View a Hearing or Meeting. Congress ready to tackle postal reform - Mar. 27. Congress turns its focus on efforts to save the U.S. Postal Service. WASHINGTON (CNNMoney) -- Congress is looking this week at ways to save the struggling U.S. Postal Service. The Senate could start debating a bipartisan bill that offers buyouts to senior employees, cuts worker compensation benefits and makes it possible to end Saturday service in two years. On Tuesday, Postmaster General Patrick Donahoe will tell a House subcommittee that "doing nothing is not an option," according to prepared remarks that focus on the Postal Service's new five-year plan to cut costs and get back into the black. "The Postal Service is at a crossroads. The Senate was expected to vote to begin debate on a postal bill. Congressional action would throw a lifeline to the deeply indebted Postal Service, which is otherwise contemplating closures of hundreds of postal processing plants and post offices,, triggering job cuts in the tens of thousands nationwide.
The U.S. But lawmakers don't like it. Violence Against Women Act Divides Senate.
Speaking With the Speaker. On International Women's Day, Congress Debates Measure To Limit Reproductive Rights. WASHINGTON -- Thursday, March 8 is International Women's Day, and Republicans in Congress are celebrating by debating a new bill that would restrict abortion rights. The House Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution held a hearing on Thursday to discuss the Child Interstate Abortion Notification Act (CIANA), which is sponsored by two Florida Republicans, Marco Rubio in the Senate and Ileana Ros-Lehtinen in the House. The bill would make it illegal for anyone but a parent to accompany a young woman across state lines to seek an abortion -- even if her parents are absent or abusive. Perhaps more significantly, the bill is the latest in a long series of attempts by Republican lawmakers to criminalize physicians who perform abortions, to chip away at women's constitutionally protected right to decide when and if they will have a child and to otherwise politicize women's health.
Rep. By all accounts, 2011 was a watershed year for challenges to women's reproductive rights. Rep. Rep. Empty Promises: Experts Say Keystone XL Won't Do Anything For Gas Prices. By Stephen Lacey on March 2, 2012 at 12:30 pm "Empty Promises: Experts Say Keystone XL Won’t Do Anything For Gas Prices" Top oil economist: Pipeline would increase gasoline prices in the upper Midwest 5 to 10 cents a gallon. Amidst the mind-numbing array of hollow political promises to lower U.S. gas prices, there’s one really important point everyone should know: the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, which supporters say will “bring down prices at the pump,” wouldn’t be built until 2014. And that’s if everything went forward today without a hitch. Keystone XL has become a political mantra for supporters of the carbon economy. But experts continue to warn that promises of cheaper gas prices are unfounded. What would be the impact of opening up that giant pool of carbon and piping it through America’s heartland?
Other analysts are far more pessimistic. There is a lively debate among oil-industry analysts about whether Keystone will impact gasoline prices in the Midwest.
House passes bipartisan bill aimed at start-ups - Mar. 8. House Majority Leader Eric Cantor pushed to get a bill passed to make it easier for start-up companies to go public. WASHINGTON (CNNMoney) -- In a rare moment of bipartisanship, the House overwhelmingly passed a bill Thursday aimed at making it easier for small companies to grow and go public. The House voted 390-23 to pass the bill easing certain rules that the Securities and Exchange Commission enforces on small companies going through the process of becoming a publicly traded company.
The Senate is working on a similar version of the bill, and President Obama has indicated he supports it. The package is en route to becoming one of the few pieces of legislation aimed at boosting job creation and the economy to be signed into law in the past few years. That said, the bill isn't without critics. "This bill makes it easier for start-up businesses to happen again in America," said House Majority Leader Eric Cantor after the bill passed. Lynn E. One year in, GOP Solyndra investigation remains a gigantic nothingburger. Rep. Bachus faces insider-trading investigation. The Office of Congressional Ethics, an independent investigative agency, opened its probe late last year after focusing on numerous suspicious trades on Bachus’s annual financial disclosure forms, the individuals said. OCE investigators have notified Bachus that he is under investigation and that they have found probable cause to believe insider-trading violations have occurred.
