Politics

Republican congressional candidate Brooks Wicker has launched his first ad of the general election campaign, and it attacks Democratic incumbent John Yarmuth over the country's increasing debt under President Obama.

The online ad features Yarmuth at a town hall meeting three years ago at Central High School discussing the president's pending health care overhaul. Yarmuth faced a series of questions from constituents, many of whom opposed the legislation.

It criticizes the congressman for saying he didn't know how the government would pay for the rising cost to entitlement programs on top of the Affordable Care Act.

Check it out:

A progressive economic group says Kentucky should expand Medicaid under the Affordable Care Act based on recently release Census data.

The Kentucky Center for Economic Policy points to data that shows the percentage of Kentuckians without insurance dropped last year based on early elements of the health care law.

The drop was mainly attributed to a large number of young adults who are staying on their parents’ insurance thanks to one of the law’s provision.

Senate Republicans shelved the Veterans Jobs Corp Act on Wednesday due to amendments introduced by U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., that sought to strip foreign aid from Middle Eastern countries.

The jobs bill would have added a $1 billion to help create jobs and train returning veterans for the workforce. Last week, Paul proposed changes to the measure to take away U.S. assistance to Pakistan, Egypt and Libya in response to the recent protests and attacks against American consulates and embassies.

The changes would have tripled funding for the jobs bill, according to Paul's office. But the amendments put up a procedural step that required 60 votes to waive objections.

That vote failed 58-40 in the Senate on Wednesday.

From The New York Times:

The bill was opposed, by, among others, Senator Tom Coburn, Republican of Oklahoma, who said he believed the bill duplicated existing job programs for veterans that are not well run, and Senator Rand Paul, Republican of Kentucky, who has been seeking amendments on bills that would cut off funding to Egypt and to Pakistan until Pakistan freed Shakil Afridi, the doctor who helped the United States find Osama bin Laden.

Kentucky’s House Republicans have unveiled the agenda they will pursue if the party wins a majority of the chamber this fall.

The GOP has focused its attention this year on unseating Democrats in the state House. To help that effort, House Republicans have promised to address fiscal issues, taxes and government reform if elected.

Republican leader Jeff Hoover says, among other issues, the GOP will require that every bill be read before a vote.

A second legislative hearing on Kentucky’s federally-mandated health insurance exchange led to a dramatic walkout by Democrats today.

For the second consecutive time, the interim joint Health and Welfare committee saw their meeting devolve into arguments over the exchange.

And this time, a motion by Republicans to register a vote of disapproval against the exchange led every Democrat to get up and leave in the middle of the meeting.