Seemeyer Appointed to Head State Department of Health Services

Linda Seemeyer

Governor Scott Walker

Gov. Walker appointed Linda Seemeyer to lead the Wisconsin Department of Health Services (DHS) as its next secretary after the passing of Secretary Kitty Rhoades. “Linda’s experience in health and human services at the county level, along with her career in management, makes her the right fit for this job,” Walker said. “I thank Linda for her willingness to once again serve the people of Wisconsin.” Seemeyer comes to DHS from the Walworth County Department of Health & Human Services, where she served as its director from 2007 to 2015. Seemeyer’s prior experience includes serving as the director of the Milwaukee County Department of Administrative Services, and deputy secretary of the Wisconsin Department of Administration under Governor Tommy Thompson. “I thank Gov. Walker for placing his trust in me to lead DHS,” Linda Seemeyer said. “I look forward to working with department staff, legislators and stakeholders to promote the health and safety of Wisconsin’s citizens.” Seemeyer will begin her duties on Aug. 22, 2016. Interim Secretary Tom Engels will resume his duties as deputy secretary.

Source: Walker press release

Representative Reid Ribble

Ribble led a bipartisan group of Members of Congress in introducing a balanced 75-year fix for Social Security, The S.O.S. Act, on July 13, 2016. Here’s a look at the response:

Maya MacGuineas for The Wall Street Journal, July 14, 2016: “Notably, Rep. Reid Ribble (R., Wis.) and the co-sponsors of the Save Our Social Security Act have put forward a serious and responsible plan to strengthen Social Security for future generations.” U.S. Chamber of Commerce, July 18, 2016: “We simply have no choice but to reform our major entitlement programs. While many in Congress would prefer to pretend these problems will all go away by themselves, some are willing to step forward with real solutions like the ‘Save Our Social Security Act’.” Huffington Post, July 15, 2016: “In an unusual move, a small group of House Republicans has endorsed higher taxes as part of a bipartisan strategy to improve the long-term financing of Social Security retirement insurance.”

Source: Ribble press release

Senator Tammy Baldwin

Baldwin welcomed support from veterans’ organizations in Wisconsin for her bipartisan legislation to support job creation for America’s veterans. She introduced the Boosting Rates of American Veterans Employment Act (BRAVE Act) with Senator Thom Tillis (R-NC) last month. The legislation will reform the Department of Veterans’ Affairs (VA) contracting process to give preference to businesses that actively employ veterans. The BRAVE Act would allow the VA to consider the proportion of veterans employed by a prospective business when awarding federal contracts. The VA Secretary would have the authority to give preference to businesses that employ veterans based on its percentage of full-time veteran employees. The bipartisan legislation would encourage and incentivize VA contractors to employ veterans, and hold contractors responsible by requiring temporary debarment from contracting for businesses who knowingly misrepresent their proportion of veteran employees.

Source: Baldwin press release

Senator Ron Johnson

Johnson, who once accused those fighting climate change of “environmental jihad,” has now compared such people, including his Democratic opponent Russ Feingold and Sen. Bernie Sanders, to Joseph Stalin and Hugo Chávez. Speaking recently on WRJN 1400 radio, the longtime climate-change denier said liberals and progressives, like socialists and communists, “want to control everything.” “I mean, again, I don’t know why they want to do it. There’s an arrogance of power there that they’re utopians, that they really think they can create heaven on Earth, and where it’s failed in the past, those people like Stalin and Chávez and the Castros, the nutcases in North Korea – by the way, if you want equal results, go to North Korea, you have equal misery. The arrogance of liberal progressives,” he added, “is that they’re just a lot smarter and better angels than the Stalins and the Chávezes and the Castros of the world, and if we give them all the control, and they control your life, they’re going to do a great job of it. Well, it just isn’t true.” Johnson said the “climate hasn’t warmed in quite a few years, that is proven scientifically.” Which is why, he said, scientists have “changed the terminology from ‘global warming’ to ‘climate change,’ because that covers everything. The climate has always changed, it always will.” The reality, however, is that 2015 was the hottest year in recorded history, and 2016 is all but guaranteed to break heat records once again.

Source: Huffington Post

President Barack Obama

The President said it was time for Congress to lay aside politics and to act to provide additional money to combat the Zika virus before government funding dries up. “Our experts at the CDC, the folks on the front lines have been doing their best in making do by moving funds from other areas, but now the money we need to fight Zika is rapidly running out,” Obama said at a press conference at the Pentagon. He warned that development of a vaccine for the virus could be delayed if Congress does not provide any more money and urged Americans to contact lawmakers to pressure them to take up the issue. Concern over the threat from Zika, which can cause a birth defect called microcephaly marked by small head size that can lead to severe developmental problems in babies, has risen since Florida authorities recently detected the first signs of local transmission in the continental United States.

Source: Fox News