During the 2008 campaign, President Obama declared, “It’s time to fundamentally change the way that we do business in Washington.” And change it, he has done! It’s been transformed into even more of a brash, thuggish, and coercive environment than it ever was before. The current IRS scandal of politically motivated discrimination against conservative non-profit groups perfectly characterizes the disturbing ends-justify-the-means “Chicago-style politics” that Obama and his comrades have brought to Washington.

As admitted by an Internal Revenue Service (IRS) official last week, and confirmed this week by the Inspector General’s (IG) special report on IRS abuses, the IRS, arguably the most onerous and oppressive government agency in the country, was discriminating against conservative, religious, and pro-Israel non-profit groups seeking 503(c) designation. What would normally take 6-12 months for such a ruling was taking up to three years. In addition, the filing requirements of such groups went far beyond the requirements specified for such applications.

To make matters even worse, IRS employees were releasing the confidential filings for such groups to the George Soros-backed liberal propaganda organization ProPublica. They admitted earlier this week, “In response to a request for the applications for 67 different nonprofits last November, the Cincinnati office of the IRS sent ProPublica applications or documentation for 31 groups. Nine of those applications had not yet been approved — meaning they were not supposed to be made public. (We made six of those public, after redacting their financialinformation, deeming that they were newsworthy.),” according to ProPublica.

There are clearly five improprieties or crimes under one scandalous umbrella here. First, the systemic targeting of groups thought to be critical of the administration; second the demand for information that was irrelevant to the tax status filing; third, obfuscation and outright lying by IRS officials to Congress and the public about those abuses; fourth, sharing those confidential filings with an opposing political group, ProPublica; and fifth, intentional withholding of information until after the election.

And lest we think these abuses were perpetrated by just a couple of rogue employees, all requests for 503(c) status go through the Cincinnati office. The Inspector General’s Report indicated it was the entire division, referred to within the IRS as the “Advocacy Group.” The IG’s report clearly documents that Washington was aware of what the “Advocacy Group” was doing.

So what’s happening to those involved? Not much. Acting IRS Commissioner Steven Miller, has resigned, even though he was already planning on leaving the agency. And Sarah Hall Ingram, who had been serving as commissioner of the Tax-Exempt and Government Entities Division from 2009 to 2012, the “Advocacy Group,” is now serving as director of the IRS’ Affordable Care Act division. That is the unit that’s responsible for enforcing Obamacare. Now isn’t that comforting?
Although this has been going on for at least three years, if we’re to believe White House Spokesman Jay Carney, Obama only found out about it from press reports, though the IG’s report reveals that Treasury Secretary Geithner’s office knew last summer.

The President seems to know nothing about what’s happening in his administration. From the Fast and Furious gunrunning, to the IRS and the AP phone records scandals, the president knows nothing until he hears “from news reports.” Whether he knows personally about these scandalous activities of his administration or not, it seems clear that since he’s surrounded himself with compatible ideologues and sycophants, that the entire atmosphere of Washington has become an extension of his Chicago-style politics of suppressing dissent, colluding against groups opposed to his agenda, intimidating the opposition, and suppressing damaging news.

Charles Krauthammer said this week, “Obama ran as a man who would not only change Washington but change the essence of politics itself in America as a kind of Olympian historic figure. He can’t even run the bureaucracy, that’s what we’re seeing. There’s arrogance here, of course, but there is incompetence of the highest order. He poses as the bystander. ‘I learned about it in the press.’ This is an indictment of people who believe in big government, want to expand it, have it control healthcare and cannot run the minimal essence of the duties of government.”

Harry Truman famously kept a plaque on his desk that said, “The Buck Stops Here.” If Obama had a plaque on his desk along the same lines, it would likely read, “The Buck Never Gets Here.” It could also include an additional qualifier, “And if it does, I don’t know anything about it.”

On March 7, 2010, Obama famously declared, “Ultimately, the buck stops with me.” On Sept. 23, 2012, in a 60 Minutes appearance, he said, “As president, I bear responsibility for everything, to some degree.” Yet still we have Jay Carney denying the president is responsible for anything. Obama has said of the Benghazi scandal that it’s merely “a side show.” If that is the case, this entire administration is a scandal-ridden three-ring circus, and the president is the ringleader.

Even Commissioner Miller understands the idea of accountability. In his testimony on Friday before Congress, he said, “I resigned, because as the acting commissioner, whatever happens in the IRS, whether I was personally involved or not, stops at my desk. So, I should be held accountable for what happened.” It’s too bad the head of the country hasn’t come to that same realization.

