In the opening address of Heritage’s Protect America Month, Rep. Howard “Buck” McKeon (R-CA) praised the two companies for putting their own money on the line and embracing free-market principles. Even without additional funding from the Pentagon, GE and Rolls-Royce will continue to develop an alternative Joint Strike Fighter engine, the chairman of the House Armed Services Committee announced in a speech at The Heritage Foundation this week. “Instead of lobbying for the final 20 percent needed to finish the engine, the GE team has committed to funding the engine …
Among the speakers at this week’s Heritage Foundation Bloggers Briefing, the consensus was clear: College students could stand more exposure to conservative ideas. The inherent contradiction of the liberal political consensus among students is mystifying, the speakers said. American Action Forum President Douglas Holtz-Eakin put it this way: “Young people have supported [President] Obama in droves, even though they’re at a point in their life when they’re typically most rebellious — and he is going to tell them how to run every part of their life.” “Why aren’t college students …
Despite systematically undermining domestic oil production, President Obama has recently said he hopes to drastically decrease America’s dependence on foreign oil. Luckily for the president, congressional Republicans have proposed an array of legislation to accomplish just that. The House Natural Resources Committee spent Wednesday working on three new energy bills. The Obama administration’s de facto moratorium has led to a precipitous decline in U.S. oil production in the Gulf of Mexico. That prompted Natural Resources Chairman Doc Hastings (R-WA) to take action. His committee approved three new pieces of legislation with bipartisan support …
New York Governor Andrew Cuomo’s surprising push for tort reform came to an end Sunday night. The latest New York budget plan eliminates the proposed $250,000 “cap on non-economic damages for medical malpractice awards” that would have saved the state an estimated $384 million. Cuomo, a Democrat, abandoned the plan even after he accepted the Medicaid Redesign Team’s proposal. The setback leaves New York’s blundering Medicaid program unreformed and according to Mississippi Governor Hailey Barbour, no meaningful changes can be made to until someone in the Governor’s Mansion follows through …
Dr. Martha Boone doesn’t hide her displeasure with Obamacare. She was opposed to the law long before President Obama signed it one year ago and remains critical of it today. She spoke at Heritage this week about its impact on doctors. One story Boone shared shed light on the challenges government-run health care has created with her patients. She spoke of an incident involving a Medicare patient with stress incontinence, a condition that can be treated by one of two operations. The first operation takes 15 minutes, is not invasive …
On the one-year anniversary of Obamacare, the problems of the health care law remain a constant frustration for doctors around the country. Many go about their lives feeling frustrated, but a few brave doctors are speaking out. Dr. Martha Boone of Atlanta is one of them. She’ll speak on a panel at The Heritage Foundation today at noon about the difficulties doctors face from Obamacare and other entitlement programs. Rep. Michael Burgess (R-TX), a medical doctor, will join her along with Gurjeet Guram, a student at Harvard Medical School. Click …
Sen. Tom Coburn (R-OK) has a powerful ally in the fight to eliminate wasteful duplication in government programs: House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) announced the two lawmakers are teaming up for a bipartisan, House-Senate effort to eliminate overlapping and unaccountable government services that cost taxpayers more than $100 billion a year. A recent Government Accountability Office report on government waste revealed the extent of duplication. Now the two Republicans want Congress to do something about it. Cantor has directed House committee chairmen to look at the GAO’s recommendations for …
Two Republican lawmakers have developed a plan they hope will put pressure on the Obama administration to speed up the permitting process for offshore drilling in the Gulf of Mexico. Reps. Bill Flores (R-TX) and Jeff Landry (R-LA) introduced legislation to codify timeliness of permitting process by establishing stringent deadlines and clear requirements on drilling applications. Leaseholders would even be able to request a refund on their bonus bid if the Department of Interior rejects an application. The goal is to finally end the de facto drilling moratorium, which was …
As the standoff in Wisconsin drags on with no end in sight, Republican Gov. Scott Walker continues to make his case about the fiscal implications of collective bargaining. His office highlighted some of the most outrageous benefits and behavior that public-sector unions have institutionalized through collective bargaining. The case of Milwaukee teacher Megan Sampson is a classic example. Less than a week after the Wisconsin Council of English Teachers named Sampson its “Outstanding First Year Teacher,” she lost her job. The cause? Sampson got the pink slip because she lacked …
The spending cuts included in Congress’ recently passed two-week continuing resolution are just the first steps to greater fiscal discipline, freshman Rep. Renee Ellmers (R-NC) said last week at The Heritage Foundation. With a new deadline of March 18 to fund the government, Ellmers promised push for more spending reductions in the weeks ahead. Speaking at The Bloggers Briefing, Ellmers said the $4 billion in cuts included in the two-week CR represent only what President Obama has requested to be defunded in his fiscal 2012 budget. Republicans are just “taking …