(Washington Post investigation: Capitol Assets) The case is the first of its kind involving a member of Congress. It comes at a time of intense public scrutiny of congressional ethics, with the House passing legislation Thursday to tighten rules against insider trading by lawmakers. The impetus for the legislation, a version of which passed in the Senate a week earlier, came from a “60 Minutes” report and a book mentioning Bachus’s trades, “Throw Them All Out,” by Peter Schweizer. Omar S. Ashmawy, OCE staff director and chief counsel, declined to comment. Bachus was elected in 1992. Read more on PostPolitics.com. Ray LaHood: ‘The worst transportation bill I’ve ever seen’ Culture Connoisseur Badge Culture Connoisseurs consistently offer thought-provoking, timely comments on the arts, lifestyle and entertainment.
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Post Recommended Washington Post reporters or editors recommend this comment or reader post. You must be logged in to report a comment. You must be logged in to recommend a comment. Republicans’ agenda for repeal of Affordable Care Act. (J. Scott Applewhite - AP) Ever since Republicans declared their intention to “repeal and replace” the Affordable Care Act, their agenda and rhetoric have tended to be heavy on repeal, light on replace. That’s often been to the dismay of health policy wonks, who want to hear more about not just what Republicans would do to get rid of the health reform law, but how they would fix our health care system. “Republicans may have convinced the public that President Obama’s national health care law will make things worse, but they have yet to adequately explain how they’d make things better,” the Washington Examiner’s Philip Klein wrote this summer.
Wednesday afternoon, Rep. The timing is partially about legislative opportunity: It’s possible, albeit unlikely, that after the Supreme Court rules, we’ll no longer have the health reform law. “We’ll have a window of opportunity with everyone looking to explain the Affordable Care Act,” says Pitts. No strip club spending for welfare recipients - Feb. 6. A bill passed in the House bans the spending of welfare money in liquor stores, casinos and strip clubs. NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- If welfare recipients want to dole out the dollar bills at a strip club, they'd better make sure it's not government money ... at least if a bill in Congress becomes law.
The House last week overwhelmingly passed legislation that would require states to ban the ability to access government benefits at strip clubs, liquor stores and casinos. The benefit program in question is Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF), formerly known as welfare. TANF provides cash assistance to working poor families -- often through an electronic benefit transfer card that can be used like a debit card. Some recipients' use of their TANF benefits were called into question after media reports found the cards were being swiped at ATMs in strip clubs, liquor stores and casinos.
The bill would force states to develop policies to prevent this from happening. North Carolina Democratic Rep. Heath Shuler to retire. Rep. Heath Shuler (D-N.C.) will not run for reelection after three terms in office. Rep. Heath Shuler (D-N.C.) is retiring. (Jonathan Ernst - REUTERS) “This was not an easy decision,” Shuler said. It’s been a brutal couple of weeks for North Carolina Democrats. Like Rep. Gov. Shuler considered running for governor but earlier this week decided against it. On Thursday we noted that Shuler, a former Redskins player and an outspoken member of the conservative Blue Dog caucus, got contributions in the fourth quarter of 2011 from just two North Carolinians.
“Heath Shuler’s retirement in this strong Republican seat is another turnover to end his second career in Washington,” said National Republican Congressional Committee spokesman Paul Lindsay, “and it is also a cautionary sign of the troubles House Democrats face with Barack Obama on the ballot in November.” Shulers is the 12th House Democrat to announce his retirement. The 25 richest/poorest members of Congress: Why it pays to listen - Ask The Post. Posted at 02:35 PM ET, 01/03/2012 Jan 03, 2012 07:35 PM EST TheWashingtonPost @washingtonpost i think it'd be telling to see the 25 POOREST members of Congress.
@dabeard— cory provost (@coryprovost) December 27, 2011 Thank you, Cory Provost. An online reader of The Washington Post, @coryprovost weighed in on Twitter after seeing our slide show of the 25 richest members of Congress. "I think it'd be telling,'' Provost tweeted us, "to see the 25 POOREST members of Congress.'' We thought so, too. Readers agreed with the Brooklyn-based Provost as well. Both the richest and “poorest’’ lists originated from a Dec. 26 Post story by reporter Peter Whoriskey and a detailed graphic representation by Pam Tobey, Whoriskey and Dan Keating, based on data by the nonpartisan Center for Responsive Politics. The two items had the second- and fifth-highest number of pageviews on the site in December, despite appearing very late in the month.