Just two weeks ago at the Ohio State University commencement, President Obama said, “Unfortunately, you’ve grown up hearing voices that incessantly warn of government as nothing more than some separate, sinister entity that’s at the root of all our problems; some of these same voices are also doing their best to gum up the works. They’ll warn that tyranny is always lurking just around the corner. You should reject these voices. Because what they suggest is that our brave and creative and unique experiment in self-rule is somehow just a sham with which we can’t be trusted.”

How ironic that we’ve seen so much of his administration unmasked by his adulating media so soon after that statement, for the first definition of tyranny is, “arbitrary or unrestrained exercise of power; despotic abuse of authority.” And that’s precisely what we’re seeing as the Oz curtain is pulled away revealing the tyranny of the Obama administration.

Whether the president is explicitly complicit in all of these scandals or not, his politics and leadership style have created, and are conducive with, the pattern and atmosphere of corruption and abuse now in full display by the administration.

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I’ve seen the poster of the 9 bridges of Jefferson County that have been determined by the Idaho Transportation Department to be structurally deficient. And these bridges need to have diminished speed limits and weight limits and immediate repairs. I’m reminded of the nursery rhyme, London Bridge is Broken Down.

“London Bridge is broken down…How shall we build it up again?”

“We’ll build it up with gravel and stone,” or we can prop it up with railroad ties and plywood, as has been done in Jefferson County.

“Gravel and stone will be washed away….” or the railroad ties and plywood can slip and rot.

“We’ll build it up with iron and stone….” which probably would be prudent if we’re planning for long time structurally sound bridges and public safety.

One of my neighbors, upon hearing about the public safety hazards posed by the county bridge system, lamented about what would happen if a potato truck passed over such a bridge and brought it down. I’m thinking about what would happen if one of our school buses loaded with children were to result in “London Bridge came falling down”. Perish the thought and the law suits that would ensue. Am I the only one thinking that safe and reliable bridges are more important than a new high school?

Andi Elliott

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The now notorious abortionist Kermit Gosnell is in prison for the rest of his natural life. Given the difficult judgment facing him, one could imagine that he is hoping that prison time lasts for a long, long time. He was held accountable for but a fraction of the crimes committed, but we can give thanks for the fact that a jury of ordinary men and women had the strength of character to endure a horrific trial to render a guilty verdict.
Imagine for a moment the dire social consequences had they failed to find such a man guilty.

Now our attention can turn to the possible fallout from the Gosnell trial.

Many on the Left would have you believe that he was an evil aberration. Some would have you buy the notion that abortionists are simply kind, gentle souls rendering a public service. But abortion is, by its very nature, a grisly and bloody business. Gosnell is no by means an “outlier”. (In fact, several abortion operations have come in for public scrutiny since the Gosnell trial began – Texas and Delaware come to mind).

What is genuinely unique about the Gosnell case is that it has forced the public to see and hear the sordid details of America’s abortion culture. The nation, including media personalities impersonating journalists, have been cornered into actually seeing behind the dark curtain which surrounds abortion mills. We are collectively nauseated, our hearts hurt over the evil we silently tolerate.

Will the revulsion last? No. The nation is all too anxious to move along, to think of more pleasant things. But a deep crack in the foundation has nevertheless developed. For all our denial, somewhere in our minds the images and descriptions of industrialized child murder linger. Seeds of doubt have been planted in even the most virulent defenders of abortion. Some abortion supporters have even publicly changed their minds on the matter.

The fact that Gosnell was even tried proves that the nation’s conscience still exists, that there are boundaries of decency left.

We must take encouragement from this demonstration of decency and nurture the seeds into mighty shade trees of relief from this national scourge.

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U.S. Federal Judge Edward Korman (New York) issued an order on Friday making “Emergency Contraception” available to girls without restriction. His order was a direct answer to the Obama Administration’s attempt to limit easy access to girls 15 and older.

By the terms of Korman’s order, girls of any age can purchase the potent drug without identification or prescription from the shelves of any drug store. By the terms of his order, parents will, of course, be cut out of the process. And so will medical personnel, including pharmacists. Girls will have easier access to “Plan B” than adults do sinus headache medicine.

As we’ve noted before, this imperious social engineering will have devastating implications for the health and safety of America’s daughters. Allowing grade school girls to ingest these dangerous and powerful hormones without adult supervision is simply madness. Which is to say nothing about the deaths of untallied preborn children and the further erosion of parental authority.

