PRESS RELEASES
Press Release
Prepared for Delivery at the Cookeville Peforming Arts Center
June 15th, 2010
Republican Candidates Night Forum
"Right now, as I speak, down in the Gulf of Mexico, the worst oil spill accident and ecological disaster in history continues to unfold and getting worse by the day. I'd like to say that our government is doing everything possible to contain it and reduce its impact on our country, our economy, our wildlife and our sensitive eco-system down there. But I cannot
tell a lie.
"Bobby Jindal's pleas for help and assistance in building up berms in front of his eco-sensitve barrier islands to protect them against the advancing oil were denied and his appeals fell on deaf ears. Why? Because he is a Republican and a possible contender in the 2012 Presidential election. I'd like to also point out that besides Louisiana, both Mississippi and Alabama have republican governors, as did the state of Florida.
"As Rahm Emmanuel likes to say, "A crisis is a terrible thing to waste" Obama has every reason to let the oil spill get ever larger and more disastrous, to use as a background prop for his push to get through his cap and trade legislation and green energy program. In fact, as I am speaking here tonight, I predict that is exactly what he is saying to the American people right now! Using this disaster as his illustrative "bullet point".
"Right now there is an American out of Texas who has lined up eight oil skimming ships and he says he has a line on about eight more, but he is being denied the okay by the government to go forward, even thought all the states are crying out for more skimmers.
"Right now, there are ships from more than 13 foreign countries, sitting idle in the Gulf waters nearby with aid in both equipment, advanced technologies for fighting the spill and manpower...and our government continues to ignore their presence and their offers to help, and instead our government watches with indifference from the sidelines as state's economies and family's livelihoods are destroyed. This is criminal neglect, pure and simple.
"All this is coming about because our government refuses to waive the Jones Act which prohibits the use of foreign built vessels and crews from operating in U-S waters, in other words its a protection made into law that benefits unions and the American worker. But in times of an emergency, the Jones Act has been waived so there is precedent in doing so. When hurricane Katrina caused heavy damage in the Gulf, President Bush quickly waived the Jones Act, so that assistance and aid from foreign countries could be used in the disaster.
So one has to seriously ask why this President and this Congress hasn't granted a temporary waiver.
"With the economy in deep recession, and a Depression still in the shadows,
our government now decides to stop further oil drilling in the Gulf with a six month moratorium...knowing full well that oil rigs operate at a daily cost of a million dollars
and they will not sit idle for long, before heading off to other parts of the world...and once gone, they're gone! A six month moratorium will end up crippling yet another gulf coast industry, to be put alongside the fishing and seafood industries and the tourism industry. And all of these industries feed countless other businesses and companies that are suppliers of those industries and all the mom and pop stores along the coast that count on those workers to keep their businesses going. And while all this is being pointed out to the government, they are refusing to budge.
"But the most heinous act of all, in the face of an ever growing spillage of oil and the threatening movement of that spill into the gulf currents and gulf stream that will send it around Florida and up the eastern coastline, ruining even more state's economies...is the fact that additional help, equipment, technological support and manpower from 13 nations remains idle on purpose and at the direction of the president and the democratic congress because he refuses to waive the Jones Act and upset all of his union alliances!
"While America fears the consequences coming from this disaster and what the six month moratorium on oil drilling will do to the price of gasoline, home heating oil, and the economic recovery in general, the President and his advisors see this as a golden, once in a lifetime opportunity to score their political points and move their socialist agenda forward.
To that I say, "But at what cost to America?"
"The question everyone will eventually have to address and answer for themselves is...just how quickly this oil spill disaster could have been contained and cleaned up had everybody been playing on the same team? Just how much of this disaster could have been avoided or reduced if 13 nations' offers of help back in early May, had not been rejected.
This is outrageous, morally reprehensible and downright criminal in nature."
Bruce McLellan
Republican Candidate for Congress
Tennessee 6th District
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Press Release -
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum
For Release, Wednesday, June 16th, 2010
I was barred from speaking! The advertisement in the Cookeville Herald-Citizen
read that there would be a public forum to be held Tuesday, June 15th, 2010, at the
Cookeville Performing Arts Center and would include "all" of the Republican candidates
for Congress in the Sixth District. The last time I checked I was an official candidate, my filing with the state, approved, a certified copy of my filing in the hands of the state GOP. And here I was at the foot of the stage, being barred from speaking. Let's go back.
I read about the forum in the newspaper and I called one of the contact numbers and reached one John Thayer, an office holder of the Putnam county GOP, and asked him why I wasn't invited? He said we didn't have you listed as a candidate, we didn't know you existed.
I told him, well you do now, what's the format for tomorrow night's event? And he went ahead and told me that candidates have 15 minutes to speak and can break it down any way they choose, either to speak for the entire 15 minutes or speak for a lesser time to allow for questions, etc. I said fine, see you tomorrow.
