Weekly remarks: Susan Collins decries federal regs; Obama wants improved education

Weekly remarks by Sen. Susan Collins, as provided by Republican Party leadership

I'm Senator Susan Collins from the Great State of Maine.

Last month, our nation produced no net new jobs. More than 14 million Americans could not find work.

I’ve asked employers what would it take to help them add more jobs. No matter the size of their business or the size of their workforce, they tell me that Washington must stop imposing crushing new regulations. 

Some regulations are just plain silly. Last year, the federal government issued a warning to a company that sells packaged walnuts. Washington claimed that the walnuts were being marketed as a drug, so the government ordered the company to stop telling consumers about the health benefits of nuts.

Other regulations have far more serious consequences. The EPA has proposed a new rule on emissions from boilers that it admits would cost the private sector billions of dollars and thousands of jobs.

No wonder employers dread what is coming next out of Washington.

Over-regulation is hurting our economy; unfortunately, the problem is only....

Goshen College dumps 'Star-Spangled Banner' as too bombastic, prefers 'America the Beautiful'

 

When Francis Scott Key witnessed the Battle of Baltimore during the War of 1812, he was inspired to see in the light of explosions that the relatively new country's flag had survived.

So, he wrote "The Star-Spangled Banner," which became the national anthem of the United States of America.

Even though there would likely not be a United States of America without that second combat against Great Britain, all that red rocket glare and bombs bursting in air business is a tad too militaristic for Indiana's Goshen College.

So officials there have banned "The Star-Spangled Banner" at athletic events.

The seeming celebration of combat "seemed inconsistent to the entire message we were trying to send," said Richard Aguirre, a spokesman for the Mennonite institution. Officials were especially concerned about the song's impact on foreign students.

As a result, from now on they've opted instead to play "America the Beautiful."

How does this strike you? And how do you feel about the songs?

Above, we have one video version of the national anthem. And below we have one version of "America the Beautiful."

Faith Hill sings both.

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-- Andrew Malcolm

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Tonight's required TV viewing: C-SPAN's special on the secrets within the Library of Congress

TiVo alert for tonight:

Regular Ticket readers know of our enduring admiration for C-SPAN's enduring contributions and value to the flow of information in a modern operating democracy. Which the U.S. may become someday.

Take just C-SPAN's video archive alone, every C-SPAN program ready for viewing and searching by name and subject, back to 1987, all free online and bookmarkable right here.

Now comes the latest major video project in the network's long history, a 90-minute documentary on the 211-year-old Library of Congress, the unique institution that so many think is merely a library for Congress.

It's much more, of course. See a video excerpt below of the new C-SPAN program, which debuts tonight at 5 and 8 p.m. Pacific

If you took one minute to look at every photograph stored in the Library, you'd spend 24 years looking at stored photographs. Like the one above of the completion of the transcontinental railroad in 1869. That was also the last time a U.S. passenger train was on time.

Ten minutes to pore over each map in the Library? 100+ years. Or a day with each book on the Library of Congress' shelves? If you started today, that would take the next 60,000 years and bipartisanship still wouldn't be in Washington fashion when you finished.

The documentary also solves some mysteries that even Nicolas Cage can't conjure. Where did the Library order its first books from in 1800? What word did Thomas Jefferson smudge off an early draft of the Declaration of Independence?

Like we said, TiVo this one.

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OMG! The Library of Congress acquires every Tweet ever Twittered

 -- Andrew Malcolm

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Video courtesy of C-SPAN.      Photo: Library of Congress (Completion of the transcontinental railroad, 1869, Promontory Summit, Utah).

Ticket pic of the week: Here's one Obama who's shovel-ready

You know, maybe as the photographer you want to stand back a little bit farther.

First Lady Michelle Obama doesn't look too happy this week as she helps build a school playground in Washington.

However, this coming week she is taking her mother and two daughters on a weeklong visit to Africa, with stops and public events in South Africa and Botswana and including a private safari experience.

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You won't see space photos like these for long

Ticket pic of the week: A face in Japan to touch your heart

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo: Yuri Gripas / Reuters (Michelle Obama works on a school playground in Washington, June 15).

Basic cable host Conan O'Brien delivers a commencement address for the ages

By tradition, college commencement addresses are supposed to be brief, serious, self-important and eminently forgettable because the diplomas are coming real soon. (Quick! Who spoke at your graduation?)

By all these counts, late-night comedian Conan O'Brien failed the other day at Dartmouth College.

Which is what makes his 23-minute oration so memorable and funny and human. Amid all the relevant and self-deprecating silliness, O'Brien also managed to share a significant slice of himself and to impart a valuable lesson to the more than 1,700 graduates, family, friends and, as O'Brien put it, those old folks who just like to come to these things.

Who cares about Dartmouth. That was just the setting for a memorable speech by someone now starring on basic cable.

There's a smidge of politics in his remarks. But even if there wasn't we'd highly recommend you give this video a view.

-- Andrew Malcolm

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Photo: Jason R. Henske / Associated Press (Conan's audience reaction).

The softer side of the Obamas' visit to Britain; Michelle chats with teen girls

Someday it'll be a man, but for now the presidential spouse sent off for gentler human relations appearances during the chief executive's official talks is a woman, Michelle Obama.

