Friday, December 24, 2010

Merry Christmas!

The Whitley County Democratic Party wishes you and your family a very Merry Christmas!

Thursday, December 23, 2010

Message from President Obama

This time of year, Americans around the country are taking the time to exchange heartfelt messages with friends and loved ones, reflecting on the past year. They write of achievements and setbacks, of births, graduations, promotions, and moves.

These messages allow us to overcome the miles that separate us. And they allow us to continue one of the most basic American traditions that has held folks close for centuries -- the simple sharing of stories.

And as families gather around holiday tables this season, we also have the opportunity to share the stories of the change this movement has achieved together.

It is a narrative woven by individuals across America -- in big cities and small towns, hospitals and classrooms, in auto manufacturing plants and auto supply stores.

These are stories of rebuilding, and of innovation. Stories of communities breathing new life into old roads and bridges, of local plants harnessing alternative fuel into new energy. Stories of small businesses getting up, dusting themselves off, and beginning to grow again. Stories of soldiers who served multiple tours of duty in Iraq now coming home -- and enjoying the holidays this year in the company of loved ones.

These are stories of progress.

They unite us, and they are ours to share.

We've pulled many of them together in one place, PROGRESS. You can see what our reforms have meant to Americans in every state -- block by block, community by community.

The reforms that we fought long and hard for are not talking points.

And their effects don't change based on the whims of politicians in Washington. They are achievements that have a real and meaningful impact on the lives of Americans around the country. They are achievements that would not have been possible without you. PROGRESS localizes them -- and brings them to life.

It tells of how a green technology business in Phoenix, Arizona, is using a grant through the Recovery Act's Transportation Electrification program to bring the first electric-drive vehicles and charging stations to cities around the country.

It tells how, thanks to closing the "donut hole" in prescription drug coverage, a diabetic woman in Burlington, Vermont will no longer have to choose between purchasing her monthly groceries or the insulin she needs to survive.

It tells about how 136,000 Pennsylvania residents' jobs were saved or created by the Recovery Act.

And about how, thanks to the Affordable Care Act, 22,900 small businesses in Utah's 2nd Congressional District are now eligible for health care tax credits -- and how 17,500 residents in Idaho's 1st with pre-existing conditions can no longer be denied coverage.

There are thousands more stories like these.

In the coming days, as we gather with our loved ones at dinner tables around the nation, let's pass them on. Let's celebrate the spirit of service and responsibility that brought them to fruition. And let's steady ourselves with the resolve to continue pressing forward.

Because the coming year will hold new challenges -- battles that have yet to be fought, and stories of progress that have yet to be written.

Take a look at the progress we've made in your area -- and share the stories you read with your friends and family:

http://progress.democrats.org

Happy holidays, and God bless,

Barack

Tuesday, December 21, 2010

Holiday Message from Indiana Democratic Party Chairman

Friends,

I wanted to write a quick note to wish you a happy holidays and thank you for the work you have done in the last year. During that time, Democrats have had some monumental legislative accomplishments to be extremely proud of, including the signing of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act into law, the repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’, tax cuts for middle class Americans, and enacting legislation that ensures unemployed Americans have the security they deserve.

Here in Indiana, Democrats have been crucial in protecting our state’s education system from drastic budget cuts and holding Governor Daniels accountable for the lack of private sector job growth in our state.

While the results of November’s election were not as positive as our legislative successes, we should use this holiday season to reflect on what we achieved and start preparing for the next election. As we turn our eyes toward the future, there are several signs that point to our Party being well placed to achieve gains in municipal elections across Indiana and build a strong foundation for our federal candidates in 2012.

This is where your financial support makes our future success a possibility.

There is no question we have more work to do – both for Indiana families and for our nation. But what's clear from the efforts of Democrats across the state in the last year is that we remain committed to growing and strengthening our party – and that your work is crucial to making a lasting difference.

Your passion and resolve is what carried us through tough times in the past. It's this same sense of determination that will carry us through future fights and more historic improvements for Hoosiers and our communities – in the New Year and beyond. Please enjoy your time with family, friends and neighbors during this holiday season.

Happy Holidays!

Daniel J. Parker
Chair

Monday, December 20, 2010

Draw districts that respect communities of interest

Written by
Dave Crooks and Bill Ruppel


When the Indiana General Assembly last drew maps for congressional and state legislative districts in 2001, the public had limited opportunities to impact the process. Legislative mapmakers held a few sparsely attended public hearings and a computer was available at the State Library in Indianapolis if people wanted to try their hand at map drawing with a more limited data set than lawmakers had access to.

For the most part, redistricting was carried out behind closed doors under a curtain of fierce incumbent protection and intense partisanship.
The result has been a decade of elections where the majority of races are decided not by voters but by where the district lines fall. Half of the current state legislative districts favor one party by more than 30 percent. This has led to 40 percent of candidates for the General Assembly running without major party opposition. It is no wonder that voters are frustrated with such limited choices.

As former state legislators, we have seen redistricting firsthand and can testify that partisan interests greatly outweigh any other principle.
Forget compact districts that respect communities of interest and encourage competition; it's all about making sure the majority party keeps its edge and current lawmakers keep the voters they want and get rid of those they cannot count on. It is the ultimate conflict of interest, and it is time for a change.
The good news is that several statewide citizens groups are not waiting on the General Assembly to reform redistricting. AARP Indiana, Common Cause/Indiana and the League of Women Voters of Indiana are forming the Indiana Citizens Redistricting Commission that will bird dog the legislative redistricting process, hold public hearings across the state to generate public discussion and sponsor a map-drawing competition. We are proud to serve as co-chairs of the commission.


The ICRC will be composed of Hoosiers who are representative of the voters in our state. They will come from communities across Indiana and include racial and ethnic minorities and a variety of political ideologies. The one thing they have in common is a desire for a map-drawing process that is less dominated by partisan interests and that results in fair districts that respect the Voting Rights Act and promote accountability and competitive elections.

The ICRC will monitor the legislative redistricting process by analyzing the maps proposed by the Indiana House and Senate and draw attention to those districts we believe are gerrymandered. But, the ICRC won't just point the finger at the districts drawn to gain political advantage. We will sponsor a map drawing competition to provide a yardstick to see how the legislature's maps compare to those drawn by neutral parties.

We will make available to any interested citizen District Builder, an open-source software redistricting application designed to give the public transparent, accessible and easy-to-use online mapping tools. Citizens will submit their proposals to the ICRC where they will be judged according to how well they meet criteria such as compactness, competitiveness and incorporation of communities of interest. We will pick the best set of maps and submit them to the General Assembly.

