Allen Tharp Appeared Friday on Fox News Your World w/Cavuto  to Explain the Lawsuit

By Allen Tharp, President San Antonio Tea Party

This past Thursday (May 2) my company and I joined two other employers and four individuals in a lawsuit against the Federal government filed in the District Court for the District of Columbia.  The case has already generated media attention, as it should, to the Federal government’s overstepping its bounds with the employer mandate for subsidies under Obamacare.  Let me share with you why we have taken this action. (See the complaint and a Washington Wire story from the Wall Street Jounal for more details.)

I believe that it is important to stand up against legislation like Obamacare that will be so tremendously damaging to our economy.  So I am doing my part to fight, not only for the continued viability of small business,  but also for employees’ right to work full time.  Most small businesses can’t afford the added costs of Obamacare and  have to cut employee hours to less than 30 hours per week to avoid costly fines that would result in business closures.  Obamacare is forcing us into a part-time society, where employers can no longer afford to provide full-time schedules, and employees are forced to either work less hours or take additional work with more than one employer.

Obamacare authorizes health insurance subsidies only to qualifying individuals who live in states that created their own healthcare exchanges.  Those subsidies trigger the employer mandate, which equates to a $2,000 penalty on the employer for every employee.

The San Antonio Tea Party stands with other Patriotic Americans in saluting the 46 United States Senators who stood tall yesterday in defeating the Schumer-Toomey-Manchin Amendment, including our own two Texas Senators, John Cornyn and Ted Cruz.  Their principled stand against this proposed infringement of all Americans’ Second Amendment Rights is only overshadowed by the sad fact that 55 Senators would vote to take away these rights.

The Constitution is the law of the land.  If proponents of changing it can get two-thirds of the both Houses of Congress to vote on a change to the Second Amendment through the Constitutional process and then three-fourths of the States to ratify it, then that would become the Law of the Land.  But for the Senate to act as a de facto Constitutional Convention without due process violates everything we as free Americans stand for and should be opposed by every quarter.

We in the San Antonio Tea Party support those who would abide by the Laws of the Land and will forevermore uphold the rights of all our countrymen to keep and bear arms as provided by the Constitution.

Based on the ceaseless torrent of dire predictions by Obama and his henchmen that were flooding the airways during the last two weeks of February 2013, we should all now be hunkered down in our bunkers fighting off marauding bands of unemployed teachers, police, fire fighters, and of course those TSA agents wielding those confiscated nail clippers and dangerous bottles of shampoo.

Well, at least sequestration was supposed to bring about a post-apocalyptic world until Republicans miraculously decided not to capitulate again and raise taxes again to replace the sequester Obama birthed in 2011.  This left Obama scrambling at the end of Februrary to back away from his absurd predictions of armageddon.

A couple of factors that were instrumental in precipatating this abrupt change were:  1. Bob Woodward’s article forcing Obama to tell the truth about the sequester’s origin, and 2.  Republican leadership surprisingly failed to cave this time, like they have so predictably done everytime before.

Woodward’s piece made it crystal clear that the Obama administration themselves had introduced the very concept they now condemned and that they had previously insisted upon adoption of sequestration as part of a deal to raise the debt ceiling. Shortly after that Speaker Boehner and Majority Leader Cantor decided that it would be politically expedient to stand up to the demagogue in chief and allow the sequester to go in to effect in order to avoid yet more tax hikes on hard working Americans..

The back-pedaling began when it became clear these “cuts” were going to happen and the administration’s lies and exaggerations were going to be exposed to the masses when the purported Armageddon would fail to materialize.

Perhaps when Obama said his administration would be the most transparent in history, he was referring to the lies they would tell which were so transparent as to be humorous.

In a true theater of the absurd, Rep. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., predicted 170 million jobs would be lost if the sequester happened.  Never mind that there are not even that many jobs in the entire country.

Obama posed ridiculous questions like, “Are you going to hurt the poor kids or the disabled kids,” as if these were our only choices.  He also said he would have to choose which shipyard to shut down. Total nonsense.

Obama said that “Thousands of teachers and educators will be laid off,” although no federal education program operated by the Department of Education directly funds teacher salaries because it is a state and local responsibility.

Education secretary Arne Duncan falsely asserted that public school teachers were already receiving pink slips because of the sequester.

Janet Napolitano, the Secretary of the Department of Homeland Security, lied that the waits in airports were 150% to 200% as long as we’d normally expect thanks to the sequester.

Obama said that “Air traffic controllers and airport security will see cutbacks, which means more delays at airports across the country.”  False. “Officials representing a dozen major airports said there were few if any unusual flight delays or lines at security or customs checkpoints” since the sequester started.   Most people understand that there is plenty of waste and inefficiency at the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). In fact, a congressional report “found that TSA is wasting hundreds of millions of taxpayer dollars.” Another report found that the TSA “has continually grown its ranks despite fewer travelers.”

