IVEY TO BYRNE:  RETURN THEDONATIONS

“Untilthe tainted money is returned, a cloud of doubt will linger over thesetransactions.”

(MONTGOMERY, AL – MARCH 16, 2010) State Treasurer and Republican gubernatorial candidate Kay Ivey today challengedRepublican opponent Bradley Byrne to return thousands of dollars inquestionable donations made by four PACs linked to gambling interests.

Sunday’s Montgomery Advertiser reported thatoriginal campaign finance statements, which were filed earlier this year,showed VictoryLand and the Jefferson County Racing Association made donationstotaling $148,000 in late December to PACs operated by the Alabama Nursing HomeAssociation. Those PACs (VOTE98 PAC, FUTURE PAC, ELDER PAC and Secure PAC) madecontributions on the same day to Bradley Byrne, as well as several politicalcandidates, including Roger Bedford, Lowell Barron, Ron Sparks and Artur Davis.

Oddly enough, the statements’ dates were changedlast week to show the PACs contributed to Byrne BEFORE they received money fromthe gambling interests, raising new questions about the matter.

“Byrne has repeatedly promised he will not acceptgambling money, and I take him at his word,” Ivey said. “But as they say, theproof is in the pudding. It is highly unusual to amend a finance report just tochange a date, and that is prompting new questions.

“Given how contentious gambling has become in ourstate, people deserve to know where this money came from, and when it changedhands. Byrne swore last October that he would not accept any money from theAlabama Education Association, directly or indirectly. I agreed with hisposition, and took the same stand for my campaign as well.

“Yet in this instance, Byrne is engaging in a doublestandard by taking gambling donations that are being washed throughPACs.  

“So I say to Bradley Byrne: abide by your originalethical standard. Return all of the money you received from VOTE98 PAC, FUTUREPAC, ELDER PAC and Secure PAC. Then the matter will be resolved once and forall.

“Until the tainted money is returned, a cloud ofdoubt will linger over these transactions. As one Republican candidate toanother, I urge you to do the right thing. You will sleep better at nightbecause of it, and the people of Alabama will, too.”

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Paid for by the Kay Ivey Campaign forGovernor

P.O. Box 771, Montgomery, AL  36101-0771  ∙  (334) 293-9300  ∙  www.kayivey.org

KAY IVEY INVITES GOP RIVALS TO UNITE

IN OPPOSING DEMOCRATIC HEALTH CARE BILL

“Thehour of decision has arrived, and it’s time all Republican candidates forgovernor set aside our differences and let Washington know that Alabama says‘No!’ to ‘Obamacare’ in a loud, decisive voice .”

(MONTGOMERY,AL – MARCH 12, 2010) State Treasurer and Republican gubernatorial candidate Kay Ivey today invitedher GOP rivals to unite in a statement opposing the Obama Administration’shealth care reform bill. National news reports said Democratic House leadersare poised to push for a vote in the House, possibly within a few days.

“NancyPelosi and her gang are pulling out all the stops to ram this bill down thethroats of the American people,” Ivey said. “President Obama is even delaying aplanned trip overseas a few days so he can pressure House Democrats into votinghis way. 

“Thehour of decision has arrived, and it’s time all Republican candidates forgovernor to set aside our differences and let Washington know that Alabama says‘No!’ to ‘Obamacare’ in a loud, decisive voice.”

Iveysaid she participated in a strategy-planning conference call this morning forRepublican gubernatorial candidates around the nation that was sponsored by theRepublican Governors Association and hosted by Mississippi Governor HaleyBarbour.

“GovernorBarbour urged all candidates to do everything they can to oppose this bill,”Ivey explained.  “It’s bad for our country’s health care system, it’s badfor the American people, it’s bad for business, and it’s bad for Alabama.”

Ivey issending the following statement to rivals Robert Bentley, Bradley Byrne, TimJames, Bill Johnson, Roy Moore and James Potts:

We,the undersigned Republican candidates for Governor of Alabama, hereby announceour united opposition to the current proposed health care reform legislation (H.R.3590) before Congress, commonly known as “Obamacare.”

Weare opposed to this bill because it raises costs for medical services whichwill require new, additional federal spending; it raises individual healthinsurance premiums by an average of $2,100 for every family; it includes fartoo many secret deals made to “buy” votes for support; it will result indropped coverage for potentially millions of individuals who already havehealth insurance; it is a job killer at a time when the economy is bleedingjobs already; it creates severe financial distress on our states by placingeven more “unfunded mandates” upon them; it utilizes “smoke and mirrors”accounting as budgetary gimmicks with no guarantee for future solvency; and itcreates even more unwanted government bureaucracy that would impose pricecontrols and micro-manage health insurance premiums.

