Due to the withdrawal of Steve Welch from the Republican primary for Pennsylvania’s 6th District in the US House of Representatives, Pennsylvania Conservative Council will cancel the Republican candidate debate, scheduled for April 10, 2010.    

“We are disappointed to cancel this event as we know so many constituents of the 6th District were looking forward to attending this forum, to hear from the Republican candidates.  But we are heartened by the great response we received from both the candidates and voters, and we look forward to sponsoring other events beginning this spring which will focus on voter education and engagement in the political process.” said Greta Scriboni, Executive Director of Pennsylvania Conservative Council. 

About Pennsylvania Conservative Council

The Pennsylvania Conservative Council is a non-partisan grassroots organization. The group operates out of West Chester, PA and has members throughout the tri-state area.

Contact Information:
Greta Scriboni, Executive Director
610-517-4170
gscriboni@verizon.net

There is nothing restricting Barbara McIlvaine Smith and Andy Dinneman from returning their COLA pay raise to the Pennsylvania Treasury. In fact, this is exactly what Rep. Curt Schroder, R-155th, is doing. Hopefully all our other representatives will be so concerned about our deficit to do the same thing, and finally see fit to repeal the COLA pay raise entirely.

They are simply performing another political trick with our taxes.

Why can’t McIlvaine Smith and Dinneman give the money back to the Pennsylvania Treasury, and back to the taxpayers of this state?

In response to Ms. Karen Porter’s recent letter to the editor citing how the cré�che outside of the Chester County Courthouse is offensive because it portrays Jesus as non-Middle Eastern, I’d like to point out that Ms. Porter, who claims to be a lifelong Christian, is indeed correct. Jesus was a Jew from the town of Nazareth, which is located in the Middle East. Ms. Porter’s accuracy ends there.

Nazareth’s first inhabitants were Canaanites, Israelites, and Galilean Jews, all of whom were primarily white. And while many Middle Easterners are indeed darker skinned, most ancient and modern depictions are of Jesus as a white male. While definitive proof of Christ’s skin color might never be proven until He comes again in glory, riding on a cloud, shining like the sun as the trumpets roar, I hardly think it offensive that a manger scene portrays him as white. Are we about changing history for the sake of political correctness? True Christians know that Jesus died for everyone, not just white people.

As a “lifelong Christian” perhaps Ms. Porter should direct her spiritual and editorial energies to praying for the folks behind the “atheist tree” that looms over the cré�che, obscenely proclaiming that both God and Christ are frauds. At Christmas, nothing could be more offensive than to mock the faith of devout believers by placing a “Tree of Knowledge” next to the infant Savior.

More important than Christ’s ethnic origin, however, is his message to “love one another” and it is God’s greatest commandment. Taking the focus off of that message by complaining about a couple of statues is just plain wrong.

We are living in bad economic times. Many are losing jobs and not getting raises or bonuses this year, mainly in part because of the fiscal irresponsibility of our national government and banking system.

In Pennsylvania, why can’t the House Democrats from Chester County be fiscally responsible by returning their COLA to the state treasury? By donating it to charity, they are still taking it. Does this really make them look good? Giving to charity is a good thing, but not at the expense of taxpayers.

Rep. Curt Schroder is returning his COLA to the state treasury and I think other House Democrats should do the same. This would help ease the projected $2 billion deficit that has been created by them. It would make me angry if those who took the COLA ended up voting to raise taxes next year in order to make up for the deficit.

Can someone give me a reasonable explanation as to why the Freethought Society has a right to put up a so called “Tree of Knowledge” at Christmastime? Or, why they want to? Is the Freethought Society a religious organization? No. What does a “Tree of Knowlege” erected by atheists signify? Does it signify that religious people are stupid because they believe in God?

It’s interesting that the Freethought Society always chooses Christmastime to erect this tree. It is, in fact, because they are anti-religious that they choose this time of year to demand their rights to have a symbol right next to the creche and the menorah, religious symbols. Why our society and the county commissioners tolerate this blatant insult to those who believe in God and celebrate a national holiday commemorating the birth of Christ is indicative as to how political correctness has poisoned our society. Now, the most important thing is not being sued by the ACLU so all is tolerated, no matter what.

I would challenge the Freethought Society to get their own holiday so they don’t have to infringe on religious holidays and insult those who believe in God. No one makes these anti-religious citizens go to church or worship in any way. They are free to believe whatever they want and it is telling that they feel such a need to insult those who think differently from them — free thought, indeed!