Rep. Donna Edwards (D-Md.) said that if the sequester goes into effect, women who are victims of domestic violence will be forced to stay in their homes with their abuser at the hands of the GOP.  Edwards said $20 million in cuts will be made from programs funded by the Violence against Women Act as a result of the sequester.  However, According to the Justice Department, the Office on Violence Against Women (OVW) operated on a budget of $412.5 million during fiscal year 2012 and has requested the same amount of funding for this fiscal year.

Obama’s top economic aide, Gene Sperling, admitted that the White House had first suggested the sequester idea during budget talks in 2011. That admission came after officials had spent weeks lying that the sequester was a GOP proposal. Obama made the same claim during a TV debate.

Reporters also debunked Obama’s claim that sequester-related cuts were causing Capitol Hill pay cuts, marking numerous false claims in one week.

To compound the absurdity of the political theater we were all subjected to, there really are no actual cuts under sequestration.  The so-called cuts are really only decreases in the growth of government spending; they are spending just as much under sequestration as they did the previous year.  How could that be?  Well, In Washington a “cut” is not necessarily a cut.  In this case, it was merely a nominal decrease in the rate at which government plans to increase spending.  When it comes to the Federal government, spending cuts are almost always just rhetorical gimmicks to mislead the uninformed public and totally unrelated to any real decrease in spending.  That is why spending continues to increase every year unabated, despite all the political jibber-jabber to the contrary.

The reason spending still continues to increase, although we are already trillions in debt and have already undergone a credit rating decrease, is that congress benefits from all the spending because they can buy votes with all their giveaways to the various special interest constituent groups.  It is destroying the economic viability of the country but doing wonders for re-election campaigns.  This is surely the most selfish and dangerous aspect of our political system.

While the general populace tends not to pay much attention to government actions, many did pick up on the long string of inconsistencies and hyperbole over the sequester.  Many have seen the steady stream of reports of government waste:  expensive parties, unnecessary conventions, lavish travel and accommodations for government officials, and all manner of waste.  So the idea of a minor decrease in the amount of increase in government spending causing end times is seen as laughable and was the Achilles heel for Obama’s failed messaging.

Now, we have had big spenders in the Whitehouse before.  George W. Bush ran an average deficit of $500 billion per year during his failed eight years in office.  There are a couple of big differences between the Obama administration and any previous administration in our lifetimes though.   First, Obama is by far outspending even Bush or any other previous president and has more than doubled the annual deficits run by bush.  We are likely already past the tipping point and may very likely see the total collapse of our economy as a direct result of the overspending that has already been done.  Second, Obama is the only president in history who has tried to visit intentional harm on the citizens of this country.  Certainly there are other presidents who have made stupid, ill-advised decisions, but I do not doubt their good intentions.  Now for the first time we have a president that is using his office to intentionally hurt US citizens so he can gain some political advantage over his opponents who sought to slow the growth of the national debt.

In the week since sequestration went into effect, emails have come to light proving that this administration wants to prioritize spending cuts in a way that will be the most visible and harmful so that his dire predictions will be proven to be right.  Cut where it hurts, not where it makes sense.

This is akin to an overextended family deciding to cut off the water to their home rather than passing on a vacation, turning off the heat in the winter rather than stop smoking, letting their children go without shoes so they could go to the movies every weekend, or not buying food so they can take foreign language lessons.

No responsible person would consider such ludicrous behavior, but this administration did.  They released illegal aliens who were felons and attributed it to the sequester. They shut down Whitehouse tours because inconveniencing so many people who had to change long-standing plans to visit the White House was so highly visible.

Obviously the proper place to start cutting should be unnecessary and/or Unconstitutional agencies: DOE, EPA USDA, DOL, HUD, HHS, etc… etc…

And how about cutting foreign aid:  ”In fiscal 2008, the government spent a total of $11.427 billion in international assistance programs, according to the Monthly Treasury Statement. In fiscal 2011, according to the statement, it spent $20.599 billion—an increase of $9.172 billion, or 80 percent, from 2008.”

And how about cutting the $307 billion for the African Internet, budgeted by Obama?  The “Alliance for an Affordable Internet” is a public-private partnership which intends to build a huge, expensive African Internet. Its headquarters are in Nairobi, Kenya, now dubbed “Africa’s Silicon Valley.”

And how about cutting the plans to send $60 million in aid to Syrian rebels?

Or the $500 million to subsidize snacks on Amtrak?

