Press Release From The Lou Barletta For Congress Campaign Committee
FOR IMMEDIATE
RELEASEContact: Lance
Stange, Jr.
August
11, 2012lance@loubarletta.com
or 570-501-8683
Lou Barletta’s statement on the selection of
Paul Ryan as Mitt Romney’s running mate
Hazleton,
PA – Today, Lou Barletta issued the following statement regarding the selection
of Paul Ryan to complete the Republican presidential ticket:
“Jobs and the economy are the number one
concern of voters across America.Paul
Ryan and Mitt Romney understand the need for pro-growth strategies that will
get our economy back on the right track.
“A Romney-Ryan ticket offers a clear contrast
to the failed policies of President Obama that have only made our economy
worse.The team of Governor Mitt Romney
and Representative Paul Ryan has the expertise to offer idea after idea on how
to fix our economy, cut Washington’s red tape, right-size federal spending to
deal with our deficit, and save important federal programs that so many rely
on.
“Having worked with Paul Ryan, I can say no
one in the House of Representatives knows the federal budget better than he
does.He will be an invaluable resource
to the ticket and the American people as their next Vice-President. At a time
when our country is heading for a fiscal cliff, there could not be a better
team for the future of America than Gov. Mitt Romney and Rep. Paul Ryan.”
In this Times Leader article by Jonathan Riskind Congressman Lou Barletta rips into President Obama for playing politics with his visit to Scranton, Pennsylvania today.
U.S. Rep. Lou Barletta said Tuesday he supports extending the Social Security payroll tax cut into 2012, but criticized President Obama’s visit to Scranton today as playing politics with the issue.
Guest speaker, U.S. Congressman, Lou Barletta, addresses the gathering at the Chamber of Commerce autumn Breakfast Meeting.
Obama
Obama is to make a pitch for the payroll tax cut extension during his speech this afternoon at Scranton High School.
Barletta, a Republican from Hazleton, said keeping the payroll tax low for another year is a good idea because “I believe that money is better staying in the pockets of American citizens than it is in the coffers of the federal government.”
But Barletta said Obama would be better served by staying in Washington and working with Senate Democrats to pass “some of the 20-plus job-creating bills that we in the House passed, and that are now sitting in the Senate.
WASHINGTON – Rep. Tom Marino, PA-10, today issued this statement regarding President Obama’s visit to Scranton, Pa., in the neighboring 11th Congressional District:
“A visit by a President is always exciting but today’s appearance has lost some of its luster because of the President’s poor performance in the White House.
“His lack of leadership and his refusal to do what is best for the country and his insistence on sticking to his worn-out ideologies and Chicago-style politics is clearly hurting the national economy and Americans of all walks of life.
“He delays making important decisions and leading at a time when we need a strong and reassuring President.
“One of the best examples is the President’s delaying of the Keystone Pipeline, a project that would immediately employ 20,000 people with the promise of 200,000 jobs down the road.
“A true leader would not table such an important project just to appeal to opposing sides of his political base. The question is clear: `President Obama, do you want to pander to extreme leftist environmentalists or do you want to create thousands of good-paying, union-labor jobs?’
“If the President wants to make a career out of not being able to make a decision, he should go back to the U.S. Senate where the Democratic leadership has refused to vote on important bills passed by the House including 20-plus job-creating measures.
“President Obama can do all the campaigning he wants but we in Pennsylvania have a good memory. We remember what he really thinks of us and how he mocked our respect for our religion, for life and for our Second Amendment rights.”
The following is from a Lou Barletta For Congress 2010 press release:
Kanjorski drops bombshell on Luzerne County residents
Lou Barletta vows to fight this dangerous idea to bring 500 explosions a year to our area
Hazleton, PA – Paul Kanjorski wants to open a military-style training camp in Conyngham Township, a quiet community that will have to get used to “chases, machine-gun fire and bomb blasts” that will take place at the facility. (Washington Post, 2/23/10).
There would be about 500 bomb blasts a year at the site, according to published reports about a similar project proposed for Maryland. That project was successfully fought and killed by Maryland residents, who said the military-style camp would disrupt their lives.
