As I have previously stated, President Obama’s “accommodation” of religious liberty in his revised health care mandate covering contraceptives, sterilizations and abortifacients raises more questions than it answers. Perhaps, the most egregious part is that the President refuses to acknowledge that the Constitution guarantees conscience protections and instead tries to run around them.

You don’t “accommodate” religious liberties, you respect them. That’s why they are enshrined in the Constitution. Those Constitutional protections should prevent the President from trampling the conscience rights of Americans and religious institutions who hold a strong belief that contraceptives, sterilizations and abortifacients are wrong. Clearly, however, they are not enough. President Obama’s “accommodation” shows that he considers conscience rights to be an inconvenience in his effort to remake America in his vision. That is why we need to pass the “Respect for Rights of Conscience Act.”

The “Respect for Rights of Conscience Act”—introduced by my colleague from neighboring Missouri, Senator Roy Blunt—seeks to restore conscience protections that existed before President Obama’s flawed health care law. These are the same protections that have existed for more than 220 years since the First Amendment was ratified. It will likely be taken up in the near future as an amendment to the Highway Bill.

Many longstanding federal health care conscience laws protect conscientious objections to certain types of medical services. President Obama could have just as easily followed that course when he issued a mandate requiring almost all private health insurance policies—including those issued by religious institutions such as hospitals, schools and non-profits—to cover sterilizations and contraceptives, including emergency contraceptives, at no cost to policyholders…. ....but he did not. Now Congress must step-up and protect the religious liberties of all Americans.

Three years ago today President Obama signed his ‘stimulus’ bill into law promising to keep unemployment below 8 percent and create 3.5 billion jobs.

In its “Understanding and Responding to Persistently High Unemployment” report released yesterday, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) describes how well the ‘stimulus’ worked.

“The rate of unemployment in the United States has exceeded 8 percent since February 2009, making the past three years the longest stretch of high unemployment in this country since the Great Depression. Moreover, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that the unemployment rate will remain above 8 percent until 2014. The official unemployment rate excludes those individuals who would like to work but have not searched for a job in the past four weeks as well as those who are working part-time but would prefer full-time work; if those people were counted among the unemployed, the unemployment rate in January 2012 would have been about 15 percent. Compounding the problem of high unemployment, the share of unemployed people looking for work for more than six months—referred to as the long-term unemployed—topped 40 percent in December 2009 for the first time since 1948, when such data began to be collected; it has remained above that level ever since.”

Since signing this failed legislation, we have experienced 36 straight months of unemployment over 8 percent and zero net jobs. The President’s empty promise cost taxpayers more than $800 billion and has left us with an even deeper hole in our national debt and little in return to show for it.

During last night’s newscast, KARK, Little Rock’s NBC station, took an in-depth look at how The Local Courthouse Safety Act could help enhance security in Arkansas’s smaller courthouses. 

Watch their story and then learn more about The Local Courthouse Safety Act here.