ArklatexPolitics.com

Posted 4 hours 24 minutes ago
Posted In: Home, Arkansas

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) -- Democratic Senate candidate Bill Halter
says if elected he wouldn't accept any cost-of-living pay raises as
long as there's a federal budget deficit.
Halter on Tuesday said he would oppose any automatic pay raises
and would donate the money to charity if any were approved in
Congress. The Arkansas lieutenant governor is challenging
Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln in the May 18 primary.
Members of the House and Senate under current federal law
receive automatic cost-of-living raises each year, unless they pass
legislation rejecting the raise. Congress rejected a pay raise for
this year.
Halter also said that if elected he'd hold town hall meetings in
all 75 counties, make his schedules available to the public online
and never become a lobbyist after serving in the Senate.

Posted 4 hours 25 minutes 48 seconds ago
Posted In: Home, Louisiana

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) -- Lawmakers are pushing the state veterans
department to step up its delivery of veterans medals and to stop
waiting for Gov. Bobby Jindal to deliver them personally.
Members of a joint House and Senate committee said Tuesday that
thousands of medal requests have been made with the Department of
Veterans Affairs and that they've received calls from veterans who
have waited months for their medals.
Jindal has traveled the state to give the medals to veterans,
and Veterans Affairs Secretary Lane Carson says having the governor
deliver the medals gives a dignity to the veterans.
Sen. Robert Adley, a Republican whose bill created the state
medal program, says some veterans are too elderly to wait for
Jindal. Asked if he would be willing to mail medals to veterans,
Carson would only say that he'd look into it.

Posted 4 hours 27 minutes 1 second ago
Posted In: Home, National

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Former New York Congressman Eric Massa says he
groped a staffer but denies it was sexual.
Massa's comments came Tuesday on conservative commentator Glenn
Beck's Fox News Channel show.
The Washington Post, citing anonymous sources, first reported
that the House ethics panel is investigating allegations Massa
groped multiple male staffers in his office. Massa has previously
claimed his misconduct was limited to using inappropriate language
with staffers.
Massa has given different reasons over the past week for
quitting his seat, including health worries, a House ethics probe
and charges fellow Democrats pushed him out because he opposed
their health care bill. Democrats deny the charge.

Posted 9 hours 59 minutes 11 seconds ago
Posted In: Home, Louisiana

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) -- State lawmakers are pressing higher
education leaders for details of the strategies they're using now
to cope with budget cuts expected in 16 months.
Louisiana's college campuses aren't proposed to take cuts in the
budget for the fiscal year that begins July 1. But that plan relies
on $290 million in federal stimulus money.
Those dollars disappear a year later, in the 2011-12 fiscal
year, and members of the Senate Finance Committee said Monday they
want to see plans for how campuses will cope with that loss.
Republican Sen. Mike Walsworth says he's heard Commissioner of
Higher Education Sally Clausen talk for a year about planning for
that "cliff." But Walsworth says he hasn't seen a plan.
Clausen says schools are shrinking costs now, by eliminating
programs, cutting staff and changing degree requirements.

Posted 10 hours 2 minutes 5 seconds ago
Posted In: Home, Louisiana

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) -- The Democratic leader of the state House
says a Republican senator's bill that would nullify any federal
health care overhaul passed by Congress is ridiculous and
premature.
Rep. Karen St. Germain, head of the House Democratic Caucus,
says it's too soon for state lawmakers to issue a "blanket no" to
federal legislation that hasn't even been completed.
St. Germain's comments were in response to a bill filed by
Republican Sen. A.G. Crowe that asserts states' rights to refuse
the federal mandates proposed in the congressional Democrats'
health care legislation.
Crowe's bill mirrors similar legislation proposed in more than
30 other states.
State lawmakers will consider the proposal in the regular
session that begins March 29.

Posted 10 hours 4 minutes 39 seconds ago
Posted In: Home, Louisiana

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) -- The campaign of Democratic Senate
candidate Charlie Melancon has filed an ethics complaint against
Republican U.S. Sen. David Vitter.
Jeff Giertz, a spokesman for Melancon's campaign, says the
complaint was filed Tuesday with the Senate Select Committee on
Ethics. The complaint alleges Vitter violated federal law and
Senate ethics rules by sending out a fundraising letter on his
official Senate letterhead.
Melancon, a congressman from Napoleonville, is the only
announced Democrat challenging Vitter in the Senate race. The
primary election is Aug. 28, and the general election is set for
Nov. 2.
Melancon's campaign provided a copy of Vitter's fundraising
letter, which was sent in February.

Posted 10 hours 10 minutes 55 seconds ago
Posted In: Home, Arkansas

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Senator Blanche Lincoln says she is still
opposed to pushing a health care bill through the Senate with a
simple majority vote, despite saying she wanted to see what was in
the legislation.
Lincoln, a Democrat who faces more liberal challenger in the
party primary plus GOP opposition, said Tuesday her earlier comment
should not be taken as a change of heart. Lincoln says she is still
opposed to the controversial majority-vote procedure known as
"reconciliation."
Reconciliation could put a health care reform measure up for a
simple-majority vote.
Lincoln told reporters outside the Senate floor Tuesday, "I
don't support reconciliation! All I said was I want to see what's
in it."

Posted 10 hours 16 minutes 53 seconds ago
Posted In: Home, National

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Dozens of health care activists are protesting
in the nation's capital against what they call an abusive health
insurance industry.
Members of Health Care for America Now gathered at Dupont Circle
Tuesday morning, and former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean and other
speakers addressed the crowd. They planned to march through
downtown Washington to a hotel where America's Health Insurance
Plans, an association of health insurance companies, is meeting for
a conference.
Protesters say they are fed up with rising premiums, denials of
care and claims, and insurance companies' efforts to thwart reform.
They say they want to hold the industry accountable for its
actions.

Posted 10 hours 21 minutes 35 seconds ago
Posted In: Home, National

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Major business groups say President Barack
Obama's health care overhaul is a job killer, and they're launching
a multimillion-dollar ad campaign to take that message to voters.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of
Manufacturers, and groups ranging from contractors to retailers
said Tuesday the Democratic health care bills would raise their
expenses, while failing to control health care costs.
Advertisements will start airing nationwide Wednesday on cable
television and shift in a few days to 17 states, targeting moderate
and conservative Democrats whose votes are critical to passing the
bill in the House. The campaign is estimated to cost between $4
million and $10 million, with the insurance industry paying part of
the cost.

Posted 10 hours 28 minutes 13 seconds ago
Posted In: Home, Texas

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) -- Democrat Bill White is criticizing
Republican Gov. Rick Perry for pressing state agencies to cut their
budgets by five percent, calling the approach "Soviet-style"
budget management.
With Texas facing a budget shortfall of at least $11 billion,
White says he'd insist on "fiscal discipline" but refuses to rule
out possible tax increases to close the gap. He says he'd first
have to "look under the hood" of state government to identify
possible savings and inefficiencies.
White, who faces Perry in the November elections, spoke Tuesday
at a conference hosted by the Texas Tribune online news site.