Feb 17, 2012

This morning, approximately 13 million Americans woke up and looked for work. Over 8 million Americans went to a part-time job, but would prefer to work more hours. Millions more Americans gave up looking for a job in the past few years. There are more jobs opening up, but the question for many of these job-seekers is how they will find their new employer and how they will get to work everyday.

Not everyone makes enough to own a car. According to Consumer Reports, the average American car-owner spends around $8,000 a year on their automobile. Because of the recession, fewer Americans can afford a car. In 2009, the number of cars in the U.S. dropped by four million.

Many Americans rely on mass transit to find and keep a job. For many low-income Americans, this is their only option.

For many years, I’ve worked to support local mass transit agencies like the Red Rose Transit Authority in Lancaster County and the Berks Area Regional Transportation Authority. In the late 1990s, Congress passed a law prohibiting transit systems that service urbanized areas exceeding 200,000 in population from using federal transit funds for operating expenses.

This law used an out-dated and arbitrary threshold, the consequences of which were not realized until after the 2000 Census, the first census carried out under this law. Following the 2000 Census, many transit systems, including RRTA and BARTA, were forced to significantly cut routes and raise fares.

I introduced the Transit System Flexibility Protection Act to provide a long-term solution to this problem. Specifically, it adds a provision to current law stating that if an urbanized area exceeds a population of 200,000, but the transit system continues to operate fewer than 100 buses on fixed-route service during peak service hours, that transit system can maintain its funding flexibility. By offering amendments, I’ve been able to have my language included in various transportation bills.

The new House transportation bill that will be considered in a few weeks contains this provision. Unfortunately, it contains no dedicated stream of funding for mass transit. This could make it very difficult for transit systems to plan for the future.

I think this is bad news for job-seekers, especially in our area. Unlike major metropolitan areas like Philadelphia, the bus is the only mass transit available. If local transit agencies have to cut back, workers and the unemployed will face a big setback.

It’s already hard for those relying on mass transit. Last year, the non-partisan Brookings Institution took a look at access to mass transit and where jobs are being created. Seventy percent of residents in major metropolitan areas have access to transit. However, a typical resident can only reach about 30 percent of jobs via transit in 90 minutes. In other words, those who only have access to transit are very limited in the number of jobs they can apply for.

Much of the job growth in our nation has shifted from urban centers to more suburban areas. Suburbs and lower-density areas offer many advantages to new small businesses that need to keep expenses low in order to grow. Cutting back on mass transit makes the climb back to employment even steeper.

The first priority of our transportation bill has to be the maintenance of our roads and bridges. Mass transit funding has always been a small but critical portion of larger transportation bills.

I know that there are many other members who agree with me and I will be working with Democrats and Republicans on an amendment to restore this dedicated funding. In a few weeks, this bill should be coming to the floor. I am hopeful that a bipartisan coalition will be able to correct the bill before it is sent to the Senate.

We want every American to be able to find and keep a job. Transit is especially important for low-income Americans, younger workers, and the elderly. We don’t want lack of an automobile to be a barrier to a job.

Please take a moment to read a copy of a letter by Ginny Pitts

Dear Friend,

My husband, Joe Pitts, is running for Congress again this year.
I’m writing to you today to ask you to support him.

When we were first married, Joe and I were both school teachers.
In those days, teachers didn’t make much money. When we had our first child I wanted to stay home with her, but we simply couldn’t make ends meet without my salary. So Joe joined the Air Force. It was a way for him to serve his country and provide for his
family at the same time. It was a hard decision, but it led to a
career in public service we’re both very proud of.

After flying 116 combat missions in Vietnam, Joe returned home
and returned to teaching—this time at Great Valley High School.
Just a few years later he ran for the state legislature, beating the
Republican Party “machine” in a close election. Now he is in
Congress, where he continues to work in an independent and
bipartisan way. Not only does he work with Democrats on many
issues, but he also stands up to his own party leaders and tells
them when they’re wrong.