While the Citizens Commission won't have any official role in the process, we believe it will provide a new level of transparency and public participation that can pressure the General Assembly to put the interests of citizens above their own. And it will demonstrate how an independent redistricting commission would work, making passage of legislation to create such a commission more likely.

Hoosiers have the tools to make the next set of legislative maps more equitable and less partisan. Working together, we can draw the line on gerrymandering. For more information about the Indiana Citizens Redistricting Commission see www.commoncause.org/in

Saturday, December 18, 2010

Stutzman misses his first vote

Niki Kelly and Benjamin Lanka | The Journal Gazette
Peaks and valleys aptly describes the week Rep. Marlin Stutzman, R-3rd, had.

At the beginning of the week, it was a thrill to attend the White House gala in a tuxedo with his wife, Christy, who wore a gorgeous one-shoulder white gown with a red ribbon sash.

POTUS and FLOTUS were “very gracious” hosts, Stutzman reported.

But by the end of the week, Stutzman had made a boo-boo that nabs every member of Congress sooner or later: He missed a vote because he turned off his BlackBerry. He was meeting with friends from Indianapolis who were in Washington to attend a fundraiser for Rep. Mike Pence, R-6th. The event was hosted by political commentator Oliver North, who was at the center of the 1980s Iran-control political scandal.

“My bad,” Stutzman said of being recorded as “not voting” on legislation that would provide a pathway to legal status for children who were brought to the U.S. by their parents who were in the country illegally. For the record, Stutzman would have voted against the bill, which the tea party lobbied heavily to kill.

Wednesday, December 15, 2010

City lands 2012 state convention

Democratic event worth $400,000
Benjamin Lanka | The Journal Gazette
A concerted effort by local Democrats will bring the state party’s convention to the Summit City in the summer of 2012.

Dan Parker, Indiana Democratic Party chairman, announced Tuesday the convention will be held June 15 to 17, 2012, at Grand Wayne Center downtown.

He said the efforts of Mayor Tom Henry and Carmen Darland, 3rd District Democratic Party chairwoman, were instrumental in bringing the event to a site other than Indianapolis for the first time since early last century.

“Fort Wayne’s effort on this was really remarkable,” Parker said after showing a handful of letters and e-mails he received from local Democrats and businesses supporting the effort.

Darland said the idea to hold the convention in Fort Wayne was hatched at a lunch with the mayor and his wife, Cindy, in February. It was presented to the state party in May, and a majority of the delegates of this year’s convention supported the idea of looking outside Indianapolis. Parker said Fort Wayne and Indianapolis were the only two cities to meet the group’s criteria, and Fort Wayne was chosen overwhelmingly in a vote Saturday.

Parker said the newly opened Courtyard by Marriott downtown was critical to the group’s requirement for hotel rooms within walking distance of the convention center. He added the support by Henry, a Democrat, was overwhelming. Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard is a Republican.

Henry said the event will bring state and local attention to Fort Wayne, as well as give thousands of people an opportunity to visit since the opening of much of Harrison Square. He said politics aside, the event will be a boon for the local economy.

“I would encourage the state Republican Party to consider us as well,” he said.

Dan O’Connell, director of Visit Fort Wayne, said the event will draw between 2,000 and 2,500 guests and pump up to $400,000 into the local economy. He said the community did not have to provide financial incentives to land the convention.

O’Connell said he already has begun discussions with the Fort Wayne TinCaps, Embassy Theatre and Fort Wayne Children’s Zoo to have special events for the guests.

Friday, December 10, 2010

WCCS ponders joining small-school resolution

.Home
WCCS ponders joining small-school resolutionDecember 10, 2010
ByPhil Smith
phil@thepostandmail.com
COLUMBIA CITY — At Monday’s work session of the Whitley Consolidated School Corporation, Superintendent Dr. Patricia O’Connor and corporation Business Manager Tony Zickgraf presented a document to the board that was drafted by the John Glenn School Corporation.
The document — a call out to the Indiana Legislature.
The Walkerton-based school corporation drafted a resolution to Indiana lawmakers and sent letters to WCCS and other districts around the state.
In the letter, the John Glenn board wrote “As you may already know, the John Glenn School Corporation Board of School Trustees has taken issue with the discrepancy among districts in per-student funding.
“We feel this, among other issues, needs to be addressed. We have constructed a draft resolution to take to the legislature before they convene next session.”
The school officials from Walkerton are seeking a coalition of 50 school districts to sign the resolution before sending it off to Indianapolis.
“We would appreciate your participation in preparing the ‘final product’ and invite you to sign the resolution,” said the letter to WCCS.
“I think the purpose of the resolution is to educate our legislature,” said O’Connor, saying school officials hope to convince the lawmakers that “one size doesn’t fit all. I think we’re just asking the legislature to consider the smaller districts when decisions are being made.”
In the budget for 2010, the state cut school funding across the board and O’Connor told the board that WCCS’s “per-student” cuts were heavier than some districts. The intent of the proposed pact among school corporations is to call on the legislature to remove that funding disparity.
John Glenn’s letter and resolution also referred to the state’s funding formula as “complicated and outdated.”
The board discussed the possibility of signing the resolution.
“The squeaky wheel gets the oil,” said board member Tim Bloom.
“Every school’s saying they’re not getting their fair share and I don’t envy the legislature,” said Zickgraf.
In late 2009, reports said Indiana schools lost $297 million in 2010.
The new legislature meets Jan. 5 and local residents Jim Banks (Senate) and Kathy Heuer (House of Representatives) will begin freshman terms in their respective branches. Coincidently, both members will serve on education committees.
After discussing the petition by John Glenn, WCCS Board President Don Armstrong said the board should consider the issue before the next meeting Dec. 20.
“I want to think about it,” said Armstrong. “But I also want to think about education in general. We can vote our hearts if we make it an action item.”
“I think it is a show of solidarity,” said O’Connor, “but not in an offensive way, but more in a ‘yoo-hoo, we’re small, but we’re out here’ way.

Thursday, December 9, 2010

Not ready for that 'adult conversation' on debt?

We have started an adult conversation that will dominate the debate until the elected leadership here in Washington does something real.”

So claimed Erskine Bowles, co-chairman (along with former Sen. Alan Simpson) of President Barack Obama’s commission on federal deficits and debt, last week.

The feeling that Americans and their representatives in Congress were ready for serious “adult” work on reducing deficits and debt lasted about three days, from last Friday’s final fiscal commission meeting to Monday’s announcement by Obama of a $900 billion accord with congressional Republicans to extend tax cuts and embark on a round of new spending.

