-time politician, pulled in $113,000 and was left with $122,000 in the bank.

Reports for Sens. John McCain and Jeff Flake were not yet available.

Reach the reporter at 602-444-8096.

Members of Congress vow to rein in NSA

If the House or Senate votes on a single bill several times many members will first vote for the bill, then a second time vote against the same bill. No our Congressmen and Senators are not confused, dyslexic idiots who can't make up their minds. This is very intentional because they want to be able to tell supporters of the bill they voted for the bill, and be able to tell opponents of the bill they voted against the bill.

How they vote on the final bill is usually an indication of which special interest groups gave them the most money.

It's all part of the game plan to get reelected. And to keep us in the dark.

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Members of Congress vow to rein in NSA

By Pete Yost Associated Press Wed Jul 17, 2013 10:27 PM

WASHINGTON — In a heated confrontation over domestic spying, members of Congress said Wednesday that they never intended to allow the National Security Agency to build a database of every phone call in America. [If that is true why did they vote for the bill in the first place???] And they threatened to curtail the government’s surveillance authority.

Top Obama administration officials countered that the once-secret program was legal and necessary to keep America safe. And they left open the possibility that they could build similar databases of people’s credit-card transactions, hotel records and Internet searches.

The clash on Capitol Hill undercut President Barack Obama’s assurances that Congress had fully understood the dramatic expansion of government power it authorized repeatedly over the past decade.

The House Judiciary Committee hearing also represented perhaps the most public, substantive congressional debate on surveillance powers since the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Previous debates have been largely theoretical and legalistic, with officials in the Bush and Obama administrations keeping the details hidden behind the cloak of classified information.

That changed last month when former government contractor Edward Snowden leaked documents to the Guardian newspaper revealing that the NSA collects every American’s phone records, knowing that the overwhelming majority of people have no ties to terrorism. [Edward Snowden is a patriot and freedom fighter for exposing the lies of Congress, the President and the government] Civil-rights groups have warned for years that the government would use the USA Patriot Act to conduct such wholesale data collection. The government denied it.

The Obama administration says it needs a library of everyone’s phone records so that when it finds a suspected terrorist, it can search its archives for the suspect’s calling habits. The administration says the database was authorized under a provision in the Patriot Act that Congress hurriedly passed after 9/11 and reauthorized in 2005 and 2010. [Well if you ask me the database is NOT allowed by the Fourth Amendment and that should be the final authority on the matter]

The sponsor of that bill, Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., said Wednesday that Congress meant only to allow seizures directly relevant to national-security investigations. No one expected the government to obtain every phone record and store them in a huge database to search later. [Bullsh*t, the members of Congress voted for the bill to turn American into a police state, which is what the special interest groups who gave them campaign contributions wanted the bill to do.]

As Deputy Attorney General James Cole explained why that was necessary, Sensenbrenner cut him off and reminded him that his surveillance authority expires in 2015.

“And unless you realize you’ve got a problem,” Sensenbrenner said, “that is not going to be renewed.”

He was followed by Rep. Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., who picked up where his colleague left off. The problem, he said, is that the administration considers “everything in the world” relevant to fighting terrorism. [Yea, and so does the House and Senate]

Later, Rep. Blake Farenthold, R-Texas, asked whether the NSA could build similar databases of everyone’s Internet searches, hotel records and credit-card transactions.

Robert S. Litt, general counsel in the office of the Director of National Intelligence, didn’t directly answer, saying it would depend on whether the government believed those records — like phone records — to be relevant to terrorism investigations.

After the phone surveillance became public, Obama assured Americans that Congress was well aware of what was going on. [I suspect Congress was well aware of what was going on, but didn't care, because it served the interests of the special interest groups that give them money]

“When it comes to telephone calls, every member of Congress has been briefed on this program,” he said.

Whether lawmakers willingly kept themselves in the dark or were misled, it was apparent Wednesday that one of the key oversight bodies in Congress remained unclear about the scope of surveillance, more than a decade after it was authorized. [Willingly or not willingly they voted to turn Amerika into a police state and should be booted out of office for that.]

The Judiciary Committee’s senior Democrat, Rep. John Conyers of Michigan, noted that the panel had “primary jurisdiction” over the surveillance laws that were the foundation for the NSA programs. Yet one lawmaker, Rep. Ted Poe, R-Texas, said some members of Congress wouldn’t have known about the NSA surveillance without the sensational leaks: “Snowden, I don’t like him at all, but we would never have known what happened if he hadn’t told us.” [Again bullsh*t. That's like saying a drunk drive didn't know he was drunk because nobody told him he was weaving all over the road]

The NSA says it looks at numbers only as part of narrow terrorism investigations, but that doesn’t tell the whole story. [Narrow terrorism investigations??? What rubbish. I think NSA has been collecting phone call data on 100+ million people or roughly a third of the American population.]

For the first time, NSA Deputy Director John C. Inglis disclosed Wednesday that the agency sometimes conducts what’s known as three-hop analysis. That means the government can look at the phone data of a terrorism suspect, plus the data of all of his contacts, then all of those people’s contacts, and finally, all of those people’s contacts.

If the average person calls 40 unique people, three-hop analysis could allow the government to mine the records of 2.5 million Americans when investigating one terrorism suspect. [Well I guess using that definition NSA's spying on 100+ million people's phone records it is a narrow investigation]

Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va., said such a huge database was ripe for government abuse. When Inglis said there was no evidence of that, Forbes interrupted:

“I said I wasn’t going to yell at you and I’m going to try not to. That’s exactly what the American people are worried about,” he said. “That’s what’s infuriating the American people. They’re understanding that if you collect that amount of data, people can get access to it in ways that can harm them.”

The government says it stores everybody’s phone records for five years. Cole explained that because the phone companies don’t keep records that long, the NSA had to build its own database. [Since when is it the job of the phone companies to spy on people for NSA???]

Rep. Steve King, R-Iowa, asked why the government didn’t simply ask the phone companies to keep their data longer. [I guess if Rep. Steve King has his way he will pass a law making it the phone companies job to spy on people for Congress!!!] That way, the government could ask for specific information, rather than collecting information on millions of innocent people.

Inglis said it would be challenging, but the government was looking into it.