Nearly every profound social ill is on display with this story: the abuse of power by our federal judiciary; disregard for the family; and an evil agenda by the American Left to destroy the lives of America’s youth by imposing a dysfunctional and degrading sexual ethic upon the culture.

With our federal and state authorities so compromised by this whole dynamic, pro-Lifers must focus significant prayer time on behalf of our nation’s vulnerable daughters.

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The unrelenting campaign to allow children free and unaccountable access to the “Morning After Pill” is nothing short of an effort by evil to destroy the innocence of children, particularly female children. The manufacturer of “Plan B” has been pushing for years to allow unsupervised and unrestricted access to their deadly product in the cause of greater profits. They have been joined by zealots in the Abortion Rights movement who seek to unfetter America from any moral concerns about sex or its consequences. Those forces have recently gained invaluable allies in the Obama Administration and the federal courts.

The first victims of their campaign to make Emergency Contraception as easily available as Luden’s cherry cough drops will be the new human beings destroyed by the drug’s powerful chemical make-up.

But the collateral victims will be the girls who use their new “Green Cards” to engage in premature sexual activity. By order of the federal government, these children will now have official permission – even encouragement – to engage in self-destructive sex before they could ever possibly appreciate the emotional, spiritual or physical consequences. Parents will be officially banned from interfering in the matter. Even doctors won’t be allowed to obstruct access to the pills painted by the media as the “solution” to whatever consequences might follow premature sexual activity.

Could anyone concoct a more heinous plot to destroy innocence and future well-being?

Sadly, the dire consequences of this policy shift don’t end there. Not by a long shot.

Official permission to access the Morning After Pill – which, again, acts as an abortifacient – will almost certainly lead to higher rates of sexual activity among the nation’s children. You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to realize that this increased rate of premature sex will lead to higher numbers of STD’s, and higher rates of teenage pregnancies. With each destructive sexual encounter, innocence is wounded. Denigrated self-esteem and guilt is sure to follow, leading to other sexual encounters as a band-aid for the spiritual and emotional pain.

And we haven’t even touched upon the ‘predator dynamic’ – the easy availability of this deadly drug without medical and parental supervision is cause for celebration among those family members or neighbors who would prey upon the vulnerable and innocent.

And then there is there is the deadly matter of the health impact of the Morning After Pill itself. No long term studies have been performed on the consequences of ingesting these mega-dose hormones into the bodies of girls right in the midst of the most profound developmental changes. During the very period when they are maturing into women, the abortion-drug cabal would allow girls to freely add powerful hormonal cocktails into their bodies.

That cocktail contains mega-doses of the standard contraceptive pill, already shown to produce heart problems and even cancer in women who use the pill for extended periods of time. What happens to a young girl who uses “Plan B” on a repeated basis? No one knows. And no one – at least in official Washington circles – seems to care.

One could go on and on about the dire implications of this movement to normalize sexual activity among children. But be assured that countless future mothers, sisters, daughters, spouses will be forever changed by this sinister plot.

But there is one more dynamic which must be added to your consideration: the Idaho Legislature.

Last month we sought to insert a “Religious Liberty Amendment” into the language creating Idaho’s new Obama Insurance Exchange. It would have prevented the exchange from forcing any employer or individual from paying for insurance covering abortifacients – like the “Morning After Pill” – if that employer had moral or religious objections to participating in the destruction of the innocent(s).

Our efforts failed. A majority of Republican senators were more interested in helping Blue Cross build an insurance monopoly in Idaho than they were in protecting human life or our religious liberties.

As a result, it is entirely possible that not only will a 12 year old child be able to walk into an Idaho Falls Wal-Mart and purchase Plan B off the shelf – she may be able to do so without a dime in her pocket. Those deadly drugs may be “free” to her under the terms of her father’s group health insurance plan.

Lord have mercy upon those children we are publicly and willfully betraying.

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We have a President who is intentionally hurting the nation and the people he’s entrusted to serve. In the name of the sequester, the White House’s own plan to clinch a budget deal last year, Obama is willfully and intentionally doing as much damage as he can. This is not subjective, but is verifiable fact.

The President rejected a proposal by the Senate Republicans to give the President more flexibility to pick and choose which programs should be cut to reach the $85 billion spending reduction over seven months mandated by the so-called sequester. That would have given him the opportunity to meet the requirements of the budget deal, without affecting the people our government is supposed to be serving. Keep in mind, that these legislatively mandated reductions are not cuts in actual spending, but only reflect a 2.5% reduction in the growth of government spending.

