The Illinois Opportunity Project (IOP) announced today that it is making a $500,000 donation to the campaign of State Representative Ken Dunkin, a Chicago Democrat.
IOP promotes public policy solutions rooted in economic liberty and the leaders who advance such solutions. We are policy-focused and thus post-partisan.
As such, IOP decided that a substantial financial commitment is warranted to support State Rep. Ken Dunkin against the onslaught he is facing from House Speaker Mike Madigan and his public sector union allies in the March primary election.
Rep. Dunkin has consistently shown independent thinking and provided support in policy areas of critical importance including: (1) protecting honest, adversarial collective bargaining between the governor and public sector unions representing state employees, and (2) ending the discrimination against children based on their household income and address when it comes to the primary and secondary schools they may attend. Dunkin’s support for certain structural reforms well predate the election of Gov. Bruce Rauner. For example, in 2010, Dunkin voted for the school choice legislation (SB 2494) sponsored by then State Sen. James Meeks.
We hope Rep. Dunkin’s example of acting in furtherance of his constituents rather than toeing the party line established by Speaker Madigan will be followed by more of his colleagues in the House.
In Liberty,
Matthew Besler
President
Illinois Opportunity Project
The Illinois Opportunity Project (IOP) announced today that it is making a $500,000 donation to the campaign of State Representative Ken Dunkin, a Chicago Democrat
Opposing opinion on our Government coming for our guns
It’s Official. They are Coming for Our Guns…
Now they are ready to make their move and I predict it will consist of a number of assaults on the American people. In fact, some of them are already in the works:
- The DOJ is floating the claim that the UN Small Arms Treaty is now the law of the land despite the fact that it has never been submitted to the U.S. Senate for ratification by a two thirds majority as required by the U. S. Constitution. This means that Obama plans to enforce the provisions of the treaty without ratification and despite the fact that in 1957 the Supreme Court ruled that no treaty, even if signed by the President and ratified by the Senate can override the protection of individual rights guaranteed to Americans in the Constitution.
- Obama’s enforcement of the UN treaty will include prohibiting the importation of firearms or replacement parts from other countries into the U.S, and providing a list to the UN of all American gun owners, importers, and exporters. In order to legally facilitate this, Congress would have to repeal the ban on funding of a national gun registration. However, I believe Obama plans on doing this by another illegal and unconstitutional Executive Order.
- To continue and escalate the effort to disarm American veterans. The private medical records of veterans are being turned over illegally to the FBI so that they can be put on the NICS list of people who cannot legally purchase firearms because of mental illness. However, mental illness of these veterans is based on minor PTSD, suffering from minor depression, or even letting their spouses pay the family bills. There is no adjudication of mental illness to the point of being a danger to themselves or others as required by law.
- Veterans are also being required to tell the VA if they own firearms, how they feel about the federal government and/or the Obama administration and in some cases forced to submit to a strip search to determine if they have any “radical tattoos”. No definition of what constitutes a radical tattoo is provided.
- Obama has by an illegal and unconstitutional amendment to the Affordable Care Act overridden the prohibition on doctors to question their patients about gun ownership. Obama has called on pediatricians to question children about whether their parents have a gun in their home. Just recently I have also learned that seniors newly enrolling in Medicare are being required, when they go to a doctor for a routine physical, to take a test to determine if they are showing signs of Alzheimer’s disease. The questions include repeating a sequence of numbers and letters and other memory type questions and then there is the question about whether they own a firearm. Obviously, this information is then sent to the Federal government.
- Obama has also issued an Executive order that is being enforced by new HHS regulations that virtually set aside the HIPP law that protects the privacy of medical records. Under these new regulations, if your records contain anything indicating you have ever been depressed, had PTSD or taken certain medications your records will be turned over to the FBI and you will be put on the NICS list. This will apply to everyone, not just veterans.
- Obama also has the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms changing the definition of mental illness to provide that anyone can be declared mentally ill to the point of being a danger to themselves or others for any reason without an adjudication of any kind, and therefore can be prohibited from owning firearms. This is already happening in states like New York that have adopted similar laws and regulations. A citizen of New York has been declared mentally ill and had his guns seized because he was seeking treatment for insomnia.
- In the meantime, we have a Republican Senator casting the deciding vote to confirm Obama’s appointment of a Surgeon General who believes that gun ownership constitutes a health threat. We have the EPA moving to control the manufacture of ammunition because it claims that the use of lead in ammo produces a threat to the environment.
