Archives for February 2009

We have Friday’s top news… When does President Obama say combat operations will end in Iraq?  When will all of the troops be home?  What will be his priorities in the meantime?  What charges have been filed against a suspected terrorist?  How long will a former CIA official spend in prison on a corruption conviction?  How much did the economy decline in the 4th quarter of 2008?  How much trouble is Citibank facing these days?  What happened on Wall Street today?  We have all the answers as we bring you the biggest stories for Friday, February 27, 2009.

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On Friday, President Obama announced combat operations in Iraq would close at the end of August 2010.  Are conditions right for this move?  Do we risk the enemy waiting for our exit and then creating more chaos?  What needs to be accomplished before the bulk of our troops come home?  Why has training of Iraqis been so much better in recent years?  What work will the remaining 35,000-50,000 forces be doing?  And will George W. Bush be graded harshly or favorably by history?  We ask retired U.S. Navy Captain Chuck Nash.

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The Capitol Steps close out the week by taking aim at America’s ever-expanding waistline in their parody “I Wrecked My Heart with Spam and Crisco”.  Our guest is Steps star Elaina Newport.

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After years of chiding the Bush administration, how do Democrats explain the $3.5 trillion budget blueprint unveiled by President Obama this week?  How about the $1.75 trillion deficit for the coming fiscal year?  Why do they believe greater government control of health care will actually bring spending on health care down in the long run?  And who besides the very rich will be asked to pay for all this?  We ask Larry Haas, former spokesman for the Clinton White House Office of Management and Budget.

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Earlier this week, Attorney General Eric Holder said he would like to see the return of the assault weapons ban which expired in 2004.  What did the original ban actually accomplish?  What would it mean for gun owners if the policy is imposed again?  Why are Congressional Democrats not excited about taking up this issue right now?  How are gun laws even more repressive here in Washington today than when there was a total ban on handguns?  How is current legislation looking to change that?  We ask all these questions to Larry Pratt, executive director at Gun Owners of America.

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We have Thursday’s top news… Just how much does President Obama want to spend in Fiscal Year 2010?  How immense will our deficit be?  How are Republicans reacting?  Is the White House sympathetic to those concerns?  How did the Senate vote on giving DC a vote in Congress?  Why was the vote a big step in the fight against the Fairness Doctrine?  And what happened on Wall Street today?  We have all the answers as we bring you the biggest stories for Thursday, February 26, 2009.

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How are Republicans reacting to the Obama budget blueprint?  What do they see as the true impact of all this spending?  Who really ends up paying?  What principles will guide the Republican alternative?  And are Democrats spending all this money because they think it will be good for the economy – or just because they can?  We ask Michigan Rep. Dave Camp, the top Republican on the House Ways and Means Committee.

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On Thursday, President Obama released his budget blueprint for Fiscal Year 2010 at a price tag of anywhere from $3.5 trillion to $4 trillion. What kind of shock will this kind of debt have on our economy? How does the projected deficit compare to previous record deficits? Why does the price tag fluctuate? Is the increasing tax burden just on the rich or will all of us end up paying? How much could our energy bills rise? And what about more than $630 billion for government control of health care? We dig through the details with Bill Beach, director of the Center for Data Analysis at the Heritage Foundation.

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How did President Obama do on style and substance in his address to Congress and the nation Tuesday night?  How did Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal fare in the Republican response?  How are conservatives planning to fight off the Obama agenda and an overwhelming Democratic majority over the next two years?  What kind of government will eventually be formed in Israel?  We ask John Gizzi, political editor at Human Events.

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On Tuesday night, President Obama named energy independence as one of the nation’s most urgent priorities.  Yet on Wednesday, Obama’s Interior Secretary Ken Salazar decided against opening up what could be one of the world’s largest oil supplies right here in the U.S.  What did Salazar do?  How much oil will now just go ignored in the name of moving towards wind, solar and other alternative energies?  And how does the Obama budget blueprint make life miserable for oil and natural gas producers?  Will this just target the Exxons of the world or will many small businesses be hurt as well?  We ask Kevin Kennedy of the Institute for Energy Research.

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