Near the end of the hearing, Litt struck a compromising tone. He said national-security officials had tried to balance privacy and security. [Bullsh*t!!!!]

“If the people in Congress decide that we’ve struck that balance in the wrong place, that’s a discussion we need to have,” he said. [Well Congress is the gang of criminals that decided to flush the Bill of Rights down the toilet by passing the Patriot Act]

Obama, too, has said he welcomes the debate over surveillance. But his administration never wanted the debate to be quite so specific. [Obama would prefer that we don't know that he is spying on us]

That was obvious when Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va., asked Litt whether he really believed the government could keep such a vast surveillance program a secret forever.

“Well,” Litt replied, “we tried.” [And thanks to patriot and freedom fighter Edward Snowden the American public found out]

Congress should try listening to constituents before voting

Frequently when one bill is heard several times in either the House or Senate a Congressman or Senator will vote for the bill one time, and then against the bill the second time.

No the these folks are not dyslexic nut jobs who don't know what is going on. They intentionally vote BOTH ways, so they can tell supporters of the bill they voted for the bill and tell opponents of the bill that they voted against the bill.

Of course their final vote for the bill will almost always represent the voice of what ever special interest group gave them the most cold hard cash in campaign contributions.

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Letter: Congress should try listening to constituents before voting

Posted: Thursday, July 18, 2013 12:16 pm

Letter to the Editor

Congressman Matt Salmon claims to be concerned with “the erosion of our constitutional rights,” according to a recent press release on his sponsorship of the LIBERT-E Act. While he appears to have a legitimate concern for constitutional rights and liberties, his voting record begs to differ.

Let’s go back to the beginning of 2013. In February, CISPA was reintroduced to the House. This bill raised heavy criticism from both sides of the aisle as to the Internet surveillance powers it granted to the federal government. The bill passed with support from Congressman Salmon. Then, last month, the NSA leaks hit the press and government surveillance became the most discussed issue of the summer.

Kicking off the anti-NSA tirade was a congressional letter to Keith Alexander demanding answers to questions on how the FBI and the NSA collect internet information and cellular metadata. Among the 25 signatures on this letter was Rep. Salmon’s. Why is this Representative who voted to extend Patriot Act surveillance powers to the federal government suddenly interested in their use? After a call to his local office, a spokesperson claimed that he “regrets” voting in favor of CISPA. Congressmen don’t get to just regret a controversial vote.

Is Salmon’s sponsorship of the LIBERT-E Act a sincere effort to limit unconstitutional federal surveillance, or is it merely an appeal to the now-outraged conservative voting population he represents? Maybe the next time he votes he should listen to his constituent concerns rather than ignoring them until it becomes an unpopular practice.

Andrew Barber

Gilbert

$85 bribe will get you thru TSA lines faster???

According to the TSA, these "bribes" or "enrollment fees" as the TSA goons call them will bring in $255 million in revenue for the TSA.

Think of the TSA "enrollments fees" as kind of like the bribes which our US Senators and Congressmen accept, except again they use the words "campaign contribution" instead of "bribe".

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TSA expands faster screening to more travelers

Associated Press Fri Jul 19, 2013 4:29 PM

WASHINGTON — The government is expanding the ways airline passengers can enroll in an expedited screening program that allows travelers to leave on their shoes, light outerwear and belts and keep laptop computers in cases at security checkpoints.

Under the Transportation Security Administration’s Precheck program, only travelers who were members of the frequent flyer programs of some air carriers were eligible for expedited screening. On Friday, TSA Administrator John Pistole said beginning later this year U.S. citizens will be able to enroll online or visit an enrollment site to provide identification, fingerprints and an $85 enrollment fee.

About 12 million people are currently enrolled in the program. Pistole said he expects about another 3 million people to enroll before the end of the year. [Which will bring in $255 million in TSA bribes, or enrollments fees as the our government masters call them. Who says our royal rulers in the Federal government can't be bought]

U.S. Rep. Kyrsten Sinema is both for and against Obamacare???

Source

Politics spurs some Ariz. Dems to join Republicans on health care

By Rebekah L. Sanders The Republic | azcentral.com Sat Jul 20, 2013 7:47 PM

U.S. Rep. Kyrsten Sinema once toured Arizona on behalf of the White House, touting the benefits of health-care reform. Last week, the freshman Democrat voted with the GOP to delay the law’s requirement that individuals and businesses buy insurance by 2014.

Sinema said she still supports the law because it helps students and people with pre-existing conditions obtain coverage.

“However, the law isn’t perfect. ...,” Sinema said in a statement after the vote. “Arizona’s hard-working families and businesses need transparency and certainty about this health care law and its implementation. A one-year delay will ensure that Arizonans get that certainty.” [And she will trick a few people into thinking that she is against Obamacare and get their votes]

Sinema also had a political motivation for the vote. Her congressional district, which stretches from Phoenix to Mesa, is considered a toss-up seat, where enough conservative-leaning voters concerned by the health-care law could boot her out of office in the mid-term elections. [Which is why she would love to trick a number of people into thinking she is against Obamacare so she can get their votes.]

That’s what happened in 2010, when voters turned out in droves to unseat Democrats in an uproar over passage of the president’s health-care law. [And of course Kyrsten Sinema doesn't want to be booted out of office because she is a big time socialist that supports Obamacare]

The GOP is hoping to capitalize again on opposition to the overhaul in the midterm elections, just as more consumers begin to feel the effects of reform as requirements for most individuals to obtain insurance kick in.

“Folks like Sinema have reason to be concerned because they are still champions of a law that is not popular in their districts,” said Constantin Querard, a Valley Republican strategist. “When you see someone who’s as much of a vocal supporter of ‘Obamacare’ as Sinema is voting against it, you know it’s going to be an issue” in the 2014 campaigns. [And even though Kyrsten Sinema loves Obamacare, if you hate Obamacare Kyrsten Sinema probably wants to trick you into thinking she hates Obamacare to get your vote]

Arizona’s two other Democrats who represent swing districts, Reps. Ron Barber and Ann Kirkpatrick, voted for the delays as well. [Again probably for the same reason Kyrsten Sinema voted for it. To trick their opponents into thinking they are against Obamacare]

House Speaker John Boehner scheduled the votes, calling for fairness for individuals and to “delay and dismantle Obamacare,” after President Barack Obama announced fines would be postponed until 2015 for midsize businesses that fail to provide employee health insurance.

