June 10th, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government (ALG) President Bill Wilson today issued the following statement condemning the Senate’s 53-47 vote today upholding an EPA finding classifying carbon dioxide as a harmful pollutant:

“The Senate has just voted to affirm that the EPA should be able to arbitrarily set the nation’s energy policy by imposing unilateral restrictions on carbon emissions without any vote at all in Congress. This is a vote that will assuredly lead to higher energy prices, lost jobs, lost business, and the tyrannical imposition of a radical, environmentalist agenda upon the American people.”

Attachments:

“Earth Not on Fire: The Threat Posed by the EPA’s CO2 Endangerment Finding on the Individual and the Economy,” Americans for Limited Government, June, 2010.

ALG Letter to U.S. Senate, June 8th, 2010.

“Apocalyptic EPA Should Not Be Setting Energy Policy,” Editorial by ALG News, June 9th, 2010.

“The EPA’s Reckless Endangerment,” by ALG President Bill Wilson, June 8th, 2010.

Interview Availability: Please contact Rebekah Rast at (703) 383-0880 or at rrast@getliberty.org to arrange an interview with ALG President Bill Wilson.

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June 8th, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government (ALG) President Bill Wilson today urged the Senate to vote in favor of Senator Lisa Murkowski’s resolution that would repeal an Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) finding classifying carbon dioxide as a pollutant.

In Wilson’s letter to the Senate, he wrote, “If you do not act to repeal the EPA’s endangerment finding against carbon dioxide, as in S.J. Res. 26, it will be utilized by the agency as the foundation for the EPA to regulate, restrict, and eventually prohibit emissions of carbon dioxide by motor vehicles, industry, and even the air people exhale.”

The letter continued, “The EPA’s finding is based on shoddy science that disregards the downward trend in global temperatures despite increases in carbon emissions, ignores the failed projections of increased temperatures by the International Panel on Climate Change and other proponents of the man-made global warming hypothesis, and overlooks the impact of the Climategate scandal where it was revealed that global temperature data was manipulated and exaggerated by climatologists and utilizes data that has now been discredited.”

ALG today published a summary of the implications of the EPA’s finding. It cites research from Christopher Monckton of Brenchley documenting lower actual global temperatures than had been projected by the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the UN agency often cited as justification for draconian restrictions on carbon emissions.

Wilson said in a statement, “All of the predictions made by the IPCC have been discredited. They said that temperatures are supposed to be going up, but they’re not. Since the EPA’s carbon endangerment finding depends so heavily upon the IPCC for its finding that carbon dioxide is a harmful pollutant, the only responsible action for the Senate is to repeal it.”

“It’s not as if the EPA did not have an opportunity to get up to speed on recent revelations in climate science. EPA analyst Dr. Alan Carlin submitted comments warning against the finding citing data that disproves the man-made global warming hypothesis, and they consciously disregarded it. They suppressed it,” Wilson noted in a statement.

The summary also notes that the EPA did not take into consideration the Climategate scandal in producing its finding, which revealed widespread manipulation of temperature data by what Wilson called “alarmist climate scientists driven by ideology rather an impartial pursuit of the truth.”

Wilson said the IPCC’s poor track record calls into question further predictions made by the EPA citing IPCC research. In its finding, the EPA claimed that the increased concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere “threaten[s] the public health and welfare of current and future generations.”

The regulation predicts increased heat waves, more-intense hurricanes, floods, storm surges, rising sea levels, erosion, wildfires, drought, and even allergens and pathogens. The EPA also predicts the displacement of indigenous populations, the eventual decrease of food production and agriculture, and the reduction of forest productivity.

The Senate is expected to vote on Murkowski’s resolution on Thursday.

“The true danger to the American people is tyrannical restrictions on carbon emissions and energy usage that harm population sustainability and economic growth. The Senate has a golden opportunity to stop the EPA dead in its tracks before it imposes a carbon rationing regime upon the American people,” Wilson concluded.

Attachments:

“Earth Not on Fire: The Threat Posed by the EPA’s CO2 Endangerment Finding on the Individual and the Economy,” Americans for Limited Government, June, 2010.

ALG Letter to U.S. Senate, June 8th, 2010.