According to the President a few weeks ago, “There’s no smart way to do that [the sequester cuts],” he said. “These cuts are wrong. They’re not smart, they’re not fair. They’re a self-inflicted wound that doesn’t have to happen.” This is a surprising admission that his own plan is, in fact, stupid!

Actually, Mr. President, there was a smart and prudent way to do it. The third annual installment of a Government Accountability Office (GAO) report spelled out a reasonable way to meet the spending-growth reduction. According to Sen. Tom Coburn, “These are among the findings in the new GAO report that found 162 areas where services are duplicated or money is being wasted in the federal government. The annual cost of duplicative or wasteful programs is estimated at roughly $250 billion. That’s 250 billion dollars a year,” Coburn said. “Just in waste, in duplication, in stupidity, and lack of efficiency and effectiveness by the federal government. (It) makes you want to pull your hair out.”

By simply incorporating the GAO recommendations, cost savings amounting to three times the $85 billion reductions specified in the sequester deal could have been realized! And there would be no impact on travelers, no impact on meat inspections, no furloughed TSA agents or Department of Energy employees, and no impact on our military’s ability to protect the nation.

But Obama rejected congressionally authorized flexibility in applying the reductions, and he opted instead to make the sequester as painful as possible. The Washington Times reports of emails to department heads that the administration intended to make good on its warnings of the “painful” sequestration cuts. According to the Times, the emails directed agency heads, “not to do anything that would lessen the dire impacts Congress had been warned of.”

It’s clear that Obama intends to make the cuts painful to average Americans while he and his family continue their lives of royalty, which we bankroll to the tune of $1.4 billion per year. In the seven weeks since he announced the White House tours would be cancelled, he’s had ten trips, and two all-star concerts in the White House. The only thing being cut at the White House is White House tours. Don’t hold your breath watching for the Obama’s to curtail their extravagant travel and vacation plans! And further proving that it’s all political, and that the President still does have discretion, Obamacare employees are not being furloughed, or facing reduced pay or work hours.

For air travelers it’s a different story, as they began this past week to feel the pain of the President’s decision as the Federal Aviation Administration has furloughed 1,500, or 10% of the nation’s 15,000 air traffic controllers. This has created delays of hundreds of flights.
Sen. Rand Paul said this week, “I think that it’s inexcusable to take important things like travel, air traffic controllers or meat inspectors or something that most of us agree we should have, and play a game with it,” the senator said. “The same day that [President Obama] announces that we have no self-guided tours in the White House, he sends $250 million to Egypt. We’ve got money. It’s a matter of priorities, and a good leader wouldn’t cut essential services. So I think it’s a bit of a charade and it ought to stop.”

Clearly the White House places politics ahead of the needs and interests of the American people. It would appear that either he thinks the blame should be ascribed to members of Congress who would not agree to the budget deal last year without some spending cuts, or he is intentionally curbing high profile, required services to show that we can’t cut a dime from actual spending. Most likely, it is for both of those reasons, which places his political agenda ahead of our interests.

The President rejected flexibility in applying the spending cuts, ignored the GAO report of where reductions could be made without adversely affecting services, and his agency heads are being instructed to make the cuts “as painful as possible.” This is not leadership; it’s ignominious politics, Chicago-style!

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The Gosnell trial in Philadelphia is coming to a close. But the trial is no longer just about a murderous abortion doctor who long ago abandoned any pretense of the Hippocratic Oath. The public revelations of what happens behind the heavy dark curtain has put the abortion industry on trial.
And make no mistake: Gosnell’s horror show is not some aberration.

Planned Parenthood has long fought for abortion at any place, anytime. They fought President Bush tooth-and-claw when he supported the Born Alive Infants Protection Act some ten years ago. It was their public policy to ensure that a doctor should have as many swings at the defenseless baby as necessary in order to guarantee a corpse is produced.

And don’t be deceived that the unhealthy, contaminated, barbaric treatment of women at Gosnell’s shop is unique. As a by-product of the Gosnell trial, nurses at a Planned Parenthood clinic have come forward to describe an abortion factory in Delaware as “ridiculously unsafe”. Former Planned Parenthood employee Joyce Vasikonis told reporters, “They were using instruments on patients that were not sterile.”

