Today is Ash Wednesday — the first day of Lent — the beginning of 40 days of prayer and fasting observed by Christians across the country, culminating in the Easter feast. Likewise in April, Jews will gather to celebrate Passover, one of many traditions observed under the religious freedom that the U.S. Constitution was designed to preserve. Now, though, that freedom is under direct attack by the very government that purports to represent the people, and that is but the first step in Obamacare’s re-writing of America’s blueprint.

This week, two more Christian colleges joined other religious institutions in fighting back against that attack when they filed lawsuits against the Obama Administration for imposing an anti-conscience mandate under Obamacare. The controversial regulation forces almost all employers to provide health insurance coverage of abortion-inducing drugs, contraceptives, and sterilization, without a co-pay.

Heritage’s Sarah Torre writes that Geneva College, a private institution in Pennsylvania associated with the Reformed Presbyterian Church of North America, and Louisiana College, a small Southern Baptist school located in the middle of the state, have deeply held moral objections to the mandate and are left with no choice but to take their case to court:

With an offensively narrow religious exemption that will cover only some formal houses of worship, the mandate leaves many religious employers who hold moral objections to abortion and contraception without recourse. The mandate places the many non-exempted religious employers in an untenable situation: forced either to violate their beliefs by providing coverage of morally objectionable services or forgo providing employee health insurance altogether and pay hefty fines for doing so.

To date, seven lawsuits have been filed in response to this mandate, and those legal actions are but the tip of the iceberg of opposition to the Administration’s despotic directive.

The controversy began last August when the White House announced the anti-conscience policy as an interim final rule. Individuals and leaders from various faith backgrounds, including Roman Catholic, Jewish, evangelical, and Protestant traditions spoke out, prompting President Obama to announce an “accommodation” in response. But the proposal announced at a February 10 press conference would have done nothing to resolve the moral problem at the heart of the matter. In fact, more than 300 leaders to signed a letter deeming the gesture “unacceptable.”

Moreover, the so-called “accommodation” turned out to be nothing more than a smokescreen, since the Obama Administration ultimately finalized the August version of the rule that had caused the controversy in the first place. Adding insult to injury, the White House finalized the rule within hours of holding a press conference in which the President implied further changes — repeating the disregard for accountability to the American people first seen when they were told that Congress would have to pass the bill to find out what was in it.

The fight, though, extends beyond the issue of the anti-conscience mandate and speaks to the dangerous, endemic flaws at the root of Obamacare. In a new Heritage video, several political leaders speak out against the anti-conscience mandate while warning that this first assault on religious freedom is but a taste of what’s to come under the President’s health care law. George Weigel, a prominent Catholic scholar, says that Obamacare puts our society’s core in jeopardy:

What is at stake here ultimately is whether civil society will survive, and whether voluntary institutions or voluntary associations ranging from the traditional family to multimillion member organizations like the Catholic Church to small businesses will be allowed to function only if they imitate the government, only if they imitate the state.

Truly, the state will attempt to refashion society using Obamacare as its cudgel and awl. Matthew Spalding, vice president of American Studies at The Heritage Foundation, writes that this new, unaccountable regime of unelected bureaucrats — with regulatory authority over one-sixth of the American economy — will issue regulations that will fundamentally alter Americans’ way of life. Spalding says the anti-conscience mandate is but one of the ways that individuals will be affected under this new order of governmental dominance:

What is happening has little to do with health care or even public policy and everything to do with the role of government in the most immediate and intimate matters of our lives. All is subject to government control, regulatory dictate, and administrative whim. Nothing will be allowed outside of the new regulatory scheme: no independent state programs, no individuals or businesses permitted not to participate, no true private market alternatives.

In announcing his school’s Obamacare lawsuit, Louisiana College president Dr. Joe W. Aguillard declared, “The time for silence is over. Louisiana College will not sit by and allow this or any government to usurp our God-given religious freedoms and our time-honored Baptist heritage.” Like Louisiana College, Americans collectively are witnessing their time-honored liberties being trampled upon. They should not sit idly by, either. And Congress should repeal Obamacare forthwith in order to preserve the people’s freedom.

Click here to watch our new video, Religious Liberty: Obamacare’s First Casualty, to learn more about this issue.

Quick Hits:

• One hundred and forty days later, the White House has missed another deadline to produce internal documents about the Solyndra debacle as called for by a House subpoena.
• Only 22 percent of Americans say they are satisfied with the direction America is headed, nearly as low as the approval rating during Jimmy Carter’s presidency.
• White House press secretary Jay Carney yesterday claimed that “the President didn’t turn down the Keystone pipeline” and blamed Republicans for making the issue political.
• Iran has blocked International Atomic Energy Agency inspectors from visiting a key military site which is suspected of housing a secret underground nuclear facility. Iran denied a similar effort to inspect the site in January.
• The Supreme Court has granted review in Fisher v. University of Texas, a case involving racial discrimination policies of the University of Texas. Learn more about it at Foundry.org.

An examination of “administrative earmarks” around the time of congressional votes on key pieces of President Obama’s agenda suggests the White House used its power to fund local projects as a means to “buy” votes for major legislative efforts.

Administrative earmarking refers to the federal government’s allocation of funds from its discretionary budget for specific projects. The practice is less transparent than legislative earmarking, since, according to the Congressional Research Service, “[t]here is no source that defines and comprehensively identifies Administrative earmarks.”

