Hostettler Money Bomb

Congressman John Hostettler and Brad Ellsworth had their sole debate tonight on the campus of Vincennes University in Indiana. Hostettler is the Republican incumbent, and he’s facing off against Brad Ellsworth, who is in his second term as sheriff here in Evansville (Vanderburgh county).

The debate was informative…to an extent.

Only problem? It was John Hostettler vs John Hostettler. There is actually no difference between the two men. Two conservatives, both pro-gun, anti-gun control, anti-abortion, anti-gay marriage, pro-tax cuts.

As Hostettler said at the start of the debate- the liberals are pouring hundreds of thousands of dollars into the 8th district because of one reason- Ellsworth would add one more to the Democratic side, and he would be the vote needed to put Pelosi in as speaker of the house. That’s the sole reason liberal groups are supporting Ellsworth, because he doesn’t share their values at all. His values and goals…his entire platform matches Hostettler’s completely.

This is why I don’t care for Ellsworth, and I have a feeling that Hoosiers will vote for him, not realizing that a vote for Ellsworth will be a vote for the party of moveon.org, and it’s not a party of the values of the citizens in the 8th district.

BELOW IS A COMPLETE RUNDOWN FOR THE DEBATE, THE QUESTIONS ASKED, AND THE RESPONSES FROM EACH CANDIDATE.

IRAQ
-Hostettler for staying in Iraq. No time table for withdrawal.
-Ellsworth the same.

WARRANTLESS WIRE TAPS
-Hostettler against them. Patriot Act is enough.
-Ellsworth the same.

BALANCE OF POWER
-Hostettler voted with Dems to fight warrantless wiretaps.
-Ellsworth the same.

IMMIGRATION
-Ellsworth= secure the borders with fences and technology. Stop the drug trafficking in doing this. Enforce existing laws to prosecute companies that hire illegals. Wants to “turn the job magnets off”
-Hostettler= has held scores of hearings on this issue. Most important thing is to “turn off the job magnets.” Enforce laws already on books. Admonish Bush admin. to enforce laws on books. Come up with new technology and barriers.

MINIMUM WAGE
-Hostettler= against min wage increase. Increase in labor costs will cause inflation. Bad for economy. Most people making min. wage aren’t poor, but are teenagers with first jobs or wage earners in dual earning households.
-Ellsworth= Supports rise in min wage. Cost of living has risen. Min wage jobs, he says, aren’t jobs for young people…mentions anecdotal story of grown man he talked to who can’t make ends meet with his min. wage job. People can’t make a living in min. wage, cost of living has gone up and it’s been 10 yrs since the last raise in min. wage.

HEALTHCARE/HEALTH INSURANCE
-Elsworth= affordable healthcare is at crisis proportions. Needs to be most important issue for this congress. We have to act now and be creative. Look at reimportation of drugs from Canada, which we’re starting to do. Look at letting small businesses pool together resources to bid on insurance for workers.
-Hostettler= clarifying “tens of millions without insurance”- approx. 15% of those without insurance are illegal aliens. Millions of illegals (9 million according to 1 witness)- they have displaced millions of Americans, now unable to get health insurance. The two issues are connected. Agrees with Ellsworth in allowing small businesses to pool resources to bid on insurance for their employees. Private sector solutions are best.
rebuttal=
-Ellsworth= says illegal aliens have never been an issue in health care and lack of it in hearing others speak on this issue.
-Hostettler= mentions Ellsworth’s support for universal healthcare and wondering why he didn’t mention it.

FOSSIL FUELS
-Hostettler= reduction in oil prices…increased pools have lowered gas prices. More oil being found in deep water exploration will help. We need to move away from oil, in general, as we depend more and more dependent on foreign sources. Ethanol and bio-diesel will benefit all of us, including farmers in Indiana. Hydrogen fuel cells also a good idea. Indiana businesses are researching these fuel cells, taking military applications and moving it to the consumer applications.
Ellsworth= we should have been looking at alternative fuels since the 1970′s. We didn’t learn our lesson in the 70′s. Beans and corn are sources for alternative fuels. $14 billion in tax breaks for “big oil” isn’t good. Hybrid and alt. fuel vehicles need to be brought about. Posey Co. Indiana has plants for this. We need hybrid vehicle tax incentives and make them more affordable.
rebuttal=
Hostettler= tax breaks aren’t given to oil companies. You merely don’t take as much from the companies as you usually did. The fed. govt. would be a much larger recipient of tax money.
Ellsworth= will be an indepdent voice in DC.

