Here is a sampling of links and excerpts regarding last week’s passage of the 1.1 trillion dollar omnibus spending bill. The citations (which includes some non- conservative news sources), helps to authenticate the extent of conservative disgust with the Republican leadership. Here in Iowa we see that Senators Grassley and Ernst opposed the bill (and Republican leadership) along with 24 other Republican Senators (about half of the GOP Senate compliment). On the House side all three of Iowa’s congressmen, Blum, King and Young opposed the bill. They were among the 95 Republican House members to oppose the bill (and Republican leadership). We appreciate Iowa’s federal legislators’ votes opposing this monstrosity and its furthering of the Obama agenda.
Congress passes $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill (Net Right Daily)
The $1.1 trillion omnibus spending bill effectively funds 9 of the last 12 months of the Obama agenda at higher spending levels in exchange for very little. The bill includes by virtue of not defunding it, 
funds for the implementation of Obamacare, executive amnesty for illegal immigrants with U.S.-born children, Planned Parenthood, the resettlement of refugees from the war in Syria and Iraq, the EPA’s war on coal and so forth.
They even managed to inexcusably reinstate the wind turbine tax credit through 2020 that had previously expired this year.
Reid spikes the football: ‘Successful year for Democrats’ (Washington Examiner)
Even the lone GOP victory, ending the ban on U.S. oil exports, was matched by the extension of green energy tax credits.
“The legislation caps off a successful year for Senate Democrats,” Reid said.
Dick Durbin Assistant Minority Leader to Reid) also boasted that Democrats were able to push to renew the Export-Import Bank, after it was prevented from taking on any new business since the summer. The bank was renewed as part of a long-term highway bill
Who Wrote the Omnibus? Four Lawmakers, Many Lobbyists (Breitbart)
Senator Sen. Jeff Sessions, Republican of Alabama, in a blistering interview Thursday night, shed some light on the details.
According to Sessions, lawmakers found out what was in the bill by talking to lobbyists, who had a better idea than they did as to what was being included in the bill. “No member of even the House and Senate knew what was going on,” he told Portland, Oregon talk show host Lars Larson. “Special interests did because we heard from lobbyists what some things were being considered.”
N.C. Rep. Jones swings a sword at 2,000-page omnibus bill (McClatchy)
North Carolina Rep. Walter Jones didn’t just oppose Friday’s $1.1 trillion budget deal by voting against it, he brandished a sword in his congressional office Thursday night to cut through the 2,000-page document, expressing disdain for what he later called on Twitter a win for “the Washington Establishment” and loss for “the people.”
Paul Ryan’s Omnibus Confirms Fears of Alien Crime Victims, Funds Sanctuary Cities (Breitbart)
Prior to Rep. Paul Ryan’s election to House Speaker, American victims of illegal alien crime warned conservatives against supporting Ryan’s Speakership, given his two-decade-long history of pushing for open borders. . . .
The American victims’ concerns now seem confirmed by Wednesday morning’s unveiling of Paul Ryan’s $1.1 trillion, 2,000-page spending bill, which will reward lawless Sanctuary Cities with federal funding grants. Division B Title II of Ryan’s omnibus funds various grant programs for the Department of Justice (pages 167, 168, and 169) and contains no language that would restrict the provision of such grants to sanctuary jurisdictions.
Comments regarding Ryan’s tension with conservatives Allahpundit at Hot Air
. . . Conservatives in the House Freedom Caucus, who have said at various points that they would not vote for a spending bill that funded either Planned Parenthood or Syrian and Iraqi refugee resettlement, are sticking to their word. Rep. Jim Jordan, chairman of the Freedom Caucus, does not expect his group to support to omnibus and doesn’t even expect that many rank-and-file Republicans to support it either. Rep. Tim Huelskamp, among the more vocal Freedom Caucus members, also predicted that a majority of Republicans would vote against the $1.1 trillion appropriations package that he’s calling the “Boehner legacy bill.”