On Tuesday, November 3rd, we, the people, will again head to the polls to vote. On the ballot are the often-overlooked judicial elections.

Although I rarely advocate electing a single-party slate, I think that this year presents an important case for electing the Republican judges at all levels.

Our individual freedom and autonomy, the very heart of Constitutional limited government and free markets, is under unprecedented attack by Leftists now dominating the Democratic party. The same Leftists control the U.S. Congress, with a filibuster-proof majority in the Senate giving one-party rule to the furthest-left administration in history.

While I disagree with many of the established politicians of both parties, the difference between the Republican and Democratic parties is that within the Republican Party are conservative reformers dedicated to Constitutional limited government, economic freedom, individual accountability, individual autonomy, and American exceptionalism. There is no viable reform movement within the Democratic Party; in fact, is is being led by Union organizers implacably committed to monopoly control of a collectivized workforce and statist Leftists advocating consolidated government control and coercion.

This is where the Republican party, at this time, is different, through its viable and principled reform movement. This is highlighted by the campaign of Pat Toomey with his themes of Constitutional limited government and individual and economic freedom. Examples can also be found in Peg Luksik’s campaign and the work of State Senators John Eichelberger and Mike Folmer.

These reformers, along with the Constitutional limited government/individual liberty/economic freedom movement entirely, are threatened by one-party rule, where dissent is simply ignored. I don’t want some “know-it-all genius” adjucating from Olympus; I want someone competent and careful. I want a judge with depth of experience in criminal law; someone who has shown persistence; someone who understands that decisions in the courtroom impact the lives of real people; someone willing to work for a better Republic; someone dedicated to the rule of law. Knowing the law is indespensable; yet there is more than simply this to be a judge.

For Commonwealth Court, the Republicans have two complimentary candidates in Judge Patricia McCullough and Kevin Brobson. Winning the primary despite not getting party endorsement, Patricia McCullough is independent and principled on Constitutional limited government. She is thoughtful and understands the philosophical and moral implications of her decisions. Kevin Brobson’s thirteen years’ of practice before the Commonwealth Court qualifies him as the most technically knowledgeable of all the candidates. Combining Kevin Brobson’s technical skills with Patricia McCullough’s philosophical and Constitutional focus will benefit us all.

For the Superior Court, there are four Republican candidates: Temp Smith, Sallie Mundy, Judge Judy Olson, and Judge Paula Ott. Judge Ott is from West Chester and has an outstanding reputation among politically active Chester Countians.

Finally, Judge Joan Orie Melvin is heading the judicial ticket for the Supreme Court of Pennsylvania. Judge Orie Melvin is impressively smart and her presentation is stunning. I have no question of her commitment to public service and to the integrity of the Constitution.

There are also local judicial races across each county. This year, more than any other, presents a compelling case to vote for the seven Republican judges highlighted above as well as Republican judges at the local level. Voting for the Republican slate supports the Constitution and its ideals of limited government and individual and economic freedom; failure to do so will only bolster the one-party rule and make the reformer’s job that much more difficult.

In this well-intended document, protecting clean water is and should be a big priority. The Constitution of Pennsylvania specifies that people have a right to clean water. No one of sound mind can argue against  protecting water, as it should be a priority of every citizen, and this process must be carried out within all other laws of Pennsylvania.

The USDA Forest Service defines a riparian buffer as:

Streams, rivers, lakes, and bays and their adjacent side channels, floodplain, and wetlands. In specific cases, the riparian buffer may also include a portion of the hillslope that directly serves as streamside habitats for wildlife.

To a homeowner with a stream running through his property, ordinances on riparian buffers may present a costly situation from something as simple as mowing weeds. Cutting weeds on a bank could reduce a stream’s filtration characteristics and allow poisons to leach into the waterways. This means that those weeds will need to be replaced, of course under township supervision and with an engineer’s report, thus assuming there are no fines, mowing the wrong weeds could result in hundreds or even thousands of dollars to the homeowner.

This is not a hypothetical situation – if you live in Chester County, your municipality has enacted legislation “protecting” riparian buffers on private property. Every municipality must create a comprehensive plan to outline growth controls as mandated by Chester County via a document called Landscapes. This utopian guide sets priorities which municipalities are instructed to enact through their Planning Commissions. Specifics included in Landscapes are items such as “creating affordable housing” and strict regulations around riparian buffers.

Having created a Riparian Buffer ordinance for my municipality I have uncovered many of the legalities of water legislation at the local, state and federal levels. In the quest to “do something”, mandates coming from the county level are little more than feel-good ordinances that put unreasonable restrictions on landowners. Riparian ordinances often end up creating ever larger buffers, so large that a homeowner’s property becomes untouchable, and at the same time not addressing the primary sources of water pollution: agriculture, industry, and waste treatment.