Now, Kanjorski wants to bring this project to Conyngham Township under the guise of local job creation – yet according to the Washington Times, federal officials questioned about the Maryland project “did acknowledge that they could make no guarantee that the promised 400 jobs, many in food service, groundskeeping and maintenance, would go to local residents.” (3/29/10)
“In an election year, we expect Paul Kanjorski to come up with some wild ideas in his quest to retain power, but this one is hard to believe. Kanjorski is clearly out of touch if he believes the residents of Conyngham Township – and the miles around the site that will bear the brunt of repeated bomb blasts – would be in favor of this project. For Kanjorski to take a dangerous project that the people of Maryland rejected and now try to pass it on to the people of Northeastern Pennsylvania shows how desperate he is,” said Shawn Kelly, spokesman for Lou Barletta, Hazleton mayor and candidate for Congress.
Kanjorski has overpromised and underdelivered for the residents of the 11th District for years, and he’s always reached for the fantastical, whether it’s mystery employers only he knows about, moving sidewalks, monorails, inflatable dams, or everyone’s favorite, the Kanjorski family goldmine known to us as Cornerstone Technologies. Sadly, Kanjorski continues to lead people on with the promise of new jobs as unemployment in the region is at an 18-year high due to his failed economic policies.
Lou Barletta said, “I will never put residents of this district in danger by supporting a project like this. What guarantees are we going to have that children will not sneak onto this bomb range? What will this project do to home values? What businesses are going to move into a town that’s rocked by 500 explosions a year? Mr. Kanjorski’s project will completely destroy the area around it, and I’m going to fight it.
“We need good jobs and real answers to our problems, not more of Kanjorski’s fantasy projects – least of all one that will turn our communities into bomb ranges. I believe Northeastern Pennsylvania needs jobs, but not at any cost – and certainly not in exchange for 500 bomb blasts a year.”
Facts about Kanjorski’s bomb range
• This project was rejected by the citizens of a community in Maryland because the noise and commotion that would come from the chases, machine-gun fire, and bomb blasts would disrupt their way of life.
• The project was so toxic that U.S. Sen. Barbara Mikulski and Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley – both Democrats – withdrew their support of it after the public outcry.
• Only 400 jobs would be created. Most of them would be support-level jobs – food service, groundskeeping, and maintenance.
• Federal officials cannot guarantee that any of those jobs will go to local residents.
• From July 2009 to September 2009, the federal government narrowed down the list of potential sites to five – the Maryland site, two in Virginia, and two in West Virginia. Pennsylvania isn’t even on the list of finalists, let alone Northeastern Pennsylvania.
• The federal government is looking for a site within 150 miles of the U.S. Capitol. State Department officials say that distance was calculated as the maximum commute students could reasonably be required to travel by car from Washington in one day. Kanjorski’s bomb range is outside of that radius.
• Federal officials admitted there would be 500 bombs detonated at the facility each year.
Sources: “Some in Md. town call anti-terrorism training plan a dud,” The Washington Post, Feb. 23, 2010 “‘Porky’ project smells bad to locals,” The Washington Times, March 29, 2010 “GSA drops plan for Maryland training site,” The Washington Times, July 29, 2010 End of Press Release
According to published reports the government tries to sell the public on the fact that they will be exploding 3 pound bombs at the training facility. S.O.P. found this video on the net. Here's what a 3 lbs. of explosive placed in a bunker looks like.
Instead of wasting our stimulus money which could be used elsewhere to stimulate this lucklaster economy why doesn't the government consider one of the 350 military bases it has closed under the Base Realignment and Closure (or BRAC)process.
Every time Paul Kanjorski slams Lou Barletta about the dredge project remember the EPA has identified and placed 34 military bases on its Superfund list and the agency is concerned with incomplete pollution cleanup at another 100 facilities. Maybe its time Kanjorski pays attention to the federal government.
IS HE FOR REAL???? Here is today's newspaper headlines.