The House bills — long shots in the Senate and guaranteed to be vetoed by the president — affirmed the business delay and added that individuals should get a one-year reprieve. Just 35 House Democrats supported the business delay and 22 backed it for individuals.

Next year’s races are expected to ramp up around the time consumers notice major changes to health care because of the Affordable Care Act.

In the fall, states will open online marketplaces for uninsured individuals and businesses to buy private coverage. A few months later, Arizona is scheduled to expand Medicaid coverage to thousands of low-income families.

Democrats are hoping voters who are uninsured will give the party credit once they receive coverage. But Republicans predict voters will react negatively once fines and higher premiums kick in.

Highlighting the political fight that still rages around the 2-year-old law, Obama held an event last week with a few of the more than 8.5 million Americans he said will receive rebates this summer from their insurance companies because of the law’s provision requiring insurers to spend at least 80 percent of premiums on health care. The president also touted early indications that insurance costs will be lower in several states under the law.

“Health-care implementation could take center stage (in 2014) if there are massive problems. And if there are, it will likely haunt Democrats no matter what Republicans vote on,” said David Wasserman, an editor at the nonpartisan Cook Political Report based in Washington, D.C.

He said Democrats like Sinema are likely to continue to frame the issue as “keep the bill and fix it,” while Republicans will continue to advocate repealing the law.

Proof elected officials can't be trusted???

State attorney argues legislators can ignore voter-mandated education funding law

Last this is a damn good example of why we need the Second Amendment, which is our right to keep and bear arms. The politicians and government bureaucrats can't be trusted to obey the Constitution and the "people" need to have some means to force them to.

Source

State attorney argues legislators can ignore voter-mandated education funding law

Posted: Tuesday, July 23, 2013 1:26 pm | Updated: 2:16 pm, Tue Jul 23, 2013.

By Howard Fischer, Capitol Media Services | 0 comments

PHOENIX — Legislators are free to ignore a voter mandate to boost education funding each year to account for inflation, an attorney for the state told the Arizona Supreme Court on Tuesday.

Kathleen Sweeney, an assistant attorney general, conceded voters did approve the inflation adjustment in 2000, and she also did not dispute that the Arizona Constitution prohibits legislators from repealing or altering voter-approved laws.

But Sweeney, seeking to allow the Legislature to disregard the 2000 law, told the justices voters had no constitutional right to enact the funding mandate in the first place.

That brought a somewhat surprised reaction from Chief Justice Rebecca Berch. She pointed out it was the Legislature that put the inflation adjustment provision on the ballot in the first place.

"They got the voters to vote on their bad language,'' she said. “And now they're trying to disavow their bad language.''

Sweeney did not exactly contest the question of whether lawmakers essentially had pulled a fast one on voters, getting them to approve a law that had no legal standing.

"Perhaps, your honor,'' she replied to Berch.

And Sweeney gave essentially the same response to a query by Justice John Pelander, who asked if she was arguing that the 2000 vote was "a fruitless, useless act.''

The fight most immediately affects whether lawmakers are required to annually adjust education funding.

That 2000 ballot measure boosted the state's 5-percent sales tax by six-tenths of a cent. It also requires the Legislature to increase funding for schools by 2 percent or the change in the gross domestic price deflator, whichever is less.

Lawmakers did that until the 2010 when, facing a budget deficit, they reinterpreted what the law requires. The result is that, since then, schools have lost anywhere from $189 million to $240 million, depending on whose figures are used. Don Peters, representing several school districts, filed suit.

Legislators did add $82 million in inflation funding for the new fiscal year that began July 1 after the state Court of Appeals sided with challengers. But they are hoping the Supreme Court concludes that mandate is legally unenforceable.

The outcome of this fight has larger implications — and not only for future education funding. It also could set the precedent for what voters have the right to tell the Legislature to do.

Sweeney argued there are limits, despite the constitutional right of voters to approve their own laws and despite the Voter Protection Act that shields these laws from legislative tinkering.

She said the 2000 measure sets the formula for increasing state aid — and then tells the Legislature to find the money from somewhere. Sweeney argued that infringes on the constitutional right of lawmakers to decide funding priorities.

Justice Scott Bales pointed out the inflation formula is a statute. He said while it was enacted by voters, it should have the same legal status as a law approved by legislators themselves.

"Do you think the Legislature can simply ignore statutes providing that it shall do certain things?'' he asked.

"Yes,'' Sweeney responded.

Peters disagreed.

"The statute that requires inflation adjustments is the law,'' he told the justices. “The Legislature has to obey the law like all the rest of us.''

And Peters said the constitutional Voter Protection Act precludes the Legislature from altering that law without first asking voter permission.

"Therefore, it must do what the statute required unless the people change it,'' he said.

Pelander questioned whether there are limits on what voters can tell the Legislature to do. Peters responded that the Arizona Constitution gives voters broad powers to make their own laws as long as those measures do not "offend'' other state or federal constitutional provisions.

"So they can do pretty much anything they want to,'' Peters told the justices. “And that includes giving instructions to the Legislature.''

Peters acknowledged the Supreme Court has previously said a law approved by one Legislature cannot bind future lawmakers.

But he argued that, as far as voter-approved laws, all that changed in 1998 with enactment of the Voter Protection Act.

"That balance of power is different,'' Peters said.

The justices gave no indication when they will rule.

Peters acknowledged after Tuesday's hearing that he could win his legal argument and still have a problem.

The high court could rule that lawmakers cannot ignore the 2000 law. But the justices have consistently refused to actually order the Legislature to find the additional dollars to fully fund the formula.

That could result in a situation where schools get the higher per-student funding as the formula requires, at least until the cash appropriated by the Legislature runs out. But Peters said he doubts lawmakers are willing to endure the wrath of voters if schools need to shut their doors before the end of the school year.

Is it time to end the war on drugs????

The problem isn't the Patriot Act, it's the people that passed it.

Of course just a few days ago a good number of Congressmen and Senators said they were SHOCKED that NSA and the Homeland Security were spying on Americans.