And what about cutting the $1.4 billion spend on maintaining Obama in the White House each year?  According to a book by Robert Keith Gray, taxpayers spent $1.4 billion on everything from staffing, housing, flying, and entertaining President Obama and his family last year.  In comparison British taxpayers spent just $57.8 million on the royal family .

Gray writes in “Presidential Perks Gone Royal” that Obama isn’t the only president to have taken advantage of the expensive trappings of his office. But the amount of money spent on the first family, he argues, has risen tremendously under the Obama administration and needs to be reined in.

Gray told The Daily Caller that the $1.4 billion spent on the Obama family last year is the “total cost of the presidency,” factoring the cost of the “biggest staff in history at the highest wages ever,” a 50-percent increase in the numbers of appointed czars and an Air Force One “running with the frequency of a scheduled air line.”

Here is a sample of other pricey taxpayer-funded perks exclusively reserved for the president:

• The president can appoint high-paid staffers without Senate confirmation: Obama has 469 senior staffers and 226 are paid more than $100,000 a year, according to the book. Seventy-seven are paid as much as $172,000 per year. He also has appointed 43 “czars.”
• The president can vacation for free at Camp David: Gray writes that each round trip made to Camp David costs the taxpayers  $25,350. It’s also estimated that the combined transportation and personnel costs for a Camp David visit are $295,000 per night.
• The president has a full-time movie projectionist in the White House Theater: Projectionists sleep at the White House and are there 24 hours a day in case anyone needs to see a movie. “Compared to the 450 times President Carter used the movie theater in his four years in the White House, the average American citizen, according to industry statistics, goes out to see a movie slightly less than five times a year,” Gray writes.
• The president’s family gets certain travel and security expenses paid while vacationing: “First Lady Michelle Obama drew flak from the media and irate citizens when it was disclosed that, not counting Saturdays and Sundays, she spent 42 days on vacation  - within the span of one year.”
• The president’s dog gets its own high-paid staffer: “Bo made the news when he and his handler were flown to join the president on vacation in Maine,” Gray wrote about the Obama family dog. “It has been reported that the first family’s dog handler was paid $102,000, last year.”

When our nation is saddled with nearly $17 trillion of “on the books” debt and people are struggling to put food on the table, this gross mismanagement of taxpayer funds  should be investigated.

Texas has opted out of the Medicaid expansion proposed as part of the Affordable Health Care Act.  The decision to opt out has been reiterated by Governor Rick Perry, Lieutenant Governor David Dewhurst, and Attorney General Greg Abbott. To put this in context, Texas elected officials are displaying fiscal responsibility for the long term, not just for what looks and sounds good at the moment.  Once a state participates in the Medicaid expansion, which will immediately give the state 100% of the Medicaid expense, the money will continue to decline until the state must absorb the full cost of Medicaid.  At that point, the state is provided no availability for opting out.  With a Federal Government that has 16 trillion in debt, one can only guess how long the Federal Government can continue to pay the states the promised dollars for Medicaid.

The decision to opt out of Medicaid expansion does not mean that Texas will ignore those who need Medicaid such as the disabled and seniors. It does, however, mean that Texas will take care of those who really need Medicaid within the confines of the Texas Budget. Click Here to see an excellent Fox News video of Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott explaining why Texas will not participate in Medicaid expansion.

Trey Martinez-Fischer who represents Texas House District 116 in San Antonio wrote an article published in the San Antonio Express-News article on Sunday, February 24, 2013, entitled “Medicaid Expansion Is Sound Policy”. (Click Here to read the article.) He stated that Medicaid expansion is not a partisan issue, a fact with which we can agree. However, it is an issue of Fiscal Responsibility. We must protect Texas. Representative Martinez-Fischer states in his article:

Gov. Rick Perry has chosen bad politics over good policy for too long. If the governor chooses to keep his head in the sand and remain idle while many Texans are in need, then the burden of responsible governance falls upon the Legislature. The time for action has arrived.

It is clear that there are those who want to use the Texas Legislature to override the decision to opt out of Medicaid.  It is important that all Texans who believe in Fiscal Responsibility contact Governor Rick Perry (Click Here), Lieutenant Governor Dewhurst (Click Here), and Attorney General Greg Abbott (Click Here) and let them know you support their decision to opt out of the proposed expansion of Medicaid.  Likewise, it is equally important to contact all Texas House Representatives and Texas Senators to let them know that you do not want them to vote to override the decision to opt out of Medicaid.  All contact information for the 83^rd Legislature is listed at Texas Legislature Online (Click Here). 

Regardless, the work that the TEA Party has been doing will continue. The TEA Party objectives are to advocate for a reduction in size and scope of Local, State, and Federal Government agencies and to work toward a fiscally responsible path to prosperity.