Winning the Future for May 8, 2006

Winning The Future

by Newt Gingrich

Just Say No...
To Bilingual Ballots

Dear Friend,

Legislation to reauthorize the historic Voting Rights Act contains a bad idea for America and for all our voting rights. It would continue to force certain counties to provide ballots and election materials in foreign languages.

Supporters say that requiring bilingual ballots strengthens our democracy by allowing everyone to participate. But the reality is the opposite. By sending the message that learning English isn't important, bilingual ballots help consign immigrants to the margins of our democracy.

And Roger Clegg of the Center for Equal Opportunity has pointed out another problem with the federal government's requiring bilingual ballots: If only United States citizens can vote, and one of the requirements for being a citizen is that you learn English, why in the world would we need bilingual ballots? The answer, unfortunately, is election fraud. Non-citizens are using these ballots. How exactly does this strengthen our democracy?

Fifty-six members of the House have rightly called on Judiciary Committee Chairman James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) to remove the bilingual ballot requirement from the Voting Rights bill. Congress should just say "no" to bilingual ballots and "yes" to English-only federal election ballots.

Hastert Hears the Heartland: Enough With the Pork!

Just when it seems like Congress doesn't understand the growing frustration of conservatives over pork-barrel spending, the Republican leader in the House of Representatives gives a sign that he, at least, is listening.

The Senate passed a $109-billion "emergency" spending bill last week. The word "emergency" is in quotation marks for a reason: The "emergencies" the pork-laden bill addresses include such items as $6 million to help sugar cane growers in Hawaii and $10 million to equip fishing boats with electronic logbooks.

All in all, the bill contains about $17 billion in pet projects. So House Speaker Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.) put his foot down. He called the bill "dead on arrival." And then Hastert decided to really speak his mind: "President Bush requested $92 billion for the War on Terror and some hurricane spending. The House used fiscal restraint, but now the Senate wants to come to the table with a tab that's $17 billion over budget. The House has no intention of joining in a spending spree at the expense of American taxpayers."

Well done and well said, Speaker Hastert.

Real Change Fails Again at the UN

If you thought the corruption and mismanagement uncovered in the Iraq oil-for-food scandal would finally be the catalyst for real change at the United Nations, think again. Last week, reform at the UN failed -- again.

First, there was the failure of the new Human Rights Council. The old human rights group had discredited itself by setting out the welcome mat for human rights abusers such as Cuba, Sudan and Syria while shutting the door to U.S. membership. But the "new" human rights body is just as bad.

Then Iran -- which is openly defying the UN with its drive to acquire nuclear weapons -- was elected vice-chair of the UN Disarmament Commission.

And now a majority of UN member nations has rejected a series of reforms that would give the secretary general greater authority to hire and fire staff and more control over the budget. These reforms are supported by countries like the United States, Japan and Europe who collectively supply more than 86% of the UN's budget. But the anti-reform bloc, led by China and Russia -- which contributes less than 13% of the budget -- voted them down.

In the bipartisan Task Force Report on UN reform that I co-authored with former Senate Majority leader George Mitchell, we stated quite clearly that UN reform is vital to the continued integrity of the institution itself. While I remain hopeful that the United States will prevail in achieving much needed reforms at the UN, our task force also noted that without fundamental reform, the United Nations' reputation will suffer and reinforce incentives to bypass it in favor of other institutions, coalitions or one our own if necessary.

Congress on Gas Prices: Investigate Thyself

When you hear all the witch-hunting rhetoric coming out of Washington lately on high gas prices, you have to stop and remind yourself which party is in control of Congress. Making the oil companies the scapegoat is something we normally expect from liberal Democrats, but Republicans should know better.

If Congress is looking for someone to investigate over high energy prices, it should start with itself. Republicans in Congress should immediately review the last 40 years of government restrictions on energy production.

What they'll find is that government regulations are why not a single new oil refinery has not been built in the United States since 1976.

Government regulations enacted by Congress stand in the way of exploration for oil and gas in much of America, including Alaska's Arctic National Wildlife Refuge.

Government regulations require different gasoline formulas in different regions of the country, forcing higher prices and decreased production.

And government regulations -- pushed by leftwing environmental hysterics -- have blocked the development of safe, non-polluting sources of nuclear energy.

We could have lower gas prices if Congress didn't make exploration and production so expensive. And we would have more energy independence if government didn't stand in the way of tapping domestic sources of energy.

So the next time you hear a politician complain about who's responsible for the high price of gas, tell him: "Congressman, investigate thyself."

Your friend,

Newt Gingrich