FREEDOMWORKS 03/12/2015

1. Hillary Clinton: Costing You Money Since 1993 - by Logan Albright She hasn’t been in the White House for over a decade, and hasn’t been Secretary of State for more than two years, but that doesn’t stop her from continuing to soak the taxpayers. Bloomberg is reporting that the task of sorting through the 55,000 emails that Hillary Clinton turned over to the State Department could cost taxpayers millions of dollars. Of course, this cost need not have been incurred if the former Secretary of State had simply followed the rules and conducted government business on a government email account, but then again, rules have never really stood in the way of the Clintons doing whatever they want to do. Read more here... 2. ObamaCare: A Lesson in Poor Lawmaking - by Michael Greibrok A good law needs to be clear, concise and open to debate throughout the entire lawmaking process; ObamaCare had none of these things. Since public opinion was opposed to ObamaCare from the start, the law was forced through Congress with no time to debate. Now, it appears to be up to the courts and executive orders to try to fix the many problems with the bill. The Supreme Court heard oral arguments this week in King v. Burwell, where plaintiffs argued that the IRS illegally offered subsides to individuals that purchased health insurance through federally established exchanges, but King will not be the last time ObamaCare comes before a federal court. Currently there is a case regarding ObamaCare before a federal judge in every circuit in the United States. The number of ObamaCare cases in the federal courts is impressive and is the result of a rushed and poorly constructed law. Some of these cases may eventually find their way to the Supreme Court just like NFIB v. Sebelius,Burwell v. Hobby Lobby and King v. Burwell. Read more here... 3. YAL Iowa: Liberty is on the Rise - by Noah Wall Last weekend, Matt Kibbe and I attended the Young Americans for Liberty State Convention in Iowa. Here’s what you missed: Over 200 liberty activists showed up from Iowa and every surrounding state including Illinois, Wisconsin, Michigan, Nebraska, Missouri and South Dakota – and even activists from as far away as Indiana. Read more here... 4. Tell Your Senators: Support the REDEEM Act - by Matt Kibbe As one of our more than 6.9 million FreedomWorks members nationwide, I urge you to contact your senators today and ask them to support the Record Expungement Designed to Enhance Employment (REDEEM) Act, introduced by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) and Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), “to provide for the sealing or expungement of records relating to Federal nonviolent criminal offenses, and for other purposes,” and to co-sponsor the bill if they have not already done so. The justice system is currently structured in such a way that young offenders, convicted of strictly non-violent crimes, often have their whole lives tarnished by a criminal record resulting from a youthful mistake. The stigma that comes with such a record can severely limit opportunities for employment and education, and too often, this lack of options can lead young people into a life a crime. Read more here... 5. We're All Criminals Now: Over-Criminalization Has Distorted the Justice System - by Jason Pye The average American commits three felony crimes a day, and, more often than not, doesn't even know they've run afoul of criminal statutes. In 2009, Harvey Silverglate published a book, Three Felonies A Day, that highlighted the absurdity of over-criminalization made possible by an endless string of federal laws. The premise of the book is that "federal criminal laws have become dangerously disconnected from the English common law tradition" on which the American legal and justice system is based. This disconnect has created an atmosphere in which prosecutors can, theoretically, punish virtually anyone of crimes they have unwittingly committed, even if there was no intent to break the law. Read more here... 6. 5 Reasons to Support Justice Reform 7. Teachers Speak Out Against Common Core - by Logan Albright One of the most outrageous features of Common Core education standards is the way they pit teachers against parents. Textbooks and curricula aligned with Common Core actively discourage parental involvement in homework, and new methods for solving math problems are structured in such a way that few parents can understand them enough to help their children. With this dynamic in place, it’s easy to think of the teachers as the bad guys, trying to separate children from their parents with ever increasing levels of control. But this is a mistake. Common Core was not designed by teachers, but rather by bureaucrats who do not understand the classroom, and many teachers are among the loudest voices of opposition, angry at the way the standards prevent them from effectively doing their jobs. Read more here... 8. Big Business Steps Up Pressure to Keep Export-Import Bank Alive - by Tom Borelli With the clock ticking to end government funding of the Export-Import Bank, big business is stepping up the pressure to keep the bank alive. Support of Ex-Im will stop on June 30 unless Congress passes legislation to keep it going. Knowing it must make Congress act to maintain big business subsidies for their customers overseas, business trade groups and individual companies are swinging into full lobbying panic mode. Read more here... Make freedom work, Jackie Bodnar Director of Communications, FreedomWorks