JOBLESS RATES HITS DOUBLE DIGITS...And Paul Kanjorski claims "We are helluva alot better off as a country and as an economy than we have ever been in the history of mankind" His words clearly demonstrate that he is out of touch with what is going on in his district.
When he won his election to Congress in 1984 he made the same claim about Congressman Frank Harrision whom he defeated. It was time to retire Harrision and now it is time to retire Kanjorski. In this document from Ed Mitchell's website Roderick Random's column from 2006 recalls the race.
Back then, 1984, the 11th Congressional District’s heart was Luzerne County and didn’t include any of Lackawanna County. So the story of how Mr. Kanjorski took out a freshman congressman and Democratic rising star named Frank Harrison is worth re-telling here.
It was the days of giardiasis, the flu-like disease instigated by a tiny cyst.
As thousands boiled water to kill cysts in it, Mr. Harrison took “junkets” to Costa Rica and other exotic places, Mr. Mitchell’s research found. Mr. Harrison’s spokesman repeatedly made the point that things were well in hand here, but Mr. Mitchell fashioned a television commercial that altered local political history. It portrayed Mr. Harrison as having a non-chalant attitude about the cysts, coupling video of jets landing in tropical locales, narration pointing up the congressman’s inaction and a final scene with a kettle shooting steam on a stove.
“It’s enough to make you boil,” a narrator said as the commercial ended.
The commercial is a big part of why Mr. Kanjorski is a congressman today. When he drove up Wednesday morning from Washington, it was a sign he remembered the political lesson he inflicted on Mr. Harrison.
Ed, look what my research is finding. The mistake your client, Paul Kanjorski, is making lies in the fact that inflicting a political lesson is one thing...learning from the infliction is another. You're Outta Touch, Paul
Tony Phyrillas highlights a chart by Jake Towne for Congress that shows dramatically what Nancy Pelosi and Paul Kanjorski created with their lack of stimulus package and the TARP bailout. It mirrors the information I supplied in an earlier post today.
In this report out of Pennlive.com the Associated Press announces sweeping findings from the Grand Jury empaneled to investigate the misuse of taxpayer money commonly known as Bonusgate.
A grand jury that investigated the state legislative corruption scandal known as Bonusgate wants the General Assembly to make sweeping changes, from how it hires and supervises employees to how it provides constituent services and even the way it debates passage of the annual budget.
A 34-page report obtained Monday by The Associated Press describes the Legislature as bloated with unnecessary staff and living in a time warp that reflects practices other states outlawed decades ago.
“This grand jury concludes, without any hesitation, that the current operational structure and ingrained procedures of the Pennsylvania House Democratic and Republican caucuses are irretrievably broken and in desperate need of systemic change,” the jury wrote.
“In the eyes of this grand jury, it is beyond dispute that numerous legislative employees have for years spent an enormous amount of time working on political campaigns when they were supposed to be performing their legislative duties,” the grand jury wrote. “All campaign work on legislative time must be eliminated and this will result in a surplus of legislative work unless rapid, meaningful change occurs.”
The 2,800 legislative employees amount to nine for each representative and 17 for each senator, the jury said.
“Despite the best efforts of numerous witnesses before the grand jury, nobody was able to justify such a large number of employees for this body,” the jurors wrote.
Among other reforms, the grand jury said the Legislature should:
— Eliminate, or at least make more transparent, the special leadership accounts that give House leaders millions of dollars in discretionary spending to control.
— Stop per diem payments to lawmakers, or at least tie them to actual expenses.
— Convert the General Assembly to a part-time body, impose term limits and give House members four-year terms.
— Combine the House Democratic and Republican print shops, information technology departments and personnel offices. Hire based on “standardized, published job descriptions.”
— Cease constituent service work related to the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation, described as a giveaway to businesses and a wasteful means of currying favor with voters at taxpayers’ expense.
— Impose tougher ethics practices, halt all payments and benefits to staffers on leave to campaign and ban compensatory time. Keep legislative employees from entering campaign offices during work hours.