Of course that was just 100 percent political BS to help them get re-elected next time around.

Sadly the members of Congress and the Senate don't work for the American people, they work for the entrenched government bureaucrats like the folks in the NSA, CIA, and Homeland Security. And of course this vote shows their loyalty to the bureaucrats in the NSA, CIA, and Homeland Security.

Source

House votes to continue NSA surveillance program

Wed Jul 24, 2013 4:02 PM

WASHINGTON — The U.S. House of Representatives has voted to continue the collection of hundreds of millions of Americans’ phone records in the fight against terrorism.

The chamber rejected a measure to end the program’s authority. The vote was 217-205 on Wednesday.

Republican Rep. Justin Amash had challenged the program as an indiscriminate collection of phone records. His measure, if approved by the full House and Senate and signed by the president, would have ended the program’s statutory authority.

The White House, national security experts in Congress and the Republican establishment had lobbied hard against Amash’s effort.

Libertarian-leaning conservatives and some liberal Democrats had supported Amash’s effort.

The vote was unlikely to settle the debate over privacy rights and government efforts to thwart terrorism.

It's impossible to fire a crooked police chief????

Glendale Police Chief Greg Dominguez threatens to burn down store and kill employees

Sounds like it.

Glendale’s assistant police chief Greg Dominguez threatened to burn down Spanky’s Smoke Shop in Peoria for selling “stuff” to his son. Assistant police chief Greg Dominguez also threatened to kill a store employee.

If a civilian threatened to burn down the Glendale City hall and kill the mayor of Glendale for giving the Coyotes millions of our tax dollars that civilian would be in prison right now. But when the Glendale police chief does the same thing it's no big deal.

Kyrsten Sinema has always been supported by the police unions. I wonder if she is happy that this allegedly crooked cop is keeping his job. I guess that depends on if he gave her campaign any money.

Source

Board: Glendale's former assistant police chief should be reinstated

By Miguel Otarola The Arizona Republic-12 News Breaking News Team Thu Jul 25, 2013 5:32 PM

Glendale’s former assistant police chief should get his job back, so said a personnel oversight board Wednesday after reviewing his demotion.

The city’s Personnel Board voted 3-1 to recommend Greg Dominguez’s reinstatement after a four-and-a-half hour appeal hearing that ended at 10:45 p.m.

Dominguez was bumped down to commander in April following accusations that he threatened to burn down Spanky’s Smoke Shop in Peoria for selling “stuff” to his son. That stuff, Dominguez later said, was the synthetic drug known as “spice.”

The police report said Dominguez returned to the store and threatened to kill an employee if the store kept selling to his son. Dominguez was off-duty during the incidents and did not announce he was an officer, said David Leibowitz, spokesman for the Glendale chapter of the Fraternal Order of Police. Leibowitz added Dominguez was not wearing his police uniform or driving a patrol car. [So since he didn't commit the crimes while he was wearing the Glendale Police Chief's uniform that means everything is OK????]

In addition to his demotion, Dominguez was suspended for five days without pay by Chief Deborah Black in April following a internal affairs investigation.

The board listened to arguments from the city attorney and Dominguez’s lawyer, Neil Landeen, as well as testimony from Black Wednesday night. In the end, those voting in favor of Dominguez said the punishment was too harsh. [What rubbish!!! Since when is firing a crooked cop for threatening arson and murder too harsh of a punishment. If he was a civilian he would be sitting in jail waiting to go to trial for threatening arson and murder]

The personnel board hears appeals regarding disciplines, according to the Glendale city website. It is made up of five residents appointed by Glendale City Council. [Yea, and they are probably all cops or ex-cops?]

The board’s recommendation will go to City Manager Brenda Fischer, who began her position earlier this week. Fischer has the choice of upholding Black’s demotion or reinstating Dominguez as assistant police chief.

“I’m sure she will want to go forward ... and make a decision sooner rather than later,” said Julie Pendergast, president of the Glendale Chapter of the Fraternal Order of Police.

The police department has two assistant police chief positions. Currently Rick St. John is the only sitting assistant chief and the other position is unfilled. Commander Matthew Lively is serving in the interim.

Dominguez has served with the Glendale Police Department for 28 years, according to the department’s website.

Leibowitz said Wednesday’s recommendation was still not a reason for Dominguez to celebrate.

“This is not time for a victory lap. This is an intermediate step,” he said. “(Greg) is obviously very grateful to have the opportunity to have the city manager decide this case.”

Justin Harris, president of the Glendale Law Enforcement Association, called the personnel board’s decision, “the right call.” [Yea, let one crooked cops be fired, and next thing you know other crooked cops will be fired. Can let that happen. Any member of the police union will tell you it's wrong to fire crooked cops.]

Department officials did not return several calls requesting interviews.

“He is not looking to avoid responsibility of what happened,” Leibowitz said. “He just loves his job.” [What rubbish!!! He is a criminal who should have been fired from his job]

John McCain is against the "military police state"???

Kyrsten Sinema votes to support the military police state???

That's probably as accurate as Hitler saying he loves Jews.

And allegedly anti-war, anti-police state Kyrsten Sinema seems to have turned into a supporter of the military industrial complex and the police state.

Kyrsten Sinema voted against the bill which would have curbed the NSA surveillance operations.

Kyrsten Sinema when she was an Arizona elected official tried to flush Arizona's medical marijuana program (Prop 203) down the toilet introducing a bill that would have slapped a 300 percent tax on medical marijuana.

Source

McCain: More transparency on NSA

By Dan Nowicki The Republic | azcentral.com Sat Jul 27, 2013 7:51 PM

U.S. Sen. John McCain says last week’s narrow U.S. House vote on the National Security Agency’s phone-record collecting demonstrates the need for President Barack Obama’s administration to better explain the controversial anti-terror program to an anxious public.

The Republican-controlled House voted 217-205 Wednesday to defeat an amendment that would have drastically curtailed the NSA’s snooping practice, which has rattled privacy advocates and civil libertarians across the political spectrum since it was disclosed in early June.

