By Rand Paul
Obama acts as though we no longer have a Constitution
Virginia Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling cast tiebreaking votes Tuesday as the Senate passed two key components of Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell's education-reform agenda.
A Republican-dominated Senate committee narrowly killed a bill Thursday that would have barred state-funded abortions for poor women carrying mortally deformed fetuses.
Gov. Bob McDonnell met privately Tuesday with Charles J. Colgan, the longtime Democratic senator who had the power to break a 38-day impasse over the state's two-year $85 billion budget. He had a simple question. What do you want from me? Mr. McDonnell asked.
The Virginia Senate, with little warning and no debate, abruptly reversed course and approved a two-year, $85 billion budget bill Wednesday afternoon by a 21-19 vote — a day after Democrats in the chamber blocked one for the third time this year.
The indestructible force met the immovable object last week: Grover Norquist, the anti-tax advocate who presides over Americans for Tax Reform, dared to take on Virginia Senate Minority Leader Richard L. Saslaw, Fairfax Democrat.
A push by home-schoolers to get their children onto Virginia's public school playing fields died in the General Assembly on Thursday, with Democrats leading the charge against the so-called "Tebow bill."
The Virginia House of Delegates approved legislation Tuesday that would define life as beginning at conception, setting up a potential clash in the state Senate and another high-stakes battle over a measure that has been beaten back elsewhere in the country in recent years.
A "fetal pain" bill that would prohibit abortion after 20 weeks of pregnancy in most cases failed to clear a key Senate committee hurdle Thursday — a day after the full body passed a measure that would require all women to undergo ultrasound imaging before having an abortion.
"We just worked it through the various relationships that we have," he said of the police assistance. "I would suggest that they have a vested interest."
He said, however, that the measure being considered Thursday was completely different.