— Prohibit using the same vendor for legislative and campaign purposes.
— Revamp the state budget process, making line items more descriptive and halting per diems if the budget is not passed by June 30.
— Eliminate taxpayer-funded political caucuses.
The report also called for a limited constitutional convention, saying it was concerned that the General Assembly “will remain in its ’time warp’ and meddle with, obfuscate, ignore or kill every recommendation.
Let's see if Eachus knows what the term leadership really means. Let's see if he rises to the occasion or serves us more slight of hand. Let's see if Brett Marcy can spin his words more.
In a bold statement the AFL-CIO, part of the newly formed Coalition for Labor Engagement and Accountable Revenue, representing 1.1 million Pennsylvanians wants us to pay more in taxes to protect their lucrative jobs and retirement. In this report from Jan Murphy of the Patriot News the unions position is very clear.
Labor unions representing Pennsylvania state and school employees are banding together to urge the state Legislature to look at raising revenue to balance next year’s budget instead of cutting employees and services. “We think the cuts have gone far,” said Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President-elect Rick Bloomingdale.
They make the outlandish claim that Rendell's budget would eliminate half the government workforce. Not even close.
In response to a post praising Phyllis Mundy SOP wants to highlight two articles over the last few days that speak otherwise. The Pennsylvania Independent writes a post that 16,000 jobs were lost in Pennsylvania for the month of February.
"This is an example of how Pennsylvania is always late into a recession and slow to come out of it," said Matt Brouillette, president and CEO of the Commonwealth Foundation, a Harrisburg-based free market think tank. "If Gov. Rendell's economic policies were working and the stimulus money was doing its job, we wouldn't be seeing these kinds of job losses."
The Citizen's Voice ran an article about the increase in poverty in Pennsylvania on March 26, 2010.
About 14 percent of Luzerne County residents were living in poverty in 2008, up from about 11 percent in 2000, according to the Census Bureau. A family of four was considered impoverished in 2008 if their income fell below $22,025, according to U.S. Census Bureau guidelines.
The Citizen's Voice story described the jobs summit last Thursday at the Luzerne County Community College.
State Reps. Todd A. Eachus, Phyllis Mundy, Eddie Day Pashinski, Jim Wasacz and John Yudichak, who represent the Luzerne County House Delegation, attended the jobs summit. With the unemployment rate in Northeastern Pennsylvania hovering just below 10 percent, they all echoed concerns about residents struggling to find jobs.
Mundy said they will take the issues raised at the summit to Harrisburg and will work together to find solutions for job creation, get the unemployed back to work and improve the local economy. Pashinski called the event a "shining example of civility."
"Collaboration is so critical," Pashinski said. "The country needs all of us working together across party lines. It's a critical time in the history of mankind. We are in a very dangerous time."
They had the federal government pump millions into Pennsylvania and we are still losing jobs. According to this data 12,000+ jobs were created by the stimulus yet will still lost 16,000 jobs. But they are going back to Harrisburg to see what they can do???
And what about that healthcare that won Mundy some praise from a local blogger. Back in 2007 Todd Eachus, then chairman of the House Policy Committee issued this press release concerning the health crisis in Pennsylvania.
“Right now there are nearly 800,000 people without health coverage, and millions more struggling with access to quality, affordable health care,” Eachus said.
Now that is one helluva job Eachus and Mundy are doing in Harrisburg for health coverage and jobs creation. SOP won't sell you a bridge but there was this fantasy cargo airport that was going to bring in hundreds of thousands of jobs.
President Obama's budget proposes $989 billion in new taxes over the course of the next 10 years, starting fiscal year 2011, most of which are tax increases on individuals.
Click here if you care to read where the money will come from.
Some of the comments on that post.
This isnt a budget. Its a declaration of war against people who produce.
Looks like Obama is "escalating the W.O.E." (War on Employers)
Corporations don't pay taxes, their customers do.
Now we see how Obama is going to pay for (one-third) of his $3 trillion spending increase (assuming the programs are permanent). He's the most radical tax and spend liberal president in U.S. history. Raising taxes on businesses, investments, and small businesses that all pay the personal income tax rate is the perfect plan - if your goal is to dramatically shrink economic growth.