However, when I arrived, there was obviously no seventh chair on the stage, and while the local GOP chairman Curtis Shinsky was still on stage, I cornered Mr Thayer when he came off the stage and we walked back into the lobby. I asked him why there was no place reserved for me and he said they had decided not to let me speak. I asked him why? Thayer said that Curtis didn't know me and for all he knew I could be a "kook". I said I sat alongside Shinsky at an Overton county GOP meeting and introduced myself to him as a candidate (I was told Shinsky didn't remember, he meets a lot of people) I said -that are running for Congress?. I went on, that after that encounter I had left messages two times at the GOP office for Curtis to call me, but I received no call back.(He must not have gotten the messages) Well, a while later, I sent a friendly e-mail to your GOP, introducing myself, offering up my website address for details on me, along with an attachment of a quarter page advertisement that was published in some area papers, that spelled out who I was (we must never have received it). I said, you are doing a serious disservice to the people of your community, advertising that all Republican candidates would be present to speak and then not delivering on that promise, and you're certainly doing an injustice to me by barring me from the opportunity you are affording the rest of the candidates to speak to this audience. Are you sure you want to do this?
And he said, yes.
So I left and took my story to the local Herald-Citizen newspaper and waited for
the publisher to get back to me. There was no call. What's this thing with people not returning messages? So I called him the next morning and he said he had talked with Curtis and that it sounded like just a squabble between two parties, and Buddy Pearson said he didn't want to get involved in a squabble. I said so you don't see any story there at all, huh? Answer, no.
I said the fact that your newspaper advertised this event as one in which ALL of the Republican candidates would be speaking and yet one was barred from doing so, for no justifiable reason, and you still didn't see the problem. I asked him if he had been to my website yet? And Pearson said no, he hadn't. I said, well, that's too bad, because you're talking with a fellow journalist who spent more than 30 years in the business, in some of the largest television markets in the country, and who happens to know a story when he sees one, and preventing a candidate from speaking at an event specifically scheduled for that very reason, just because the local GOP chairman doesn't "think" he is a real candidate or someone worth listening to, is an injustice in anyone's book, not just for the candidate but for all the people that turned out expecting to get what was advertised, a forum for all the candidates to be heard.
So, a funny thing happened on the way to the forum. I was barred from speaking.
I just thought you deserved to know the reason behind it.
Bruce McLellan
Republican Candidate for Congress
Tennessee's Sixth District
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Press Release
Subject: Are we being told the truth?
For Release: Friday, June 18th, 2010
'I am referring to the President's address to the nation, Tuesday night. And again
I ask, are we being told the truth? In it, he said the following:
"One of the lessons we've learned from this spill is that we need better regulations
better safety standards and better enforcement when it comes to offshore drilling. But a larger lesson is that no matter how much we improve our regulation of the industry, drilling for oil these days entails greater risk. After all, oil is a finite resource. We consume more than 20% of world's oil but have less than 2% of the world's oil reserves. And that's part of the reason oil companies are drilling a mile beneath the surface of the ocean - because we're running out of places to drill on land and in shallow water."
I'm sorry, Mr President, but I disagree with you.and unlike you, sir, I cannot tell
a lie. And that one was a whopper, sir.
It is the policy of this presidency to uphold the environmental special interest strangle hold on the oil industry, and oil companies are only allowed to drill where the government gives them permits to drill, both on land and in shallower waters, which is non-existent right now. There are plenty of known oil reserves and potential oil reserves in this country on land and in shallow waters off our two coastlines and in the Gulf of Mexico. In fact, that 2% figure Obama used in his address is contradicted by the government's own figures that says the U-S is rated 11th in the world for its oil reserves. The real reason for the oil companies to be pushed out into the deeper waters, testing their technological limits at such depths, is because they have been barred from drilling in much more safer,.shallower waters, and on land! And it's for this reason that I hold you, Mr President, just as culpable as I do BP. As Harry Truman said in "the buck stops here" , I want to be sure that everyone realizes that it falls squarely on your desk, that you are just as much to blame as is BP for this horrendous nightmare event!
And just to put an exclamation point on my comments, the north slope of Alaska
holds so much potential, that back in 1923, President Harding, ordered 23-million acres be set aside as an emergency petroleum reserve for the Navy, and its still there today, untouched, and known as the National Petroleum Reserve, only in 1976, Congress passed the Naval Petroleum Reserve Production Act, which transferred the administration of the land over
to the U-S Dept of Interior, more specifically under the Bureau of Land Management, and we all know what happens to the land after that. Untouchable. And that land grab by the BLM continues today, just ask the folks that live in our western states. Let's not forget, of course, we have the 10-billion barrel potential oil reserve in ANWR, as well as similar possibilities in and around the Cook Inlet Basin of Alaska. Oh, and before I forget, we have that new Bakken oil field found in the Dakotas and Montana, that holds at least four-billion barrels of oil and some
say vastly more than that figure.
So, you see, Mr President, if BP is drilling in mile deep water, it's because of
you and your Congress. And your claims of no more oil to be found on land or in shallower
waters is just an out and out lie, to enable you to mislead the American people into your
socialist Cap and Trade legislation, and Green Energy policies.
If you'd like to hear more about my plan for solving our Debt Problem and our
Energy Problem, please go to the tab "Issues Before Us" and see my in depth plan of
action. Thank You.
