Free Republic

President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton played golf together on Saturday ahead of an evening birthday celebration for a mutual friend - the Washington power broker Vernon Jordan. Jordan, who is turning 80, and former US Trade Representative Ron Kirk rounded out the golf foursome at Farm Neck Golf Club in Oak Bluffs on Martha's Vineyard. Obama has spent much of the past week on the golf course as he vacations with his family on the Massachusetts island.

I guess this should be filed in the "Washington Politics" thread ... I'm an African American registered Democrat. I don't mind giving conservative Republicans hell when they deserve it. But unlike many conservative, I don't mind speaking out against my Party when I think they are wrong and encouraging them to do the right thing. Anyway, white liberals are having fits about the article posted below, which was written by me and published on my blog, in Black newspapers across the country, and at the liberal Daily Kos blog. I'm posting the article here because I'd like to have some...

DALLAS — Canada’s trade minister said Monday that some progress is being made on a nagging trade issue with the United States, while U.S. Trade Representative Ron Kirk said a tangled dispute with Mexico over cross-border trucking and California Christmas trees might resolve itself next year. Welcoming Cabinet-level Mexican and Canadian trade officials to the city where he served as mayor, Kirk said language that removed funding for the Mexican truck program has been restored in next year’s budget bill. "We won’t be handcuffed by prohibitory language," he said. When the border was closed to 500 U.S.-certified trucks in a...

Continued concerns about Chinese products being sold in the U.S. now include poultry. Arkansas Senator Mark Pryor was recognized in Washington today for his work on an agriculture appropriations bill that focuses on the use of appropriated funds from the Department of Agriculture for potential imports of poultry products from China. "Food safety and trade are not mutually exclusive, and are in fact very important to the economy of Arkansas. We can have both as long as the USDA can do its job of policing imports to make sure they meet our food safety standards. Our agreement enables the government...

"I'm befuddled. There are few moments in my life where I'm embarrassed to say I'm from Texas, this was one of them," U.S. Trade Representative and former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk said. "I think that some of those that have been the most ungracious and discourteous five years from now will be embarrassed by their behavior. But right now, I guess the best we can do is be embarrassed for them."

Ron Kirk returns to Booker T. Washington High for Obama speech 01:27 PM CDT on Tuesday, September 8, 2009 By BRAD WATSON / WFAA-TV KIRK IN DALLAS FOR SPEECH September 8th, 2009 Brad Watson reports. >More WFAA Latest News video * View larger * E-mail clip * More video Related links: * Obama offers advice to America's youth * Obama's address to America's youth * More politics * More by Brad Watson Search Video: DALLAS - Barack Obama's cabinet members traveled to their hometowns to view the president's speech to students. That brought former Dallas mayor Ron Kirk back to...

Washington, D.C. (AHN) - The Senate Finance Committee on Monday revealed that President Barack Obama's nominee for U.S. Trade Representative, Ron Kirk, had failed to pay $10,000 in taxes over the span of three years beginning in 2005. The panel report comes after several other nominees faced controversy over tax issues. Kirk, a former Dallas mayor, failed to report as income $37,750 in honoraria collected for 16 speaking engagements at Austin College, his alma mater, for 2004, 2005, 2006 and 2007. He also deducted NBA Mavericks tickets worth $17,382 as entertainment expenses in 2006, 2006 and 2007, but has substantiated...

Trade: President Obama's encouraging words to Colombia's president Monday signaled an improving outlook for the two nations' long-delayed free trade treaty. It's good news, but he must take that message to Congress.Contrary to what you might think from the administration's responses to Iran and Honduras, not all of our friends are being snubbed or our enemies embraced. Obama showed considerable respect for our friend and ally Colombia at a working meeting with President Alvaro Uribe at the White House Monday, declaring at a joint press conference that "we are grateful for his friendship." It was a commendable show of leadership,...

Free Trade: With unemployment at 9.4% and worse on the way, there's no doubt the economy's hurting. If the White House and Congress are serious about ending job destruction, they must open up new markets.It's not easy to flip-flop on a campaign promise, but it's urgent for President Obama to push for free trade as a way to create new jobs — one of the few really effective ways of doing it. Obama's appointment of Ron Kirk as U.S. Trade Representative shows he's coming around. Kirk, a free-trader, has reached out to Korea, Colombia and Panama, allies who've been waiting...

<p>ANDREWS AIR FORCE BASE, Md. (AP) — President Barack Obama took advantage of the summer conditions in Washington on Sunday to play a round of golf for the first time since taking office.</p> <p>His motorcade left the White House at midmorning Sunday for the course at Andrews Air Force Base in Maryland.</p>

The list gets longer. Ron Kirk, Obama’s nominee for U.S. Trade Representative, owes some $10,000 in back taxes. According to the Dallas/Fort Worth Fox News channel: Ron Kirk, nominated as U.S. Trade Representative in the Obama administration, owes an estimated $10,000 in back taxes from earlier in the decade and has agreed to make his payments, the Senate Finance Committee said Monday. Despite the error, Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont., chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, issued a statement calling Kirk "the right person for this job," and said he would attempt to have the nomination moved through the panel quickly....