But an analysis of grants from agencies during the early years of the Obama administration shows that the districts of moderate Democrats, whose support was so crucial for Obama during the 111th Congress, received large sums right around the passage of three key pieces of legislation: Obamacare, Dodd-Frank financial regulations, and the cap-and-trade bill.

During the run-up to votes in the House of Representatives for each of those pieces of legislation, the rate of administrative earmarking spiked. This chart shows the number of grants requested by 12 federal agencies, as documented at Grants.gov.

The number of grants given by those agencies spiked precisely when the House was considering each of the three pieces of legislation.

Even more troubling: during the same time periods, significant grant money went to the districts of numerous Democratic representatives who looked to face tough battles for re-election. The legislation Obama was attempting to get through Congress was generally unpopular, and vulnerable members needed other ways to appeal to constituents. Federal grants made for a perfect opportunity.

Then-Rep. Chris Carney (D-PA), for instance, kept his support for Dodd-Frank quiet. His website never posted a press release announcing his “yes” vote on the bill. It did, however, tout two federal grants totaling $3.6 million for businesses in his district two days before the Dodd-Frank vote.

Then-Rep. Zach Space (D-OH) hailed from a district reliant on the coal industry, which would have been hit particularly hard by cap and trade. He voted for the measure, but neglected to publicize the vote on his website. He did, however, announce eight federal grants totaling roughly $1.8 million all made during the month before the House passed cap and trade.

At least 32 vulnerable House Democrats received significant federal grant money in the periods leading up to or directly after their votes on at least one of these three pieces of legislation (see charts below), raising concerns that those grants may have been used either to encourage or reward votes in favor of the administration’s position.

The use of administrative earmarks to “buy votes” is not new. President Richard Nixon saw the practice as “a way to gain political support for Nixon’s re-election by using federal resources and grants to influence key states and voting blocs.”

President Franklin Roosevelt was an early pioneer of the political use of administrative earmarking. He “deliver[ed] large defense projects to key states whose electoral votes he wanted to secure,” according to historian Burt Folsom.

But while administrative earmarking is a practice used by nearly every administration, CRS found in a report published in April 2010 — immediately after the time period at issue — that “[b]oth the number and value of earmarks requested solely by the President increased since FY2008.” The number of earmarks had increased by 54 percent, CRS found, while the value of those requests had increased by a whopping 126 percent.

The timing of those requests also suggests political factors at play. Heritage’s Hans von Spakovsky, a former Federal Elections Commissioner, said the administration’s actions “show how taxpayer funds are used for crass political purposes — it is a rank abuse of the government’s power and another sign of this administration’s lack of a moral compass.”

While speculating on the motives of individuals responsible for these grants is difficult, this administration has a history of using its powers for political purposes. In the case of “vote-buying” in particular, the administration offered to expand Medicaid funding to residents of Louisiana and Nebraska to the tune of roughly $145 million to secure the votes of Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and Ben Nelson (D-NE) for the Obamacare bill.

Poor George Washington. His birthday, spontaneously celebrated since the Revolution and formally declared a holiday in 1879, has slowly morphed into the insipid Presidents Day you’ll hear about today.

George Washington, the “indispensable man” of the Revolution who was rightly extolled for being “first in war, first in peace, and first in the hearts of his countrymen,” has now been lumped together with the likes of James Buchanan, Jimmy Carter, Franklin Pierce and John Tyler.

It gets worse. Washington’s good name and great legacy are now shamelessly invoked to justify positions that he would never have envisaged.

In a Time Magazine special edition on George Washington currently in newsstands, historian Joseph Ellis matter-of-factly remarks: “He began the political tradition that produced a Union victory in the Civil War, the Federal Reserve Board, Social Security, Medicare and, more recently, Obamacare.”

Washington, who called on Americans to display “pious gratitude” for their Constitution and warned against any “change by usurpation,” is now a partisan of the sprawling welfare state and the unprecedented individual mandate. Ellis even has the gall to hail Washington–the man who gracefully and voluntarily relinquished power after two terms when he could have stayed on for life–as the father of “strong executive leadership” and the precursor to FDR, who stayed in office for an unprecedented 12 years!

The true Washington still has much to teach us, in particular when it comes to the presidency, foreign policy and religious liberty. Although much has changed in the past two centuries, his sage advice and conduct in office have lost none of their relevance, anchored as they are in the timeless principles of the Founding and a sober assessment of human nature.

Washington, like every President after him, swore the following oath upon taking office: “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my Ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States.” Unlike many presidents in the past 100 years,  however, Washington took the oath seriously and did not try to place himself above the Constitution.

He understood himself to be the President of a Republic in which the people, through their elected representatives in Congress, make laws–not some visionary leader who must define what Progress requires and lead the unenlightened masses there.

Washington took care “that the laws be faithfully executed,” as when he quashed the Whiskey Rebellion in 1794. He did not try to make the laws himself, either by issuing executive orders that circumvented Congress or by regulating what could not be legislated. He left behind no “signature” legislative accomplishments as we would say today. He only used his veto twice–once on constitutional grounds and once in his capacity as Commander-in-Chief.

Washington gave, on average, only three public speeches a year while in office–including the shortest ever inaugural address. And, of course, he had to be persuaded to serve a second term.

As a President who took his bearings from the Constitution, Washington devoted considerable attention to foreign policy. Our first President sought to establish an energetic and independent foreign policy. He believed America needed a strong military so that it could “choose peace or war, as our interest guided by justice shall Counsel.” His Farewell Address remains the preeminent statement of purpose for American foreign policy.