Despite their failings, Planning Commissions are typically representative of and reactive to the will of the people, and if not they are easily replaced. Unfortunately, there is now Federal legislation, introduced on April 2, 2009 by U.S. Senator Russ Feingold allegedly intended to restore protections for waterways throughout the country.  Feingold’s Clean Water Restoration Act (CWRA) would ensure protections for rivers, streams and wetlands, which were long protected under the Clean Water Act (CWA), but are now in jeopardy of losing protections as a result of two recent Supreme Court cases.

Specifically, legislation S. 787, fundamentally changes the definition of “water” under control of the federal government:

The term ‘waters of the United States’ means all waters subject to the ebb and flow of the tide, the territorial seas, and all interstate and intrastate waters and their tributaries, including lakes, rivers, streams (including intermittent streams), mudflats, sandflats, wetlands, sloughs, prairie potholes, wet meadows, playa lakes, natural ponds, and all impoundments of the foregoing, to the fullest extent that these waters, or activities affecting these waters, are subject to the legislative power of Congress under the Constitution.

No longer is there a requirement for the waters to be navigable, and includes a vast component of “activities affecting these waters”. This essentially grants vast new control of land, via all waterways and riparian buffers, to the Federal government. Ominously, the entire text of S787 has no mention whatsoever of “just compensation”, meaning that the Federal government will be able to dismantle use of land without the consequence of paying for it. This is perhaps the greatest heist ever conceived by government, turning over perhaps our most precious asset to the special interests controlling Washington DC.

We are already burdened by state and local ordinances, often passed with little or no awareness by those affected. The proposed CWRA adds a Federal component to this already tricky area. It is a matter of our inherent right through the Pennsylvania Constitution, yet that document is constrained by the other rights it specifies and laws it establishes. As we continually and typically see from our Federal government, they are not so constrained. We ignore this legislation at our own peril.

In brief:

Those who cite the WHO rankings typically present them as an objective measure of the relative performance of national health care systems. They are not. The WHO rankings depend crucially on a number of underlying assumptions— some of them logically incoherent, some characterized by substantial uncertainty, and some rooted in ideological beliefs and values that not everyone shares.

The analysts behind the WHO rankings express the hope that their framework “will lay the basis for a shift from ideological discourse on health policy to a more empirical one.” Yet the WHO rankings themselves have a strong ideological component. They include factors that are arguably unrelated to actual health performance, some of which could even improve in response to worse health performance. Even setting those concerns aside, the rankings are still highly sensitive to both measurement error and assumptions about the relative importance of the components. And finally, the WHO rankings reflect implicit value judgments and lifestyle preferences that differ among individuals and across countries.

WHOm Are They Kidding?

Original Cato policy paper on the WHO World Health Report 2000:

WHO’s Fooling Who?

I have recently attended two health care forums, both dominated by concerns over “ObamaCare” and the damage to our healthcare system should the government ever take control. When the discussion turned to what is really needed to improve our health care and reign in costs that increase premiums, there was a common theme at both events: the need to reform medical malpractice.

Medical malpractice law suits have had a devastating impact on the practice of medicine in Pennsylvania. Thanks to jury verdicts, expensive settlements to avoid trials, and increasing premiums for malpractice insurance, high risk specialists are in short supply across the state. Medical students educated in Pennsylvania schools leave to practice in other states with more reasonable liability systems. Obstetric units at hospitals have closed all across our region, and trauma care has suffered.

The expensive malpractice premiums paid by our doctors add to their overhead and the cost of their services. The fear of being sued causes doctors to practice “defensive medicine”, ordering more tests and procedures than might be necessary out of fear of being second-guessed by a trial lawyer should something go wrong. This drives up the utilization of medical services and virtually everyone is in agreement that such utilization is a major cost driver in our health care system.

Earlier in this decade, we in Pennsylvania had the opportunity to address and resolve this issue. Instead, legislative leaders literally snatched defeat from the jaws of victory. The high water mark of medical malpractice reform came with House passage of my amendment which was a complete package of medical malpractice solutions. My amendment allowed for a system to limit, or cap, so called non-economic damages (”pain and suffering”), reformed “joint and several” liability to prevent those with deep pockets but no liability from being sued, kept our county doctors out of the lottery-like Philadelphia court system as well as providing reforms to the way in which malpractice awards were paid out. It had all of the necessary ingredients to solve the problem once and for all.