“The EPA’s Reckless Endangerment,” by ALG President Bill Wilson, June 8th, 2010.

Interview Availability: Please contact Rebekah Rast at (703) 383-0880 or at rrast@getliberty.org to arrange an interview with ALG President Bill Wilson.

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June 4th, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today issued the following statement on this morning’s unemployment numbers by the Bureau of Labor Statistics:

“This Administration’s war on private business is costing millions of Americans the ability to take care of their families by having meaningful jobs. Today’s disastrous unemployment report shows that private sector employment is dead in the water, with temporary U.S. census hiring creating virtually all of the job growth. The Obama, Reid, Pelosi spend, tax and regulate plan for our nation’s economy is a historic failure. Congress needs to return to stop trying to spend us out of what appears to be a coming double dip recession, and face the reality that it is our national debt that is the greatest threat to our nation’s future. ”

Interview Availability: Please contact Rebekah Rast at (703) 383-0880 or at rrast@getliberty.org to arrange an interview with ALG President Bill Wilson.

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June 4th, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government President Bill Wilson today blasted Obama Administration policies that he said are “crushing the marketplace of jobs that once made the American economy a robust engine of opportunity.”

“The whole premise of deficit-spending ‘stimulus’ being used to address the recession has been turned on its head by the sovereign debt crisis that threatens the solvency of nations throughout the world,” Wilson said.

“Debt and overspending are the problem. The economy is clearly being weakened by government excess, and it is hurting the American people, who are looking for jobs and instead are finding stagnation,” Wilson added, pointing to what he termed to be a “weak jobs report.”

Wilson pointed to a recent USA Today report that documented private wages sinking as a share of personal income while government benefits are increasing as “evidence that government is crowding out, and indeed crushing the private sector. Today’s job numbers show an increase of 411,000 government Census jobs but only an anemic 41,000 private sector jobs created.”

Wilson also noted that unemployment was disproportionately affecting young people. Youth unemployment rose to 26.4 percent last month, compared with an overall 9.7 percent unemployment rate.

“Not only is government burdening future generations with an insurmountable debt that will rise to over $20 trillion by 2020, which cannot possibly be paid, its policies are making it harder for young people to enter the workforce and gather experience,” Wilson said.

Wilson highlighted a piece published today by John Stossel about the Department of Labor eliminating unpaid internships as “a small example of Obama regulations that are eliminating opportunities for young people to gain experience and become more marketable employees.”

“Only the Obama Administration would push for billions in increased public education spending to ‘train’ future workers with outdated curricula while simultaneously eliminating unpaid government internships — where students and young professionals gain real-world work experience — whose cost is minimal,” Wilson lamented.

“Never before have the American people been faced with an Administration so hostile to the private sector, and so ideologically-driven as to restrict opportunity in ways that threaten the future prosperity of the nation,” Wilson concluded.

Interview Availability: Please contact Rebekah Rast at (703) 383-0880 or at rrast@getliberty.org to arrange an interview with ALG President Bill Wilson.

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June 4th, 2010, Fairfax, VA—HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius defended Obama appointee Donald Berwick to head the Center for Medicare and Medicaid Services after he praised the British national health care system. Americans for Limited Government recently published this Nominee Alert regarding Berwick.

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June 2nd, 2010, Fairfax, VA—Americans for Limited Government (ALG) President Bill Wilson today urged Representative Darrell Issa (R-CA) to pursue a House of Representatives investigation of a job offered by the White House to Representative Joe Sestak (D-PA) in return for dropping out of the Pennsylvania Senate race.

In his letter to Issa, Wilson wrote, “Representative Sestak has a duty to be fully forthcoming regarding this clear violation of law, lest he be deemed an accomplice in its concealment. An official investigation is the proper venue for an initial finding of facts, under oath, which will advise further action by the House.”

“It is time for Representative Sestak to fully come clean,” the letter continued.

The scandal could result in an ethics investigation of Sestak. Issa had previously warned that if Sestak did not disclose what job he was offered, and who offered it, that he would lodge an official complaint with the House ethics committee.

Wilson in a statement said that “Although Representative Sestak has revealed new information, it contradicts his previous statements, only raising more questions and warranting an official investigation.”