In his career, Joe has been away a lot—in Southeast Asia,
Harrisburg, and Washington. But he has always found a way to
be there for me and our kids. He’s a good listener. When they
were little, Joe would call the kids every night he was away and
talk to them individually about their day. Every month, he took
one of them out for breakfast, giving them the individual attention
every child craves from their father.

But Joe hasn’t kept that kind of care and attention just for our
family. As a Congressman, he takes on causes other politicians
don’t have time for. Right now he’s working to get airlines to
train their flight attendants to identify and rescue victims of sex
trafficking.

He’s also one of the few members of Congress to actually write
a plan for getting us out of this recession by helping people and
creating jobs. Joe and I remember what it was like when we
couldn’t make ends meet, and that’s what motivates him to help
people now.

I think people are looking for leaders who care, listen, and can
work together for the good of our country. That’s who Joe is.
I hope you’ll vote for him on Tuesday.

Sincerely,

A year ago, on January 28, 2009, I voted against the Democrats’ “stimulus bill.” I predicted, correctly, that it would be too ineffective to justify the massive price tag. It was supposed to cost $787 billion and keep unemployment from exceeding eight percent. Well, today unemployment is at ten percent and the CBO just announced the stimulus will cost another $75 billion more than advertised.

Not content to just criticize, I issued a memorandum to my constituents on the day Congress passed that bill. I called for tax reduction, increased energy production, and trade promotion as the three things that would genuinely stimulate the economy.

A year later, in Wednesday’s State of the Union Address, the President finally called for these three things in what appears to be a serious way. While I disagree with much of what he called for in his speech, we at last agree on some of the areas we should be focusing our efforts.

It’s a year late. But I’m glad to see the President finally realize that tax cuts are the quickest and surest form of stimulus. I’m glad to see him recognize that we need to expand energy production, not constrict it as his “cap and trade” proposal would do. I’m glad to see him realize that we must open new markets for manufacturers to sell their wares to.

If he had acted on these things a year ago, unemployment might really have stayed under eight percent. It remains to be seen if he will actually act on them even now.

After two straight elections with huge gains for Democrats, Democrats control the entire federal government. You’d think they would be happy--but Democratic voters and officeholders alike are increasingly grumpy.

Democrats in Congress are increasingly nervous that their leaders’ policies are heading them for big trouble with the voters. At the top of their list of complaints is the lack of even a plan to reverse growing unemployment. Read this very interesting article for more on this.

As for Democratic voters, even Tuesday’s primary—which included a big win for Democrats in western Pennsylvania—contained an ominous sign for Democrats going into the fall: Democrats stayed home in unexpectedly high numbers. Read this from a pollster on what this means.

I’ve had several Democrats call and write to me asking how they can switch parties. I received this email from a woman on Sunday: “Hello, please help me change parties…. I am currently a Democrat. … I was raised a Democrat, my father a carpenter in the union. I can no longer belong to a party I do not believe in,,.please tell me how I change parties.”

If you would like to change your registration or register to vote for the first time, registration forms are available at most public libraries and many other government offices. If you can’t find one, please call my office and I’ll send you one!

Before I got involved in politics, I taught high school science and math. I don’t think a student ever tried to tell me, “My dog ate my homework.” But if one did, I think I would have called his or her parents to make sure the family actually owned a dog. If you’re going to make excuses, at least make them plausible.

This week at the White House, President Obama announced a new proposal to stop manipulation of the international oil market. He’s calling on Congress to pass legislation and spend an additional $52 million to enforce regulations.

The average price of a gallon of regular gasoline has climbed to $3.95 in the state of Pennsylvania. Consumers expect the President to do his homework and propose solutions to stabilize and bring down prices. However, when you go looking for the market manipulators and speculators that the President blames for the current prices, they are difficult to find. You can’t blame the dog for eating your homework if there isn’t a dog.

International oil markets aren’t freewheeling saloons where gamblers play poker with each other. They are highly regulated and closely watched. Playing the market certainly entails risk, but it is not gambling. Investors analyze market forces and make informed decisions about the price of oil. Just like with stocks, they want to buy low and sell high. Investments don’t always pay off, but unlike a Vegas casino, the house doesn’t always win.