ETHICS/STANDARDS FOR CANDIDATE IN D.C.
-Ellsworth= he has pledged alliegance as sheriff. Will be no different in DC in Congress. He wants to change the image of Congress. It will require serious ethics reform. “Fraternity” up there will be broken up.
-Hostettler= when first running for Congress, his model was restoring trust in government. He has stayed consistent on his decisions. He doesn’t take PAC money. Only takes money from Americans. Ellsworth, he claims, has no similar stance in his campaign. He refused Congressional pension, as he doesn’t want the bill to be put onto his kids and grandkids.
rebuttal=
-Ellsworth= signed pledge not to take a pay raise. He claims Hostettler takes money in a “shell game,” and basically calls him a liar.
– Hostettler= reports are available to public and there’s no shell game. It’s Ellsworth who has to give explanation why all the liberal groups are sending him money when he talks so “conservative.”

TAX INCREASE OVER NEAT 2 YEARS?
-Hostettler= no support for tax increase. Greenspan says we tax too much. We need to reorganize and deal with immigration issues, which will help tax burden. It’s federal govt’s role to tax, and keep up military. Need to reprioritize budget the spending to lower tax burden. Reduce spending to balance budget.
-Ellsworth= agrees with Hostettler. No new taxes pledge, he’s signed. Better spending in Congress. Wasteful spending in Congress is wrong. If he ran his sheriff’s dept. like Congress- he’d be out of a job. Money missing sent to Iraq is a bad thing.
rebuttal=
-Hostettler= claims Ellsworth has given no solution to how we can reduce size of govt. and reduce spending. Waste, fraud, and abuse will be limited with lower spending.
-Ellsworth= agrees with Hostettler.

INDIVIDUAL PRIORITIES (TOP 3)
-Ellsworth= 1. listen to the people. What they want their Congressman to be. Citizens want to know they can get ahold of you. 2. Increase jobs in southwest Indiana. Do better job in both parties to sell Indiana to employers to turn out economy around.
-Hostettler= 1. Focus of Hoosiers is immigration from his discussions with them. Will work to fight illegal immigration. 2 Will work with local military contracted businesses to create jobs, create better technology, etc. 3. Will work to get I-69 in place, build it, create jobs through it, etc. Industry will flock to I-69 if it is built.

QUESTION NOT ASKED YOU’D LIKE TO ANSWER?
-Hostettler= Ellsworth has talked on conflicting circumstances. Has spent last 2 yrs listening to voters in 8th district. But he claims he took oath to do his job in Evansville. You can’t do your job and also travel nonstop to get voters to vote for you. He needs to clear up this inconsistency. If he were elected, voters need to know he will do his job he might be elected to do.
Ellsworth= With all these important issues today (immigration, Iraq, healthcare)- this congress has been compared to ‘do- nothing congress’…why doesn’t Congress work longer hours and more weeks to do their jobs. He does more work, hour-by-hour as a sheriff than Congressman.

rebuttal=
-Hostettler= Ellsworth not familiar with the job in Congress. He’s held over 100 town hall meetings in 12 years, which might be a record.
– Ellsworth= says he is always available to the people in Evansville in his duty as sheriff.

CLOSING REMARKS
-Hostettler= this election is about very first vote cast in Congress. 1 vote that WILL be held, regardless or any other issue, is the speaker of the house vote. We don’t know whether Dems will be in majority, as Ellsworth pointed out…but this doesn’t change the fact. Will Ellsworth’s vote, in this regard, be a throw-away vote. Ellsworth hopes, he claims, will be a Republican majority.
-Ellsworth= claims he hears about Pelosi nonstop. He’s not voted once with her. He mentions Tom Delay and this week’s scandal (Foley, we assume). This is about a man working for the people in the district. It’s about getting the work done…stop talking about it, get to the job. Stop partisan bickering, and this can’t happen with current Congress. He will work to fix the problems of Hoosiers and will do the job he’s elected to do.