Slick Willy doesn't have anything on Obama. Lower taxes a smaller percentage (a lot smaller) than Bush's tax cut, then let Bush's tax cut expire. Net result, an increase in taxes while Obama claiming to give a tax cut.
What worse than these new taxes is the amount of inflation that is going to occur within the coming year because of the money we are printing from absolutely no-where. We cannot create money and throw it at spending projects that will not create lasting jobs especially when the money runs out...
Those business tax hikes sure look scary. We ALREADY have the highest business tax rate of any industrialized nation. I see more jobs going overseas by this foolishness.
According to this article in the Philadelphia Inquirer Pennsylvania may reap as much as $10 billion over the next two years from the Porkulous Spendulous bill. Sounds great, even fantastic, right? Hold on to your bootstraps.
The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review reports that Western PA (not to be confused with Western PA Childcare) wants $8.4 billion of that money.
Allegheny County work orders would take up about $8.3 billion, according to the report. Projects in Westmoreland County would comprise the rest. Do you feel like a student in class waiting to be noticed by the teacher? Yo, Western PA. , how about us over here????
According to that article the following breakdown illustrates Pennsylvania's dose of "Viagra":
How Pennsylvania benefits
The $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, known as the stimulus package, is awaiting President Obama's signature. Here's a sampling of what Pennsylvania can expect:
• The creation or saving of 143,000 jobs over the next two years, with new positions created in industries such as clean energy and health care.
• A tax cut of as much as to $1,000 for more than 4.9 million Pennsylvania workers and their families.
• Making 138,000 families eligible for a new tax credit to make college affordable.
• An additional $100 per month in unemployment insurance benefits to more than 1 million workers who have lost their jobs during the recession.
• Funding totaling more than $821.8 million to modernize at least 409 Pennsylvania schools.
• Another $4.1 billion in federal funds over two-plus years to ease the burden of Medicaid.
• More than $1.9 billion to help stabilize the budgets of state and local governments.
• About $92 million in local funding for job training and employment services for dislocated workers, youths and adults.
• More than $1.9 billion for infrastructure investment.
Sources: White House estimates, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, National Employment Law Project
Items like this one make me crazy- "Funding totaling more than $821.8 million to modernize at least 409 Pennsylvania schools." If a school district wants to build a new school this money cannot be used for that purpose. A carpenter swinging a hammer, a mason laying a brick, and electrician fishing wire for renovations or new construction- can someone explain the difference? If you want to put humans to work then don't disfavor one job over the other. If you build a new school isn't the opportunity to really make it a green building so much better? Blockhead, bonehead, or dimwits.
Press releases over the weekend indicate that Sanofi Pasteur is negotiating to move as many as 400 jobs from its Swiftwater(11th Congressional District)location to Bethlehem.
Obstacles from townships,Monroe County, and envrionmentalists fueled this ongoing issue. Sewer issues have plagued the progress to expand their Swiftwater site.
Pocono Township finally approved a plan but it will take three years to complete. Sanofi's timetable cannot be met under such this plan.
"Company Vice President Frank Epifano says 600 employees now use temporary trailers at the Swiftwater campus. He says the company plans to relocate several hundred jobs."
In talks with Lehigh County and Upper Saucon Township officials Sanofi will be able to take advantage of a KOZ designation for the Stabler site. The KOZ designation can eliminate payment of all state, local and school district taxes for 10 years.
Look at the jobs that will be moved to the Bethlehem site. Most are high level managerial jobs that pay significant money. Imagine the EIT tax lost to those townships and Monroe County.
Paul Kanjorski, what efforts were made by your office to address this issue in your district? Its appropriate that it is Christmas time. The answer to my question can be found in Rudolph the Rednosed Reindeer. Yukon Cornelius sticks his axe in the snow, takes a lick and says "Nuttin."
Of course in Bethlehem they are yelling "WAHOOOO"!! for the jobs.
