| Plight Of The Baha’I Community |
May 14, 2013 |
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Mark Kirk, R-IL
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"The Baha’i faith is an independent world religion that began in 19th-century Persia. Its central tenets include unity, peace, and understanding. The Baha’is are currently the largest non-Muslim minority in Iran, numbering some 300,000 members, and the Baha’i faith is one of the world’s fastest growing religions with more than 5 million followers worldwide. Since the Iranian Revolution in 1979, the Baha’is have been a target of systematic government-sponsored persecution. Roughly 200 Baha’is in Iran have been killed by government authorities since 1978 and more than 650 Baha’is have been arrested since 2005 alone."
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| Recognizing May As Direct Deposit And Direct Payment Via Ach Month |
May 3, 2013 |
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Gerald Connolly, D-VA
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"The California, Georgia, New England, and Upper Midwest ACH Associations formed NACHA in 1974 to establish uniform operating rules for the exchange of Automated Clearing House (ACH) payments among ACH associations. With the aid of ACH, financial institutions located anywhere in the United States have been able to exchange ACH payments under a common set of rules and procedures since 1978. Annually, the Network processes more than 21 billion Direct Deposit and Direct Payment transactions totaling almost $37 trillion."
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| Honoring The Centennial Of The Clorox Company |
April 26, 2013 |
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Barbara Lee, D-CA
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"Even as its size, marketplace, and product base has grown, Clorox has maintained a consistent commitment to Oakland throughout its 100 year history in that city. Since its first donation to the Boy Scouts of America in 1920, Clorox has demonstrated its spirit of philanthropy and engagement in the communities where its employees live and work. The company made a conscious effort by moving its headquarters into Oakland’s downtown in the 1970’s as part of a major urban renewal project. And, since its creation in 1980, The Clorox Company Foundation has awarded cash grants totaling more than $87 million to non-profit organizations, schools and colleges. In the past year alone, the foundation has helped nearly 100 non-profit organizations reach more than 26,000 young people in the Oakland area and thousands of others in cities across the U.S. The company has also demonstrated a commitment since 1978 to the East Oakland Youth Development Center through funding and staff volunteer programs."
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| The Passing Of Carmen Weinstein |
April 16, 2013 |
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Frank Wolf, R-VA
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"Carmen Weinstein, the leader of Egypt’s dwindling Jewish community, known for her tireless work preserving synagogues and a once-sprawling Jewish cemetery, died April 13 at the age of 82. A statement from the Jewish Community in Cairo confirmed her death in Cairo. She had been suffering from knee problems and poor blood circulation. Ms. Weinstein helped urge Egyptian authorities to renovate at least four Cairo synagogues among the 15 that still exist in the city. Just a day before her death, she traveled to the Maadi suburb to inspect the renovation of a synagogue there. Since 1978, she also worked to preserve the Bassatine cemetery, the only Jewish cemetery left in Cairo. The transformation of Bassatine mirrors the dramatic changes Egypt has undergone as its population skyrocketed and poverty grew. Named in Arabic after its gardens, the cemetery is now a slum of tightly packed redbrick apartment buildings that house thousands of poor Egyptians. Parts of the Bassatine were turned into a garbage dump. Ms. Weinstein was able to preserve a small area as a Jewish cemetery. Egypt’s once thriving Jewish community largely left more than 60 years ago at a time of hostilities between the country and Israel. Since the creation of the state of Israel in 1948, an estimated 65,000 Jews left Egypt for Europe, the West and Israel. According to a friend of Ms. Weinstein’s, Magda Haroun, only around 40 Egyptian Jews remain in the country, split between Cairo and the Mediterranean city of Alexandria, which once was a thriving multicultural and cosmopolitan hub. Haroun said Ms. Weinstein’s father had owned a large print shop in downtown Cairo, where Ms. Weinstein had worked for some 50 years after her father’s death. The family’s name remains on the shop, which now sells stationery. Haroun said one of Ms. Weinstein’s other achievements was in persuading Egypt’s remaining Jews to come together and use Cairo’s main downtown synagogue for prayer, after it had been closed for years. “We were scattered all over Cairo, and she managed to regroup us and keep us together,” Haroun said. In her last community newsletter, Ms. Weinstein wrote that this year’s Passover ceremony in late March was celebrated by about 50 people in Cairo’s main synagogue, many of them diplomats. Ms. Weinstein worked to remind people that Jews in Egypt were once part of the country’s vibrant economy, cultural and political life. She was a graduate of both Cairo University and the American University in Cairo, where she studied literature, according to a biography posted on the Jewish Community in Cairo’s Web site. She spoke fluent French, English and Arabic. Haroun said Ms. Weinstein often reminisced of the Egypt she knew growing up, when neighbors did not ask about one another’s religion."
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| Regulate The Regulators—The Reins Act |
April 11, 2013 |
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Ted Poe, R-TX
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"Our small business has operated on a shoestring for several years, and we started way back in 1978, but I fear we are at an end. We manufacture 400 products, all made from the same materials. But the new product safety regulations require we certify every product to the tune of about $500 per product, even though they’re all made from the same materials. Do the math: $175,000 or more just to get these same products that we’ve been making since 1978 certified by the Federal Government. Add on the health care fines and the rising cost of gasoline and the rising property and sales taxes and income taxes—well, you know the rest of the story."
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