No survey of Washington’s legacy would be complete without acknowledging his profound commitment to religious liberty. Many today seem to have lost sight of the crucial distinction he drew between mere toleration and true religious liberty. As he explained in the memorable letter to the Hebrew Congregation in Newport:

All possess alike liberty of conscience and immunities of citizenship. It is now no more that toleration is spoken of, as if it was by the indulgence of one class of people, that another enjoyed the exercise of their inherent natural rights.

On this day, as we celebrate our greatest President (his actual birthday is on Wednesday), let us remember why he–and not Polk or, heaven forbid, Wilson–deserves a national holiday.

David Azerrad is Assistant Director, B. Kenneth Simon Center for Principles and Politics at The Heritage Foundation

Quick Hits:

• Finance ministers from 17 euro-zone countries are meeting today to sign off on a $170.9 billion deal to slash Greece’s debt burden and allow it to stay in the euro zone.
• Iran is halting the sale of crude oil to British and French companies in retaliation for EU economic sanctions that were imposed in response to Iran’s continued pursuit of nuclear weapons.
• Two Iranian warships docked at a Syrian naval base as Syrian government forces continued their attacks on opposition activists. China’s main newspaper has accused the West of stirring civil war in the country.
• The House may consider legislation that would repeal two Education Department regulations — one of which sets out federal rules for how states decide whether to allow colleges and universities to operate within the state.
• Isn’t religious freedom for women too? So why did Representative Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) and Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) walk out of a committee hearing on the subject, claiming it was disregarding women? Read more about it on The Foundry.

Three years ago today, President Barack Obama signed into law his trillion-dollar stimulus plan, a measure that he promised would save or create 3 million jobs by the end of 2010 and would prevent unemployment from ever going above 8 percent. And though the President today will likely claim that thanks to his efforts, the U.S. economy is surging, don’t believe him. The verdict is in: Obamanomics has failed.

But you don’t have to take our word for it. Yesterday, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) released a report offering an analysis of the last three years of the Obama economy. In short, the stimulus did not live up to the President’s promises.

The CBO writes that America’s unemployment rate has exceeded 8 percent since February 2009, making this the longest stretch of high unemployment since the Great Depression. To make matters worse, unemployment will remain above 8 percent until 2014. And the level of long-term unemployment — those looking for work for more than six months — is over 40 percent, the highest since at least 1948, when that data was first collected.

“But wait a minute!” you might shout, “There are jobs being created; we’re on the road to recovery.” True enough. The White House brags that 257,000 jobs were created in January and that the economy has added private sector jobs for 23 straight months. While those are good numbers, bear in mind that in this case, the beauty of the Obama economy is only skin deep and that lead has not quite been turned into gold. In fact, the strength of the U.S. economy’s recovery is much weaker than advertised. And though the President would like to credit his stimulus with today’s growth, keep in mind that the stimulus ended one year ago. Obamanomics would have predicted faster growth sooner, not later, and certainly not after the stimulus wound down.

In a new report, Heritage’s James Sherk explains that today’s economic growth needs to be viewed in its proper context — in the aftermath of the worst recession in two generations, today’s recovery is remarkably slow. Though the economy is growing, the current economic recovery is the slowest recovery in the post-war era. Four years after the recession started, the economy still has not replaced the jobs lost in the downturn. And while the economy normally grows rapidly after a steep recession, hiring rates today remain one-sixth below pre-recession levels. What’s the future hold? At current rates of job creation, the economy will not return to normal rates of unemployment until 2015.

The dismal economy is having a terrible impact on America’s workers. Sherk writes that millions of Americans have stopped trying to find jobs, and today only 63.7 percent of adult Americans are active in the labor force, meaning that they’re either employed or looking for a job. That’s the lowest level since 1983.

If you think that’s bad news, there’s even more in store for America. “Small businesses currently identify taxes and government regulations as their most important problems,” Sherk writes. “Businesses are forward-looking and fear that Congress will raise taxes to cover the cost of the recent federal spending spree.” They’re not about to get relief any time soon. On Monday, President Obama unleashed his FY 2013 budget, delivering an annual deficit exceeding $1 trillion. For those keeping score, it’s the fourth such trillion-plus budget the President has produced. Even the President’s own Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner says the level of spending is “unsustainable.”

Yesterday in testimony before Congress, Geithner admitted that “Even if Congress were to enact this budget, we would still be left with–in the outer decades as millions of Americans retire–what are still unsustainable commitments in Medicare and Medicaid.” That’s not the kind of news America’s job creators need to hear if they are to gain the kind of confidence in Washington that will encourage them to go forth, invest, and create new jobs.

But that is the story of Obamanomics — a black hole of government that sucks the energy out of America’s job-creation machine in order to fuel an ever-expanding bureaucracy. This trend must end. Washington should adopt pro-growth policies like the job-creating New Flat Tax, allow the exploration and use of American fossil fuels, pursue free trade policies, cut unnecessary regulations, and deliver a budget that gets government under control. Americans have suffered long enough, and they can’t afford to wait any longer.

Quick Hits:

• Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the 25-year-old Nigerian man who attempted to detonate explosives in his underwear on a Detroit-bound plane on Christmas Day 2009, has been sentenced to life in prison.
• The United Nations General Assembly yesterday condemned Syrian dictator Bashar al-Assad’s assault on his people, but today Syrian troops are continuing their heavy attack on the city of Homs.
• The president of Germany, Christian Wulff, resigned today in a scandal over political favors, causing political grief for chancellor Angela Merkel, who postponed a trip to Rome following the announcement.
• Google, which is already under the microscope for its privacy practices, bypassed Apple Web browser security settings in order to track iPhone users’ Web-browsing habits.
• LUNCHTIME CHAT: Join us today from 12 to 1 PM ET as Heritage education expert Lindsey Burke discusses President Obama’s decision to eliminate funding for the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program in his 2013 budget.