This is the way that these supposed “advocates for women” treat those they claim to serve; imagine the barbarity they use in treating those innocent babies, deemed “enemies” of their world view.

The Gosnell trial has also put members of the media on trial. They have been weighed and found wanting. Most of the main stream media simply turned its back on the story. Liberal writer Marc Lamont Hill admitted as much in a posting on the Huffington Post:

“I do think that those of us on the left have made a decision not to cover this trial because we worry that it’ll compromise abortion rights… there’ a direct connection between the media’s failure to cover this and our own political commitments on the left… I think it’s dangerous.”

Yes, dangerous for women and babies, certainly. But the failure of our nation’s 4th Estate to perform its basic function is dangerous to the nation on a very basic level.

But despite that unspoken conspiracy, the truth is leaking out. The conscience of the nation is being challenged. Even the ethics of journalists are being challenged by the facts of this Gosnell trial, hearts are being reached. (See the heart-moving interview of a journalist by Governor Mike Huckabee on his Fox News Show).

The truth shall set us free.

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One of the most specious and inane arguments in politics today is that the Constitution is an arcane, anachronistic document created by imperfect men, and that it is therefore illogical to interpret it literally. They assert that the founding fathers didn’t have a “crystal ball” and couldn’t have foreseen issues like privacy in the 21st century, and so those of us who believe the Constitution to be a social contract limiting the powers of government must be “out of our minds.”

The first of those arguments is a logical fallacy. The tu quoque fallacy asserts that since the founders were imperfect, whatever they may say or do is equally imperfect or questionable. That would be tantamount to saying that because a certain physics instructor is specious, illogical, and misinformed about history and our system of governance, that he’s equally inept and tenuous in physics. Such a conclusion is obviously faulty logic, and based on a false premise.

The second argument is equally misguided. The founders didn’t need a “crystal ball” to foresee 21st century challenges. A constitution is by definition, “a body of fundamental principles or established precedents according to which a state is to be governed.” Consequently, the founding fathers didn’t need to be aware of “privacy” issues, or the internet, or any historically contextual development that may prove intellectually taxing to those who presuppose in their unwarranted arrogance, that they should have.

The structure established by the Constitution created legislative bodies that could adapt to changing times, by passing laws to deal with such vicissitudes, while the foundation, or fundamental principles, could endure, protecting the individual over the presumed and evolutionary expansion of the “rights” of the state. Plus, provision for changing the text of that social contract was made through the amendment process, which has been done 27 times to date.

Our Constitution established a system of governance that could stand the test of time, as long as citizens valued freedom more than tyranny. A system that, if held fast to, would assure that no one person, or oligarchical self-anointed leaders, could become totalitarians in a republic so structured. And it included guaranteed rights and privileges, for the first time in history, not granted by a monarch, ruler, magistrate, or benevolent dictator, but acknowledged to have originated from deity for all men. This is perfectly illustrated by our current president’s admission that, “I am constrained by a system that our Founders put in place,” although there’s precious little evidence of such constraint.

Is it a perfect system? Obviously not, especially in light of our contemporary crony-capitalism, that corrupts government and capitalism. The founding fathers maintained that for the republic to endure, we must have a moral people, which is the only real anachronism from our founding era, casting the most ominous clouds of doubt over the perpetuity of the republic.

When it is argued that the Constitution is a “living” document, implication is made that the precepts and principles of the Constitution are not applicable to today and provides an excuse for all types of scurrilous and specious assertions for expanded government largesse at the expense of our freedom and our money. To say that the Constitution is a “living document,” hence, not to be taken literally, is akin to asserting that the Ten Commandments are really just “Ten Suggestions.” It also affords proponents of the “living document” theory latitude to pick and choose cafeteria-style, which rights established by the Constitution are legitimate or applicable today. Some like freedom of speech for themselves but not for those they disagree with, for example. And some absolutely detest the freedom to bear arms.

Judicial precedent and daily judicial decisions are judged against the basic principles and rights specified by the Constitution and statute to provide applicability to today’s milieu. In that way alone is it a “living document.” Statute is how the fundamental principles of the Constitution are codified in a changing social structure, but the Constitution provides the baseline.

James Madison, regarded as the Father to the Constitution, said, “There are more instances of the abridgment of the freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.” We have witnessed this over the generations since the founding of the country, and we see that process of “silent encroachment” of government on the freedom of the people accelerated over the past few years in a way never before witnessed. We see government dictating terms of property ownership, dictating terms of access to health care, and dictating terms of energy use and private consumption, for starters.