In other words, Ryan will have to pass the omnibus with the same organic governing coalition of mostly Democrats and some Republicans that Boehner himself used to pass most necessary legislation. That’s a violation of the so-called Hastert rule in which a speaker has pledged to only call up legislation that has support of a majority of the majority party. Ryan assured conservatives that he would abide by this rule if they supported his bid. On his first big funding bill, Ryan will just … not follow the rule that he said he would follow. . . .
Ryan and Pelosi corral votes as $1.1T funding bill speeds to floor The Hill
. . . One thing lawmakers agree on is a desire to put 2015 behind them. Many were anxious to vote quickly and begin their long holiday recess, where Christmas dinners, vacations to Machu Picchu and CODELs await them.
And there are other pressing matters to tend to this weekend: Several lawmakers said after Friday’s vote they were flying directly to Dayton, Ohio, where GOP Rep. Mike Turner is tying the knot on Saturday with his fiancée, Majida Mourad.
Conservatives ‘Shocked’ by Change to Immigration Law Tucked Inside Spending Bill Heritage Foundation – Daily Signal
Tucked into the 2,009-page spending bill, the measure would increase the current federal caps on H-2B visas for low-skilled foreign workers seeking blue-collar jobs in the U.S.
The provision would quadruple the number of foreign workers allowed annually from 66,000 to 264,000.
House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wis., in courting conservatives just weeks ago in the speaker race, promised he wouldn’t push immigration changes while a Democrat is in the White House. . . .
Asked about it Wednesday, Ryan told reporters:
This passed the House Appropriations Committee in July, with the House Judiciary Committee working with that committee. So if you have any questions, I’d refer you to those guys. The whole point of this, I want committees driving the process. I want committees writing the legislation, and that’s what happened here.
Rep. Dave Brat, R-Va., said that claim is “a little slippery.”
Although the guest worker provision is “not comprehensive,” Brat told The Daily Signal, the measure didn’t follow regular order; it came “before committee, maybe, but never before the House for a vote.”
Rep. Tim Huelskamp, R-Kan., said he found out about the provision from media reports. He said the episode hearkens back to experiences under the previous speaker, John Boehner, R-Ohio.
Paul Ryan Builds Border Fence Around His Mansion, Doesn’t Fund Border Fence in Omnibus Breitbart
While Paul Ryan’s omnibus spending bill does not provide funding for the mandatory completion of a 700-mile double-layer border fence that Congress promised the American people nearly a decade ago when it passed the 2006 Secure Fence Act, Paul Ryan has constructed a fence around his property.
As Breitbart News’s photographic documentation reveals, Ryan’s home is surrounded by a tall border fence reinforced by equally high bushes— ensuring both privacy and security. Moreover, the fence is manned by an on-duty agent who guards his property’s perimeter. Upon even the slightest appearance of any unusual activity— such as a 5’2″ female taking a photograph of the fence— Ryan’s border agent will deploy into action to ensure the perimeter’s sovereignty. . . .
Sessions said, “Well, the ‘masters of the universe’ are very fond of open borders as long as these open borders don’t extend to their gated compounds and fenced-off estates.” . . .
However, Ryan’s fence ensures that no refugees will be able to enter his property without his permission— even as U.S. communities are not able to make any such restrictions.
In 2013, when Ryan traveled with Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) to stump for Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) ’s immigration agenda (failed Gang of 8 proposal), . . .Ryan said: “We want to have a system where people can come here and work– go back and forth if they want to… so that we have an open door to the people who want to come and contribute to our country, who want to come and make a difference in their families’ lives, and our economy.”
GOP Sells America Down the River Rush Limbaugh
When you surrender the power of the purse — and that’s the primary power the House of Representatives has. . . . But the Republicans squandered that. They gave up the power of the purse. The reason they did that is because for some inexplicable reason, they are literally paranoid and scared to death of even being accused of doing something that would shut down the government.
