Hook, Line and Sinker

Guest article by Edmund Adams.

Sometimes he who takes the bait also gets the hook. That could happen to First District Congressman Steve Driehaus.

Representative Driehaus signed off on the health care bill when President Obama issued an executive order that purported to prohibit the federal funding of abortions. Whether the executive order did so is a matter of intense debate. If it did not, Driehaus has armed his challenger, Republican Steve Chabot, with a campaign issue potentially more decisive than Driehaus’s vote for Obamacare generally.

Both Driehaus and Steve Chabot are avowedly pro-life. Both are Catholics who attended Catholic high schools, Driehaus Elder and Chabot LaSalle. The First Congressional District remains heavily Catholic, although gerrymandering and changing demographics have whittled down that predominance.

While the polls show the country somewhat evenly divided on the pro-life, pro-choice issue, that’s not so with respect to abortion funding. Ohio Right to Life’s polls show that a surprising 72% of Ohioans oppose taxpayer funding of elective abortions. That’s what makes the question whether Obamacare funds abortions so critical in this year’s First District race.

Having been bounced from office by Driehaus in the 2008 Democrat landslide, Chabot had no vote on the health care bill. No one doubts, though, how the conservative Republican would have voted.

Driehaus, on the other hand, held out, along with Congressman Stupak and other pro-life House members, until the 11th hour, when President Obama rode to their rescue with an executive order that purportedly nullified any abortion funding in the health care bill. As explained in Driehaus’s website:

“I worked with my Congressional colleagues and the Administration to ensure that no federal funding will be used for abortion. The President’s executive order clarifies existing law and ensures that federal subsidies will not pay for abortion services.”

The Congressman’s website statement presents two critical issues: Did the health care bill provide for abortion funding and, if so, did the President’s executive order negate that? One relevant view is what the candidates’ own bishops have to say about that. The General Counsel of the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops in a scholarly legal analysis concluded that:

• The health care bill appropriates $9.5 billion for services at Community Health Centers that may be required to be used for elective abortions.

• The bill also provides tax credits for, and therefore subsidizes, health care plans covering elective abortions.

• Because an executive order cannot amend or contradict Congressional legislation, the President did not have the power to prevent the federal funding of abortions.

With his fingers controlling the temperature knob as this campaign progresses, Chabot will have the opportunity to ratchet up the heat on Driehaus’s Congressional seat. Chabot can do so by advising a public overwhelmingly opposed to taxpayer funding of abortions that according to the candidates’ own bishops that’s precisely what Driehaus voted for when he took the President’s bait, hook, line and sinker.

Edmund Adams is a retired attorney living in Columbia-Tusculum.

November is Coming

Driehaus' votes are bankrupting America

Please join COAST at the Americans for Prosperity BUS (not streetcar) tour to remind voters that "November is Coming" and what Steve Driehaus has done to harm us in Washington

this Saturday, July 31 at 10 AM in Winton Woods

Congressman Steve Driehaus voted with Nancy Pelosi for a government takeover of health care, the failed economic stimulus bill and the job-killing cap-and-trade bill.  These votes will bankrupt America.

Now you can join Americans for Prosperity and its November Is Coming bus tour (no rails at all) and help educate fellow citizens about Steve Driehaus's voting record on key issues.  This Saturday, July 31 at 10:00am at Cottonwood Meadow in Winton Woods join COASTers at the Cincinnati stop of the Americans for Prosperity BUS (not streetcar) tour and learn which Driehaus votes are bankrupting America and put pressure on him to stand up for taxpayers. 

What: November Is Coming BUS (not streetcar) Tour, Cincinnati
When:  Saturday, July 31, 10:00am
Where:  Cottonwood Meadow, Winton Woods, 10245 Winton Rd., Cincinnati, OH 45231 (click here for a map of the park)

This event is free and open to the public. Click here to register. Registration is appreciated, but not required.

Bring out your family and friends for great speakers, free food, free T-shirts and the opportunity to help save your children's future from out-of-control spending and debt from trolleys and such.

Traffic camera ban may be on November ballot in Garfield Heights

Everdeen Mason, The Plain Dealer
Posted: 07/19/2010 6:28 PM

Lisa DeJong, Plain Dealer file photoFrom left, Kathy Wagner; her neice Candice Piskac, 5, and April Wagner (Kathy Wagner's daughter), all of Garfield Heights, hold signs in protest of red light cameras.

GARFIELD HEIGHTS, Ohio -- Residents tired of giving more of their money to the city have taken matters into their own hands.

Residents turned in petitions Monday to the city's clerk of council to get two charter amendments on the November ballot. They want voters to throw out traffic cameras and garbage collection fees.

The group sees both issues as an attack on their civil liberties, as well as their pocketbooks.

"It's a money grab on the back of the tax payers," said Frank Wagner, a member of Citizens for a Greater Garfield and a former city council president.

More than 2,500 residents signed the traffic camera petition, and more than 2,000 signed the garbage fee petition. Only 875 signatures are necessary to put issues on the ballot. Groups routinely collect more signatures than required in case some are disqualified. The petitions must pass a legal review by the city before the issue is put on the ballot in November.

The garbage fee $15 for single-family homes with a discount for elderly residents, said Councilman Joseph Suster. Wagner said residents already pay for trash pickup through their property and municipal taxes. But the real hot-button issue is the traffic camera program, which was introduced in 2009 as part of a financial recovery plan initiated by former mayor Tom Longo. About 4,800 motorists were ticketed in June, the first month the city issued tickets from the cameras. The tickets are $100 and could bring in up to $312,000 in fines for the June infractions alone.

Wagner calls the cameras speed traps that take away from the average working person on a fixed income.

Mayor Vic Collova told the Plain Dealer previously that safety is a major factor of the new traffic cameras.

"My biggest thing about it is they say they want a police officer on the scene, they don't want a camera taking a picture of them," he said. "If someone's robbing a bank and the security camera takes a picture, do they think he shouldn't be arrested? I don't understand the difference."

The police department is more than enough to ensure residents drive safely, Wagner said. He said the fine and two points on the license are enough to dissuade speeders. No points are given for a camera ticket since it is a civil infraction, police Capt. Robert Sackett said.