What happened? The bill went to the Senate where it was eviscerated. When it came back to the House it was so watered down that it was no longer recognizable as the bold effort contained in the amendment. The only meaningful provision to survive was the limitation on “venue” to keep suburban doctors out of the Philadelphia court system.

Later we made a second attempt at capping malpractice damages.  This took the form of a constitutional amendment.  When it became obvious that House leadership was going to allow this effort to die, I took the extraordinary step of filing and bringing a discharge petition to the floor. This was a direct challenge to my own House Republican Leadership as I was bound and determined to bring caps on damages to a vote.  I did get the discharge resolution to the floor but we fell about 7 votes short of the numbers needed to pass it.

The current debate on health care makes it clear to me that we need to revive this effort to bring limits and common sense to our malpractice system and litigation in general.  Yet it seems no one in Washington is championing this reform that would help lower healthcare costs. It is time the President and Congress drop their single-payer, public option, government controlled, nationalized healthcare fantasies and take the steps necessary to reform our current system while maintaining the best aspects of our health care.

Medical malpractice reform is a good place to start. Providing competition among insurers by allowing the purchasing of insurance across state lines would also help. Greater transparency in pricing for services would allow the consumer to make informed health care decisions. Expanding the use of consumer driven healthcare through Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) will allow individuals to make cost/benefit decisions for their own healthcare as opposed to rationing by federal bureaucrats.

There are plenty of good ideas to reform our healthcare and promote affordability and access for everyone without government control.  Once we defeat “ObamaCare” perhaps these good ideas will be taken seriously. 

Curt Schroder is in his eighth term representing the 155th District of Pennsylvania. He is currently running for US Congress in the 6th District of Pennsylvania. More information can be found at www.vote4curt.com

Reprinted from http://janeoftheunitedstates.blogspot.com/

September 3, 2009

Every year around this time I survey my eleventh grade students to see what they remember about September 11, 2001. Naturally, every year students remember less because every year they are younger and further removed from the terrible events of that day. This editorial is for them and for the generations after them, so that they never forget.

I remember September 11. There were big puffy clouds in the Pennsylvania skies that day and temperatures were in the high 70s. New Yorkers enjoyed the same pleasant skies, as did residents of Washington, DC that day. The day started routinely enough with FoxNews on the TV as I readied myself for another habitual eight period journey of shaping young minds in my high school English classroom.

I remember the urgency in my principal’s voice as he came over the PA system during second period with the shocking news that terror had come to our shores in the form of commercial jetliners hijacked by people we would later determine to be radical Islamists seeking the death and destruction of innocent and unassuming Americans in New York City, and Washington, DC and fatefully, western Pennsylvania. My country was under attack.

I remember the tears on the faces of my fellow teachers and the chaos and confusion even among the network anchors on TV as they scrambled to piece together the magnitude of this terroristic sucker punch to our nation’s financial and legislative capitols respectively. I remember watching on TV with utter dismay and disbelief that our borders had been so unsuspectingly breached – violated by an enemy we had ignored or dismissed until that fateful morning when 2,993 Americans never returned home to their families. What did they do to provoke such wrath, such fury?

I remember images of desperate people dangling from the sky-scraping windows of the World Trade Center, ironically escaping the Towers’ collapse by desperately jumping to their certain deaths below as panicked New Yorkers in the streets ran for their very lives to escape the devastation and bedlam of a city under siege. I remember President George W. Bush bowing his head in humble prayer to ask for the Almighty’s intercessory power in the face of such terror, and I remember fervently joining him in desperate petition.

I remember the dust cloud that blurred the New York City skyline for weeks after 9/11, and the gaping hole in lower Manhattan where the Towers once loomed as the hub of our economic stasis, proud beacons of our capitalistic mores and financial stability engendered only from the convergence of toil and opportunity that is uniquely American. I remember pointedly watching Howard Lutnick, CEO of Cantor-Fitzgerald, weep uncontrollably as he explained to a journalist that simply because he took his daughter to her first day of kindergarten, he was the sole survivor of his 658 person company occupying five of the top floors of One World Trade Center.

I remember that as my shock and sadness subsided along with the powdery grime in lower Manhattan, my anger raged like a furious inferno. Jihad had rattled my patriotic cage. I wanted retribution, justice for the unforeseen kick in our homeland’s groin.

Eight years have quieted my rage somewhat, but time won’t ever erase the scars of America’s wounds. And as our nation marks another 9/11 anniversary eight years later, I still remember so that generations to come won’t ever forget.