WASHINGTON – Another Obama administration nominee has tax troubles. This time, it's Ron Kirk, the president's choice to be U.S. trade representative. Kirk owes an estimated $10,000 in back taxes from earlier in the decade and has agreed to pay them, the Senate Finance Committee said Monday. The committee said the taxes arise from Kirk's handling of speaking fees he donated to a scholarship fund that he set up at his alma mater, and for his deduction of the full cost of season tickets to the Dallas Mavericks professional basketball team. Kirk also agreed to make changes in his accounting...

Add former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk to the list of Obama Cabinet picks with tax problems. The Senate Finance Committee says he underpaid by $9,975 in the last three years. Senate aides uncovered the shortfall during weeks of vetting, and Kirk – the administration’s designated point person on trade -- has promised to pay the Internal Revenue Service in full. The problems: Kirk deducted too much for season tickets to the Dallas Mavericks and too much for tax preparation fees, and failed to report as income speaking fees that he donated to his alma mater, Austin College. The full political...

President's Nominee for Trade Rep, a Lobbyist in 2008, to Take Advantage of Loophole in Anti-Lobbyist Regs On first blush, Ron Kirk, the former mayor of Dallas and President Obama's nominee for U.S. Trade Representative, could seem as though he has an enormous impediment standing in his way to the Cabinet: President Obama's high standards against lobbyists in his Cabinet. As recently as last year, Kirk was a lobbyist for investment bank Merrill Lynch & Co., Inc., and President Obama has said no one can work in his administration on issues they lobbied on in the previous two years.

Democrat consultant Donna Brazile told HUMAN EVENTS she wouldn't seek her party's leadership post at the Democratic National Committee, and declined to offer an endorsement, calling the current slate of candidates inadequate. "The current list of candidates, in my judgment, are not up to the task, but we'll see what emerges in the next couple weeks," said Brazile, who was a panelist Tuesday at a liberal strategy session organized by the Center for American Progress. As for herself, Brazile said the rumors that she might seek the position are false. Brazile was former Vice President Al Gore's campaign manager in...

Democrats rail against GOP's map Congressmen testify of redistricting flaws Associated Press AUSTIN (AP) — A proposed plan to put more Texas Republicans in Congress would be detrimental to the seniority of the state's congressional delegation, veteran Democratic incumbents testified in federal court Friday. In the second day of testimony in a redistricting trial, Democratic Rep. Chet Edwards of Waco and Rep. Max Sandlin of Marshall each described to a three-judge panel the influence wielded by senior members of Congress from either party. "Seniority is everything in the U.S. Congress," said Sandlin, chief deputy whip for the Democratic Caucus. Edwards,...

Kirk: Remap violates voter rights 10:16 PM CST on Friday, December 12, 2003By PETE SLOVER / The Dallas Morning News AUSTIN – Former Dallas Mayor Ron Kirk told a federal court Friday that if the proposed GOP-backed congressional remap doesn't violate the federal Voting Rights Act, the minority protection law is meaningless. "If the Voting Rights Act means anything, it means this map cannot stand," said Mr. Kirk, arguing that the right to vote is an empty illusion if blacks and Hispanics can't affect election outcomes. Mr. Kirk appeared as a witness for Democratic and minority groups seeking to overturn...

YOUNGCONSERVATIVES OF TEXAS NEWS ADVISORYNovember 2, 2002 For Immediate Release Contact:  Chris Allen, Chairman (940) 328-4175 YCT Demands Ron Kirk Donate Contribution from Convicted Felon & Terrorist Bagman to Charity for Victims of TerrorismAustin, TX - Ihsan Elashyi, who donated $500 to Ron Kirk's campaign, was sentenced to prison on October 22 on charges stemming from an anti-terrorism investigation over sensitive illegal computer equipment exports to Libya and Syria. The Houston Review reported that Elashyi's firm Infocom received a $250,000 investment from the wife of Mousa Abu Marzook, a Hamas leader based in Syria.  Infocom is closely linked to the...

WASHINGTON, Nov. 2 — State polls showing that more than half a dozen Senate seats were still within either party's grasp prompted Republicans and Democrats today to intensify their feverish campaigns for control of the chamber. Seeking to influence the truly undecided voters — and to make sure those who have made up their minds go to the polls — both parties marshaled volunteers to ring doorbells and hand out leaflets. They also paraded big-name politicians and star-quality supporters before the cameras and drowned out commercials for consumer goods with advertisements extolling their candidates and assailing their opponents. Politicians and...

The Nature of the Coverup:Though few voters in Texas likely know the details, many members of the "mainstream" media are engaging in blatant lies to benefit a Democrat candidate for U.S. Senate, Ron Kirk. The coverup extends not only to Kirk's  liberal politics, but also to his extensive affiliations with anti-Israel activists and causes, radical islamic organizations, political associates of John Walker Lindh, and even a high profile felon who was sentenced last week in a post 9/11 anti-terrorism investigation. These dubious affiliations extend throughout Kirk's operation, including his supporters, contributors, and even his campaign staff. To date the Texas...