"I'm deeply disappointed that we have this short-term deal and it's not linked to long-term fiscal restraint," Bowles said Wednesday.

On Thursday morning after he and Simpson met at the White House with Budget Director Jack Lew and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, they issued a statement calling on Obama to launch negotiations with congressional leaders from both parties "on the critical next step of establishing a serious fiscal responsibility plan" and to unveil his own deficit cutting proposals in his State of the Union address, building on the ones in last week's Bowles-Simpson report.

Long-term debt problem
The long-term budget prospects remain as stark as they were before Obama announced his deal with the GOP leaders.

Top politics news Key vote on 'Don't Ask Don't Tell' repeal fails
A key procedural vote on the bill containing a repeal of the military’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy failed Thursday, likely dealing a final blow to advocates who hoped to overturn the 17-year old ban on gays and lesbians serving openly in the military during this session of Congress.

According to the Congressional Budget Office, the ten-year budget forecast is for continued budget shortfalls, extraordinarily high national debt (compared to previous decades), and higher interest payments to service that debt — to the point that CBO predicts that by 2016 interest payments will be larger than military spending.

When debt service exceeds military spending, says Harvard historian Niall Ferguson, it has historically been the tipping point where a great empire or nation ceases being great.

Why did the feeling that America was ready for serious debt reduction evaporate so quickly?

One reason may be that members of Congress don’t believe that the United States could suffer a sovereign debt crisis as Greece and Ireland are undergoing.

“I think it’s true that a number of people just don’t buy it, because we still are different than Greece and Ireland,” said Maya MacGuineas, president of the bipartisan Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget.

“They can’t believe that the debt problems could actually come here," she said. "I think a number of other people think, ‘maybe I do buy it but it isn’t worth the sacrifice of actually changing things.’ But I think most people don’t quite buy it — and the worrying thing is that people who buy it the most are the financial people, the people who are managing money.”

Stopping momentum for debt reduction
MacGuineas said the tax and spending deal that Obama announced Monday night did seem “surreal” coming as it did on the heels of the Bowles-Simpson plan. “It stops the momentum that we should have started last week with the Bowles-Simpson plan.”


But she remains optimistic. She compared the accord with a smoker who is on the verge of quitting smoking. “You smoke an extra cigarette just before you have to give it up. I really do think this is the last major deficit-financed bonanza that we’re going to see.”

She pointed to fact that a conservative member of the Bowles-Simpson panel, Sen. Tom Coburn of Oklahoma and a liberal Democrat, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, both voted for the plan. (It got 11 votes, three shy of what was needed to officially forward its recommendations to Congress.)

Coburn took a jab at his own party Wednesday when he denounced as "political cynicism" a statement by Dan Bartlett, a former staffer for President George W. Bush, who said the 2001 tax cut was designed as a "trap" so that it "becomes almost impossible to remove it."

Coburn has hinted he might vote against the deal Obama negotiated with GOP leaders and urged his colleagues to debate a plan to cut the deficit.

"We are going to have a major liquidity crisis, and we are also going to have a major interest rate crisis," he said Wednesday. "Nobody knows when it comes."

Economic historians and members of the president’s fiscal commission do believe a sovereign debt crisis is feasible, or at least that the United States will suffer many years of anemic growth and high unemployment.


Federal government debt is approaching that level. Using a different measure — total debt for all levels of government — U.S. gross debt is at 93 percent of GDP, according to the International Monetary Fund. (Compare that with Greece at 130 percent of GDP and Ireland at 99 percent of GDP.)

Wolf at our door?
Making the analogy between hostile bond markets and a wolf, Reinhart also warned that “We never know when the wolf will be down (at) our door. The wolf is very fickle and markets can turn very quickly. And a high debt level makes us very vulnerable to shifts in sentiments that we cannot predict.”

In a debt crisis, in order to persuade bond buyers to keep buying Treasury bonds, Congress would be forced to cut spending and raise taxes.

The commission member who put that scenario most clearly was a non-politician, Honeywell chief executive David Cote: “These difficult political decisions will get made one of two ways. The first is we can do it thoughtfully and proactively. The second is we can wait for the bond market to force it upon us, and that will be decidedly harder, more abrupt and unpleasant. We can ask Greece and Ireland what that's like, and soon Italy, Spain and Portugal.”

He added that Americans ought to wonder, "What happens when the bank — in this case foreign countries like China — doesn't want to loan you any more money?"

Of course, the alternative to raising revenues through borrowing is raising them through higher taxes. But one reason Obama is not likely to get Republicans to agree to that is their memories of Republican presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush agreeing to tax increases in 1982 and 1990.
“If I believed that the increased revenue would actually be used for deficit reduction, you know, I might reluctantly come to the table, in a global agreement," said panel member Rep. Jeb Hensarling, R-Texas last week, before voting against the debt commission's recommendations.
Hensarling said when he recalls Reagan's agreement to raise taxes in 1982 and Bush’s reversal on taxes in 1990, “It just seems to me that somehow the spending restraint never quite materializes, and yet the increased revenues do, and it seems like the increased revenues simply chase the spending.”
It's Obama in the Oval Office now, not Bush or Reagan, but it is the familiar tug of war between Republicans and Democrats over cutting taxes versus cutting spending.
Obama’s statement at Tuesday's press conference implied that in some areas federal spending may not be big enough.
“What are we doing to revamp our schools to make sure our kids can compete?” he asked. “What are we doing in terms of research and development to make sure that innovation is still taking place here in the United States of America? What are we doing about our infrastructure so that we have the best airports and the best roads and the best bridges?”
He sounded confident he will win the debate with Republicans — forcing them to agree to tax increases because they'll find out once they start running the House of Representatives that spending cuts would be, as he said Tuesday, “very painful.”
Putting on his hat as campaign strategist, Obama said, “Either they rethink their position, or I don’t think they’re going to do very well in 2012.”
He said, “The fact of the matter is the American people already agree with me.”

Friday, December 3, 2010

State, public differ on schools

Niki Kelly | The Journal Gazette
INDIANAPOLIS – Hoosiers pointed to creating jobs and upgrading K-12 education as top priorities for the state legislature and Gov. Mitch Daniels in 2011, according to a new public opinion survey released Thursday from Ball State University.

The polling contradicts the agenda of Daniels and House and Senate Republicans on several specific education policies.

The poll was unveiled at the 2011 Legislative Conference in Indianapolis, where Daniels also delivered the keynote speech.

In the Ball State survey, 45 percent of Hoosiers said schools in communities that face the greatest obstacles to learning should receive more money than schools in communities that are experiencing the greatest growth.

