Free Republic

We keep hearing that we are in the middle of the worst economy since the Great Depression, but occasionally even the liberal media are forced to report the facts, even if they gloss over them: On a day when the nation's gross domestic product suffered its worst slide in three decades, President Obama ordered the creation of a task force on the middle class and signed executive orders aimed at strengthening labor unions. Worst slide in three decades? Golly, whose presidency was it that caused the slide three decades ago? Ah yes, the President whose name must not be mentioned...

President Barack Obama signed a series of executive orders Friday that he said should "level the playing field" for labor unions in their struggles with management. Obama also used the occasion at the White House to announce formally a new White House task force on the problems of middle-class Americans. He named Vice President Joe Biden as its chairman. Union officials say the new orders by Obama will undo Bush administration policies that favored employers over workers. The orders will: Require federal contractors to offer jobs to current workers when contracts change. Reverse a Bush administration order requiring federal contractors...

WASHINGTON---- President Barack Obama intends to overturn four Bush-era executive orders that unions opposed, officials said Thursday. Obama planned to reverse one order Friday that allowed unionized companies to post signs informing workers that they were allowed to decertify their union, an order some claim is unfair because nonunion businesses are not required to post signs letting workers know they were legally allowed to vote for a union.

WASHINGTON – President Barack Obama signed a series of executive orders Friday that he said should "level the playing field" for labor unions in their struggles with management. Obama also used the occasion at the White House to announce formally a new White House task force on the problems of middle-class Americans. He named Vice President Joe Biden as its chairman. Union officials say the new orders by Obama will undo Bush administration policies that favored employers over workers.

Congressman Chris Smith was joined by Congressmen Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI), Bart Stupak (D-MI) and Congresswoman Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (R-FL), in introducing H.R. 708, aimed at restoring the abortion-neutral Mexico City Policy. This 25-year old guideline establishes a wall of separation between abortion and family planning by ensuring that U.S. international family planning funds directed to foreign non-governmental organizations (NGOs) could not be used to actively promote or perform abortion as a method of family planning. This bill would reverse one of the first acts of newly sworn-in President Barack Obama, who quietly issued an edict late Friday, Jan. 23, to allow...

Well, that didn’t take long.  Only 72 hours after he took the oath of office, newly-minted President Barack Obama signed an executive order releasing federal funds to agencies that promote and provide abortion overseas.  Known as the “Mexico City Policy,” this has gone back and forth since Reagan instituted the original ban.  Bush I kept it in place.  Bill Clinton lifted it.  Bush II put it back into place.  Obama has lifted it again. Yes, I know everyone expected it.  I know the issue of abortion is sooooo last administration.  I know that nothing will take the bloom off of...

Right out of the gate, President Barack Obama has reauthorized federal tax revenue to perform abortions around the globe and appointed a tax cheat to run the Treasury Department. His new attorney general was involved with Bill Clinton's dubious pardon of a billionaire financier who fled the U.S. to avoid federal tax evasion charges. I can hardly wait for Obama's Supreme Court picks. Americans deserve the government they get. And for the next four years we're going to get it good and hard. Alex Coalson

Anyone with a sixth grade civics education understands the wisdom of the Founding Fathers in their design of three specific branches of government and the accountability each enforces. Apparently President Obama skipped the sixth grade. Within the first three days of taking office, Obama has signed five specific executive orders without any advice or the consent of the legislative or judicial branches – the same branches the founders believed were essential for effective and accountable government. This is an unprecedented number given past presidents like Kennedy, Carter and Clinton only signed one in the first few days of taking office...

President Barack Obama has shown in the first four days of his Presidency that he has great concern for the lives of terror suspects, but not for innocent human life. With great fanfare, he signed Executive Orders ordering the closing of the Guantanamo Bay Terrorist Prison within one year, halted prosecutions of terror suspects held there, and ordered an end to the use of any enhanced interrogation techniques to gain information from high value terrorist captives. In fact, he ordered that only the "Army Field Manual" techniques be used, meaning every terror organization now has access to memorize just how...

Obama signed executive orders fulfilling his pledge to end what he has called torture and to abolish the Guantanamo facility that became a lightning rod for international criticism. His action drew praise from human rights groups as well as politicians and statesmen around the globe. Larry Downing-Reuters Yesterday, Curt noted: could there actually be some light at the end of the tunnel? [truncated] Most politicians would rather do anything than make a difficult choice, and it seems President Obama hasn’t abandoned this Senatorial habit. To wit, yesterday’s executive order on interrogation: It imposes broad limits on how aggressively U.S. intelligence...