Fifty-five explosions rocked the city of Homs, Syria, in the span of 15 minutes. Artillery and automatic gunfire pound neighborhoods. Snipers perch on rooftops, firing at civilians. Families crowd in makeshift basement shelters to avoid the violence, and the military is reportedly on a campaign to flatten every single neighborhood where opposition can be found. This is the state of play under Bashar al-Assad’s regime of terror, and those who stand against him have died by the thousands in an 11-month revolt against the government. Amid these horrid conditions, there are actions the United States can and should take to help bring aid to this suffering people.

The explicit details of the conditions in Homs come from the eyewitness account of CNN correspondent Arwa Damon, one of the few reporters in Syria. “You can just imagine the situation people are under,” she reports, “not just from a dangerous standpoint, but the psychological impact that this is having on these families, these civilians, who are stuck in these areas unable to get to safe ground or unable to get adequate medical treatment should they be hit in these attacks.” The violence has taken its toll. To date, the regime has killed more than 7,000 people, most of whom were unarmed demonstrators, has jailed more than 10,000, and “disappeared” thousands more. Yet opposition to Assad continues in the face of escalating attacks, with some indications that the military is losing ground as the army loses thousands of defectors.

As the suffering continues, the international community has done precious little to halt the violence. The Arab League sent an observer mission to Syria but withdrew when the Assad regime failed to keep commitments to halt its repression. The United Nations has been ineffectual, with Russia repeatedly vetoing efforts by the Security Council to take action. China, which also vetoed U.N. action, is sending a diplomat to Syria but opposes regime change. And today, the U.N. is scheduled to vote on a resolution to strongly condemn the human rights violations and to back an Arab League plan to end the conflict, but the action would be non-binding, merely sending a message to the Assad regime, with no teeth attached.

Yesterday, Assad called for a national vote on a new constitution that would create a multiparty system in the country, but it’s too little, too late from the man whose family has ruled the country as an autocracy for 40 years — not to mention the fact that Assad has a long track record of breaking his promises to usher in reforms. Case in point: despite the call for a referendum, forces today began an attack on the city of Daraa. Assad’s belated concessions now are likely to have little effect in stemming the rising tide of opposition, but has been embraced by his close ally Russia, which continues to insist that he is open to political compromise.

The Heritage Foundation’s James Phillips writes that the Assad regime is on borrowed time — the vast majority of the Syrian military, though hundreds of thousands strong, is becoming increasingly unreliable. The government has only two dependable units — the Republican Guards and the 4th Armored Brigade, both of which are being stretch thin. In short, the beleaguered tyrant is slowly losing his grip on power all while the Free Syrian Army, consisting mostly of military deserters, is becoming a more organized opposition force. Desperate, the Syrian government has turned to Iran, and there are reports that the Quds Force, a special unit of Iran’s Revolutionary Guards, are fighting beside Assad’s forces.

Amid this environment, Phillips warns that the United States should not supply arms to the resistance or offer direct military intervention — an outside peacekeeping force would only get caught in the conflict and make matters worse. However, he advises that the United States can offer valuable assistance:

The U.S. can play a constructive role in the conflict by supporting efforts to deliver humanitarian aid. The U.S. should also be working closely with regional partners, especially Turkey, both to help speed the transition to a new, legitimate government and to continue diplomatic pressure and international sanctions against the Assad regime.

Ultimately, the best way forward will be for the Syrian people to win their own future without direct foreign intervention. It is with great valor that they continue to fight against Assad and to weather the storm of his violent oppression in hopes of a better tomorrow. When the smoke lifts, one can only hope that the cloud of terror and death goes with it, and that a government with true legitimacy is formed.

Quick Hits:

• Congress is a step closer to passing a $150 billion economic plan that will extend the payroll tax holiday and unemployment benefits. Negotiators reached agreement on the plan early today, and a vote could come on Friday.
• Secret three-way talks among the United States, Afghanistan, and the Taliban have begun, Afghan President Hamid Karzai told The Wall Street Journal.
• President Obama is considering cutting the U.S. nuclear arsenal by as much as 80 percent, a plan that Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) says is “reckless lunacy.”
• New York City police are beefing up security around Israeli government offices and synagogues as a precaution in light of increased tension with Iran over its pursuit of nuclear weapons.
• A recent White House decision to allow cabinet secretaries to raise money for political organizations could coerce individuals or organizations into financially supporting the president’s reelection in order to avoid a regulatory backlash. Read more about it on The Foundry.

Click here to view this post in Spanish at Libertad.org.

You don’t need to log on to President Barack Obama’s Facebook page to find out who his friends are, and you don’t need to read tea leaves, gaze into a crystal ball, or consult a psychic to learn where his priorities lie. No, you only have to take a look at his 2013 budget, just released on Monday, to see what kind of company the president keeps and to what extent he will go to lend his pals a helping hand.

The folks seated at the president’s head table haven’t changed much in the past few years — the only difference is how much is being served up in the taxpayer-funded buffet. As in the past, the president has plenty of handouts for his big labor buddies. His budget delivers a fourth consecutive annual deficit exceeding $1 trillion — and that spending goes to yet another round of not-so-shovel-ready construction projects and government “investments” totaling $178 billion. Heritage’s Patrick Knudsen writes that the spending includes the president’s favored road, bridge, and school construction projects, but “then they go alarmingly beyond the usual ‘infrastructure’ arguments to fund teachers’ pay.” In other words, unions representing the construction site and the classroom win big.

