Pelosi Scolds GOP For Stalling Economic Agenda

By Benny Martinez

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) scolded Republican Senators at her weekly press conference Thursday for refusing to cooperate with a stalled jobs bill.

“Show us the jobs,” Pelosi said.

After countless attempts to advance the bill and create more jobs, Pelosi said Republican Senators need to recognize that the American people want and need more opportunities to succeed.

“What did middle-class families ever do to Republicans in the Senate that they would snuff out every opportunity for job creation that has been sent to them,” the Speaker said.

Despite relentless GOP opposition, the Speaker said that “we are on the path to create more jobs this year than eight years of the Bush administration.”

Pelosi also lauded middle-class tax cuts saying they served as a means to “inject demand into the economy.”

House GOP Outraged Over Debt Ceiling Attachment To Defense Bill

Travis Martinez, University of New Mexico/Talk Radio News Service

Congressman Steve Scalise (R-La.), along with other House GOP leaders, reacted Friday to plans by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to tack a Pentagon appropriations bill with legislation that would increase the nation's debt ceiling amount by $1.8 trillion by unveiling the" CAP the DEBT Act."

The bill would repeal the Gephart Rule, which allows debt ceiling increases to be included in joint budget resolutions without a direct vote. Under the Scalise legislation, changes to the national debt ceiling amount would have to pass both Congressional houses with two-thirds majority vote.

Congressman Scalise said that the CAP the DEBT Act is being filed because "the liberals that are running this Congress have been on a wild spending spree for the last three years, since Speaker Pelosi has had the gavel."

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi announced Thursday that the ceiling increase would be tacked to a spending bill headed to the House floor next week and that legislation is largely expected to be the pending $636.4 billion Pentagon appropriations bill that would partially fund the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Prior to Pelosi's announcement, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said that increasing the ceiling is necessary in order to pay the country's mounting bills.

However, Scalise was not happy with the proposed method for increasing the national ceiling, saying “the ultimate sign of hypocrisy is [that] this Democrat liberal group running Congress is going to now again hide behind our troops and throw this increase of the national debt ceiling on a defense bill."

Pelosi Criticizes Insurance Companies, Defends Public Option

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) fired back Thursday at what appears to be a major push by insurance companies to sway the health care reform debate.

“If anyone had any doubts about the need for such an option, you only need to look at the behavior of the health insurance industry this week,” Pelosi said during a press conference, referencing a report released by America’s Health Insurance Plans claiming health care costs would rise under the Senate Finance Committee’s bill.

Pelosi described the report as “totally discredited.”

The Speaker went on to explain that while the mandate requiring individuals to purchase insurance is becoming more widely discussed, support for the public option is growing in response.

“If you’re going to mandate that people must buy insurance, why would you sell them to the lions den of the insurance industry without some leverage with a public option?”

“We may call it something else by Tuesday,” Pelosi added. ‘It might have a better name.”

Dalai Lama Received By McCain And Pelosi, Not Obama

by Julianne LaJeunesse- University of New Mexico

The 14th Dalai Lama was in Washington, D.C. Tuesday to receive a Lantos Foundation award for his human rights service, and despite a missing President Obama, the religious leader still offered kind words and advice for "America... the greatest democratic country."

"I think American weapons, military forces, of course, is to some people... you can take seriously," the Dalai Lama said. "But the real greatness of America is your ancestors, or the principles. These are, at any cost, you must preserve these principles. That is important."

Some of those principles could be in question with the Obama administration's decision not to receive the Dalai Lama this week. The White House says Obama will meet with the leader after a November session with China's President Hu Jintao in Beijing, a decision which the Dalai Lama says he understands.

At the Lantos Foundation ceremony, which was created to further late Rep. Tom Lantos' work on human rights and justice issues within U.S. policy making, John McCain (R- Ariz.) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) praised the work of both Lantos, who died in 2008, and the Dalai Lama's humanitarian efforts. McCain called the Dalai Lama "an example of a moral leader."

McCain called the Dalai Lama, who won the Noble Peace Prize in 1989, a father to Tibet, despite the tensions between the exiled ruler and the Chinese government.

"For over half a century, he has led their struggle, petitioning governments and people of conscience throughout the world to lend their voice to the just demands of Tibetans," McCain said. "He has endured the long trying years, and every setback for their cause, with an unyielding determination that is singular because of the patience, humility, and kindness that are his most admirable qualities."

If Obama and the exiled leader don't meet this year, it will mark the first time in 14 years that a U.S. president has not received the Dalai Lama. In 2007, the Dalai Lama received the U.S. Congressional Gold Medal, a ceremony attended by President George W. Bush.

Pelosi and Maloney talk plastic

by Christina Lovato, University of New Mexico-Talk Radio News Service

This morning at a press conference on Capitol Hill, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi addressed the public on the H1N1 flu and the 'Credit Cardholders' Bill of Rights that is being voted on today.

Pelosi said the recent outbreaks of the swine flu are a high concern and advised people to use common sense.

“Wash your hands, wash your hands, wash your hands,” said Pelosi.

Congresswoman Carolyn Maloney (D-NY) also attended the conference and spoke about the 'Credit Cardholders’ Bill of Rights Act of 2009”
saying that it will provide consumers protection from consumer fraud and deception.

Maloney said that the bill will help level the playing field between credit card issuers and consumers and will ban some abuses like raising interest rates on existing balances and double cycle billing where they are charging interest rates or balances that have already been paid.

“This bill will provide 45 days notice if they’re going to raise an interest rate going forward so consumers can move on to another card, putting more competition into the system. It stops many of the tricks and traps of changing the terms and changing the due dates that trap consumers and very importantly, it stops the any time, any reason, the unrelated activity which they then say cause a rate increase and it will help many many consumers,” said Maloney.

Maloney called Molly Gordy, a working mom who lives in Manhattan and has two credit cards, a model consumer.

Gordy who has always paid her credit card bills on time recently received a notice from her card company that the interest rate on her card would increase from 13 percent to 19 percent on her existing balance along with new purchases.

“I called and yelled at the company and asked them ‘Why are they doing this? This is not what I signed up for!’ The customer service representative told me ‘Its because of the tough economy.’ That made me really mad because when I lost my job a few years back they didn’t
lower my rate.”

A week later Gordy says she received another letter from a different division from the same company offering her a new credit card with a zero percent interest on balanced transfers for the next 16 months.

“I had to laugh, well one part of the company is telling me there is no money to lend to me, as an existing customer, another party is offering me free lending as a new customer. In my world we call that bait and switch.... If I make a contract with someone they should not be able to change it just because they can.,” said Gordy.