Activism Across America

In Georgia’s 10th congressional district, Democratic Challenger Bobby Saxon has blasted Paul Broun for voting against H.R. 3999, the National Highway Bridge Reconstruction and Inspection Act. Remember the deadly collapse of that bridge in Minnesota? H.R. 3999 is designed to help prevent that kind of disaster in the future. It’s the kind of common-sense legislation that everyone ought to agree upon.

137 Republicans in the House of Representatives joined the Democrats to vote for the National Highway Bridge Reconstruction and Inspection Act. Not Paul Broun. Congressman Broun was one of only 55 extremist Republicans in Congress who voted against safe bridges.

Saxon wrote,

“Our highways are one of the most visible and important parts of our state and national infrastructure. Bridges are a key link in that infrastructure and we must ensure they are safe for travel. We must put a priority on the safety of our citizens and the proper maintenance of the roads that we all travel.

Mr. Broun’s vote against the National Highway Bridge Reconstruction and Inspection Act potentially endangered the lives of our most precious resource, our citizens. Fortunately, responsible leadership prevailed and the bill passed on a bipartisan vote of 367-55. 87% of the Congressional delegation voted in favor of safety for their constituents as I would have had I been the Congressman for the 10th District.”

In 2008, Georgia’s 10th congressional district has the chance to leave the fringes and rejoin the mainstream that is willing to uphold responsible government for the sake of public safety. The 10th district has the opportunity to vote for Bobby Saxon instead of Paul Broun.

John Linder, of Georgia’s 7th district, is a downright despicable member of Congress, and rather lazy too. When Linder does show up to vote, he almost always casts a vote the wrong way. John Linder has voted for laws banning free protest, and free speech, and for big government spying. Heck, John Linder has even voted against Head Start preschools. Picking on little kids is tacky, Congressman Linder.

Don’t think that means I’m about to endorse John Linder’s challenger, Doug Heckman. Yes, Doug Heckman has the Democratic nomination, but he’s not really much of a Democrat, to tell the truth.

Doug Heckman has endorsed the FISA Amendments Act. The FISA Amendments Act retroactively legalizes a corrupt government spying program that gathered private information about the personal communications of millions of Americans so that George W. Bush and his aides could look at them at their leisure.

Doug Heckman had the gall to state recently, “This bill ensures—as Senator Obama said recently—that ’somebody’s watching the watchers.’”

Pardon me, but has Doug Heckman even read the FISA Amendments Act? No one who has actually read the law could say such a ridiculous thing. The FISA Amendments Act does not ensure that “somebody’s watching the watchers”. What the FISA Amendments Act actually does is give the Attorney General of the United States the authority to set massive spy operations against Americans into action, and then make the Attorney General the sole person in all the federal government to certify that the spying is taking place according to the law.

Look on page 77, Mr. Heckman. Read it. You’ll see quite clearly that there’s nobody watching the watchers except the watchers themselves. The FISA Amendments Act puts the fox in charge of guarding the henhouse.

No one, and I mean no one, so profoundly stupid as to endorse the FISA Amendments Act deserves any citizen’s vote. That goes for Democrats as well as Republicans.

John Linder ought to be kicked out of Congress, but to be honest, Doug Heckman wouldn’t be much of an improvement. I have advice to the Democrats of Georgia’s 7th congressional district: In 2010, why don’t you nominate someone for Congress who is knows the Constitution, and who actually reads laws before he endorses them?

Last week, Georgia’s Congressmen John Barrow and Jim Marshall betrayed the constituents who sent them to the U.S. House of Representatives. Given the chance to support the Creating Long-Term Energy Alternatives for the Nation Act, they instead chose help out big oil corporations and dirty coal-burning power plants.

The Creating Long-Term Energy Alternatives for the Nation Act would have increased fuel efficiency of American automobiles. The law would have provided for the creation of real sustainable sources of electric power, not just research for future generations. It’s estimated that the law would have saved Americans tens of billions of dollars every year.

With all that, Jim Marshall and John Barrow voted against it. Why?

Who doesn’t want their car to get more miles per gallon? Who doesn’t want cheaper electricity? Well, the oil companies and power utilities don’t want that. What a shame that John Barrow and Jim Marshall chose the interests of those companies over the interests of the American people.

Jim Marshall voted in favor of starting Iraq War. Congressman Marshall voted in favor of the three laws that have done the most to reduce liberty in the USA: The Patriot Act, the Military Commissions Act, and the Protect America Act. Representative Marshall has voted to allow government-funded programs to engage in religious discrimination against workers. Marshall voted against providing expanded SCHIP health care for the children of working families across America.

Jim Marshall votes just like a Bush Republican. So, why is it that Jim Marshall calls himself a Democrat? Well, it’s because the Democrats are the stronger political party in his congressional district, and he wants to keep on using their political power to maintain his own power. Jim Marshall uses the Democratic Party to stay in Congress, and then kicks Democrats in the teeth by voting against everything that Democratic voters care about.

Up until now, the Democrats of the 8th congressional district have stood by and taken the abuse from Jim Marshall. Not any more. Now, Georgia’s 8th district Democrats have a mainstream Democratic candidate, Robert Nowak, to set things straight. Nowak is challenging Jim Marshall in the Democratic primary for the congressional nomination. Please give him your support.

This August, Georgia Democrats can count their state’s representatives in Congress as do right and do wrong.

One of the very last things that the U.S. House of Representatives did this August, before breaking to go on vacation, was to pass a Republican law called the Protect America Act. Think fast, and you’ll realize that Congress could not have passed this Republican law unless many Democrats turned coat and joined the Republicans to help it get done. In fact, forty one Democrats did just that, siding with George W. Bush over the interests of their own constituents.

In the case of the Protect America Act, that was a particularly nasty decision. You see, the Protect America Act gives unprecedented spying power to Alberto Gonzales and to John Michael McConnell. Alberto Gonzales has proven his lack of trustworthiness as the author of the Bush legal plan to justify torture, as the head of an effort to fire federal prosecutors who go after corrupt Republican politicians, and as someone who has been caught blatantly lying to Congress on many occasions. John Michael McConnell, Director of National Intelligence, is one of the original architects of the Total Information Awareness plan to spy on ordinary Americans and is the guy who came up with the idea to allow state and local law enforcement use spy satellites and airplanes like the U2 Spy planes to snoop in on the lives of American citizens, watching from above.

The Protect America Act essentially reactivates Total Information Awareness, enabling the Bush Administration to eavesdrop on our telephones and our web activities, scanning through our private email for useful information. The Protect America Act makes the American government into Big Brother.

When it comes to the Protect America Act, the Georgia Democrats in Congress are divided. Three voted against the law, and two voted for it.

Democrats against the new powers to spy against Americans:

John Lewis
David Scott
Tim Bishop

Democrats for the new powers to spy against Americans:

John Barrow
James Marshall

Note to the Georgia Democratic Party rank and file: If you are represented by John Barrow or Jim Marshall, give the home office a call and ask tell them what you think about them selling out American liberty for the sake of a quick ticket home for their summer vacation.