Other winners in the president’s budget are those who fit into the Administration’s vision of a green economy that is propelled not by the market’s demand, but by Obama’s whim. The 2013 budget proposes to spend $310 million to make solar energy cost-competitive without subsidies by 2020, $290 million to expand R&D on energy efficient manufacturing techniques, and $421 million in fossil energy research and development. Heritage energy expert Nicolas Loris writes that the budget “rejects the notion of a market-based energy industry and wastes taxpayer dollars at a time when we desperately need to curtail out-of-control spending.” In other words, he says, the president’s blueprint is all wrong.

There’s no clearer example of just how wrong the president’s blueprint is than his decision to increase subsidies for electric vehicles like the $41,000 Chevy Volt while ending funding for the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program (DCOSP), which gives low-income children in the nation’s capital a chance to escape underperforming schools. The White House intends to increase taxpayer-funded subsidies for those who purchase new-technology vehicles to $10,000 per buyer, up from $7,500. Keep in mind that the average income of a Volt buyer is $175,000 per year. That means that middle-class taxpayers are helping the rich buy pricy, politically correct cars.

With his other hand, President Obama is taking from the poor. The DCOSP provides $8,000 vouchers to 1,600 low-income children in the District of Columbia, empowering them to attend a school that they choose. The program has been a stunning success — though it has drawn criticism from the president’s teachers union allies. If the president gets his way, those children will pay the price.

They won’t be the only ones in their generation, though, who will suffer under the president’s budget. From a big picture perspective, the president’s budget rises from $3.8 trillion to $5.8 trillion in 2022. Putting that into context, that means outlays above 22 percent of gross domestic product — more than twice the New Deal’s share of the economy in its peak years. In constant dollars, outlays are more than three times the peak of World War II. With all that spending, someone will have to pay for it. Whose names will be on the bill? Those under 30 — America’s debt-paying generation. Their entire lives will be dominated by paying down today’s mountains of debt. And some of them are waking up to that fact.

“It will be my generation, rather than the retiring baby boomers, that will be paying off the national debt through higher income taxes,” says Amanda Winkler, 24, a Master’s Student at American University. Shaun Rabenius, 26, is a part-time construction worker and student. He says, “I have never followed politics much, except for when I vote. But in looking at the last decade, the presidencies, and the debt they have accumulated, I am scared out of my mind.”

They’re right to be worried. With a Senate that hasn’t passed a budget in well over 1,000 days and a president who seems intent on spending more, not less, without addressing the country’s underlying budgetary crisis, future generations will soon find that the winners today will make them losers tomorrow.

Quick Hits:

• As China’s presumptive next president, Xi Jinping, visits the White House, news is emerging that Chinese officials denied a visa to a top State Department envoy and refused to meet with her to discuss issues of religious freedom.
• Iran loaded domestically made nuclear fuel rods into its Tehran research reactor on Wednesday, yet another step in the country’s path toward producing atomic weapons.
• Congressional negotiators have reached agreement on a tentative deal that would extend long-term unemployment benefits and prevent cuts in doctors’ Medicare payments, the Los Angeles Times reports.
• Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu said Wednesday that “The world must denounce Iran’s terrorist activity and mark red lines on the Iranian nuclear program.”
• A bipartisan group of lawmakers yesterday promised to defend the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program for low-income families following President Obama’s decision to eliminate funding in his budget. Read more on The Foundry.

With tens of millions of Americans watching, Barack Obama stood at the West Front of the U.S. Capitol on January 20, 2009, with his left hand on the Bible and his right hand held aloft, swearing to God and country that he would preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States. Yet despite that pledge, President Obama has time and time again taken actions contrary to the principles of the founding document he swore to uphold, setting forth on a heretofore uncharted path of unconstitutionality that will fundamentally change the character of this Republic for the worse, not for the better.

Last week, America erupted in protest against one of those actions — the White House’s determination to force all insurance plans to cover, at no charge, contraceptives, abortion-inducing drugs, and sterilization as part of Obamacare. That mandate includes employers like Catholic hospitals, Christian schools, and faith-based pregnancy care centers, all of which must offer the coverage, regardless of their beliefs. This assault on the First Amendment’s protection of religious liberties met with opposition from all corners, prompting the president on Friday to address the American people and pledge his commitment to protecting religious liberties by offering an “accommodation” to these institutions — forcing insurance companies to offer free contraception so religious institutions don’t have to.

The trouble is, that “accommodation” was merely hypothetical and Obama’s commitment to protecting religious liberties was illusory. Obamacare’s anti-conscience mandate did not change in a final rule that was posted later that day. And even if the president’s hypothetical became reality, Heritage’s Jennifer Marshall explains that the religious liberty problem still remains:

It does not disentangle religious employers, since insurers will shift the burden back to religious groups through higher premiums in one form or another. Nor does it address the potential religious liberty concerns of other employers or individuals.

This is only the beginning of the problems Americans will continue to see as the Obamacare ‘essential benefits’ package takes shape. The anti-conscience mandate is a warning sign for us all of how one-size-fits-all health care requirements will trample religious liberty as well as individual liberty.