Wilson noted in his letter that the White House’s admission that an “uncompensated” position had been offered contradicted Sestak’s initial confirmation that he had been offered a “high-ranking” job. Wilson wrote that it also contradicts what Sestak has now said that former President Bill Clinton, acting as an intermediary for the White House, spoke with him “about my being on a Presidential Board while remaining in the House of Representatives.”

“This surprising change in Sestak’s original story casts a high degree of suspicion on the Representative,” Wilson wrote. “Even though he declined the offer of an appointment in both versions of events, the revision of his original story could make him complicit in the cover-up of the commission of a crime.”

Wilson urged Issa to investigate: “This warrants an immediate investigation by the House of Representatives in some capacity to ascertain the facts, and to determine whether or not Sestak is involved with a cover-up of a violation of the law.”

Initially, the White House had denied that any appointment had been offered, but later acknowledged that conversations had taken place with Representative Sestak, but that they were not “problematic.”

Finally, the White House Legal Counsel Robert Bauer admitted that the Obama Administration engaged in “discussions of alternatives to the Senate campaign” and at least promised an appointment in exchange for Sestak pulling out of the race.

In a statement, Wilson concluded, “Representative Issa, for pursuing this issue, deserves the thanks of the American people, who have a right to know if Barack Obama was responsible for illegally offering a Presidential appointment to Representative Sestak in exchange for dropping out of a Senate race.”

Attachments:

ALG Letter to Rep. Darrell Issa, June 2nd, 2010.

Interview Availability: Please contact Rebekah Rast at (703) 383-0880 or at rrast@getliberty.org to arrange an interview with ALG President Bill Wilson.

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May 27th, 2010

United States House of Representatives and Senate
WASHINGTON, D.C. 20510
To the Members of the U.S. Congress:

While the national debt has surpassed $13 trillion this week, and the nation’s Triple-A bond rating is threatened with the ongoing sovereign debt crisis, we were disappointed to learn that Congressional leadership has decided to once again plough ahead with its deficit-spending, pay-later policies of offering unlimited guarantees to insolvent states like New York and California. This time, Congress is offering $23 billion to the states to pay for public education funding.

This comes atop $53.6 billion that was given to the states in the 2009 “stimulus” bill, and is the second time Congress has attempted to enact a $23 billion state education bailout. The first was in HR 2847, which passed the House 217-212 on December 16th, 2009 as part of a wider $154 billion bill intended to spend paid-back Trouble Asset Relief Program monies to balance state budgets.

However, HR 2847 had most of its provisions stripped out when it was finally passed in the Senate, including the $23 billion bailout. Ever since then, the White House has been desperate to have the fund included somewhere in the appropriations process to forestall unfortunate but necessary cuts in state budgets. The effort to now have it added to HR 5136, a defense appropriations bill, is just the latest attempt to payback public unions for their political loyalty to the Congressional majority.

It’s a kickback. It’s a bailout. And it’s just the sort of thing that has the American people up in arms. While citizens are tightening their belts in these tough economic times, government employees and elected officials are increasing debt, and endangering future generations with economic stagnation, inflation, greater interest rates, and higher taxes.

According to a recent USA Today story, “Paychecks from private business shrank to their smallest share of personal income in U.S. history during the first quarter of this year, a USA TODAY analysis of government data finds. At the same time, government-provided benefits — from Social Security, unemployment insurance, food stamps and other programs — rose to a record high during the first three months of 2010.” So, while the American people suffer, government is lining its pockets at taxpayer expense.

Americans for Limited Government urges your opposition to this failed approach, which will create an incentive for states to continue to follow the failed, insolvent policies of New York and California. Making matters worse, this bill will disincentivize the prudent path that New Jersey has taken under Governor Chris Christie’s leadership in recent months, which because of the spending freeze undertaken, New Jersey will not have to raise taxes this year to balance the budget.

We urge you to reject the New York and California plan to perpetual bailouts and deficit-spending, and instead, for the sake of taxpayers, to adopt the New Jersey plan of fiscal solvency by making the tough decisions to slash spending.

Sincerely,
William Wilson
President
Americans for Limited Government