She went to Oxford University ON Wednesday to meet with schoolgirls also visiting from Elzabeth Garrett Anderson School. The first lady's prepared remarks were the usual thrill at being there, appreciation to several people who'd made it possible and her favorite plea for increased volunteerism, even while growing up.

But then came questions from the young women, none impertinent, of course, and mostly adulatory about her husband, the political pioneer. Obama's full remarks and responses are posted over here.

We were particularly struck by two of the first lady's down-to-earth, spontaneous....

Weekly remarks: GOP's Hutchison decries domestic energy delays; Obama says school reforms can't wait

Weekly remarks by Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, as provided by the Republican Party leadership

Hi, I’m United States Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison from Texas.

With energy prices soaring nationwide, many American families are struggling to put gas in their cars and trucks. We are seeing the price of food and other goods rise. An overwhelming majority of Americans say gas prices are causing financial hardship for their families. And more than half say they have had to make major changes to their budgets to compensate.

Unfortunately, rather than work to increase domestic energy production and help bring down gas prices, the Obama administration is seeking to impose more regulations and taxes on oil and gas companies. This is placing our own valuable resources out of reach and stifling job creation -– their proposals will actually increase pain at the pump. 

Earlier this week, Republicans put a modest bill to increase production on the floor, and Democrats couldn’t even support that with gas hovering around $4 a gallon!

Republicans have consistently called for greater access to our domestic sources of energy to spur good American jobs, and to prepare for circumstances we can’t control, like....

Obama's Boston fundraiser remarks: 'Back in 2004, I gave a little speech here that got some attention'

Pretty busy speaking day for President Obama in the Northeast.

Nineteen minutes for the graduating cadets of the Coast Guard Academy, which we published here. Now, 30 minutes at a political fundraiser (see full text below). His third speech of the day came at a private residence and the 130 attendees only got 16 minutes for their $35,800.

Obama aides now are trying to scale back initial 2012 campaign projections of a billion-dollar haul and a boffo first quarter's report come July 1. So, maybe because of the economy or something else, the take must be a little off in the first month of the president's 19-month campaign, down from 21 months when he was lesser known.

These remarks are fairly typical of his fundraising routine now, except for the apparently joking boast about his 2004 Boston speech at the Democratic National Convention. It didn't do the two Johns (Kerry and Edwards) any good in that election.

Also Obama has dropped the Osama bin Laden is dead references that raised eyebrows at two Texas funders.

But those remarks launched Obama's Democratic Party reputation as the Real Good Talker. He....

What President Obama is telling high school graduates this year: 'Being president is a great job'

 

President Obama's graduation speech to Memphis' Booker T. Washington High School, as provided by the White House

THE PRESIDENT:  Thank you very much, everybody.  (Applause.)  Everybody, please have a seat.  Thank you, Chris.  Hello, Memphis!  (Applause.) Congratulations to the class of 2011! (Applause.) 

Now, I will admit being President is a great job.  (Laughter.)  I have a very nice plane.  (Laughter.)  I have a theme song.  (Laughter.)  But what I enjoy most is having a chance to come to a school like Booker T. Washington High School and share this day with its graduates.  (Applause.)  So I could not be more pleased to be here.

We've got some wonderful guests who are here as well, and I just want to make mention of them very quickly.  First of all, the Governor of Tennessee, Bill Haslam, is here.  Please give him a big round of applause.  (Applause.)  Three outstanding members of the Tennessee congressional delegation, all of whom care deeply about education -- Senator Bob Corker, Senator Lamar Alexander, and Congressman Steve Cohen is here.  (Applause.)  You’ve got one of Memphis’s own, former Congressman Harold Ford, Jr. is in the house.  (Applause.)  And the Mayor of Memphis, A.C. Wharton is here.  Please give him a big round of applause.  (Applause.) I  am so proud of each and every one of you.

STUDENT:  Thank you!

THE PRESIDENT:  You're welcome.  You made it -- and not just through high school. You made it past Principal Kiner.  (Laughter and applause.)  I’ve spent a little bit of time with her now, and you can tell she is not messing around.  (Laughter.)  I’ve only been in Memphis a couple of hours, but I’m pretty sure that if she told me to do something I’d do it.  (Laughter.)  

Then I had the chance to meet her mom and her daughter, Amber, a little while back, and we....

Late-night's best: What else the SEALs found in Osama bin Laden's compound

As The Ticket's 63,000-plus Twitter followers here and 6,700 Facebook fans here know, we regularly share our daily picks of the late-night jokes of interest, usually before broadcast each night. Feel free to pass them on to friends using the Share buttons above. Normally, we publish these on Monday mornings.

SNL: a number of new conspiracy theories are surfacing claiming that Osama Bin Laden is not really dead. Which means Barack Obama will go down in history as the first black person ever to have to prove that he killed someone.

Letterman: So in Bin Laden's compound the SEALs found medicine, old newspapers and, guess what, the complete collection of Dean Martin Roasts.

Letterman: So maybe you heard that chipper Katie Couric is leaving CBS News. She'll....