Yesterday at The Heritage Foundation, Senator Roy Blunt (R-MO) spoke of his opposition to this latest Obamacare mandate. Afterward, in an exclusive interview with Heritage, Blunt called the move a “genuine assault on First Amendment freedoms” and dismissed the president’s proposed “accommodation” as nothing more than an “accounting gimmick.” “This is not about cost. It’s about the Constitution,” Blunt said. “And if you can decide this no longer offends me because I don’t have to pay for it, I guess your concern is financial all the time and not faith-based.”

Unfortunately, the president’s disregard for the First Amendment is not his first assault on the Constitution. Earlier this year, President Obama cast aside our government’s fundamental separation of powers when he made four unconstitutional appointments without bothering to seek the advice and consent of the U.S. Senate, as the Constitution requires.

Yesterday, Senator Mike Lee (R-UT), who was among the first to warn about the consequences of the president’s unilateral action, spoke at Heritage about the ramifications of those appointments. In an exclusive interview, he explained that today, more than a month after the illegal appointments, a new director is running the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau and three members of the National Labor Relations Board are conducting business — all in blatant violation of the Constitution.

“He’s reading the Constitution in a way that’s manifestly wrong,” Lee explained. “It’s contrary to the text. It’s contrary to tradition and practice, and it’s contrary to logic.”

“This is not a partisan issue for me. I would be equally outraged if this were a Republican president doing this same thing,” Lee added. “Once this gains some momentum, this practice could be very destructive to the Senate’s prerogative of advice and consent. This is a power that doesn’t belong to the president. It belongs to the people of the United States of America.”

President Obama, of course, offers justifications for his actions. In the case of the illegal appointments, he says that he simply “can’t wait” for the Congress to act. In the case of the Obamacare contraception mandate, he insists he is acting in the best interest of the American people, while offering a “fair” accommodation to religious institutions. The trouble is that the president is measuring himself against his own subjective standard while disregarding the objective limitations on his power.

In a government where there are no practical limits on executive overreach, there are likewise no limits on the government’s ability to impose its will on the people. With the president’s trampling of religious liberties, the country is getting its first taste of the consequences of Obama’s unmitigated power grab. And if this power remains unchecked, there are certainly more consequences to come.

Quick Hits:

• Just a day after an Israeli diplomatic vehicle was bombed in India — an attack that Israel attributed to Iran — three explosions reportedly linked to Iranian nationals hit downtown Bangkok, Thailand, on Tuesday.
• President Obama wants to slash the military, and today Defense Secretary Leon Panetta and Joint Chiefs Chairman Gen. Martin Dempsey will begin three days of testimony before Congress in which they’re expected to face questions about those cuts.
• The House is considering a Republican proposal to extend the payroll tax cut through the end of the year. House GOP leadership says a vote could come this week.
• Hold on to your gas cap. The average gasoline price could soon hit $4 a gallon. Experts expect prices to rise 60 cents or more by Memorial Day weekend.
• Yesterday, President Obama released his budget for Fiscal Year 2013, and Heritage’s experts were at the ready with their response and analysis. Read more on The Foundry.

Yesterday, the newest White House chief of staff, Jack Lew, took to the Sunday talk shows to get a head start on promoting President Barack Obama’s FY2013 budget, which is set to be released today. But just as he was getting warmed up, Lew ran smack into a brick wall when he was forced to defend the Democrat-controlled Senate’s failure to pass a budget in the last 1,019 days.

“You can’t pass a budget in the Senate of the United States without 60 votes, and you can’t get 60 votes without bipartisan support,” Lew said on CNN’s State of the Union. “So unless… unless Republicans are willing to work with Democrats in the Senate, [Majority Leader] Harry Reid is not going to be able to get a budget passed.” Lew repeated the claim in a slightly different form on NBC’s Meet the Press, saying “One of the things about the United States Senate that I think the American people have realized is that it takes 60, not 50, votes to pass something.”

The trouble is, Lew is absolutely wrong. As ABC’s Jake Tapper points out, budgets only require 51 Senate votes for passage. The Washington Post‘s “Fact Checker” Glenn Kessler weighed in as well, saying that Lew, who is a two-time budget director, “really should know better.” When Tapper called the White House on the error, he says that they didn’t deny that Lew was wrong and instead spun back to blaming “general gridlock in Congress that makes accomplishing even the most basic tasks nearly impossible.”

The issue, though, is bigger than whether or not Lew twisted the truth about a procedural matter that probably escapes the interest of the vast majority of Americans. The issue is that President Obama and his allies in Congress continue to take a pass on governing by refusing to address one of the biggest issues of our time: a looming fiscal crisis that will leave Americans saddled with unacceptable levels of spending and debt. According to Congressional Budget Office long-term projections, spending will rise to as much as 34 percent of GDP, with deficits at a post-war record of 15.5 percent of GDP and debt held by the public nearly twice the size of the entire economy. Heritage’s Patrick Knudsen says President Obama should address these problems head on:

No one expects President Obama to transform into a conservative. But he cannot ignore the fundamental problems of runaway spending and debt, and he can no longer turn these problems over to fiscal commissions or super committees. If his budget for fiscal year (FY) 2013 is to be a credible policy document–not just a public relations pitch–it should:

Show specific proposals for reforming entitlements and reducing other spending not just for the next 10 years but over the long term as well; prevent the devastating cuts in defense that are looming because of the debt-reduction Budget Control Act; offer permanent solutions to the large spending and tax policies that keep vexing lawmakers and the public; and reject phony budget savings and other gimmicks.

