Posted on 11/04/2009 4:50:29 PM PST by Sub-Driver
Holmes Norton: Republicans to blame for high D.C. AIDS rate By Silla Brush - 11/04/09 06:00 PM ET
Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D) is blaming Republican lawmakers for the District of Columbia’s high HIV/AIDS rate.
In a letter posted on her website, Norton lashed out at Republican efforts in recent years to attach riders to annual congressional spending bills that limited the District from using locally raised revenues to support needle exchange programs.
She said this explains “in large part” why the District has a higher HIV/AIDS rate than do similar cities.
“The District has a higher HIV/AIDS rate than cities with similar demographics in large part because of riders attached by Republicans,” Norton wrote in a letter on Tuesday. Republican efforts came “at the cost of many lives and illness caused by the spread of the virus,” she said.
The letter came in response to efforts by Republicans to seek a congressional probe into the high rate of HIV/AIDS in the District and the use of federal funds. The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform is scheduled on Friday for a staff briefing with D.C. city officials on the management of federal AIDS funding.
At least 3 percent of the District’s population has HIV or AIDS, a rate far above the national average of 1 percent, according to a 2008 report by D.C.’s HIV/AIDS Office reported by The Washington Post.
Reps. Darrell Issa (Calif.), the Oversight panel’s top Republican, and Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah) called for a congressional probe of the District’s AIDS rate and its use of federal AIDS funding after the Post reported on questionable spending and other lapses in record keeping.
“The waste and inappropriate use of such funds is inexcusable,” Norton wrote. But she said she opposed the congressional investigation because it would violate the District’s home rule and District officials are already looking into the issue.
“When the Democrats assumed the majority in the 110th Congress, we removed the needle exchange ban and the District initiated a state-of-the-art exchange health program, but Republicans are again trying to attach a rider that would effectively end the program,” Norton wrote.
Issa and Chaffetz responded in a letter on Wednesday that Norton’s claim was “absurd and offensive.”
Issa and Chaffetz also objected to Norton’s claim that the committee should not look into the situation, saying that it concerns the “waste and mismanagement of federal taxpayer dollars.”
Too many tea baggers in WDC?
I would love to see her evidence of AIDS infected Republicans raping residence of the District. /sarcasm off
Barney Fwank by himself is responsible for 75%.
Liberals don’t need facts or evidence, if they say it’s true and the DNC parrot media is supposed to take it from there.
Of course they haven’t quite figured it out their parrot is more than half dead.
I’d believe that is Butt Boy Frank was a republican!!!
I’m sure this is true, because everyone knows that the Republicans have long since been in control of the city government in DC.
Oh wait, that’s not true, either.
Norton is simply a reflection of the stupidity of a strong majority of DC voters, who would happily re-elect Marion Barry if he chose to run for mayor again.
I Swear,
I ALWAYS wore the Glove when I was back there that week.
You got that right........sheesh! Stupidity in WDC is an epidemic in itself......:(
Anything that could benefit the residents of the city she is against, like vouchers for poor black kids. She wants them stuck in the ghetto forever.
Please, oh please, oh please,...let me take an IQ test against this moron! Please!!
Anything that could benefit the residents of the city she is against, like vouchers for poor black kids. She wants them stuck in the ghetto forever.
And the residents of DC fully deserve to be screwed over by the failures of liberalism because in election after election they cheerfully vote for these people. I like how they were whining when 0bama took away their school choice program... what were they thinking he was going to do? And this is AFTER he made it clear he was anti-school choice. LOL.
1) The spread of HIV/AIDs is mostly behavior-based.
2) There are no Republicans in Washington, D.C. Just check any election result for the past thirty years.
Therefore, Republicans could not possibly be responsible for the spread of HIV/AIDS in D.C.
Checked out of reality a long time ago.
Highest HIV/AIDs infection rate in the U.S.
Second or third lowest education performance in the U.S. consistently.
DC ranks near the very top in per-pupil spending too.
This lady is a fool and a liar. Here’s a snip from an article from the Post on this very subject....notice who’s been at fault (not the mean ole Republicans)
- Tuesday, October 20, 2009
Calling the squandering of city AIDS dollars “inexcusably wrong,” D.C. Mayor Adrian M. Fenty and D.C. Attorney General Peter Nickles on Monday announced an investigation into nonprofit groups that might have misspent government money meant to care for the sick.....The city’s announcement came after a 10-month Washington Post investigation, published this week, that found the city has paid more than $25 million in recent years to small nonprofit agencies marked by questionable spending,.....
Link to story - http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/10/19/AR2009101903621.html
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