About 14 percent of the Hoosiers surveyed believe that both types of schools should receive equal funding.

Daniels and key Republicans are pushing for funding to be based solely on a district’s number of students, rather than extra money going to some urban and declining-enrollment schools facing high levels of poverty.

The governor said Thursday that the system is currently set up to aid poorer schools, but he said that the disparity has become a concern.

“That makes less sense to me, and we’ve been moving away from that,” he said. “It clearly penalizes schools with population growth.”

The Ball State survey also noted that Hoosiers believe more parental involvement would make more of a difference in education than would other changes, such as paying teachers more.

Daniels said he can’t pass a law requiring parental involvement and “it would be a complete non-sequitur to say because too many parents don’t do enough, we just forget these other changes.”

He said studies show teacher quality is the major factor behind student performance, and when good teachers are identified, “I’m for paying them more.”

Another difference is that Daniels wants to expand the number of charter schools. But those surveyed, by a 2-to-1 margin, prefer to support current schools rather than create more charter schools.

Daniels also used his speech to tell the lobbyists, lawyers, school officials and media in attendance that state tax revenue was up slightly in November and that he expects to balance the next biennial budget without a tax increase.

Thursday, December 2, 2010

Anti-earmark Tea Party Caucus takes $1 billion in earmarks

By Reid Wilson
National Journal

Members of the Congressional Tea Party Caucus may tout their commitment to cutting government spending now, but they used the 111th Congress to request hundreds of earmarks that, taken cumulatively, added more than $1 billion to the federal budget.

According to a Hotline review of records compiled by Citizens Against Government Waste, the 52 members of the caucus, which pledges to cut spending and reduce the size of government, requested a total of 764 earmarks valued at $1,049,783,150 during Fiscal Year 2010, the last year for which records are available.

"It's disturbing to see the Tea Party Caucus requested that much in earmarks. This is their time to put up or shut up, to be blunt," said David Williams, vice president for policy at Citizens Against Government Waste. "There's going to be a huge backlash if they continue to request earmarks."

In founding the caucus in July, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) said she was giving voice to Americans who were sick of government overspending.

[How do deficit-cutters sell the U.S. on pain?]

"The American people are speaking out loud and clear. They have had enough of the spending, the bureaucracy, and the government-knows-best mentality running rampant today throughout the halls of Congress," Bachmann said in a July 15 statement. The group, she wrote in a letter to House Administration Committee chairman Bob Brady, "will serve as an informal group of Members dedicated to promote Americans' call for fiscal responsibility, adherence to the Constitution, and limited government."

Bachmann and 13 of her Tea Party Caucus colleagues did not request any earmarks in the last Fiscal Year, according to CAGW's annual Congressional Pig Book. But others have requested millions of dollars in special projects.

Rep. Robert Aderholt (R-Ala.), for one, attached his name to 69 earmarks in the last fiscal year, for a total of $78,263,000. The 41 earmarks Rep. Rodney Alexander (R-La.) requested were worth $65,395,000. Rep. Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.) wanted $63,400,000 for 39 special projects, and Rep. Rob Bishop (R-Utah) wanted $93,980,000 set aside for 47 projects.

[With jobs at issue, what is Washington doing?]

Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-Mont.) takes the prize as the tea partier with his name on the most earmarks. Rehberg's office requested funding for 88 projects, either solely or by co-signing earmark requests with Sens. Max Baucus (D) and Jon Tester (D), at a cost of $100,514,200. On his own, Rehberg requested 20 earmarks valued at more than $9.6 million.

More than one member can sign onto an earmark. Still, there are 29 caucus members who requested on their own or joined requests for more than $10 million in earmark funding, and seven who wanted more than $50 million in funding.

Most offices did not respond right away to a request for comment. Those that did said they supported Republicans' new efforts to ban earmarks.

[Will Obama's winning campaign plan be used against him in 2012?]

Alexander, for one, "stands with his fellow Republicans in the House in supporting the current earmark ban. Since joining the Tea Party Caucus in July, he has not submitted any earmark requests and has withdrawn his outstanding requests that were included in the most recent Water Resources Development Act," said Jamie Hanks, his communications director.

Rep. Gregg Harper (R-Miss.), who requested 25 earmarks in the last Fiscal Year at a total cost of just over $80 million, has agreed to abide by the Republican earmark ban, according to spokesman Adam Buckalew. "He supported the moratorium and the prohibition adopted recently by the Conference on House earmarks for the 112th Congress," Buckalew said of Harper.

"It's easy to be a member of the TEA Party Caucus because, like them, I agree that we're Taxed Enough Already and we've got to balance the budget by cutting spending instead of raising taxes. Deficit spending is not new, but the unprecedented rate of spending in Congress is," Rehberg said in a statement emailed by his office. "Montanans have tightened their belts, and it's way past time for Congress to follow their lead. The TEA Party Caucus is about listening to concerned Americans who want to fundamentally change how Congress spends their tax dollars. On that, we're in total agreement."

[For America's 10 wealthiest Congressional Districts, it will be more happy holidays]

Bachmann's office did not respond to emails or phone calls seeking comment.

Still, some Republicans -- albeit none who belong to the Tea Party Caucus -- have said they will not abide by the voluntary earmark ban. And, said CAGW's Williams, the anti-spending organization isn't waiting with baited breath.

"Seeing is believing. It's going to take a lot more than rhetoric to convince us," he said.

A list of Tea Party Caucus members and their earmark requests in Fiscal Year 2010, courtesy of Citizens Against Government Waste's Pig Book: http://www.cagw.org/reports/pig-book/2010/

Wednesday, December 1, 2010

Tracking fee to increase on city electric bills

ByRuth Stanley
ruth@thepostandmail.com
COLUMBIA CITY — Columbia City residents, and those who get their electricity from Columbia City utilities, will see their rates go up for the first quarter of the new year.
The monthly tracking fee will increase by 74 cents per 1,000 kilowatt hours. For the average residential customer, the rate will change by approximately 52 cents.
The tracking fee is a pass-through fee used by the city to cover the cost charged to the city by Indiana Municipal Power Agency.
As IMPA adjusts its rates for electricity sold to the city, the city adjusts the tracking fee to cover the increase or decrease, said Rosie Coyle, clerk treasurer.
According to Coyle, most residential customers use approximately 700 kilowatt hours resulting the 52 cent increase. Those who use more or less will see the tracking fee adjusted accordingly

Tuesday, November 30, 2010

Leftover oil spotted on Gulf floor

John Roach writes: Not all of the estimated 4.9 million barrels of oil that gushed into the Gulf of Mexico simply vanished when the Deepwater Horizon offshore rig exploded and sank earlier this year. Growing evidence suggests that a good portion of it reached the ocean bottom, where it remains.