Meanwhile, multiple government agencies are watching the market, making sure that trades are being made according to the rules and that traders aren’t gaming the market. These agencies include the Department of Energy’s Energy Information Agency, the Federal Trade Commission, and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission.

The Federal Trade Commission regularly reports on the state of the gasoline market. In 2005, 2008, and just last year, they came to the conclusion that market forces were the main driver of what Americans pay at the pump. The major factors setting prices are demand for crude oil and refinery capacity.

At the start of the recession in 2008, worldwide demand for oil dipped. Now with economies recovering, especially in developing nations like China and India, demand is well above 2008 levels.

Certainly there are actors involved in the market who bend or break the rules. In last year’s FTC gasoline report, they note action taken against a terminal and pipeline owner to prevent a sale that could lead to higher fuel prices for consumers. Also, in June 2011, the FTC announced that they were undertaking another investigation into whether there is any market manipulation.

Despite this ongoing investigation, the President wants to give tens of millions of dollars to the Commodity Futures Trading Commission to conduct a duplicative examination. In his speech this week, the President failed to cite a single existing case of manipulation. How many government agencies do we need to investigate the President’s hunch that something is wrong?

What is often forgotten is that speculators drive prices up at their own risk. You can certainly try to artificially inflate a market for personal gain, but if you don’t pull out at the right moment the bubble bursts and you’ve lost perhaps billions of dollars. Market manipulators risk the loss of a fortune and prosecution.

Unnamed speculators are easy targets for the President. For good reason, the American people don’t trust Wall Street traders. Even if we find speculators and crack down on them, the problems of supply and demand don’t go away.

To solve a problem created by demand, you increase supply. This week, the House attached approval of the Keystone XL pipeline to the transportation bill. It passed overwhelmingly with 293 votes, 69 of them Democrats. Keystone XL by itself will not have a huge effect on price, but it should be part of a comprehensive program to increase supply.

The President is standing in the way of solutions that don’t cost the American people one dime. In fact, increasing access on public land and allowing private development of energy infrastructure brings revenue into the government. It’s time to stop blaming the dog and do the work that needs to be done to lower gas prices.

Rep. Joe Pitts is a Republican who represents Pennsylvania’s 16th Congressional District, which includes parts of Berks, Chester and Lancaster counties.

Read Original Story Here

Common ground on the abortion issue is hard to find.  But there is one question that the vast majority of Americans have long agreed on: the government shouldn’t pay for it.  In poll after poll, Americans of all political stripes agree on this.  Likewise, in vote after vote, Congress has for decades barred the use of federal funds to pay for the procedure.

Polling data show that majorities as large as 71 percent do not believe the government should run or subsidize programs that perform or pay for the procedure.  That was reflected in a recent vote in the House of Representatives to bar new programs in the Democrats’ proposed health overhaul from paying for abortion.  The amendment passed with broad bipartisan support.  Every pro-choice Republican and a great many pro-choice Democrats voted for it.  One fourth of all Democrats voted “yes,” including most of the twelve Democrats from Pennsylvania. The amendment reflects the mainstream of American opinion.  It reflects the conviction of decent Americans who recognize that however much people may disagree on this issue, we should respect each other enough to not publicly fund something many of us find abhorrent.

There is, however, a small minority in America and in Congress that insists on using this legislation to fund abortion through major government health programs. Much like those on the right who have claimed the health bill sets up “death panels,” the simple facts don’t seem to matter much to them.  Politifact.com has posted three “truth-o-meter” studies debunking the claims made by left-wing members of Congress on this issue.  National Public Radio and other respected sources have done the same.   Nevertheless, the wild claims continue. One of the organizers of a Saturday rally to protest my co-sponsorship of the amendment told the Daily Local News that I oppose birth control—something that is absolutely not true.

