Though not meant as an “official” response to the State of the Union, Congresswoman Michelle Bachmann’s (R-Minnesota) address to the Tea Party following President Obama’s speech turned out to be exactly that.  Where the president spoke in generalities and used ceremonial, presidential-sounding rhetoric to sell his big government programs, Rep. Bachmann laid out the reality in rather stark terms.  She showed graphs dramatically illustrating the vast expansion of government spending and debt, as well as the contrast between the low levels of unemployment during the Bush years and the high levels during the Obama years.

Mrs. Bachmann’s remarks stood out for providing very solid suggestions for fixing the economy.  She advocated stopping the cap and trade system, support for a balanced budget amendment, reducing dependence on foreign oil, turning back 132 Obama regulations that cost more than $100 million, repealing ObamaCare and replacing it with free market solutions, reducing tax and regulatory burdens on job creators, and reducing the corporate tax rate.

Bachmann ended with a soaring peroration about the miracle of America, the greatness of our country, and the liberty that is the foundation of our government.  Of course, a major aspect of the power of Bachmann’s speech was the integrity of the ideas and the consistency with which Congresswoman Bachmann and the Tea Party Movement have held those ideas and embodied them in recommended legislation.

One of them is Reagan. The other one would like to be.

After the “shellacking,” what will President Obama have to say about the State of our Union?  He gives his annual report tonight.

President Reagan made Americans feel proud of our country.  President Obama makes Americans feel obliged to defend our country (from him).  In his inauguration speech, his stated vision was to “remake America.”  Since then, we’ve gotten a glimpse of what he wants to make us into — and Americans rejected his view of America this last election.

While his messaging since then gives the appearance that he gets what Americans want, his policies and agenda have yet to change.  People are more savvy now and won’t be fooled by a cloak of rhetoric that covers the old agenda of big-government-by-regulation, disrespecting American Exceptionalism, promoting sexual identity politics, or empty words about “reducing abortion.”

President Obama will face a new Congress and public, both who are extremely sensitive to Constitutional limits and fearful of government spending.  Americans are unified, and ready for politicians to cut spending, reduce government, and quit vilifying political opponents — three items, by the way, of which the opposite mark President Obama’s career and his last State of the Union, when he pushed ObamaCare and unfairly criticized the Supreme Court justices sitting in front of him.

President Obama has an advantage this year in that it is no secret what Americans want and what the majority in Congress recognize is their mandate.  But like Reagan, his audience will not trust without verifying.

President Obama will have to prove through his actions that he will reduce government spending, promote and defend America to the outside world, stop funding abortion, and respect the Constitution and our religious heritage.

Various papers and opinions that Elena Kagan wrote in the past are now surfacing and they shed light on her liberal social views.  That’s alarming to us at Concerned Women for America Legislative Action Committee.

I’ve just released the following statement on those papers and opinions, and I thought you might like to read it:

“As we suspected, President Obama nominated a far left liberal who supports both abortion and ‘gay marriage.’ Besides her disdain for the military and choosing to adhere to her own views rather than the Constitution and what is best for the security of our country, Elena Kagan has also demonstrated her distain for the unborn, the most vulnerable in our society.

“We believe Americans want a justice who will uphold the rule of law regardless of their personal views or leanings, especially the basic freedom of the right to life and the value of traditional marriage. We urge the Senate to oppose the nomination of Elena Kagan.”

Do you ever wonder WHO those insane judges are that believe sexual predators are only sick and should thus not be given maximum sentences?  I think those judges are unfit to rule.  However, President Obama apparently wants to give one a promotion.

Michael Ross, in a documentary on serial killers, describes how he tied up 14-year-old Leslie Shelley, put her in the trunk of his car, and “took the other girl, April Bernaise [also 14] out and I raped her, and killed her, and I put her in the front seat.”  He said he killed eight girls, ages 14-25, and if he wasn’t caught, he’d still be killing.

It was of this man that Robert Chatigny, a U.S. District Judge in Connecticut, said: “[Michael Ross] never should have been convicted.  Or if convicted, he never should have been sentenced to death.”  Then Chatigny fought to stop Mr. Ross’ execution — twice — and was both times overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court.

Robert Chatigny is President Obama’s latest nominee to the 2^nd Circuit Court of Appeals, a lifetime appointment spot and can be a stepping stone to the Supreme Court (the 3^nd Circuit is where Justice Alito once sat).  If President Obama thinks his nominees are all fine and good, then why shouldn’t the American people?  Obviously for lots of reasons.

To even think of a judge sitting on one of the highest courts in the land who so clearly sides with a serial killer and rapist rather than with the women — or merely the facts of the case — is nauseating.

Chatigny was grilled by Republican Senators recently in his Judiciary Committee hearing.  Only one Democrat Senator showed up, and she asked no hard questions of the rapist defender.  Here’s a shocking video from the hearing, interspersed with an interview from Michael Ross himself on how he killed and raped his victims.

President Obama needs to withdraw Robert Chatigny’s nomination immediately.  I truly hope that the feminist groups join in CWA’s opposition to this nominee.  Anyone who claims to defend women has a responsibility to join us!  Contact your Senators and tell them to vote “NO” on Chatigny’s confirmation.