NPR science correspondent Richard Harris reported Monday about a ride he hitched to the ocean floor aboard the Alvin submersible craft with University of Georgia researcher Samantha Joye. The sea churned with seemingly healthy life as they descended. On the bottom, they struck oil.

"If you look at the camera, you can see the brown coloration," Joye told Harris. The "brown stuff," Harris said, covers coral fans "like pine trees along a dusty road." The oil also hangs over formations of frozen natural gas -- deposits that usually harbor the worms that bottom-dwelling crabs eat.

"The crabs don't look healthy," Joye said. "See all the dark spots and lesion-looking things? That's not normal."



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Harris points out that it's impossible to say from a single dive how much damage the oil spill did to the Gulf's ecosystem. That's a story that researchers such as Joye will be piecing together over the coming months and years. But the finding serves as another reminder that the oil spill is having a lasting impact on the Gulf of Mexico.

The discovery of oil on the seafloor also begins to account for the 23 percent of the oil that was not recovered directly, dispersed chemically or naturally, evaporated or dissolved, burned or skimmed, according to a report released Nov. 23 by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. A key finding of that report, which updates controversial findings from August, "is the increase in the estimate for dispersed oil, specifically from 8 percent to 16 percent," NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco told reporters.

Some scientists and environmentalists criticized the use of chemical dispersants as potentially harmful to critters in the open ocean such as tuna and turtles.

Lubchenco added that the revised accounting for where the oil went, and for the effectiveness of the dispersants, does not take away from the seriousness of the oil spill.

"'Dilute' and 'dispersed' do not mean benign," she said. "We have been and remain concerned about the long-term impact on the Gulf and the people who rely on it for their livelihoods and enjoyment, and we remain committed to holding BP and the other responsible parties accountable for damages."


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Obama, Republicans Agree to Negotiate on Tax Cuts

President Obama and top congressional Republicans emerged from a White House meeting today with an agreement to begin negotiations on a compromise to "break through this logjam," as the president put it, on how to extend the Bush-era tax cuts that expire at the end of the year.

"Today we had the beginning of a new dialogue that I hope and I'm sure most Americans hope will help break through the noise and produce real gains," the president said.

The two-hour meeting at the White House was the first sit-down between the president and Republican lawmakers since the midterm "shellacking" that cost Democrats the House. In what the president described as a "productive" session that also involved top congressional Democrats, lawmakers discussed the tax cuts as well as expiring unemployment benefits, potential ratification of the new START arms treaty with Russia and the deficit commission report out this week.

Republicans and Democrats have serious - and some say insurmountable - philosophical issues on all of these issues. Senate Republicans have been cool to ratification of START in the current Congress - the president insisted today "we need to get it done" - and have said they are unwilling to extend unemployment benefits, which expire today, unless the extension is paid for. The parties also have broad differences on how to address the budget deficit.

"None of this is going to be easy," the president acknowledged after the meeting. "We have two parties for a reason. There are real philosophical differences. Deeply held principles to which each party holds."

Republicans want to extend the Bush-era tax cuts for all Americans, while the president wants to extend them only on income below 200,000 for individuals or $250,000 for couples in order to reduce the cost of extending the cuts. The president said after the meeting he had appointed Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Jack Lew, the Director of the Office of Management and Budget, to oversee negotiations on finding common ground. He said he hopes for agreement "in the next couple of days."


Republicans struck an optimistic tone after the meeting, with soon-to-be House Speaker John Boehner saying the conversation was "very frank." He did not, however, signal that he is willing to compromise on the tax cut issue, stating that Republicans "made the point that stopping all the looming tax hikes" is what the economy needs.

Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said that from his perspective the two most important issues to be dealt with in the lame duck session of Congress are funding the government -- it will run out of money on Friday without at least a stopgap spending bill - and dealing with the Bush-era tax cuts. (Watch Mr. Obama's comments at left.)


He said the other issues on Senate Democrats' agenda - among them setting the stage for "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" repeal and passage of the DREAM Act, as well as START ratification - "aren't in the same category" as those issues. McConnell said the time had come to "reshuffle our priorities on the Senate side."

Mr. Obama he was "very encouraged" by what he perceived as a recognition among both Republicans and Democrats that their focus should be on helping Americans, not politics.

"We are Americans first, and we share a responsibility for the stewardship of our nation," he said. "The American people did not vote for gridlock."

The meeting had originally been scheduled for a week and a half ago, but Republicans objected to the date set by the White House. What was to have been a working dinner was downgraded to a morning meeting; what had been called a "summit" became the first in a series of meetings. It was a sign that neither side had high expectations for the gathering to yield positive results.

Mr. Obama acknowledged perceptions that the meeting would have little impact in his remarks, stating that often following such meetings "both sides claim they want to work together, but try to paint the opponent as unyielding and unwilling to cooperate."

"Both sides comes to the table. They read their talking points. Then they head out to the microphones trying to win the news cycle instead of solving problems and it becomes just another move in an old Washington game," he said.

This meeting, he insisted, was different.

"I think there was recognition today that that's a game that we can't afford," he said. "Not in these times."

Rep. Eric Cantor, another member of the GOP leadership present at the meeting, said he was "encouraged" that the president acknowledged in the meeting "perhaps not having reached out to us enough in the last session" of Congress. Boehner said he told the president that "spending more time [with us] will help us find some common ground."

McConnell said that divided government doesn't mean lawmakers can't get things done, pointing to what was passed under Democratic president Bill Clinton and a GOP Congress.


(At left, see a discussion of the meeting on CBSNews.com's "Washington Unplugged.")


"I think we all agree there's no particular reason why we can't find there isn't agreement and do some important things for the American people over the next two years," he said.

Also present at the meeting were Geithner, Lew, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, Democratic Rep. Steny Hoyer, Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin and Republican Sen. Jon Kyl, the GOP point-person on the START treaty. Kyl wants to wait to take up the issue until the new Congress, which will have more GOP senators; Democrats worry that meeting the 67-vote threshold for ratification could be impossible once the new Congress begins. The White House has been lobbying Kyl hard to give ground on the issue.

On Monday, the president described the meeting as the "first step toward a new and productive working relationship" with Republicans. He also backed a spending freeze for federal employee pay, something members of the GOP have long been pushing.