All of this reflects the unfortunate side of American politics today.  It has become harder and harder for elected officials and activists on opposing sides of the issues to have grown-up, respectful conversations with each other.  Lincoln-Douglas debates have been replaced by the Rachel Maddow show.  After the House vote, a liberal activist from Lancaster (who intends to run against me next year) wrote on a blog: “Everybody's angry. And everybody wants to punish someone—anyone!—for this travesty!” and then asked readers to give her money.

Given the heated rhetoric, I believe it is important for everyone to remember what this debate is about.  It has nothing to do with the legality or availability of abortion.  It is purely, and only, about whether or not the government will pay for abortion in the so-called “public option” and through new “affordability credits” if the legislation now in Congress becomes law. 

Because the vast majority of Americans do not want public money spent that way, those who do want it spent that way are faced with two options.  Either accede to the will of the majority, as Speaker Pelosi has done, or use budget gimmicks to pay for abortion while claiming not to.  (Unfortunately, the new Senate bill includes exactly that kind of gimmick.)

There is a saying that “politics is the art of compromise.” That is almost always true.  It is not true here.  You simply can’t compromise on an either/or scenario.  Either we are going to use public funds to pay for abortion or we aren’t. Giving money to a government contractor who then pays for abortions isn’t a compromise.  It’s deception.  Likewise, pretending that money isn’t fungible, as Senator Reid has done, is not a compromise.  Either the government is going to pay for abortion or it isn’t, and Congress needs to be honest about what it is doing. 

Democracy relies on the honesty and the good will of elected officials and activists alike.  We should compromise when we can and let the majority rule when we can’t.  Mudslinging, dishonest “spin,” and Saul Alinsky-style tactics undermine democracy and hurt our country.  For decades, the government has not paid for abortion services and it should not start now.  That is the overwhelming will of the American people.  The House has listened to the people, and the Senate should too.

 

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Dear Friend,

My husband, Joe Pitts, is running for Congress again this year. I'm writing to you to ask for your support.

Joe and I know the joy of raising a family. We also know the struggles. When we were first married, we were both school teachers. In those days, teachers did not make much money. We faced difficult choices. When we had our first child I wanted to stay home with her but, like so many families, we simply couldn't make ends meet without my salary.

It was then that Joe joined the Air Force to fly 116 combat missions in Vietnam. It took him away from us but we were proud to know Dad was serving our country. Like most military families, we prayed for Joe's safety and counted the days when he would return home.

In his busy career Joe has been away a lot - in Southeast Asia, Harrisburg and Washington but he has always found time for me and our kids. He's a good listener. Every night Joe was in Harrisburg he called home and spoke to each of the kids individually. Every month he took one of the children to breakfast, giving each child the individual attention they needed from their father.

Joe hasn't kept that kind of care and concern just for his family. Every time Joe votes on a bill in Congress, he has American families' economic security in mind - a quality education, a good job and a secure and dignified retirement. And Joe is committed to preserving our fundamental values of family, faith and freedom.

Joe is independent minded and works in a bi-partisan fashion. For Joe compromise is not a dirty word, it's a way to get things done in a democracy. Our newspapers have singled Joe out for praise for his willingness to seek common ground for the common good.

I think people are looking for leaders who listen, who care and who can work together for the good of our country. I hope you'll vote for Joe on Tuesday, November 6th, so he can use his experience to help solve problems that affect us all. Thank you.

Sincerely,

Ginny Pitts

For the first time in 16 years, Democrats control the entire federal government with big majorities in the House and Senate.  The “tax and spend” policies we used to complain about have returned on steroids.  This year, Washington will borrow 46 cents for every dollar it spends.  But that’s just the beginning.  An ill-conceived health bill is coming that has a price tag of $1.6 trillion.  An energy bill is coming that could also cost more than $1 trillion.  (How much is a $1 trillion?  If you spent $1 million a day from the day Jesus was born until now, you still would not yet have spent that much!)  Both bills would be paid for by raising your taxes by thousands and borrowing hundreds of billions from the Chinese. I serve on the congressional committee that is responsible for both of these bills, and I am in the thick of the fight on both of them.  I’m running for Congress again because I am in a unique position to provide an effective check and balance on the excesses of the Nancy Pelosi Congress.