“I think it’s a combination of right and left, but I think it’s a little more than that. And that is, there’s suspicion out there,” McCain, R-Ariz., told The Arizona Republic. “Because I don’t think there has been enough communication with the American people as to exactly what they’re doing and what they’re not doing. In other words, it concerns all of us that the government might be invading our privacy. So there’s going to have to be legislation that calls for greater transparency and sharing of methodology without compromising our ability to defend this country.”

The split in Arizona’s House delegation illustrates how the NSA issue has blurred traditional partisan and ideological lines. Republican U.S. Reps. Paul Gosar, Matt Salmon and David Schweikert joined Democratic U.S. Reps. Raúl Grijalva and Ed Pastor in voting to curb the NSA surveillance operation. Democratic U.S. Reps. Ron Barber, Ann Kirkpatrick and Kyrsten Sinema [looks like the allegedly anti-war peacenik Kyrsten Sinema now supports the police state and military industrial complex] and Republican U.S. Rep. Trent Franks opposed the amendment to essentially kill the program, which was developed as part of the war against terrorism that followed the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.

“I doubt if there would have been that vote on Sept. 12, 2001,” McCain said.

In other developments:

McCain is continuing to push bipartisan legislation that over four years would phase out the $1 bill and replace it with a $1 coin. He argues the transition would modernize U.S. currency while saving taxpayers billions of dollars and reducing the deficit.

But a gossip columnist for the Hill, a Washington, D.C., newspaper, last week asked him about one constituency that has been cool to the coin idea: strippers and exotic dancers who collect dollar bills as tips during their stage performances.

“Then I hope that they could obtain larger denominations,” McCain told The Hill, eventually adding, “Fives, tens, one hundreds!”

On Friday, McCain clarified to The Republic that he weighed in only when “pressed about the predicament” by the media.

“I was asked about it. ... I don’t frequent those establishments,” McCain said. “I don’t presume to know what’s best. I think I’m an expert on a lot of national-security issues, but that’s one that I’m not really well-versed in.”

McCain’s “a la carte” cable television bill got a boost last week when U.S. Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut announced that he would sign on as its lead Democratic co-sponsor.

McCain this year revived legislation that would encourage cable and satellite TV providers to offer customers the ability to purchase only the channels they want to watch instead of having to buy an expensive bundle. The bill, which faces stiff resistance from the influential telecommunications industry, remains a longshot to become law, but Blumenthal’s participation could help its chances in the Democrat-controlled Senate.

“We’re having a lot of fun with it,” McCain said. “We’re making those lobbyists earn their salaries.”

Nowicki is The Republic’s national political reporter.

John McCain and Barack Obama working together???

Or you could think of it like the Crips and the Bloods working together corner the heroin market in South Central Los Angeles. [Not that I have anything against heroin, I think it should be legalized]

Sadly ever since Barack Obama got elected he pretty much has been a clone of both George W. Bush and John McCain.

Source

Barack Obama and John McCain: Washington's newest odd couple

Posted: Sunday, July 28, 2013 1:14 pm

Associated Press

There was no conciliatory phone call, no heart-to-heart talk to soothe the tensions. No one knows exactly when President Barack Obama and Republican Sen. John McCain went from bitter rivals in the 2008 presidential campaign and foes over health care and national security to bipartisan partners.

Yet in recent months, an alignment on high-profile domestic issues — not to mention an eye on their respective legacies — has transformed Obama and McCain into Washington's most unexpected odd couple. The Arizona senator is a regular visitor to the West Wing and in near-daily contact with senior White House officials.

McCain, in an Associated Press interview, said that he and Obama "trust each other." White House chief of staff Denis McDonough, among the Obama advisers who speak regularly with McCain, praised the lawmaker as a "refreshing" partner who "welcomes a debate and welcomes action."

Like any good business arrangement in the nation's capital, the secret to the new Obama-McCain alliance ultimately comes down to this: Both sides believe that working together is mutually beneficial and carries little political risk.

For Obama, the senator has become a rare Republican backer of important elements on the president's second term agenda, including immigration overhaul, stricter background checks for gun buyers, and perhaps a fall budget deal.

In return, McCain has secured increased access to the White House and an opportunity to redeem his reputation as a Capitol Hill "maverick." That image was tainted when McCain tacked to the right during his failed 2008 presidential run against Obama.

"I've told the people of Arizona, I will work with any president if there are ways I can better serve Arizona and the country," McCain said. "That seems to be an old-fashioned notion but it's the case."

Indeed, the level of attention lavished on a functional working relationship between the Democratic president and the Republican senator underscores how rare such partnerships have been during Obama's tenure.

Lawmakers, including some Democrats, long have chafed at Obama's distant dealings with Capitol Hill and his supposed lack of understanding about how Congress operates.

It's unlikely that Obama and McCain's partnership will lead to a larger detente between the White House and congressional Republicans. While McCain may have sway over some like-minded members of the Senate Republican caucus, he has considerably less influence with his party's more conservative wing, particularly in the GOP-controlled House.

Still, the White House is hopeful that forging policy breakthroughs with McCain and other Senate Republicans will isolate the House GOP and perhaps persuade them to act.

The first test of that strategy probably will be the White House-backed immigration overhaul. McCain helped write and shepherd the bill through the Senate last month. Its future in the House is deeply uncertain.

The administration also will try to work with McCain ahead of impending budget battles, McDonough said, given that the senator and the White House agree there is a negative impact from across-the-board federal budget cuts, particularly on the military and defense industry.

McDonough said it's not just a shared view on policy that has made McCain an attractive partner to Obama on these and other issues. It's their mutual disdain for Washington meetings that never move beyond the standard talking points.

"Part of what's great to work with him is his impatience with that," McDonough said. "You can kind of get into the meat of the matter very quickly"

Obama and McCain were never close during the president's brief tenure in the Senate. While McCain is a creature of Capitol Hill, Obama largely saw Congress as a stepping stone to bigger things. The relationship deteriorated during frequent clashes in the 2008 presidential campaign, and it often appeared during Obama's first term like it would never recover.

In 2010, the two sparred during a televised negotiating session on health care. McCain chastised Obama for brokering deals behind closed doors, to which the president snapped, "We're not campaigning anymore. The election is over."

McCain replied: "I'm reminded of that every day."