Early details of the President’s plan are not promising. It purports to cut the deficit by $3 trillion over the next decade, with more than $1.5 trillion of that coming from new taxes on corporations and wealthy and with no structural changes to entitlements. Already, the President’s plan is drawing fire, with House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) saying, “It seems as if the President is doing little more than class envy and the status quo, which is the greatest threat to our health security, our retirement security, our national security and our economic security.”

In his budget last year, President Obama claimed government savings of the highest order — many of which were illusory and misleading gimmicks, including $1.09 trillion in spending reductions through 2021 for activities in Iraq and Afghanistan that was never going to be spent. That was on top of claiming mandatory savings from policies that were actually tax or fee increases. Meanwhile, the President is also finding “savings” by drastically cutting the military, leaving the nation with a hollowed-out force that will be unable to adequately execute its mission of defending the United States at home and abroad.

Later today, The Heritage Foundation will provide a detailed analysis of the President’s budget proposal on The Foundry. Judging by how early the White House turned on its spin machine — and Lew’s remarks on Meet the Press that “There is pretty broad agreement that the time for austerity is not today” — the news won’t be good. Expect more of the same from the White House — half measures and tax hikes, without bothering to address America’s entitlement spending crisis.

Quick Hits:

• There’s a new front opening in the fight over teacher tenure. Virginia lawmakers are debating bills that would put teachers on three-year contracts, at the end of which they could be let go for poor performance.
• With helmets, shields, and batons, police in Athens yesterday clashed with tens of thousands of protesters who are up in arms over a decision by Greece’s parliament to approve more public spending cuts in order to secure international aid.
• The House this week is considering a $260 billion transportation bill which has come under fire from conservatives for being an unaffordable boondoggle.
• The Arab League has called for the United Nations to help create a peacekeeping force in Syria, where the Assad regime is continuing its relentlessly violent crackdown on anti-government protesters.
• Governor Scott Walker (R-WI) delivered a passionate defense of Wisconsin’s reforms at the Conservative Political Action Conference on Friday night. Read about it on The Foundry.

Families and businesses have budgets, yet Washington doesn’t — and it hasn’t for the last three years. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) doesn’t think this major omission is that big of a deal, and the White House has no opinion on the matter. Fortunately, there are leaders in the House who see the importance of passing a budget and getting runaway spending and escalating debt under control.

For Congress, the budget is an outline of how and where money will be spent across the federal government and how high taxes and borrowing will be. The budget guides all spending, tax, and reform bills that must be passed during the year, and Congress is obligated to pass one every year. Despite those facts — and even with a $15 trillion national debt — Senator Reid last week said, “We do not need to bring a budget to the floor this year,” disavowing the entire budgeting process — and his responsibility, right along with it.

On Wednesday, ABC’s Jake Tapper asked White House press secretary Jay Carney where the President stands on the Senate’s failure to pass a budget, particularly in light of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke’s statement that the lack of a budget has had an adverse effect on economic growth. Carney’s response: “Well, I don’t have an opinion to express on how the Senate does its business with regards to this issue.”

For the record, the White House has had plenty of time to formulate an opinion. For those keeping count — and The Heritage Foundation certainly is — America’s do-nothing Senate has gone 1,017 days without passing a budget, opting instead to pass a variety of continuing resolutions and omnibus spending bills to keep the government running. This is just a way to pass the buck on making real decisions about spending priorities, while Washington keeps burning money at the current rate.

The trouble is, that current rate is a disaster. But, of course, Reid has an excuse for why passing a budget isn’t necessary — he says Congress already imposed a spending cap in last summer’s Budget Control Act (BCA). It’s an argument the American people shouldn’t be buying, and it’s one that Reid shouldn’t be selling. Heritage’s Patrick Knudsen explains that the BCA was nothing more than “a poor substitute for a budget resolution — a rushed, eleventh-hour ‘solution’ to a manufactured debt ceiling crisis.” And the cap that Reid is relying on? It only affects about a third of total spending and is full of deliberate loopholes that make the caps all but meaningless.

Why does a budget matter? It’s all about priorities. And if Washington doesn’t govern with one, well, it isn’t governing. Instead, Congress is avoiding the tough decisions it must make to get our twin crises of spending and debt under control. The first step to doing that is to pass a budget, like the House did last year and intends to this year. Otherwise, spending will continue to spiral out of control, and no choices will be made about what is important and what is not.

We’re already seeing the effects. Remember that “super committee” that was supposed to come up with another $1.2 trillion for deficit reduction? It failed as predicted, and now the U.S. military is threatened with devastating cuts that will render it a hollow force, unable to adequately carry out its mission. Likewise, entitlement programs are reaching the tipping point with spending set to more than double by 2050 as more and more babyboomers flood into the programs and health care costs continue to rise. As spending on entitlements and other programs spirals out of control, it will drive publicly held debt upwards of 300 percent of Gross Domestic Product. This is an untenable situation both economically and morally as younger generations will be on the front lines of paying for this mess.

There is, however, a ray of light coming out of Washington. Last year, the House passed a strong budget under House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan’s (R-WI) leadership. And it continued that work this week by speedily passing several budget process reform bills. Two of the measures would enhance transparency by helping measure the cost of legislation and by requiring the Congressional Budget Office to measure the economic impact of legislation. A bill passed last week targets one of the greatest enablers of hidden spending increases: the automatic inflation increases to discretionary spending baselines. And on Wednesday, a bipartisan bill passed with an additional tool to restrain spending. A total of ten budget process reform bills are planned.