MY CLOSING COMMENTS:

As I said- I see very little differences between the two men, and I think what Hostettler said was true. The liberal groups have spent massive amounts of money in this campaign to support Ellsworth, not because the groups share his values or the values of the constituents in the 8th district, but because they want a more liberal-leaning Congress in general that won’t share these values. They want one more peg added to the Democratic side, in order to further their ambitions of having Pelosi as speaker, Rangell as head of a very important committee, and more. I’m personally voting for Hostettler. I disagree with him in his fight against warrantless wiretaps- I think they’re vital. Ellsworth comes off as a nice guy, but I don’t want the party of moveon and Kos to have a single new seat in Congress, and when you have two men who basically agree on the basic issues- I say go with experience, go with the candidate who will help keep in place the party that truly represents the values of south, central, and western Indiana.

The National Board of the Republican Liberty Caucus has endorsed two former Members of Congress in their respective runs for U.S. Senate in Indiana and Pennsylvania.

U.S. Senator Evan Bayh (D) decided to retire this year, leaving Democrats to hope that Blue Dog Brad Ellsworth can win statewide. Because of where Ellsworth is from in the state and the political climate, Republicans in Indiana would be best served to select former Congressman John Hostettler to face him in the upcoming May primary.

Hostettler’s main primary opponents are State Senator Marlin Stutzman and former U.S. Senator Dan Coats. Stutzman is fairly competent on the issues, but seems to take a more interventionist position on foreign policy in contrast to Hostettler. The other problem with Stutzman is that he will not be able to rival Ellsworth in the General Election in southern Indiana. Senator Dan Coats is a moderate, not a conservative or a libertarian. He would not be the best candidate to capitalize on the angst and frustration expressed by conservative voters in 2010.

Which brings us to Hostettler. He’s not a perfect candidate, as he opposes a Balanced Budget Amendment and term limits, supports a closed border, and is too conservative on most hot-button social issues (but doesn’t usually believe the federal government should be involved). Perhaps his most significant vote was his 2002 vote to oppose the War in Iraq. He said at the time, “Iraq indeed poses a threat, but it does not pose an imminent threat that justifies a pre-emptive military strike at this time.”

Hostettler favors the dissolution of the Department of Education, and voted against the No Child Left Behind Act because he believes education is a state matter. He also voted against most federal health care bills with the view that health care is a private or state matter. He maintains that many federal environmental laws and regulations infringed on individual property rights. He is active in promoting issues of freedom of religion and expression. He supported repeal of the estate tax, capital gains tax, and marriage tax penalty. Hostettler was recently endorsed by Congressman Ron Paul, and his supporters are having a MoneyBomb tomorrow.

Let’s hope Hostettler wins the upcoming primary and sends Brad Ellsworth back to southern Indiana.

The Republican Liberty Caucus also endorsed Pat Toomey for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania. Toomey’s Republican primary opponent is Peg Luksik, who is affiliated with the far-right of the Republican Party. His general election opponent will likely be Republican-turned-Democrat Arlen Spector.

Pat Toomey is a former Congressman who upheld his term limits pledge in 1998 to only serve three terms. While in Congress, Toomey voted to reduce the capital gains tax, to eliminate the estate tax, to cut small business taxes and to eliminate the marriage penalty. He publicly opposed the stimulus package passed in 2009 and supports a Balanced Budget Amendment.

Toomey takes a libertarian position on Roe v. Wade, believing it should be overturned and returned to the states. That position, however, seems to contradict his support for an Amendment to the U.S. Constitution to ban same-sex marriage. He also has a poor record on drug law reform (having voted against medical marijuana for DC) and foreign policy (having supported the Bush Administration’s War in Iraq).

Pat Toomey would be a competent and pro-liberty Senator for Pennsylvania.

The National Board of the Republican Liberty Caucus has endorsed two former Members of Congress in their respective runs for U.S. Senate in Indiana and Pennsylvania.