White House advisers still bristle over McCain's accusations that the administration covered up details of last year's deadly attacks on Americans in Benghazi, Libya, as well as his relentless criticism of former U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice's role in that alleged effort.

McCain's criticism contributed to Rice's decision to withdraw from consideration as Obama's secretary of state. She now serves as White House national security adviser, a post that does not require Senate confirmation.

McDonough acknowledged that McCain's role in keeping the Benghazi controversy alive has been a source of frustration. But he credited the senator with largely shelving his criticism of Rice once she joined the White House staff.

"The way he's worked with her since she became national security adviser speaks to his interest in making sure that even where we disagree, we're finding a way to work together when we can," McDonough said. "I know the president has appreciated that."

McCain said his stronger ties with the president on domestic issues won't keep him from challenging the president on national security issues, including Syria, where McCain backs a more aggressive U.S. response than does the administration. But he said there's a way to strike an appropriate balance.

"He is the president of the United States," McCain said. "You can strongly disagree and still be respectful."

Corporate welfare at Tempe Town Lake!!!!

Corporate welfare at Tempe Town Toilet!!!!

1) A large part of the time the park is not open to the public, but used for events to raise money for the royal rulers of Tempe. And these events are expensive to attend and most of the working class people that live in Tempe can't afford to attend the events, despite the fact that these people were forced to pay for Tempe Town Toilet with their hard earned tax dollars.

2) These events cause huge traffic jams and parking problems in the downtown Tempe area

3) When these events are concerts they routinely keep people awake late at night in the entire downtown area, and as far north as Roosevelt Road in Scottsdale which is also Continental Drive in Tempe. I am not sure how far south the concerts can be heard.

Also check out:

Source

Tempe to weigh revising Town Lake plan

By Dianna M. Náñez The Republic | azcentral.com

Tue Jul 30, 2013 12:10 AM

The Tempe City Council took a leap of faith more than a decade ago when it sank $44.8 million into building a 2 1/2-mile-long lake in the desert.

The council hoped that risking the debt to create high-profile waterfront property would pay off in the long run for Tempe, then a landlocked city desperate for new development.

But 14 years after the lake opened in 1999, city finance officials say Tempe is faced with a reality check that Town Lake is far from reaching the city’s development goals.

Tonight, the council is expected to consider revising a financing plan for Town Lake.

City finance officials have said the revised plan would give developers a financial break on their share of costs tied to the man-made lake [i.e. - stiff us taxpayers with the cost], make private development more affordable [i.e. stiff us taxpayers with the cost] and, ultimately, advance Tempe’s plans to secure sufficient lakeshore private development to ease the hefty public costs of maintaining Town Lake. [now the last phrase certainly is an oxymoron - give tax dollars private developers to lower the cost to taxpayers - now that's an impossibility - the more we give them the more it costs us]

But critics argue that taxpayers have long carried the financial burden for private lake development.

The new plan offers no guarantee that economic breaks for developers will actually spur construction, argue Joe Pospicil and Art Jacobs, two longtime Tempe residents who regularly question city finances and criticize lake expenses.

If approved, the revised plan also would shift the burden of paying for a new west-end lake dam, which the city has estimated will cost at least $37.4 million, to Tempe taxpayers, freeing developers from sharing the expense to replace the dam. [That a fancy way of saying give boatloads of our hard earned tax dollars out in corporate welfare rich corporations - the rich corporations that give bribes, oops, I mean campaign contributions to the members of the Tempe City Council]

Approval of the city proposal would mark the second time a Tempe City Council, aiming to drive development, has tweaked the original 1995 lake-financing plan in favor of developers. The first was in 1997.

Mayor Mark Mitchell said he believes the proposal merits more time in the public realm so that council members may gain sufficient community feedback. [Translation - he wants to make it look like the taxpayers approve of the members of the Tempe City Council giving boatloads of our cash to the rich corporations that gave the members of the Tempe City Council bribes, oops, I mean campaign contributions]

But it remains to be seen whether Mitchell’s colleagues agree that the council has a responsibility to arrange future forums for the public to question and comment on the proposal.

As of Monday, the proposed changes were included on the agenda for today’s council meeting.

The finance proposal is not set for a two-hearing process, which would have allowed for public comment at the first hearing and then required a vote and a second opportunity for public comment at a future council meeting.

That means the council could choose to approve the revised Town Lake financing plan with little opportunity for public input.

But before the council agenda was posted on the city’s website Friday, Mitchell said he still had questions about the financing plan.

“When we initially developed the lake, we had a plan, but it’s a working document,” he said. “We might change it, we might not. (But) we’ll have enough time to thoroughly review (any formal changes).” [translation - we know how to run your life better then you do, but if we screw it up don't blame us]

Mitchell said he expects staff today to merely explain the long-term impact of the proposed changes. [That pretty simple Mayor Mitchell, you and the other royal members of the Tempe City Council will be giving our hard earned tax dollars out as corporate welfare for years to come to corporations that give you bribes, oops, I mean campaign contributions]

The proposed finance changes were triggered by an economic reality check, Roger Hallsted, the city finance analyst for the Rio Salado Community Facilities District, told The Arizona Republic.

“From all of our original projections, (we were) thinking really by about this time ... the lake would be built out,” Hallsted said.

Tempe’s goal is for private development on 120 acres to generate assessment fees covering 60 percent of annual operations costs. [So us taxpayers will be forced to pay for 40 percent of the developers costs]

But a Republic analysis last year revealed that in the 13 years since the lake was filled, private development still only covered about 20 percent of operation and maintenance costs, well below the 60 percent envisioned in the original city plan. [So in stead of us taxpayers being stuck with paying 40 percent of the developers costs, we are stuck with paying 80 percent of the developers costs - if you ask me us taxpayers are getting screwed on this deal]

Tempe taxpayers have and continue to pay the majority of the $2 million to $3 million in annual costs for operations and maintenance as well as most of the bill for the $44.8 million in original construction costs. [translation - us taxpayers are getting screwed - also did you know that the city of Tempe spends more on Tempe Town Toilet, aka Tempe Town Lake then on all the other parks in Tempe combined???]