While Republicans are unified in calling for an extension of all the Bush-era tax cuts, Democrats are split, with a faction led by New York Sen. Charles Schumer calling for the threshold for extension to be raised to $1 million in household income.

The White House has signaled that it is open to compromise on the issue, and a temporary (one to three-year) extension of all of the cuts appears likely, perhaps in exchange for an extension of unemployment benefits or a vote on START.

Monday, November 29, 2010

Pence favors flat tax, return to traditional values

Last updated: November 29, 2010 2:23 p.m.
Sylvia A. Smith | Washington editor

WASHINGTON – The graduated income tax should be abandoned in favor of a flat tax for individuals and businesses, Rep. Mike Pence, R-6th, said Monday.

In a speech to the Detroit Economic Club, Pence also said he supports amending the Constitution to cap federal spending at 20 percent of gross domestic product except for wartime defense spending.

The Detroit Economic Club is considered a must-do venue for politicians hoping to elevate their profiles. Pence is one of several Republicans whose names are mentioned as contenders for the 2012 GOP presidential nomination, but he deflected a question about whether he intends to run. Pence is also thought to be considering a bid for Indiana governor.

Pence’s support for the flat tax echoes other conservative candidates for president in past years, and Pence has advocated it for many years.

In Pence’s version, everyone would pay the same rate on wages and business income after first deducting personal and dependent exemptions. Businesses would be allowed to deduct all the costs of operating a business. Savings and investments would not be taxed.

After doing the math, people and businesses would play a flat rate – generally suggested at 15 percent. There would be no exemptions for mortgages, charitable deductions or depreciation.

“The more you money you make, the more you pay,” Pence said. “It’s fair, simple and effective.”

In addition to the flat tax and constitutional amendment to cap federal spending, Pence said the country’s economic engine is best fueled by a reduced regulation, an “all-of-the-above” energy policy that includes nuclear power plants, more trade agreements and a more restricted mission for the Federal Reserve.

But he said none of that can be accomplished unless America renews a commitment to values that include honesty, integrity, dual-gender marriage and religion.

He said Americans are ready to return to “timeless ideals” and that “they await men and women who will lead us back to that future.”

Saturday, November 27, 2010

Backlash feared as some in GOP push social issues

Associated Press
TOPEKA, Kan. – Although fixing the economy is the top priority, Republicans who won greater control of state governments in this month's election are considering how to pursue action on a range of social issues, including abortion, gun rights and even divorce laws.

Incoming GOP governors and legislative leaders across the nation insist they intend to focus initially on fiscal measures to spur the economy, cut spending and address state budget problems.

"At this point, the economy dominates everything, and until the economy is turned around and our fiscal house put in order, there's not going to be a lot of appetite for anything else," said Whit Ayres, a pollster in Alexandria, Va., whose firm did research for several GOP candidates in the midterm race.

But the pressure to go further, as soon as possible, is only slightly below the surface in states where conservatives' top social goals have been foiled for years by Democratic vetoes and legislative obstacles.

The tension is particularly visible in Kansas, where the victory by Gov.-elect Sam Brownback, a strong opponent of abortion and gay marriage, has created strong expectations among evangelical supporters.

A similar scenario is taking shape in strongly conservative Oklahoma, where a Republican governor will replace a Democrat, and to a lesser extent in Michigan, Wisconsin and several other states.

Some Republican legislators are already worried about getting bogged down in volatile issues or conflicts between wings of the party. But, if the different agendas can be harnessed, an election largely driven by voters' economic concerns could wind up having much broader social consequences.

"I'm a little bit nervous," said Rep. Dean Kaufert, a Republican state House member in Wisconsin, where Republicans, including incoming governor Scott Walker, campaigned on enacting tough immigration legislation and banning embryonic stem cell research. If Republicans overreach, "the danger is the citizens of the state will just say we'll clean house again and we're going to keep doing it until we get it right," he said.

But some conservatives said they won't wait forever. "We're not going to spend the next 18 months doing nothing but economic issues," said Wisconsin Republican Sen. Glenn Grothman, an advocate of tougher abortion restrictions.

GOP candidates in the midterm election successfully wooed independent voters and those upset with President Obama and the agenda of the Democratic-controlled Congress. But abortion opponents and socially conservative evangelical Christians are a key party constituency.

This year's vote gave Republicans control of 29 governorships, including 11 held previously by Democrats. The GOP significantly strengthened its position in many state legislatures.

The GOP won all statewide races on the ballot in Kansas for the first time since 1964. Republicans picked up 16 seats in the state House, giving the GOP an overwhelming 92-33 advantage.

Abortion opponents now plan to make the state as close to an abortion-free zone as possible. Proposed measures would impose new regulations for clinics, restrictions on late-term procedures and increased reporting requirements for physicians. Vetoes by outgoing Democratic Gov. Mark Parkinson and his predecessors blocked such action in the past.

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lance Kinzer, who serves on Brownback's transition team, said action against embryonic stem cell research and to allow "covenant" marriages, which are harder to dissolve than standard marriages, are likely to be considered, too.

"There's a lot of unfinished business out there, isn't there?" Kinzer said.

In Oklahoma, where Republicans won all eight Democrat-held statewide offices, GOP lawmakers are planning to bring back firearms bills vetoed last year by outgoing Democratic Gov. Brad Henry. They include a bill to allow the open carrying of firearms.

A move to legalize concealed weapons is expected in Wisconsin, where the Republicans scored their most dramatic victory, seizing control of both the legislature and the governor's office. Some Republican lawmakers hope to repeal a law that extends benefits to gay state employees and their domestic partners.

It's not clear whether Republicans could win approval of such measures or would wind up in protracted battles not only with Democrats but among themselves.

Wisconsin Republican Party Chairman Reince Priebus insists the party can manage the competing demands. The economy "doesn't mean we have to exclude tackling every other issue facing the voters of Wisconsin," he said.

In Michigan, Iowa and Ohio, where Republicans are replacing Democratic governors, legislative leaders are all under pressure to back anti-abortion legislation but insist they will focus on the economy.

Brownback's economy-first approach in Kansas has put him in the rare position of disappointing conservative allies.

Rep. Owen Donohoe, a Republican from the Kansas City-area suburb of Shawnee, sent colleagues an e-mail saying Brownback's legislative agenda "may not be as conservative as we wish."