- The Department of Justice will continue its campaign to force banks to deny loans and even bank accounts to firearms dealers and will continue to harass them in other ways to force them out of business.
In other words, multiple resources of the Federal Government and some state governments are going to be used to take our firearms, but we can and must fight back. As the Executive Director of the United States Justice Foundation (www.usjf.net) I plan on taking the following actions to:
- Contact members of the U.S. Senate and urge them to refile the “Veterans Second Amendment Protection Act” that will stop the efforts of the VA to disarm America’s heroes. This law was previously defeated by Democrats in the Senate.
- Continue our representation of individual veterans in their fights to reverse declarations that they are incompetent to handle their own financial affairs and cannot own firearms. We have won some recent victories in this effort.
- File suits against the VA, FBI, DHS, and DOD to force them to comply with our Freedom of Information Act requests to gain documents about the attacks on veterans by these agencies.
- Continue our involvement in lawsuits against states that are implementing and enforcing unconstitutional gun control laws.
- Offer our support to any members of Congress who file suit against Obama to stop his use of illegal Executive Orders to implement gun control and other unconstitutional actions.
- Continue to support the Constitutional Sheriffs and Peace Officers Association (CSPOA) in their efforts to recruit law enforcement leaders around the country to pledge that they will not allow unconstitutional laws or regulations to be enforced in their jurisdictions.
Sanders Campaign Says It Was Informed By Iowa Dem. Party That Results From 90 Precincts Are Missing
CNN reported that the Iowa Democratic Party said it would need to “re-stage” the results of the caucuses in those 90 counties.
https://twitter.com/WPJohnWagner?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw
With 98 percent of the precincts reporting, Clinton only led Sanders by 0.3 points, 49.8 percent to Sanders’ 49.6 percent.
A spokesperson for the Iowa Democratic Party did not immediately respond to TheBlaze’s request for comment.
Obama was never a professor; he was a lecturer
From American Thinker:
Lie one: Obama was never a professor; he was a lecturer. He did not have the qualifications to be a professor. Obama never published a single law paper. He was hired by the University of Chicago when they learned he had been given a book contract on race and law directly after graduating from Harvard. There was no book – just the contract, which he later reneged on. This is not the normal level of accomplishment for a University of Chicago professor or even lecturer.
Obama was not capable of writing, and eventually, after failing to deliver, he changed it to a memoir, which he also struggled with. Finally, he asked Bill Ayers to write his memoir for him, using tapes that Michelle dropped off at the Ayerses’.
Lie two: Obama did not specialize in the Constitution. Obama cared about and taught only one subject: race. One course was about race in the Constitution. It is on this flimsy basis that he attempts to pawn himself off as a constitutional scholar.
As the New York Times explains, Obama the lecturer taught three subjects only: “race, rights and gender.”
Lie three: Obama calls himself a constitutional law prof to imply that he loves the Constitution. Obama gives the lie to this himself. He is on record – literally, a radio interview done when he was a lecturer – slamming the Supreme Court’s interpretation of the Constitution because they never tried to invent a right to “redistribute wealth” – a failing he describes as a “tragedy of the civil rights movement.” Obama laments the constraints on government power (what we would call liberty) imposed by our Constitution. Obama himself contrasts following the Constitution with being a community organizer, creating “coalitions of power,” which could “redistribute wealth” and create “economic justice.”
It seems the majority of leftists have an issue with telling the truth, desiring to make themselves feel special and more important than they actually are.
Caterpillar Inc. announced another series of job cuts
From Illinois Policy Institute 1/292016
Peoria-based Caterpillar Inc. announced another series of painful job cuts on Jan. 29, trimming five facilities and 670 jobs in Illinois and several other states. The company will cut 230 jobs from office and production workers in its East Peoria, Ill., facility, and place another 120 employees from the same campus on indefinite layoff.
The cuts come as part of Caterpillar’s plan, announced in September 2015, to reduce its global workforce by 10,000. About half of those planned cuts were for management and salaried employees, and the other half will come from the consolidation of 20 of Caterpillar’s 103 manufacturing facilities worldwide.
