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Weekly Issues
Alert February 4, 2010
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Budgeting Away Your Freedom
This week, President Obama
released his proposed budget for the Fiscal Year of 2011 (begins in
September 2010), which includes a new record deficit of $1.56 trillion,
to be paid for with your hard-earned money and your children's money for
years to come. The proposed budget
grows government at an alarming rate and provides massive spending on
what President Obama calls "investments in the American
people." Additionally, it
pushes for lots of tax increases for those who produce the jobs in our
economy (and allowing numerous other tax cuts to expire), and few budget
cuts and tax cuts. Many of the
budget cuts decrease funding for defense projects and NASA. Also in the budget, Troubled Assets
Relief Program (TARP) funds that have been recovered from banks would be
distributed to small businesses instead of being used to pay down our
national debt.
In
response to the President's budget proposal, Senator John Cornyn
suggested that Congress set up a special commission to identify and
eliminate wasteful spending.
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Science Catches Up with
Common Sense: Abstinence Education Works
Good
news this week: a study released on Monday reported in the Journal of the
American Medical Association shows that students who are taught
abstinence-only sex education are less likely to engage in sex than
students who were taught other methods, including condom use. Texas is not an abstinence-only
state. In Texas, schools do not
even have to teach sex education.
However, if a school teaches sex education, they must teach about
abstinence more than any other method and tell students abstinence is the
only 100% effective way to prevent pregnancy and sexually transmitted
diseases. During the 2009 Texas
Legislative session, Planned Parenthood and Austin liberals tried
unsuccessfully to pass a law to ban abstinence-only teaching in public
schools. Since this is now proven
to be the best approach, it should follow that abstinence-only teaching
will be the leading method of sex education, yet we expect a huge fight
over this in the next legislative session. Recently, President Obama has cut
federal funding for abstinence-only sex education in public schools. Jonathan Saenz, director of legislative
affairs, said this about the study: "Now that science and research
have caught up with common sense, I hope educators will use their time
and our tax dollars wisely by teaching students what works best,
abstinence."
For
more information on this and other issues, visit our Texas Legislative Update blog.
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Hiram Sasser Talks Education on Fox News!
Yesterday morning, Hiram
Sasser, director of litigation, appeared on Fox and Friends to talk about
how children are the real losers when "educrats" dig in. Hiram commented on the outrageous
situation in New York where a teacher, who is no longer allowed to teach
children, has been collecting $100,000 a year since 2001 for doing
nothing because he has tenure. Check out this video to see Liberty
Institute in action.
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Sexualizing the Military;
the Attack on Don't Ask, Don't Tell
On Tuesday, a Senate
committee held a hearing discussing how to repeal the military's Don't
Ask, Don't Tell policy. Defense Secretary Robert Gates outlined his
plan for dropping the long-standing policy, and others including former
Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Colin Powell have announced
support for repealing Don't Ask, Don't Tell. For years, Don't Ask,
Don't Tell has been a part of military guidelines, requiring the
dismissal of any open homosexuals serving in the military.
Repealing the policy would likely decrease morale and cohesiveness at a
crucial time for our military serving at home and overseas. Send an email to Secretary of Defense
Robert Gates, former president of Texas A&M University, asking him to
stop this attack on our military for the President's social
experimentation!
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Last Chance to Order Your 2010 Primary Voters' Guides!
This year, Americans again
have the opportunity to hold their elected officials accountable!
The primary election is on March 2, 2010 (early voting is Feb. 16-26,
2010). As always, Liberty Institute will release the 2010 Primary
Election Voters' Guide for all statewide races. This Friday is the
last chance to request large numbers of the hard copy of our Voters'
Guide! If you would like to make sure you receive a hard copy of
this year's Guide, email your address (your privacy is protected) to programs@libertyinstitute.org
to get your free Voters' Guide! If you can volunteer a few hours of
your time to help this be the best Voters' Guide yet or you want to
distribute the guides at your church or elsewhere, email Megan at programs@libertyinstitute.org
to find out how you can get involved.
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Make a Donation to
Liberty Institute Today!
Liberty Institute now accepts non-cash donations, which includes
property, vehicles, and stock, among other assets. Have a car you'd
like to donate? CLICK HERE to
make your donation now!
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