Hoyer: New Abortion Act Putting Lawmakers In Tough Spot

By Gabriella Landeros

As the House of Representatives considers the “Prenatal Nondiscrimination Act” to ban sex-selection abortions and require doctors to report a woman to authorities if they suspect her of doing so, House Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) spoke for many Democrats by warning that it puts lawmakers in a sticky situation.

With most proponents of the bill being against abortion no matter what, Hoyer stated, “I think this has come up because someone has decided politically that it was a difficult place to put people in, because again, any interpretation in voting against this bill is therefore for abortions for the purpose of selecting gender would be wrong, period.”

Although Hoyer is against abortion based on gender, he feels that when it comes to abortion alone, “a woman and her doctor gotta have the choice of what alternatives she wants to choose.”

It puts medical personnel in a difficult position as well, Hoyer warned, with a five year penalty if they don’t report a sex-selection abortion. Hoyer explained that doctors have to base their assumptions on the woman’s reasoning for an abortion, but if found out later they were lying, doctors are the ones getting penalized.

Read the original article on the Talk Radio News Service site.

White House Unveils Multimillion Dollar Effort To Help Hard-Hit Manufacturers

By Gabriella Landeros

The Obama administration Tuesday unveiled a $26 million, multi-agency effort to spur job growth in the manufacturing sector.

14 various federal agencies and funding partners, such as the U.S. Department of Commerce Economic Development Administration, U.S. Small Business Administration, and U.S. Department of Agriculture, “will assist the development and implementation of regionally driven economic development strategies that will remove obstacles and/or promote advanced manufacturing growth, thereby helping to enhance the competitiveness of U.S. manufacturers in the global marketplace,” Acting Assistant Commerce Secretary for Economic Development, Matt Erskine said during a conference call with reporters.

The initiative is “designed to strengthen high potential regional clusters across the country that accelerate innovation, strengthen capacity in advanced manufacturing, and foster innovation fueled job creation through public-private partnerships,” added Erskine.

Read the original article on the Talk Radio News Service site.

Drug Prohibition Holds Hidden Dangers, Warns Harvard Economist

By Gabriella Landeros

Jeffrey Miron, Harvard University’s Department of Economics Undergraduate Studies Director, told the National Economists Club Thursday that drug prohibition is likely causing more harm than good.

“Opponents of drug prohibition would argue that it actually increases crime and corruption, rather than reducing crime, that it reduces the health and productivity of drug users, rather than making people who use drugs better off, and it has a bunch of other side effects unintended for consequences,” Miron said.

“In an underground market, people can’t resolve their disputes with courts, lawyers, ballot initiatives, and so on. They are likely to resort to violence instead, that’s the obvious substitute for non-violent dispute resolution mechanisms,” added Miron.

Having to find other sources for income, such as theft or prostitution, increases overall, Miron noted, pointing out that prohibition also reduces quality control.

Read the original article on the Talk Radio News Service site.

Coburn Calls For Tax Repatriation Holiday

By Gabriella Landeros

Sen. Tom Coburn M.D. (R-Okla), writer of “The Debt Bomb: A Bold Plan to Stop Washington from Bankrupting America,” spoke on his views that would steer politics in the right direction.

With the theme “principled leadership” as the core of his book, Coburn stated, “If you want to change Washington, you have to change who’s here. You have to have people here who actually have real world experience outside of politics.”

Coburn added, “It’s leadership individually, by making this sacrifice…leading by example, and we just do not have that today in our parties, and in our president, and in our country in the political level.”

Coburn believes in maintaining the independence of Americans by creating solutions to “fix our broken entitlement system…It needs to be spoken to the American people, Medicare has to change to save it, same with Medicaid, and same with Social Security.”

The second solution for Coburn involves tax reform. He said American companies should be encouraged to investing “200 trillion sitting on the sideline.” Doing so, he said, would prevent businesses here from spending their profits overseas.

“The way we tax it now is that the money is going to be invested over there, wherever that is, and not brought home because of our punitive tax system and the fact that we don’t have a territorial tax system,” he said.

Coburn also argued that the U.S. is not using its natural resources efficiently, causing slow economic growth and lack of jobs.

“We’re sending 300 billion dollars a year out of this country, for oil and gas that we can produce here, and yet we have a policy not to do that. So if you think about 300 billion not going out of the country, and 300 billion staying here and being invested here, you would see a large response.”

Read the original article on the Talk Radio News Service site.

Marketing Strategy Or Offense To Some?

This quarter I have been doing a journalism internship with the Talk Radio News Service in Washington, D.C. for my last quarter as an undergraduate. With graduating early, I thought an internship in D.C. would give me the extra training I need to sharpen my journalism skills. These past few months I have been writing about politics, foreign affairs, and various issues like student debt. I have also been using my technical skills by creating video and audio packages for the company.

During a Target trip with a couple of friends, I bumped into the "Hispanic Products" aisle. While being perplexed, and sparking my curiosity at the same time, I investigate these Hispanic foods. And what do they consist of? What I expected- tortillas, salsa, refried beans in a can. I was not too sure what was the purpose of having "Hispanic Products" taking over one aisle. People I know have commented on this before, but it's a different feeling when you see it with your own eyes and realize it's not a joke. Why couldn't the salsa be with the other condiments? Why couldn't the canned refried beans be with the garbanzo beans? or Why couldn't the tortillas be with the bread and bagels? I didn't see an aisle with "Asian Products," but apparently my friend said there was an aisle of "Ethnic Hair Products."

The reason I didn't see an aisle with "Asian Products," but did see an aisle with "Hispanic Products," is because it is a marketing strategy to grab the Latino consumers. The area I was in was Columbia Heights, an area in Washington D.C. with 58% African Americans and 34% Hispanic. How clever of companies, like Target! Although this may be racist to some, marketing is marketing, and it will for sure surpass any social constraint to get its product across. A friend from San Diego, CA said their Target has the same thing, makes sense if San Diego is just minutes from the Mexico-United States border.

Is this becoming a new trend for companies? One may think it's a marketing strategy since people love Latin food and want everything in one place, while some may actually take offense to it. Whatever it is, it will not stop companies from conforming to the majority of their shoppers. With Hispanics counting 16.3% of the U.S. population and increasing every year, creating a new age of a "Hispanic boom," manufacturers will continue to target Hispanic consumers in the most evident areas.

Van Hollen: Dems Wanted “Balanced” Approach To Thwarting Sequestration

By Gabriella Landeros

Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) told reporters Monday that Democrats had a plan to dodge sequestration with a “balanced” approach but ultimately saw the Republican effort to avoid Defense cuts steal the stage.

“It combined cuts with cuts to tax breaks for special interest, and very wealthy Americans very specifically,” Van Hollen said during on a conference call. “Our plan would have ended the add subsidies that take the form of direct payments, these are payments that go to agribusinesses in good times and bad…The Democratic plan also would have ended many of the taxpayer subsidies for the big oil companies, the big five.”

Van Hollen noted that the Republican plan, which is considered Dead on Arrival in the Senate, “cut deeply into food and nutrition programs for kids and struggling families.”

The Republican plan aimed at staving off $98 billion in automatic defense cuts instead promised $242 billion over the next decade in cuts among entitlement programs and financial reforms.

Read the original article on the Talk Radio News Service site.

Boehner: Focus On Jobs, Not Same-Sex Marriage

By Gabriella Landeros