Over the Great Recession era, manufacturing work opportunities have shrunk dramatically around Caterpillar’s Peoria headquarters. According to county-level data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Peoria and Tazewell counties saw a combined net reduction of nearly 6,800 manufacturing jobs between January 2008 and June 2015, with the total jobs count dropping to 21,457 from 28,224. That amounts to the elimination of one quarter of all manufacturing jobs in the two-county area.
After a big loss at the outset of the recession, the two-county area regained manufacturing jobs until the middle of 2012. Since then, manufacturing losses have resumed, and, as of June 2015, the most recent month of data, manufacturing jobs in Peoria and Tazewell counties had dropped to within 40 jobs of the counties’ combined all-time low.
Prior to Caterpillar’s September 2015 layoff announcement, the company had already reduced its global workforce by 31,000 since 2012.
Included in those earlier cuts was a June 2014 announcement of the closing of three plants in Sterling and Dixon, Ill., which were to be consolidated and moved to similar production facilities in Menominee, Mich. At the time, Caterpillar spokeswoman Rachel Potts said, “[T]he location in Menominee is a better location for efficiency reasons.”
Other Illinois layoffs will result from Caterpillar’s plans, announced in March 2015, to relocate 230 jobs from Joliet to Mexico to “remain cost competitive.”
Caterpillar is facing tremendous global headwinds, as weak growth abroad and plummeting commodities prices have sunk demand for its products in the mining and energy production industries. Moving forward, CEO Doug Oberhelman said, “I’m confident these additional steps will better position Caterpillar to deliver solid results when demand improves.”
Illinois can prepare for renewed global demand by getting its house in order, so that when Caterpillar and companies like it begin hiring again, Illinoisans will get the jobs, rather than workers in other states or countries. Oberhelman addressed this topic in a February 2012 op-ed in the Springfield State Journal-Register in which he wrote:
“In short, when Caterpillar and most other companies look to locate a new factory in the United States, Illinois is not in the running for such projects.”
For Illinois to be in the running for factory development and expansions, Oberhelman said Illinois needs at least two things:
- A long-term, sustainable budget that relieves pressures on taxpayers, with the 2011 tax hike to sunset as planned
- Dramatically lower workers’ compensation costs
In closing his 2012 article, Oberhelman called for action, saying:
“Business leaders are making decisions today on where to invest in the future. Illinois must act now, with a bipartisan sense of urgency, to position itself for future job creation that is being discussed in boardrooms all across the country.”
State government failed to enact these needed reforms four years ago, and jobless Illinoisans are suffering for it today. During the last four years, Illinois is the only state in the entire Midwest to lose manufacturing jobs. Enough is enough. It’s time for tax and regulatory reform so that Illinois workers can compete for jobs again.
Supporters of Senator Ted Cruz to gather the evening of the Iowa Caucus
For Immediate Release Contacts:
Steve Orlando (630) 309-3344
Yvonne Bolton (815) 272-1110 Steve Balich (815) 557-7196
Illinois Supporters of Senator Ted Cruz to gather the evening of the Iowa Caucus
Enthusiasm for the Texas Senator’s campaign for President heats up in the Land of Lincoln
The media is invited to a gathering of supporters of Ted Cruz’s Presidential campaign as the results of the Iowa Caucus roll in on Monday evening, February 1st, 2016. The event will take place starting at 7:00pm at the Diplomat West Banquet Hall, located at 681 W. North Avenue in Elmhurst, IL (conveniently located near IL Route 83 and North Avenue). The Iowa Caucus is the first contest of the Presidential Season. Voters in Illinois will have their voices heard regarding the presidential race on Tuesday, March 15th.
Diplomat West Banquet Hall 681 W. North Ave. Elmhurst, IL 60126 7:PM until ?
Lack of understanding about all things Second Amendment.
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Are You Satisfied or Merely Distracted?
By Stephanie Shirely
Thanks to technology and society telling us it’s normal and expected to be connected 24/7, we have found more ways than ever to live life distracted. We have become accustomed to consuming multiple forms of media at a time, so much so, that watching TV is often accompanied by surfing our phones for social media updates.
I am just as guilty as the rest of the world. I have caught myself checking my phone with one hand, answering an email with another hand and fooling myself into believe I’m still paying attention to the TV show playing in the background. During these moments in life, I feel productive, entertained and comfortable. But am I mistaking these feelings for happiness?
The question I pose today is this…amidst all of the distractions we use to take our attention off of feeling undesirable emotions like boredom, loneliness, doubt and sadness, are we skirting around the hard, but paramount task of seeking out true satisfaction in our lives?