<Recent media reports have indicated that Elena Kagan, when she worked under President Bill Clinton (D), urged him to support the partial-birth abortion ban, a supposedly “pro-life” amendment.  To the contrary, the actual amendment was a fake, meant only to swindle Congress and the public into weakening a ban on partial-birth abortion.

It was all just a political stunt.  In a 1997 memo, Kagan and her boss, Bruce Reed, advised President Clinton to support then-Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle’s (D-South Dakota) compromise to the Partial Birth Abortion Ban for political reasons.  The ban on partial-birth abortion was strongly supported by Congress and the public, and Clinton risked having his veto overridden, a move that would hurt him politically.

Kagan and Reed could not have been clearer:

“We recommend that you endorse the Daschle amendment in order to sustain your credibility on H.R. 1122 and prevent Congress from overriding your veto,” they wrote.

Presented as a “compromise,” Daschle’s ban on aborting viable babies had a loophole so large than it wouldn’t ban anything.  In fact, the title of a Washington Times article said just that: “Daschle Bill May Not Ban Anything.”

Just like Obama’s health care bill, Daschle’s amendment was kept secret, but the Washington Times was able to get a copy.  It found that the bill would allow abortionists to decide whether or not they broke the law.  The abortionist would decide if the baby was viable and if the pregnancy would harm the woman.

Way to put the weasel in charge of watching the hen house Mr. Daschle!  Late-term abortions cost quite a hefty fee — at least $2,000 at some clinics.  Abortionists aren’t to going give up a profit for the life of the baby.

Infamous late-term abortionist Warren Hern told the Washington Times, “I will certify that any pregnancy is a threat to a woman’s life and could cause ‘grievous injury’ to her ‘physical health.’”

Even if the baby was viable and the mother was healthy, under the Daschle amendment, the abortionist could commit a partial-birth abortion and face no criminal penalty.  He could possibly be fined or have his license suspended.  However, he would not risk the kind of criminal penalty that would come from doing the same thing to a fully born human being — or animal.

Thankfully, the Daschle amendment was defeated.  And in 2007, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld a true ban on partial-birth abortion.

Another example of Kagan giving bad — and unsuccessful — political and legal advice.

Penny Nance, CEO of CWA

Today the D.C. Court of Appeals heard arguments to put a measure on the ballot in DC to decide whether or not gay marriage will be legal in the District. Concerned Women for America released the following statement from CEO Penny Nance regarding the hearing: 

The 19th century Supreme Court Jurist Joseph Story said:  “Marriage is treated by all civilized societies as a peculiar and favored contract.  It is in its origin a contract of Natural Law.”  

We are here today in hopes that the D.C. Court of Appeals will allow the residents of the District of Columbia their voice in deciding whether or not marriage should be redefined in D.C.  

The issue of the protection of the traditional definition of marriage transcends racial, gender and party lines.  

According to an AP exit poll in California, 70 percent of African-Americans voted in favor of Proposition 8 to protect marriage in the 2008 election. Virtually all of these same respondents voted for Barack Obama for President. 

In just the past 18 months, some of the most liberal states have decided to protect marriage either by statewide vote or through their state legislatures.  Both California and Maine saw voters cast ballots to protect marriage.  State legislatures in both New York and New Jersey voted down bills that would have legalized same-sex “marriage.” 

In every state this issue has been put on the ballot — 30 states in all — voters have emphatically turned out to support marriage and reject attempts to redefine marriage. 

However, proponents of “gay marriage” do not care about the tension this new law causes religious charities in their care for the poor. They do not care if it threatens the religious freedom of those who disagree. They do not care if it threatens businesses who cannot bend to their will, and they do not care that what they seek redefines the bedrock of society.  

This is not about tolerance, for tolerance already exists.  This is about forced recognition via the heavy hand of government.

With a Supreme Court nominee coming any day now from President Obama, Concerned Women for America sent a letter today encouraging the President to pick a Justice who will uphold the Constitution and not lean on “empathy” or “feelings” when deciding the law.

“We pray you would choose a nominee that makes all Americans feel proud.  At a time when the political chasm between citizens seems to be expanding at an alarming rate, such an admirable move would certainly do a lot to bring us back together and rally for the common purpose of doing what is best for America,” reads the letter.

And we also released an executive memo outlining our concerns, and those of our members, with the top prospects for nominees.

We have serious concerns about all of these nominees and the ideology driving the search behind picking the proper candidate.  President Obama has given conservatives no reason to trust that he will do the right thing.  He has articulated a judicial philosophy that not only allows but expects a judge to decide cases based on what he “feels” is right, instead of the law.

The memo states that “this idea is so preposterous that even his own Supreme Court nominee, Justice Sotomayor, rejected it at her confirmation hearings.  ‘We apply law to facts.  We don’t apply feelings to facts,’ she said, distancing herself from the President’s ideology.”

See the memo here.  Read it yourselves, and feel free to distribute the link around.

Here are CWA, we are following the nomination process closely and will update you with all the latest news as it comes in.