So to avoid even the accusation that they were going to or would ever even think of shutting down the government, they signaled that whatever Obama wanted to spend, he would get, because they figured that had less damage to them politically than the allegation that they were shutting down the government. . . .
Now, there’s also a factor that needs to be mentioned, too, and that is that many Republican donors want every bit of this money spent, and they have donated voluminously to key Republicans in order to get the money spent. So it’s not all Republican fears. It’s not all Republican caving. A lot of it is Republican fealty and loyalty to some of their donors. Some people today looking at this, and this is 2,009 pages. It’s said to be a spending bill. Among the things that it does, it fully funds Obamacare.
It fully funds Planned Parenthood. That, to me, is unforgivable, with everything now known about what goes on behind closed doors at Planned Parenthood, and that the federal government, led by a Republican Party, sees fit to pay for it. It is beyond comprehension, and it is a total squandering of moral authority to fully fund the butchery at Planned Parenthood. This spending bill fully pays for Obama’s refugee plans, fully. This spending bill, this budget bill quadruples the number of visas Obama wants for foreign workers. This is even a slap at American union workers. Not the leaders. The union leaders seem to be in favor of it, but blue-collar people, known as working people, have been sold down the river along with everybody else here.
This spending bill even fully pays for every dime asked for by Obama on all of this idiocy that’s tied up into climate change. Everything Obama wanted, everything he asked for, he got. You go down the list of things, it’s there.
We had two midterm elections in 2010 and 2014, which were landslide victories for the Republican Party. . . .
. . . And it hasn’t made any difference at all. It is as though Nancy Pelosi is still running the House and Harry Reid is still running the Senate. “Betrayed” is not even the word here. What has happened here is worse than betrayal. Betrayal is pretty bad, but it’s worse than that.
. . . You know, we don’t even need a Republican Party if they’re gonna do this. You know, just elect Democrats, disband the Republican Party, and let the Democrats run it, because that’s what’s happening anyway. And these same Republican leaders doing this can’t, for the life of them, figure out why Donald Trump has all the support that he has? They really can’t figure this out?
Conservatives angry at Ryan’s ‘no limits’ spending bill One News Now
Texas Congressman Louie Gohmert said during television interviews that while there are good parts of the bill, he has grave concerns over funding included in the thousands of pages of text. . . .
“I’m just so frustrated,” Gohmert added on The Fox Business Network. “Here, once again, our leadership has negotiated with Democrats to get votes to pass the funding bill, rather than work with those of us, who make up the majority of the Republican Party.”
The omnibus spending bill will fund the federal government through September 30, 2016. In Gohmert’s opinion, that’s a problem.
“… Do you honestly think that things we didn’t put in this spending bill will be different six weeks before the election? You really think we are going to get more out of Obama as he is going out of office and doesn’t really care about re-election?” he wonders. “That is not going to happen. We needed to do it now.”
What Republicans supposedly received for the perfidy toward election promises, pales to insignificance compared to the furthering of the Obama agenda as alluded to above. For example, much is made by McConnell and Ryan about the accompanying tax bill which made “permanent” (yes they said that) desirable tax deductions that previously had to be renewed . . . yet they have been renewed and would likely continue to be, would they not, under McConnell and Ryan’s leadership? So what did Democrat’s give up on that score? Besides, there is nothing permanent about them if Democrats are in charge and they desire them removed.
The removal of the ban on domestic oil exports, something unions wanted as well, while beneficial to the economy in and of itself , does not inhibit Obama’s ability to strangle the industry with his out of control EPA. Oh, and slipping in the Export Import Bank reauthorization, a crony capitalist tool, was just too precious in spite of McConnell’s and Ryan’s official demurrals.
In an earlier post we also discounted credit claims by Ryan and McConnell for aspects of the omnibus appropriations bill regarding Obamacare that powerful Democrat interests wanted (Cadillac tax delay) or were conflicted about (bailing out insurance companies). Indeed Ryan and McConnell helped save Obamacare in several ways, saving it from itself and by nurturing it “root and branch” with continued funding.
R Mall