City Council discusses pay periods

ByPhil Smith
Phil@thepostandmail.com
COLUMBIA CITY — Members of the Columbia City Common Council discussed their own salaries Tuesday night and the second reading of the ordinance establishing their 2011 pay did not pass by without discussion.
Council member Roger Seymoure took issue with the way the pay is set up, which is an annual salary, but which is divided into bi-weekly pay periods.
A fluke that happens only once in a great while caused the council members, as well as the mayor and the clerk-treasurer, to receive an extra paycheck in 2010.
“This (ordinance 2010-32) conforms to the way that other cities are doing it,” said Mayor Jim Fleck.
Due to the pay schedule, the officials received 27 pay checks this year. The normal number of pay days for bi-weekly pay periods is 26.
“I think (changing the ordinance) would cut out the questions, so we never get into this discussion of whether there are 26 or 27 pays,” said Seymoure. “I would like to see it changed to show it (the salaries) as an annual amount.”
Fleck said changing ordinance currently being reviewed would be man hours and paperwork that isn’t necessary since 2011, the year the ordinance was written for, has only 26 pay periods.
“It substantially would require some major recalculations,” Fleck said.
The board, along with the mayor and Clerk-Treasurer Rosie Coyle, receive their final paycheck of 2010 on Dec. 31, although Coyle said it would probably be earlier due to the holiday.
Coyle told Seymore that the board could pass the current ordinance, which was approved for its second reading but not ratified yet, and she would remember to change the 2012 salary ordinance before it comes in front of the board in a year.

Wednesday, November 24, 2010

Tea Parties Turn to Local Issues .

HAMILTON, Ga.—The Harris County Tea Party near the Alabama border campaigned far and wide in this month's midterm elections. Donations were mailed to tea-party candidates in Nevada and Alaska. There were multiple overnight bus trips to rallies in Washington, D.C.

The next stop, however, is closer to home: the local school board.

"Don't get me wrong, we're still going to engage in Washington, but now we're going after what is here locally. Our focus is turning to our community," said Kathy Ropte, the group's founder, over cola at a Blimpie sub shop, a popular local tea-party meeting spot off the town square. Aware that education consumes a big chunk of local property taxes, group members are combing through the salaries of every county school employee from the superintendent down.

After fighting for several months on the highest level of American politics, the leaders of many local tea-party activist groups now plan to take their agendas of limited government and penny pinching to their hometown governments.

Most say they'll stay involved in watching Congress, and dozens attended a recent Washington summit organized by national umbrella group Tea Party Patriots for newly elected members of Congress. But the local leaders say that to truly stem spending, they also must stage what Steven Vernon, vice president of the Tea Party Manatee on Florida's Gulf Coast, calls "a ground-level attack."

"We have to start at the lowest level and take our country back," Mr. Vernon said.

It's also more convenient for tea-party activists—typically volunteers with separate full-time jobs–to be local gadflies than national ones. "We can't go to every congressional hearing in D.C. but we can go to every school-board meeting in Manatee County," said Mr. Vernon, a technology-contracts negotiator.

Meanwhile, many recession-weary local officials are gearing up for a potential clash with tea partiers, saying they have already squeezed all they can out of their budgets.

"Good luck! If they can find the fat, I want to know where it is," said Craig Dowling, the superintendent of the Harris County School District, who said he had a visit from local tea-party activists in late October. "We are driving school buses that are 20 years old. I wonder how many of them are driving 20-year-old cars."

Tea-party groups in Pennsylvania, Delaware and Michigan have recently voiced plans to have members run for local town boards in 2011—a bid to start a farm team of politicians who can move up to higher offices.

View Full Image

Jennifer Levitz / The Wall Street Journal

Craig Dowling, Harris County schools superintendent, says that if the tea-party activists 'can find the fat, I want to know where it is.'
."We hope to field candidates for the congressional race two years from now, but for 2011, our focus has shifted to the school boards," said Lee Ann Burkholder, spokeswoman for the York 912 Patriots, a tea-party-affiliated group in York, Penn.

The 912 Patriots last month drew some 300 people to an area hotel for a meeting by taking out a front-page ad in a local paper, asking: "Why are your property taxes so high? How is your school district spending your hard-earned dollars? You might be surprised."

"A lot of our members are upset that we have to pay for raises and fund pensions for teachers while many people in York County are out of work," Ms. Burkholder said.

Teachers' representatives warn against skimping on pay. "If you don't invest, you're not going to get the best and brightest and that will manifest itself in student performance," said Brian Koppenhaver, a spokesman for the Pennsylvania State Education Association, the union that represents York County school employees.

On Election Day, Don and Diana Reimer, co-founders of the Philadelphia Tea Party Patriots, were in Washington, waving signs for Republican Pat Toomey, a fiscal conservative who won the Pennsylvania Senate race.

Now, the Philadelphia Tea Party Patriots plan to launch the "Watchman Project," in which members will be assigned to attend local government meetings, monitor meeting minutes and then report back to the group, Mr. Reimer said. "If there is a particular vote coming up that we support or oppose, we would all show up to influence what is going on," he said.

Already, tensions are brewing in some municipalities, with local officials saying they need new revenue to maintain public services, while tea-party activists say new taxes aren't an option.

Earlier this month in Troy, Mich., tea-party activists delivered a petition to city hall, seeking to force officials to keep the Troy Public Library open without a new tax.

"We really are embroiled in a big controversy here in Troy," said Janice Daniels, co-founder of the Troy Area Tea Party.

Local voters narrowly shot down a proposal for a library tax on the Nov. 2 ballot. Now, the library is scheduled to close in June.

The tea-party members believe the city can find money for the library by cutting compensation packages of municipal employees, but Mayor Louise Schilling said that "the suggestions made by the tea party are not realistic."

"If you're going to have services, you have to pay for them," she said.

In Georgia, Mr. Dowling, the Harris County school superintendent, said he cut $3.3 million from his budget last year in order to balance the books.

In March, the district will ask Hamilton voters to extend a one-percentage -point increase in the sales tax earmarked for school funding. Without a voter-approved extension, the sales tax would go back down from 7% to 6%.

Mr. Dowling likely won't have the vote of the Harris County Tea Party. "No more money. No more money," said the founder, Ms. Ropte. "They need to learn how to live within their means."

Dems challenge incoming GOPers on health coverage

Washington (CNN) -- House Democrats are calling on Republican congressional leaders to make public how many incoming GOP senators and representatives who campaigned on repealing the new health care law will forgo enrolling in the federally subsidized health care coverage they receive as members of Congress.

A group of more than 60 Democrats -- led by New York Democratic Rep. Joe Crowley, California Rep. Linda Sanchez, Maryland Rep. Donna Edwards and Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan -- sent a letter to GOP leaders on Tuesday arguing that Republicans who want the health care bill repealed but accept coverage for themselves are hypocrites.