The New Era of Irresponsibility   By Ben JohnsonFrontPageMagazine.com | Friday, January 23, 2009 Upon hearing that President Obama plans to close Guantanamo Bay within a year, the first thought that occurred to me was: where will terrorists go for their lemon chicken? One detention center librarian has said "a few [detainees] are kind of hooked on" the Harry Potter series; will Obama at least detain them long enough to finish The Deathly Hallows? For that matter, where else will these young jihadists ever enjoy access to a several thousand-volume library? How can you keep a boy in the...

EXECUTIVE ORDER -- REVIEW AND DISPOSITION OF INDIVIDUALS DETAINED AT THE GUANTÁNAMO BAY NAVAL BASE AND CLOSURE OF DETENTION FACILITIES By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, in order to effect the appropriate disposition of individuals currently detained by the Department of Defense at the Guantánamo Bay Naval Base (Guantánamo) and promptly to close detention facilities at Guantánamo, consistent with the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States and the interests of justice, I hereby order as follows: Section 1. Definitions. As used in...

EXECUTIVE ORDER -- REVIEW OF DETENTION POLICY OPTIONS By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, in order to develop policies for the detention, trial, transfer, release, or other disposition of individuals captured or apprehended in connection with armed conflicts and counterterrorism operations that are consistent with the national security and foreign policy interests of the United States and the interests of justice, I hereby order as follows: Section 1. Special Interagency Task Force on Detainee Disposition. (a) Establishment of Special Interagency Task Force. There shall be established...

EXECUTIVE ORDER -- ENSURING LAWFUL INTERROGATIONS By the authority vested in me by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, in order to improve the effectiveness of human intelligence gathering, to promote the safe, lawful, and humane treatment of individuals in United States custody and of United States personnel who are detained in armed conflicts, to ensure compliance with the treaty obligations of the United States, including the Geneva Conventions, and to take care that the laws of the United States are faithfully executed, I hereby order as follows: Section 1. Revocation. Executive Order 13440 of...

WASHINGTON - US President Barack Obama's order to close Guantanamo Bay prison is a huge step in the right direction but leaves open the question of what to do with the 245 detainees still held there, rights groups and legal experts said Thursday. "This is a terrific start, a giant step on the path to restoring justice," said Anthony Romero, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) after Obama signed three executive orders just two days into his presidency, including one to shutter the controversial prison within a year. "We are concerned by legal ambiguities in the order...

WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Senators Lindsey Graham (R-South Carolina) and John McCain (R-Arizona) today issued the following statement regarding the executive order put forth by President Obama calling for the closure of the prison at Guantanamo: “We support President Obama’s decision to close the prison at Guantanamo, reaffirm America’s adherence to the Geneva Conventions, and begin a process that will, we hope, lead to the resolution of all cases of Guantanamo detainees,” said Senator Lindsey Graham and Senator John McCain. “The executive orders issued today constitute an important step in the right direction but leave several major issues unaddressed.” “Numerous...

WASHINGTON -- President Obama, putting his executive pen in his left hand to overrule eight years of Bush administration policy, signed "several" executive orders Thursday, including ones affecting national security and abortion. The national security orders mandate that interrogation techniques in the Army Field Manual be used by all intelligence and law enforcement services; call for a task force to look at closing the detention center in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, within the year; and order a strategy be developed for handling detainees in the future. The presidential directive also orders a stay in the case of Ali Al-Marri, the only...

WASHINGTON (AP) - President Barack Obama began overhauling U.S. treatment of terror suspects Thursday, signing orders to close the Guantanamo Bay detention center, shut down secret overseas CIA prisons, review military war crimes trials and ban the harshest interrogation methods. With his action, Obama started changing how the United States prosecutes and questions al-Qaida, Taliban or other foreign fighters who pose a threat to Americans - and overhauling America's image abroad, battered by accusations of the use of torture and the indefinite detention of suspects at the Guantanamo prison in Cuba. "The message that we are sending the world is...

President Obama will issue an executive order on Thursday reversing the Bush administration policy that bans the use of federal dollars by non-govermental organizations that discuss or provide abortions outside of the United States. Obama will sign the executive order on the 36th anniversary of the landmark Roe v. Wade Supreme Court ruling that legalized abortion in all 50 states. The policy, known in governmental circles as the "Mexico City policy," requires any non-governmental organization to agree before receiving U.S. funds that they will "neither perform nor actively promote abortion as a method of family planning in other nations." The...

according to their sources they will be...1. Ban torture explicitly in US field manual 2. Close Gitmo 3. Review all the detainee cases.