A few weeks ago, I was listening to a thought-provoking lecture that cautioned us not to mistake satisfaction for distraction. By nature, we as humans have found countless ways to distract ourselves (i.e. procrastination) from the real task at hand, often because it’s more work. But we’re not fooling anyone. The repercussions of our distracted lives can be found all around us. How many “friends” do you have on Facebook versus how many friends you talk to (I mean real, meaningful conversations) on a weekly basis?
The blinking light of a social media update should not be valued higher than your family conversation around the dinner table. The distractions around us are tempting, and sometimes warranted, but for the most part they are futile attempts to fill a void that can only be filled by seeking true satisfaction – whatever that means to you.
The life lesson I want to share is this. We can continue down this slippery slope of distracting ourselves into believing we are satisfied in life, but we will always need to find more and better distractions to make us believe we are “happy.” Or we can start today by taking a closer look at our lives and the relationships that form our happiness. And the first step is to close our laptops during the evenings and weekends, turn off our phones when spending time with loved ones and seek satisfaction before distraction.
It’s a crazy, but simple notion – so simple that unless these two words were brought my attention in stark comparison, I might never have considered how satisfaction could be mistaken for distraction (and vice versa). It really makes me think about my intentions when I’m tempted to pick up my phone at dinner or check my email during family time. If I’m desiring the feeling of distraction, maybe there’s a void I need to fill first and foremost with true satisfaction that is far more lasting.
Take a constructive look at your own happiness. Would you say you are truly satisfied or merely distracted? If you feel compelled to share your insights, I’d love to hear your personal response to this deep question!
Clinton emails some to secret to show congress
Tags: Hillary Clinton | US | Clinton | Emails
‘Top Secret’ Info Found in Clinton Emails
Image: ‘Top Secret’ Info Found in Clinton Emails
Saturday, 30 Jan 2016 07:11 AM
The Obama administration has confirmed for the first time that Hillary Clinton’s home server contained closely guarded government secrets, censoring 22 emails that contained material requiring one of the highest levels of classification. The revelation came three days before Clinton competes in the Iowa presidential caucuses.
State Department officials also said the agency’s Diplomatic Security and Intelligence and Research bureaus are investigating if any of the information was classified at the time of transmission, going to the heart of Clinton’s defense of her email practices.
The department published its latest batch of emails from her time as secretary of state Friday evening.
But The Associated Press learned ahead of the release that seven email chains would be withheld in full for containing “top secret” information. The 37 pages include messages a key intelligence official recently said concerned “special access programs” —highly restricted, classified material that could point to confidential sources or clandestine programs like drone strikes.
“The documents are being upgraded at the request of the intelligence community because they contain a category of top secret information,” State Department spokesman John Kirby told the AP, calling the withholding of documents in full “not unusual.” That means they won’t be published online with others being released, even with blacked-out boxes.
Department officials wouldn’t describe the substance of the emails, or say if Clinton sent any herself.
Clinton, the Democratic presidential front-runner, insists she never sent or received information on her personal email account that was classified at the time. No emails released so far were marked classified, but reviewers previously designated more than 1,000 messages at lower classification levels. Friday’s will be the first at top secret level.
Even if Clinton didn’t write or forward the messages, she still would have been required to report any classification slippages she recognized in emails she received. But without classification markings, that may have been difficult, especially if the information was publicly available.
“We firmly oppose the complete blocking of the release of these emails,” Clinton campaign spokesman Brain Fallon said. “Since first providing her emails to the State Department more than one year ago, Hillary Clinton has urged that they be made available to the public. We feel no differently today.”
Fallon accused the “loudest and leakiest participants” in a process of bureaucratic infighting for withholding the exchanges. The documents, he said, originated in the State Department’s unclassified system before they ever reached Clinton, and “in at least one case, the emails appear to involve information from a published news article.”
“This appears to be overclassification run amok,” Fallon said.
Kirby said the State Department was focused, as part of a Freedom of Information Act review of Clinton’s emails, on “whether they need to be classified today.” Past classification questions, he said, “are being, and will be, handled separately by the State Department.” It is the first indication of such a probe.
Department responses for classification infractions could include counseling, warnings or other action, officials said. They wouldn’t say if Clinton or senior aides who’ve since left government could face penalties. The officials weren’t authorized to speak on the matter and demanded anonymity.