The Democrats who signed the letter seized on a recent article in Politico that reported Republican Rep.-elect Andy Harris of Maryland complained during orientation for new House Members last week that there was almost a month of lag time before coverage under the federal plan kicks in for new employees. Harris, a physician, campaigned against President Barack Obama's health care plan, pledging to repeal it.

In the letter sent to House GOP Leader John Boehner and Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell, the Democrats contended that newly elected GOP legislators can't have it both ways.

"If your conference wants to deny millions of Americans affordable health care, your members should walk that walk," the letter said. "You cannot enroll in the very kind of coverage that you want for yourselves, and then turn around and deny it to Americans who don't happen to be Members of Congress."

No member of the House Democratic leadership signed the letter.

CNN sought comment from Harris on the letter, but there was no immediate response. In an interview with Baltimore, Maryland, television station WBAL last week, Harris said that while he did ask about the start date for federal health insurance plans during orientation, he wasn't asking about coverage for his own family because they have insurance.

Harris argued in the interview that it was ironic for the new federal health care law to mandate coverage, but "when our federal employees get hired, if they don't get hired on the right day of the month, they actually go without insurance for a while."

Michael Steel, spokesman for Boehner, responded to the letter by telling CNN that "Boehner, like Speaker Pelosi, Sen. Reid and tens of millions of Americans, receives health coverage through his employer," which has "nothing to do with ObamaCare," the GOP euphemism for the health care reform bill.

McConnell's office had no comment on the letter.

Gerald McEntee, president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees labor union that lobbied for passage of health care reform, issued a statement that called GOP supporters of repeal who enroll in taxpayer-subsidized health care "hypocrites."

"If these Republicans really support market-based solutions to health care, they ought to go out and try to buy an individual policy in the insurance market," McEntee said.

Like other federal workers, members of Congress and their aides can choose from a large list of subsidized health plans provided by their employer, the federal government. The coverage is offered by private health insurance companies, and the Congress members and their staff pay premiums for the coverage.

A liberal advocacy group launched a radio ad in Maryland this week accusing Harris of "whining about his health care."

Harris responded to the ad a statement Monday that said "an out-of-district, liberal special interest group has decided to start the 2012 campaign with false accusations and personal attacks."

"While these outsiders are focused on a different agenda, I am concentrating on long-term job creation, reducing wasteful government spending and getting America back on the road to prosperity," the Harris statement said.

Saturday, November 20, 2010

Looking forward to 2011 City Elections!

The leaders of the Whitley County Democratic Party had a very productive meeting today. Many items were discussed and we are looking forward to having a successful election in 2011! If you are interested in being a Democratic Candidate, contact Party Chair, Scott Allison at whitleydems@gmail.com today!

Tuesday, November 16, 2010

In 2011 we will hold an election for the offices of: Mayor-Columbia City. City Council-Columbia City. Clerk/Treasurer-Columbia City, Larwill, South Whitley, and Churubusco. Town Board member-Larwill, South Whitley, and Churubusco. Are you interested in being a candidate? Contact WC Democratic Party Chairman, Scott Allison at whitleydems@gmail.com today!

Monday, May 24, 2010

Mark Souder's Downfall
By E.J. DionneWASHINGTON --

A fall from grace of the sort experienced recently by Indiana's Mark Souder typically brings smiles to the faces of liberals weary of moralistic religious types who preach one thing and do another.But I took no pleasure in Souder's resignation from Congress last week after it was revealed that the conservative evangelical Republican had an affair with a part-time staff member. I always thought he was the real deal, both serious and thoughtful in his approach to religious and political questions. I disagreed with him on many things, but not on everything.I wrote about Souder for the first time in 1998 because he and Rep. Chaka Fattah, a liberal Democrat from Philadelphia, had pushed through legislation to help students from high-poverty schools go to college. I liked their forging a left-right alliance in a good cause at a moment when the nation was torn by the battle over Bill Clinton's impeachment. Souder said at the time: "Christ is concerned about the needy and the hungry and the powerless and the hurting." Good for him, I thought.A few years later, I asked Souder to appear at an event with former New York Gov. Mario Cuomo where both reflected on the role of faith in their public lives. Their thoughts were later included in a book, along with the responses of others. "To ask me to check my Christian beliefs at the public door is to ask me to expel the Holy Spirit from my life when I serve as a congressman, and that I will not do," Souder said. "Either I am a Christian or I am not."So I do hope that Souder finds a way to work out his redemption. But it is precisely because this story hit me personally that I want to shout as forcefully as I can to my conservative Christian friends: Enough!Enough with dividing the world between moral, family-loving Christians on the one side and supposedly permissive, corrupt, family-destroying secularists on the other.Enough with pretending that personal virtue is connected with political creeds. Enough with condemning your adversaries, sometimes viciously, and then insisting upon understanding after the failures of someone on your own side become known to the world. And enough with claiming that support for gay rights and gay marriage is synonymous with opposition to family values and sexual responsibility.It's not the self-righteousness of religious conservatives that bothers me most. We liberals can be pretty self-righteous, too. It's the refusal to acknowledge that the pressures endangering the family do not come from some dark secular leftist conspiracy but from cultural and economic forces that affect us all. People are encouraged to put all sorts of things (career advancement, wealth, fame, the accumulation of things, various forms of self-indulgence) ahead of being good parents and spouses. Our workplaces are not as family-friendly as they could be.Why does it even have to be said that a devotion to family has nothing to do with ideology? In my very liberal Maryland neighborhood -- my precinct voted 80 percent for Barack Obama -- parents crowd school meetings, flock to their kids' sporting events, help them with homework and teach them right from wrong on the basis of values that I doubt differ all that much from those prevailing in more conservative environs. And while a lot of my neighbors are active in their religious congregations, the secular parents take their family responsibilities as seriously as the believers do.And those of us who are liberal would insist that our support for the rights of gays and lesbians grows from our sense of what family values demand. How can being pro-family possibly mean holding in contempt our homosexual relatives, neighbors and friends? How much sense does it make to preach fidelity and commitment and then deny marriage to those whose sexual orientation is different from our own? Rights for gays and lesbians don't wreck heterosexual families. Heterosexuals are doing a fine job of this on their own."Let he who is without sin cast the first stone." It's a scriptural passage that no doubt appeals to Mark Souder. But it would be lovely if conservative Christians remembered Jesus' words not only when needing a lifeline but also when they are tempted to give speeches or send out mailers excoriating their political foes as permissive anti-family libertines. How many more scandals will it take for people who call themselves Christian to rediscover the virtues of humility and solidarity?

Copyright 2010, Washington Post Writers Group