Liberal action group MoveOn.org picketed and delivered petitions to the district offices of House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Rep. Thaddeus McCotter (R-Mich.) today, in what a McCotter spokesman said appears to be a concerted effort to target GOP leaders in their district.
The demonstrators criticized House Republicans
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Former Vice President Al Gore may have gained popularity since sharing the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize, but he is struggling to win over American voters with his latest energy plan--for all U.S. electric power to come from renewable sources in ten years.
One third of Americans think Gore's energy plan is realistic, while most non-Democrats think it will drive up costs of energy, according to a new poll by Rasmussen.
Gore forwarded his plan in a speech in Washington, D.C. last Thursday, calling on candidates at every level in this fall's election to embrace the challenge. Gore warned of catastrophic consequences if the U.S. fails to act.
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Fitness advocate Richard Simmons will go before the House Education and Labor Committee in two weeks to push for more funding for physical education.
Simmons has been pressing the committee's chairman, Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), and other members of Congress to include physical education requirements in the next version of the No Child Left Behind Act.
Simmons scheduled to testify at a hearing at 10 a.m. on July 24 in the Rayburn House Office Building.
Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.) said that Defense Secretary Robert Gates will announce today the reopening of competition for a $40 billion tanker contract.
The contract had been won by a group that was part of Europe-based Airbus. But a General Accountability Office report found credence in complaints made by Airbus's competitor, Boeing, and the U.S.-based company's supporters in Congress.
Shelby, whose state will help build the tanker if Airbus wins the contract, urged a quick resolution to the bid process in a statement, which is posted below.
"This is the best of all options. It is important to remember that out of Boeing's 111 complaints, the [General Accountability Office (GAO)] concurred with a mere seven. The plan the Department of Defense has come up with is an appropriate solution to remedy the minor procedural flaws the GAO found in the initial award. It is vitally important that members of Congress support this expeditious path forward that not only satisfies the recommendations offered by GAO, but also ensures that the Air Force's urgent and compelling need to field a tanker is met as quickly as possible."
A civil-rights umbrella group has released a report that claims that ethnic minorities, the elderly and the disabled will be left behind when the transition to all-digital television formatting begins in February 2009.
The Leadership Conference for Civil Rights (LCCR) said, "At stake is the ability of the nation's most vulnerable populations to maintain uninterrupted access to their key source of news and information and emergency warnings: free, over-the-air television."
A group of Iraq war veterans are calling on the nation's political leaders to "finish the job" in Iraq in a new television ad from Vets for Freedom.
The anti-withdrawal veterans group announced the launch of a multi-million dollar ad campaign in battleground states last week. It will air television ads that do not discuss candidates but call attention to post-surge security gains in Iraq.
The group released its first ad over the weekend. In it, veterans say the United States must finish the job in Iraq "no matter who is president." See the ad below:
Vets for Freedom, a veterans group opposing withdrawal from Iraq, will launch a multi-million dollar television ad campaign next week calling attention to security gains achieved by the so-called surge, the group announced today.
The ads will feature Iraq and Afghanistan veterans and are "aimed at informing the American people about the truth regarding progress in Iraq and Afghanistan," the group said today.
The group will unveil its first ad at a press conference Wednesday, where it will also launch a national "Four Months, For Victory" media and grassroots campaign.
Grassroots efforts will be concentrated in 12 states identified as home to key lawmakers: Colorado, Iowa, Florida, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nevada, New Mexico, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and Wisconsin. Those 12 are also all battleground states in November's presidential election.
The Club for Growth, one of Washington's leading conservative interest groups, has created a blog dedicated to "dumb laws."
The group will use it to identify and mock laws it sees as pointless. So far, targets have been a Senate resolution honoring soil as a natural resource, a House resolution supporting the goals of Financial Literacy Month, and a bill authorizing a $5 million grant program for rare cat and dog conservation activities, among others.
The aim of the site is to "clamp down on the inanity that pervades our country," according to the group.
"Every time a dumb law is enacted, or even proposed, one more lobbyist is emboldened. One more page is added to the law books. And one more politician gains confidence in subjecting the masses to even more idiocy," the group said today in an announcement email.
Many of the laws discussed on the blog deal with taxes and spending, as The Club for Growth advocates primarily for conservative economic policies.
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