Those are good first steps, but the rest of Washington remains out of step. Senator Reid has told the nation he will continue to shirk his budgeting responsibility. On Monday, one week late, the White House will kick off the annual budgeting process with the release of President Obama’s budget proposal. For the President’s FY 2013 budget to be serious, it will need to reverse the rise of spending and debt with specific, credible policy proposals. Another year of fig leaf proposals with more spending and higher taxes will allow Harry Reid and the Senate to pass the buck again.

Quick Hits:

• The Nuclear Regulatory Commission has approved the construction of two new atomic energy reactors in Georgia, set to cost $14 billion. While it’s good news, Heritage nuclear expert Jack Spencer says “I don’t think this is the beginning of a full-scale renaissance” for the nuclear industry.
• Conservative activists are gathering this weekend at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, D.C. Republican presidential candidates are scheduled to address the conference today.
• Two bomb blasts struck Syrian military and security buildings in Aleppo today, leaving 25 people dead. No one has claimed responsibility for the attacks.
• Workers in Greece are marching to parliament by the thousands in protest of wage cuts included as part of the country’s austerity package. The country’s cabinet is due to endorse the measures today.
• LUNCHTIME CHAT: The Obama Administration is trampling on religious freedom with its mandate that religious organizations provide coverage for contraception and what many people believe are abortion-inducing drugs. Join us today from 12 to 1 PM as we discuss the ramifications.

Click here to view this post in Spanish on Libertad.org.

When John F. Kennedy was President, just over a quarter of federal spending went to fund programs paying for some 21.7 million Americans to be dependent on Uncle Sam. But as high as that spending and dependence on the federal government was then, it has exploded today, with one in five Americans — more than 67.3 million — depending on Washington for assistance.

The Heritage Foundation’s 2012 Index of Dependence on Government shows an alarming trend under the Obama Administration of a level of dependence on our government that has never been seen before. Today, a full 70 percent of the federal government’s budget goes to pay for housing, food, income, student aid, or other assistance, with recipients ranging from college students to retirees to welfare beneficiaries. Heritage’s Patrick Tyrrell writes that other findings from the study show:

• Government dependency jumped 8.1 percent in the past year, with the most assistance going toward housing, health and welfare, and retirement.
• The federal government spent more taxpayer dollars than ever before in 2011 to subsidize Americans. The average individual who relies on Washington could receive benefits valued at $32,748, more than the nation’s average disposable personal income ($32,446).
• At the same time, nearly half of the U.S. population (49.5 percent) does not pay any federal income taxes.
• In the next 25 years, more than 77 million baby boomers will retire. They will begin collecting checks from Social Security, drawing benefits from Medicare, and relying on Medicaid for long-term care.
• As of now, 70 percent of the federal government’s budget goes to individual assistance programs, up dramatically in just the past few years. However, research shows that private, community, and charitable aid helps individuals rise from their difficulties with better success than federal government handouts. Plus, local and private aid is often more effectively distributed.

Representative Allen West (R-FL) writes on The Foundry that this disturbing trend does not bode well for our country and, in fact, will ultimately lead to an America where dependence — not independence — becomes the norm. And he says Washington must play a role in changing course while also encouraging charities and community groups to help lift up Americans who need support:

We in Congress need to do our part to aid the struggle for more personal responsibility. We need to reduce government spending levels so we are taking less from America’s producers of economic growth. We need to take a long, hard look at these assistance programs, eliminating duplicative efforts and directing aid first to the neediest of our population.

We also have to embolden charities, local groups, and private-sector initiatives to empower individuals through programs that require more “skin in the game.” Far too often, these good Samaritans are pushed aside by government zeal to provide inferior and bureaucratized services. And finally, we need to reform entitlement programs like Medicare and Social Security so that they are viable for future generations without bankrupting our country.

With America about to witness the largest retirement of people in world history — and with the number of “taxpayers” who pay no taxes only continuing to grow — alarm bells should be ringing in Washington and across the country warning that the federal government is about to burst at the seams. The United States simply cannot afford to continue fostering a society where a growing number of people are dependent on the federal government and not themselves. What’s more, if this trend continues, America will see increasing division between those who pay for programs that advance dependence, and those who unquestioningly accept–and expect–the assistance from those programs.

The Heritage Foundation’s Saving the American Dream plan offers policy solutions to fix the debt, cut spending, reform entitlements, and restore prosperity, enabling the people of this country to thrive and succeed — without depending on the government. And those kinds of reforms are desperately needed if America is to gain control over its $15 trillion debt and its exploding entitlement system so that the people can produce for themselves, not for Washington.

Quick Hits:

• The U.S. government is moving up plans to withdraw 8,000 Marines from the island of Okinawa while also scaling back plans to build key bases in Japan and Guam, all due to political obstacles and budget constraints, The Washington Post reports.
• California and New York are set to join nearly all the other states in reaching a $25 billion foreclosure settlement with the nation’s largest banks. At issue are allegations of improper foreclosures based on “robosigning,” seizures made without proper paperwork.
• The Obama Administration will grant 10 states waivers to the No Child Left Behind law, with 28 other states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico indicating that they, too, will seek waivers.
• Google is facing increased efforts by a consumer watchdog group that is trying to block the company’s new privacy policy from taking effect. Under the policy, Google would be able to harvest more information about its users.
• A new National Labor Relations Board regulation that expedites elections for union representation will likely lead to dramatically higher rates of unionization, Scribe reports. Read about it on The Foundry.

Click here to read the Spanish version on Libertad.org