National News

Sen. Rick Santorum announced from Gettysburg, PA that he is suspending his Presidential campaign. He did not make an endorsement.

Think fueling up your car at $4 a gallon is rough? How would you feel about paying more than $6.50? Add on top of that massive job losses and a drastic drop in U.S. economic productivity....

United Against Nuclear Iran (UANI) applauded the State of Maryland for unanimously passing legislation this weekend to bar companies active in Iran from doing business with the State of Maryland.

As of the end of February, the Hawaii GOP had $29,000 in the bank in federal funds and was carrying over $100,000 in debt.

An investigation by the inspector general of the General Services Administration found rampant abuse of an employee awards program of the agency’s Pacific Rim region, the same region that has come under fire for spending more than $800,000 on a Las Vegas training conference for 300 employees. 

From 2005 to 2009, median household wealth among Hispanics fell by 66%, compared with a drop of 53% among blacks and 16% among non-Hispanic whites....

"... S1409, the Improper Payments Elimination and Recovery Improvement Act, would create greater oversight and accountability in federal spending .... "

A zero score would indicate that the Member of Congress approved every spending proposal and opposed every pro-taxpayer reform....

We are left to guess the initial refining partner – though it is not difficult to surmise that Tesoro has been the test partner to date, and presumably would be the first to license and deploy the process....

Under the accounting rules mandated in the Federal Credit Reform Act of 1990 (FCRA), the Bank is allowed to treat its loan guarantees as risk-free in consideration of potential losses.  

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The Hawaii State House, with 17 ‘no’ votes has transmitted to the Senate a resolution calling for convening of a US Constitutional Convention....

Today's jobs report shows that two years into recovery the U.S. economy is still woefully underperforming, adding only 120,000 new jobs in March, about half the rate of job growth of the previous three months which were, themselves, somewhat disappointing for this stage of recovery.

The combined effect of these regulations and grant requirements are that a state would have to agree to surrender any last vestiges of meaningful control over how Obamacare is implemented. Thus, a state would now have no more real control over an exchange it set up than over one HHS established....

Brace yourself. In a mere 271 days, you and your fellow Americans will be hit with a tax hike the likes of which this country has never seen....

Senator Blas introduced a resolution that requests Guam’s Delegate to the U.S. House of Representatives to introduce legislation to exempt Guam, Puerto Rico, Hawaii, and Alaska from the U.S. Build provision of the Jones Act....

Former Governor Linda Lingle, candidate for Hawaii's open U.S. Senate seat, will host U.S. Senator Susan Collins at a special luncheon at the Sheraton Waikiki on Wednesday, April 11 from 12:00 - 1:30 p.m....

If you're looking for an iron-clad indictment of Barack Obama's failed fiscal policies, you don't have to look much farther than the President's own words in a speech he delivered yesterday at the Associated Press luncheon in Washington, D.C....

...even the most basic attempts at experimentation have to wait endlessly for federal approval and many are rejected....

Last year, as the government of Bahrain violently suppressed an Arab Spring protest movement, an unlikely champion of the small Gulf nation emerged on Capitol Hill in Washington: Democratic Rep. Eni Faleomavaega, the delegate from American Samoa....

Private health insurers generally don’t limit hospital coverage ....

Three interceptor ships near Japan and the Philippines, as well as U.S.-based interceptors, are ready to shoot down the North Korean missile if space-, land-, and sea-based sensors determine its flight path is targeted at the United States or U.S. allies....

While the President is throwing stones at the court, he's living in a glass house ....

Only six agencies responded that in order to track cell phones, they must first get a warrant or have probable cause: County of Hawaii, Hawaii; Honolulu, Hawaii; Wichita, Kan.; Lexington, Ky.; Lincoln, Neb.; and North Las Vegas, Nev....

Recent Congressional Votes

• Senate: 21st Century Postal Service Act of 2011
• Senate: Repeal Big Oil Tax Subsidies Act
• House: Federal Communications Commission Process Reform Act of 2011
• House: Surface Transportation Extension Act
• House: Democratic Alternative Budget
• House: Fiscal 2013 House Budget Resolution

As of yesterday, the U.S. corporate tax rate of 39.2 percent claimed the world's top spot, edging out Japan which recently lowered its rate from 39.5 percent to 36.8 percent. (The U.S. rate includes the 35 percent federal rate plus the average rate the states add on.)

Will House Republicans save Hawaii's Prepaid Health insurance law from Abercrombie's effort to destroy it? 

The Hawaii state legislature has taken dead aim at NAFTA and the provisions it requires of the state, and the protections it affords Canadians who make cross-border investments in vacation rental properties….

More than a thousand ships and barges will reach the end of their useful lives in the next few years. More may be forced out of service as environmental standards tighten....

"The Ex-Im Bank is critical to help U.S. companies to access financing to support the exports of their goods and services abroad. In fact, 85% of Ex-Im Bank's transactions directly supported small businesses last year."

...he did not want to leave his medical colleagues at the hospital short-handed.  "He didn't eat (on shift), he didn't pee, he wasn't going to say 'I need to take an hour off to go to therapy,'" said Mrs. McCaddon....

Liberals put on an election-year show, with the personal encouragement of President Barack Obama, in which they attempted to impose higher taxes on the oil industry as punishment for their profits while gas prices are at an all-time high....

TARP, provided Central Pacific with a $135 million financial lifeline in the midst of the recession but will be collecting only about $74 million from selling its Central Pacific stock .... 

Less than one year ago, Congress formally recognized that "the failures of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac helped precipitate the deepest economic decline since World War II."

When the wheels start coming off this project, as they undoubtedly will, we predict that many fingers will be pointing at your agency....

On Sunday, the United States gets a distinction no nation wants -- the world's highest corporate tax rate....

For the past three days, the nine justices of the U.S. Supreme Court heard a series of arguments on Obamacare -- what promises to be one of the most seminal decisions in the Court's history....

While Washington's eyes are focused on the historic Obamacare hearings at the Supreme Court, work continues across the street in the House of Representatives where some Members of Congress -- though not all -- are doing their best to clean up Washington's budgetary mess.

U.S. Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Thomas J. Donohue today urged lawmakers to better promote the United States as a premier travel destination and to put the welcome mat back out for international visitors ....

Scalia: 'We're not stupid'...

Heritage’s Robert Alt and Edmund Haislmaier have created a guide to the issues before the Court, potential rulings, and their effects ....

North Korea is preparing to launch yet another long-range missile, and Iran is in desperate pursuit of a nuclear weapon. Meanwhile, the United States and its allies remain unprotected from the threat of nuclear missiles, and now it appears that Obama wants to cede even more ground to Russia....

...the incentive structure suggests that banks would prefer to write down more than double the amount of investor principal for the same credits while strengthening their own balance sheets and avoiding increased losses....

• Senate: Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act
• House: Help Efficient, Accessible, Low-cost, Timely Healthcare (HEALTH) Act of 2011

Rare is the occasion when the nine justices of the U.S. Supreme Court gather to hear three days of arguments.... 

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Kahuku is 3rd on this list of junk-grade US DoE loans and loan guarantees.

$8.5 billion for military construction, down 29 percent ...

Two years ago today, President Barack Obama signed into law Obamacare, a 2,700-page bill that will radically alter America's health care system and wreak havoc on medical costs, quality of care, and fundamental rights ....

Medicaid beneficiaries have more difficulty getting primary care and they visit hospital emergency departments more often than those with private insurance....