The Constitution is not a “living” document. The Founders were specific in their language and did not mince words. They meant what they said. It was written precisely to prevent the incursion of government into our lives to the extent that we see it occurring today proving it is not an anachronism. It is a social contract to assure and guarantee fundamental freedom and liberty for all generations of Americans, and its relevance is reasserted every time a new official is sworn into office, vowing to “uphold and defend the Constitution.”

The survivability of our republic is dependent upon a knowledgeable and informed electorate, committed to liberty. We need to be intimately familiar with our founding documents, especially the Constitution, and hold those accountable who seek to subvert the freedoms of those who are intended to have ultimate power in this republic: We the People!

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Sen. Marco Rubio has come under gentle pressure from some conservative quarters over his adoption of the term “undocumented ” in his bid to persuade Americans that the Rubio/McCain/Schumer plan to deal with illegal immigrants is good for the country.

The left has been using the power of language to manipulate Americans for many years, and this debate gives us an opportunity to examine how it is done, why it is done and the impact on public policy.

Breitbart traces the fight by the left wing to cleanse the media of the term “illegal immigrant” because it is “offensive”: As far back as 2004, academics have been pressuring the Associated Press to drop the terminology. For years, the AP resisted, saying that the term was accurate because it described a “person who resides in a country unlawfully”. But politics is everything.

Just this month, the AP announced that it would no longer use the term.

The same cleansing has occurred in the abortion debate, though over a much longer period of time. The media refuses to call groups like Idaho Chooses Life as “pro-life” – while having no trouble describing Planned Parenthood as “pro-choice”. Of course that is frustrating because it drains so much of the debate of its importance.

But the manipulation of language by the Left often has real-world consequences. During this past legislative session, abortion advocate John Rusche – Democrat leader in the Idaho House – “officially objected” to the use of the term ‘abortifacient’ during floor debate because “Emergency Contraception doesn’t cause abortions”.

Of course, what Rusche would not admit is that the Left – including members of the medical profession – have conspired to change definitions so that pregnancy no longer means what we all understand it to mean. By their cynical cleansing of the abortion debate, a new life simply doesn’t exist until the fertilized ovum manages to attach itself to the uterine wall. Since Emergency Contraception is specifically designed to interfere with that process, pregnancy doesn’t happen. And you can’t have an abortion if you don’t have a pregnancy to begin with.

Pretty slick, right? So slick in fact, that it is very difficult to even address Emergency Contraception in legislation because of the intentional abuse of language by operatives like John Rusche and the liberal media.

Even more important: Manipulation of language, words, has profound consequences because it is the medium of rational thought. An idea generally requires words to exist, and we certainly need words to communicate our ideas to another. Win the battle for the dictionary and you can sometimes deprive your fellow citizens of truth altogether.

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Dear Governor Otter,

As a longtime supporter and a conservative I am writing, and asking others that read and agree, to ask you to explain some recent actions. Note: Representatives and Senators may be contacted at www.legislature.idaho.gov.

Although I agree with your veto of H0121(smoking in bowling alleys) I am not sure I agree with all of your reasoning. Since you stated in your veto letter “Given legislative concerns about “social engineering,” particularly in regard to my proposal for targeted expansion of the grocery tax credit” (more about that later) it appears you are acting like a spoiled child, saying, if you will not give me what I want I will not give you what you want.

The supporters of the “Clean Indoor Air Act H0121 state “Public Place” as their justification. They confuse public and private property. Just because I allow the public on my property I should not be forced by government to relinquish what is left of my PRIVATE PROPERTY rights. As I look at the last few years of legislative action, I see an attempt by government to remove even the illusion of PRIVATE PROPERTY in Idaho.

House bill H081a is a different matter. How dare you veto a bill that will return 31 to 32.4 million dollars to the taxpayers of Idaho and claim the state cannot afford it! You were elected on a platform of conservative principles that include smaller government, lower taxes (this is what we are talking about), and less intrusive government. I am not even asking you to cut the budget of any government agency – just reduce the rate of growth by 1.5%. This is not you’re money. This money belongs to the people of Idaho. Give it back when you have the chance.

I am sending a copy of this letter to each of my legislators urging them to allow your veto of H0121 to stand and asking them to over-ride your veto or H081a. I am also asking the media to print this letter and asking each person that reads it to contact their legislator in support of these requests.

Sincerely
Jesse Higgins
Aberdeen, Idaho

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