Private investment has spurred construction of about 24 acres of condos, high-rise office and commercial space around the lake. Town Lake supporters blame the recession for slower-than-expected development. [Well why didn't the freaking geniuses on the Tempe City Council figure out this??? I guess they were too busy taking bribes, oops, I mean campaign contributions from the rich developers]

The proposed changes to the financing plan are aimed at making land surrounding Town Lake more attractive to private development, Hallsted said. [yea, like giving then 10 times as much corporate welfare as originally planned]

If the council approves the changes, Town Lake developers would pay less toward their share of payments for the original construction costs. [And us taxpayers get screwed again and will have to make up the difference]

The proposal emanated from Tempe’s Enhanced Services Commission, Tempe Finance Manager Ken Jones said. [It sounds more like it came from the developers who will be getting the corporate welfare if you ask me!!!!]

The commission includes representation from Jones; Town Lake developers; Nancy Hormann, the president of the group that manages the downtown Tempe district; and Arizona State University, which owns and is attempting to develop acres of lakeshore property. [yes I was right, it did come from the developers who will are getting the corporate welfare!!!!]

A Republic review of public records from the commission meetings shows that commission members have spent the past year discussing development and maintenance plans for the lake.

At a January meeting, Jones asked for “the logic behind asking the council to cover the cost of replacing the dams,” according to public records of the meeting. [If you remember it was the idiots on the Tempe City Council who get screwed on the damn. The accepted a worthless ORAL 30 year guarantee on the damn, which failed after 10 years causing us taxpayers to get stuck with the replacement costs]

Hallsted said shifting the cost of the dams from being a shared debt with private developers to a taxpayer-only-funded cost is the result of the original rubber dam deteriorating years earlier than expected. [yea, like I just said]

“These new dams, at $38 million to $50 million, if we were to put that in at the true cost, just the (Town Lake) infrastructure replacement budget would have gone from $531,000 (annually) to $2 million,” he said.

The city had to face facts, he said, that it would have to shoulder the dam’s cost rather than “bankrupting every single (lake) property owner,” Hallsted said. [f*ck you!!!! bankrupt the developers for making dumb decisions, not the taxpayers. Or let the members of the Tempe City Council pay for the whole thing.]

The commission questioned whether it’s “more expensive to build at the lake than anywhere else in the Valley” and whether the city was “willing to offer an incentive to level the playing field,” according to public meeting records. [Well maybe the idiots on the Tempe City Council should not have build the lake, since it is a money losing experience]

The commission recommended a plan that would lower an annual “holding fee” of sorts that developers pay until they build on their lake property. [translation - make the taxpayers pay more of the developers expenses - i.e. more corporate welfare for the rich corporations building stuff on Tempe Town Toilet]

If the revised plan is approved, that fee would be reduced from the current 5 percent to the rate of inflation, which is currently 2.2 percent, Hallsted said. [which the Tempe taxpayers will pay]

The financing proposal also includes lowering the annual interest rate developers pay over the 25 years they are allowed to pay back their share of lake construction. [again, which the Tempe taxpayers will pay]

The current interest rate is 5 percent, and the proposal would lower it to 3.64 percent, Hallsted said. He added that the proposal calls for the council to make the rate reduction retroactive to July 1, 2009.

If the council approves rolling back the fee, developers that have built existing commercial and residential development at the lake would receive credits on biannual debt payments they are currently making. [and us taxpayers will be stuck with even bigger bills. Of course the members of the Tempe City Council will get to keep the bribes, oops, I mean campaign contributions they accepted from the developers of property at Tempe Town Toilet]

While critics worry that taxpayers are funding too much of the cost for Town Lake, Hallsted reasons that the revised plan will establish a realistic financing plan for the lake and encourage development that will help pay a greater share of the lake’s annual operations and maintenance costs. [why expect the developers to pay for their costs, when they can give small bribes, oops, I mean small campaign contributions to the Tempe City Council members who will stiff the taxpayers with the bill]

“The key thing,” he said, “is being fair to the citizens, but try to make it more enticing for developers to come in.” [translation - the key to this is SCREWING the taxpayers and forcing them to pay the developers bills]

Kyrsten Sinema inicia campaña en favor de estudiantes

Sinema inicia campaña en favor de estudiantes

por Eduardo Bernal - Jul. 25, 2013 04:47 PM

La Voz

Kyrsten Sinema, representante del distrito 9 de Arizona en el Congreso Federal, ha tomado nuevas medidas para atraer la atención sobre los préstamos estudiantiles, y como éstos están perjudicando a una generación de egresados perpetuamente en deuda.

Sinema ha iniciado una campaña denominada "Drop That Debt", la cual busca que universitarios en todo el país compartan sus historias relacionadas a sus deudas estudiantiles y que serán leídas en el Congreso por la funcionaria pública.

El pasado 1 de julio la tasa de interés en préstamos estudiantiles se dobló de 3.4 por ciento al 6.8, creando indignación en estudiantes y organizaciones que abogan por los derechos de los universitarios en todo el país, ya que los pagos en préstamos se incrementarían entre mil y mil 500 dólares anuales.

"Los estudiantes retornan a la universidad en la tercera semana de agosto y tenemos que solucionar esto antes de que eso ocurra", declaró Sinema en un comunicado.

En este marco, el Senado de la nación aprobó (con 81 votos a favor y 18 en contra) un proyecto de ley que extiende préstamos a bajo interés; no obstante, los mismos estarían supeditados a cambio cuando mejore la economía, es decir, tendrán un incremento cuando la economía se estabilice.

La medida fue criticada por opositores tanto republicanos como demócratas, quienes alegaron que las tasas de interés se incrementarán en un futuro cercano cuando la economía mejore y que esta es sólo una solución temporal, no permanente y sujeta a variaciones en el mercado financiero.

De acuerdo con estadísticas, más del 50 por ciento de estudiantes que se gradúan de la universidad se encuentran en deudas que muchas veces pagan en décadas, y en muchos casos los graduados se encuentran en mora con sus pagos.

Drop That Debt recolecta historias de estudiantes y padres de familia que actualmente se encuentran abrumados por las deudas para costear colegiaturas. Estas vivencias serán presentadas durante los debates del proyecto de ley.

Se estima que la medida puede beneficiar a más de 7 millones de estudiantes que retornan a universidades y colegios comunitarios este otoño.