Separately, Kirby said the department withheld eight email chains, totaling 18 messages, between President Barack Obama and Clinton. These are remaining confidential “to protect the president’s ability to receive unvarnished advice and counsel,” and will be released eventually like other presidential records.
The emails have been a Clinton campaign issue since 10 months ago, when the AP discovered her exclusive use while in office of a homebrew email server in the basement of her family’s New York home. Doing so wasn’t expressly forbidden. Clinton first called the decision a matter of convenience, then a mistake.
Last March, Clinton and the State Department said no business conducted in the emails included top-secret matters. Both said her account was never hacked or compromised, which security experts assess as unlikely.
Clinton and the State Department also claimed the vast majority of her emails were preserved properly for archiving because she corresponded mainly with government accounts. They’ve backtracked from that claim in recent months.
The special access programs emails surfaced last week, when Charles I. McCullough, lead auditor for U.S. intelligence agencies, told Congress he found some in Clinton’s account.
Kirby confirmed the “denied-in-full emails” are among those McCullough recently cited. He said one was among those McCullough identified last summer as possibly containing top secret information.
The AP reported last August that one focused on a forwarded news article about the CIA’s classified U.S. drone program. Such operations are widely discussed publicly, including by top U.S. officials, and State Department officials debated McCullough’s claim. The other concerned North Korean nuclear weapons programs, according to officials.
At the time, several officials from different agencies suggested the disagreement over the drone emails reflected a tendency to overclassify material, and a lack of consistent classification policies across government.
The FBI also is looking into Clinton’s email setup, but has said nothing about the nature of its probe. Independent experts say it’s unlikely Clinton will be charged with wrongdoing, based on details that have surfaced so far and the lack of indications she intended to break laws.
“What I would hope comes out of all of this is a bit of humility” and Clinton’s acknowledgement that “I made some serious mistakes,” said Bradley Moss, a Washington lawyer specializing in security clearance matters.
Legal questions aside, it’s the potential political costs that probably more concern Clinton. She has struggled in surveys measuring perceived trustworthiness and any investigation, buoyed by evidence of top secret material coursing through her account, could negate a main selling point for her becoming commander in chief: her national security resume.
Read Latest Breaking News from Newsmax.com http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/US-Clinton-
We treat the truly vulnerable in Illinois as cannon fodder
“I think it’s disgraceful that we treat the truly vulnerable in Illinois as cannon fodder…” Dan Proft
Dan Proft appeared on WTTW Chicago Tonight on 1/26/16.
As of this week, Illinois has fewer drug and alcohol rehabilitation programs, less home care for senior citizens and housing for youth in need, fewer re-entry programs for ex-prisoners, mental health counseling services and assistance for veterans.
Those are just some of cuts made by the state’s largest social service provider due to the state budget impasse.
Lutheran Social Services of Illinois announced it was slashing 750 jobs and suspending 30 programs because the state has not reimbursed the agency for $6 million in services already delivered.
“There is really no good excuse for the tragic loss of those kinds of services,” Gov. Bruce Rauner said on Monday. “It’s inexcusable for us not to have a budget by now. We could have and should have done this many months ago.”
The organization, which opened in 1867 and provided services in 2015 to 73,000 people, says that as a result of these cuts, about 4,700 people in need will no longer receive services from LSSI.
“It has been an agonizing process, particularly its impact on our clients and their families who depend on us for their care, as well as our employees whose jobs were eliminated,” Mark A. Stutrud, LSSI president and CEO said in a news release. “Many of our employees are direct care personnel who have built relationships and strong trust with the people they serve.”
Programs aimed at helping seniors are among those that saw the largest cuts, according to LSSI. “These decisions were the result of a thorough and painful process,” Stutrud said.
Joining us to talk about the cuts are David Novak, Vice President for Advancement and Communications at Lutheran Social Services of Illinois; and Dan Proft, a senior fellow at the Illinois Policy Institute, a free market policy research organization in Chicago and talk show host on WIND 560-AM.
“It was really programs that were directly linked to the non-payment for services that we had already provided,” said David Novak. “We really have exhausted all the avenues available to us. At the end of the day, we just didn’t have the capacity or the cash wherewithal to handle $6 million of not being paid.”
“I think it’s disgraceful that we treat the truly vulnerable in Illinois as cannon fodder for a big government agenda from which they derive no benefit,” said Dan Proft.