U.S. Senator Evan Bayh (D) decided to retire this year, leaving Democrats to hope that Blue Dog Brad Ellsworth can win statewide. Because of where Ellsworth is from in the state and the political climate, Republicans in Indiana would be best served to select former Congressman John Hostettler to face him in the upcoming May primary.

Hostettler’s main primary opponents are State Senator Marlin Stutzman and former U.S. Senator Dan Coats. Stutzman is fairly competent on the issues, but seems to take a more interventionist position on foreign policy in contrast to Hostettler. The other problem with Stutzman is that he will not be able to rival Ellsworth in the General Election in southern Indiana. Senator Dan Coats is a moderate, not a conservative or a libertarian. He would not be the best candidate to capitalize on the angst and frustration expressed by conservative voters in 2010.

Which brings us to Hostettler. He’s not a perfect candidate, as he opposes a Balanced Budget Amendment and term limits, supports a closed border, and is too conservative on most hot-button social issues (but doesn’t usually believe the federal government should be involved). Perhaps his most significant vote was his 2002 vote to oppose the War in Iraq. He said at the time, “Iraq indeed poses a threat, but it does not pose an imminent threat that justifies a pre-emptive military strike at this time.”

Hostettler favors the dissolution of the Department of Education, and voted against the No Child Left Behind Act because he believes education is a state matter. He also voted against most federal health care bills with the view that health care is a private or state matter. He maintains that many federal environmental laws and regulations infringed on individual property rights. He is active in promoting issues of freedom of religion and expression. He supported repeal of the estate tax, capital gains tax, and marriage tax penalty. Hostettler was recently endorsed by Congressman Ron Paul, and his supporters are having a MoneyBomb tomorrow.

Let’s hope Hostettler wins the upcoming primary and sends Brad Ellsworth back to southern Indiana.

Not only did Dan Coats miss the filing deadline for his financial disclosures, he also failed to raise as much money as people were expecting.

Doing nothing to tamp down expectations, the low side of the Coats haul was expected to be $500,000.00 and the high side to be $1 million. He only made it to $379,000.00.

On the other hand, Marlin Stutzman keeps picking up endorsements in Indiana, with more of the state legislature and Republican leaders in the state backing him.

Marlin’s is the next major Senate primary on the calendar. We need to help him get across the finish line.

I remember high school teachers complaining about our congressman, John Hostettler. They mumbled about him being a “radical conservative” and a real “hick”. While I accepted their view as fact at the time, I’ve figured out that a man’s worth can be weighed in gallons of bile spewed at him by those types. Over and over again, Hostettler did the opposite of what the media, the “experts“, and the lobbyists told him to do.

He did it again in 2003, becoming one of only six Republican representatives to vote against the invasion of Iraq. He was unceremoniously ousted in the next election cycle by a Hoosier constituency mesmerized by Fox News propaganda and Christian Zionist brainwashing. Despite having held the line on traditional conservative values and disciplined budget balancing for over a decade, Hostettler was painted as some sort of confused liberal.

During his sabbatical from Washington, he wrote a book: Nothing for the Nation: Who got what out of Iraq. The book shows how a dedicated core of wealthy and powerful lobbyists representing Jewish special interest groups hijacked the political process and plunged our country into a bloody and expensive conflict that we had nothing to gain from. While he’s not a supporter of Occidental Dissent’s White advocacy, he’s unquestionably the best hope America has of placing an outspoken critic of the Israel Lobby in office.

Hostettler’s supporters are attempting to raise a $5,000 money bomb on February 22ndfor his U.S. Senate campaign in Indiana and I’m pledging to do my part to support my principles with my paycheck. He has a real chance here to oust Evan Bayh, a Democratic Senator who proudly supports both bailouts and bombs, while feigning an interest in balancing the budget.

I know that many of the people in here have given up on the political process and many of the people in here will find Hostettler’s views or his voting record problematic for one reason or another. But if you’re looking for practical ways to support politicians who defy the Jewish interests in Washington, this might be a good way for you to do that. If you do pledge to donate, be sure to tell them in the Message section of the pledge that you came from Occidental Dissent.