Se espera que la Cámara Baja de EU apruebe la ley pasada por el Senado antes de que comiencen las clases en agosto.

Congress to take a 5 week vacation!!!!

For most of us that would mean working 52 weeks, with one week of vacation.

But our royal Congressmen and Congresswoman are taking a 5 week vacation now. Which means they only work 47 weeks a year.

I suspect they take off a lot more time then a measly 5 weeks a year. But I don't have the details on that so lets calculate their pay assuming they work 47 weeks a year.

In that case they are paid $3700 per week, or $740 for those long 4 hour days they put in.

On the other hand I think we should be glad they take off so much time. Can you imagine how much our taxes would be if they worked full 8 hour days, for 52 weeks a year robbing us and giving our hard earned money to the special interest groups that helped get them into power???

Source

Congress: Divided, Discourteous _ Taking a Break

Associated Press

By DAVID ESPO AP Special Correspondent

WASHINGTON August 2, 2013 (AP)

The accomplishments are few, the chaos plentiful in the 113th Congress, a discourteous model of divided government now beginning a five-week break.

"Have senators sit down and shut up, OK?" Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid blurted out on Thursday as lawmakers milled about noisily at a time Sen. Susan Collins was trying to speak.

There was political calculation even in that. Democrats knew the Maine Republican was about rip into her own party's leadership, and wanted to make sure her indictment could be heard.

Across the Capitol, unsteady bookends tell the story of the House's first seven months in this two-year term. Internal dissent among Republicans nearly toppled Speaker John Boehner when lawmakers first convened in January. And leadership's grip is no surer now: A routine spending bill was pulled from the floor this week, two days before the monthlong August break, for fear it would fall in a crossfire between opposing GOP factions.

A few weeks earlier, Boehner suggested a new standard for Congress. "We should not be judged on how many new laws we create. We ought to be judged on how many laws that we repeal," he said as Republicans voted for the 38th and 39th time since 2011 to repeal or otherwise neuter the health care law known as Obamacare.

Reaching for a round number, they did it for a 40th time on Friday, although the legislation stands no chance in the Democratic Senate and the GOP has yet to offer the replacement that it pledged three years ago to produce.

House Democrats claimed to hate all of this, yet couldn't get enough.

After attacking virtually every move Republicans made for months, they demanded the GOP cancel summer vacation so Congress could stay in session. The break, Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi said, "shows shocking disregard for the American people and our economy."

To be sure, there have been accomplishments since Congress convened last winter, although two of the more prominent ones merely avoided a meltdown rather than advancing the public's preferred agenda.

A closed-door session helped produce compromise over President Barack Obama's stalled nominations to administration posts and important boards — avoiding a blow-up that Republicans said would follow if Democrats changed the Senate's filibuster rules unilaterally.

Months earlier, at the urging of their leaders, House Republicans agreed to raise the government's debt limit rather than push the Treasury to the brink of a first-ever national default.

Legislation linking interest rates on student loans to the marketplace passed, and, too, a bill to strengthen the government's response to crimes against women. Two more measures sent recovery funds to the victims of Superstorm Sandy.

Among the 18 other measures signed into law so far: one named a new span over the Mississippi River as the Stan Musial Veterans Memorial Bridge, after the late baseball legend. Another renamed a section of the tax code after former Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas.

A third clarified the size of metal blanks to be used by the Baseball Hall of Fame in minting gold and silver commemoratives: a diameter of .85 inches in the case of $5 gold coins, and 1.5 inches for $1 silvers.

The Senate passed sweeping immigration legislation to spend billions securing the nation's borders against illegal entry and creating a path to citizenship for an estimated 11 million immigrants currently in the country unlawfully. The vote was 68-32, with all Democrats and about one-third of Republicans in favor.

But House Republicans, many of whom oppose granting citizenship to anyone living in the country illegally, deemed the bill a non-starter. They intend to have alternative legislation this fall. If it succeeds, that will give the two houses about a year to somehow compromise before Congress' term expires.

The Senate approved a bipartisan farm bill that followed customary lines in providing funding simultaneously for growers and for government programs to feed the hungry.

But a revolt by tea party conservatives blocked passage of a combined bill in the House, which then approved a measure to aid farmers. The leadership promises one for nutrition programs this fall, and an attempt will be made to find common ground with the Senate.

So far, Congress' classic two-house compromises have been elusive.

Both houses have approved budgets.

But some Senate Republicans have blocked Democratic attempts to begin compromise talks, saying they will relent only if there is agreement in advance not to raise the federal debt limit as part of any deal.

"Let me be clear, I don't trust the Republicans," said GOP Sen. Ted Cruz, a tea party-backed first-term lawmaker from Texas. "I don't trust the Democrats, and I think a whole lot of Americans likewise don't trust the Republicans or the Democrats because it is leadership in both parties that has got us into this mess."

Indeed, most opinion polls over the past six months put public approval for Congress in the mid-teens, with disapproval generally over 70 percent.

And yet, says Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y., "Congress does reflect the American people and the American people are divided."

Sen. Deb Fischer, a Nebraska Republican who took office in January, said gridlock "is not as bad as I expected," and seems exaggerated by the frenzied 24-hour-a-day news cycle. She said she has been able to agree with several Democrats on amendments to bills in committee.

On a larger scale, though, even prior agreements are endangered. One example:

Under legislation already in effect, spending for one category of federal programs is supposed to total $967 billion for the fiscal year beginning on Oct. 1, with a portion set aside for defense and another share for domestic accounts.

In the House, Republicans approved a budget that adheres to the $967 billion figure but puts more into defense and less into domestic programs than is mandated.

In the Senate, Democrats opted for $1.058 trillion, far in excess of the agreed-upon total.

The difference, about $92 billion, must be reconciled before lawmakers can approve legislation to keep the government in operation after Sept. 30.

Further complicating matters, some tea party-backed Republicans say they will vote for such legislation only if it cancels all funding for the health care law that Congress passed three years ago — a condition Democrats and Obama vehemently reject.

The alternative to compromise is a partial government shutdown, an outcome leaders in both parties say they can avoid.

But that's a struggle for after vacation.

More articles on Congressman Kyrsten Sinema

And here are some more articles on US Congresswoman Kyrsten Sinema.