Weencourage the citizens of this great state to immediately contact ourCongressional Delegation and elected officials of ALL parties and tell them tovote “NO!” to this disastrous takeover of our healthcare system.

Iveysays the statement will be sent to all members of Alabama’s congressionaldelegation to register the gubernatorial candidate’s fierce opposition to thebill as soon as she has received a reply from all of her rivals.

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Paid for by the Kay Ivey Campaign forGovernor

P.O. Box 771, Montgomery, AL  36101-0771  ∙  (334) 293-9300  ∙  www.kayivey.org

Ruminations, March 7, 2010

What’s behind the Democrats push on health care?

President Obama has stated, “The [health care] bottom line is, our proposal is paid for."  According to Senator Joe Lieberman (D, CT), “this legislation would reduce the federal deficit by $132 billion over the next ten years and will continue to reduce costs by billions more in the following decade. This bill will also extend the solvency of the Medicare Trust Fund for an additional nine years.”

That sounds great and, if you parse every word and its meaning, it’s not false. However, in order to say that the “proposal is paid for” or that it “reduce[s] the federal deficit,” the Democrats and the President have had to go to extraordinary lengths.

• The numbers show ten years of revenue and balance it against six years of expenses. According to Douglass Emmendorf, Director of the Congressional Budget Office (CBO), the government plan would collect some $500 billion in revenue and $500 billion in Medicare cuts over 10 years. Costs, however, are projected over six years. So, comparing the last six years of revenues to the last six years of expenditures, the $132 billion in deficit reduction becomes a $268 billion deficit increase.
• The $500 billion in Medicare cuts will be something that Congress will not let stand. It will be added under another bill. But putting the $500 billion in another bill does not make it disappear. It will still be spent by the government. So now the $268 billion increase over the last six years becomes, proportionately, $568 billion.
• It also has some dubious revenue sources. For example it counts some $52 billion in Social Security revenue as an offset. Wait a minute. Social Security is an unfunded liability now and we are reducing Social Security revenues to pay for this health plan? And here’s an interesting footnote from Emmendorf’s memo to Senator Harry Reid (D, NV) on the effects of the health care plan on the budget: “Off-budget effects include changes in Social Security spending and revenues as well as spending by the U.S. Postal Service.” The U.S. Postal Service?
• According to Richard Foster, Chief Actuary for Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the net result (i.e., after additional revenue and taxes have been taken into account) will be an increase in costs of $222 billion over ten years, and since expenses are only taken into account for six years, the actual results may be much worse.

• The Medicare Trustees’ projection for long-term cost growth has been tinkered with by the Obama Administration to make the long-term health care costs without the proposed bill look worse and at the same time it reduced the number of aging people entering into the program to make the future demands of Medicare look better.
• Medicare reimbursements to doctors are scheduled to be cut by better than 20 percent. The effect of these cuts would be that doctors would treat fewer Medicare patients. To avoid this scenario, Congress will offset the cuts and provide the necessary funds, estimated by the Administration at $245 billion over 10 years. But the funds will be provided in a separate bill. While these funds are undoubtedly health care related costs, Democrats have excluded them from the health care estimates.
• Last Friday, the CBO, even with the restrictions of evaluating the limited set of data Congress gave it, projected the health care bill will “increase … the federal budget deficit by $239 billion over the 2010-2019 period."

It’s clear that we cannot afford the proposal in Congress. Why do the Democrats continue to push it? Why do they continue to jigger the numbers in an attempt to make them appear to be something that they are not?

Could it be that pro-Obama columnist David Ignatius of the Washington Post reflected the Democrat’s attitude when he encouraged them to forget about the numbers and make health care a moral crusade? Could it be that he wants to do what he thinks is right regardless of the implied consequences because, being America, he thinks that sooner or later we will figure out how to pay for it?

Or is there something more devious at work? In order to pay for the Obama health care program in the future, we will have to cut something. Could it be that Democrats accept the bogus health care numbers because they anticipate that (1) once enacted, people and the economy will become so dependent on it that it can never be rescinded, and (2) the money will be found elsewhere through drastic cuts (for example, – the Defense Department’s budget for 2010 is over $663 billion) or higher taxes?

The Democratic health care proposals are economically unsound. Are the Democrats oblivious to these numbers or are they just devious? Maybe they are just so focused on the political process that they are not paying attention.