Bruce McLellan
Your Republican Candidate for Congress
Tennessee's Sixth District
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Press Release
Subject: Disappointment in the Congressional Race
For Release: June 25th, 2010
I am bitterly disappointed in the public comments of one of my Republican opponents for Congress in the 6th district. I must say one has to revisit those comments and the thought process behind Lou Ann Zelenik, who made them, especially when it indirectly
goes against our own Bill of Rights and U-S Constitution (prohibiting the free exercise of religion). And this from a woman who will have to take an oath of office to support and defend such documents. This is just beyond me. To prohibit someone from exercising their right to practice religion goes to the very core values of America, and in this case, to oppose a
religious group from building a house of worship for their followers in a convenient place to where they live.
But for Lou Ann Zelenik to denounce the Muslim Faith by saying:
"This Islamic Center is not part of a religious movement, it is a political movement
designed to fracture the moral and political foundation of Middle Tennessee.", is outrageous.
And for her campaign manager, Jay Hind, to go on TV and shout, "We do not want to have Sharia Law in this country." just shows him for the boob he is, and his intent to fan the flames of fear, hysteria and hatred. Shame on you. And if you take this thought process a bit further,
then one must believe that Zelenik is against every Mosque in Middle Tennessee, perhaps in the entire state, or country. Are the internment camps far behind?
I've got news for you, Lou Ann, the religion of Islam, is arguably the fastest growing religion in the world, and the Muslim people of the Murfreesboro area have every right as you and I do to practice their religion of choice. And if their application to build their new mosque and education center meets up with all the city and zoning requirements...just as the Baptist church next door had to go through before they built on their property, then the Muslim
faithful have every right to build there.
Instead of fueling the hatred and misinformation of the opposition with your comments and those of your campaign manager, you should have been preaching tolerance, understanding and perhaps a bit of education. I'd like to believe that recent polls suggesting that 80% of the people in that area oppose the new mosque, didn't have anything to do with your coming out with such a vicious attack, but you know I can't. This is such an obvious
political move to grab on to those voters and its just another illustrative reason why politics has such nastiness associated with it and why people are so turned off by it.
I know I'm risking losing those same voters by coming out like this, but I would rather stand for what's right in this country, and not for what's wrong with this country.
It's obvious that some hearts and minds need to be won over by those folks behind this building project, and I hope they continue to reach out and invite the community into their world of the Muslim faith of Islam, for a better understanding and the history behind it.
Just as I hope those invited will take the time to learn the culture and customs before
stepping inside. And say, here's an idea for you, why not ask them where Abraham, Moses and Jesus figures in with their teachings. It may not fit in perfectly with your teachings, but it may help bridge the gap of all this uneasiness that's obvious in the community.
If only the hand that reaches out, could touch.
My name is Bruce McLellan, and I AM your Republican candidate for Congress in the 6th district.
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Press Release
Subject: The Goldman Sachs Settlement
For Release: July 18th, 2010
Am I the only one unhappy with the recent news story that the SEC has decided to settle its fraud lawsuit against Goldman Sachs for a paltry 550-million dollar fine? I know, I know, it wasn't one of those sexy news stories out there that gathered much attention. But the fact of the matter, it lets Goldman Sachs and its CEO, Lloyd Blankfein, skate around the issue of guilt when it comes to defrauding their investor/customers in the recent financial meltdown. That's when trillions of dollars in wealth, some of it yours, some of it mine, vaporized in connection with these sub-prime mortgage security instruments, that Sachs grudgingly admitted recently that they withheld "certain" facts from their investors when they sold them as good investments.
I would have much rather watched as Goldman Sachs and its CEO continued to get dragged through the mud for the rest of the year, leading up to the final showdown in court, where they would finally be brought to justice over their investment practices.
After all, the entire housing meltdown was caused by Congress and their darling
"Community Reinvestment Act" of 1976, which when tweaked up in the Clinton years, became the catalyst for the pressure on banks and mortgage companies to begin lending mortgage money to people who could not otherwise qualify for loans. And it was the same Congress
that defiantly stood in the way of annual calls for stricter regulations over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, leading up to their bankruptcy and bail-outs from Congress.
BUT IT WAS GOLDMAN SACHS and others of their like that took those sub-prime mortgages, bundled them up together with some sound mortgage paper and sold them as good investments to banking and investment houses both here and abroad, resulting in admittedly fragile financial systems in other countries to blow up, pushing their countries over the edge,
leading us to the brink of a world-wide economic and financial collapse.
I don't know about you, but I feel an agreement for an out of court settlement of only 550-million dollars (about the amount of a yearly bonus or two for a couple of their employees)
just doesn't seem to cut it, in view of the economic and financial damage that resulted. Frankly, I'd like to start seeing a few people ending up in prison over this, including some in Congress.
But hey, that's just me, I guess. Probably has to do with something called justice that we're all suppose to be for. I just feel all those people now out of work and unable to find jobs over all this, deserved more.
Oh, and by the way, in case you were wondering, 550-million dollars to Sachs amounts to only 4% of that year's profit. Also, this out of court settlement does two things. It allows Sachs to keep its questionable reputation unsullied as they don't have to admit guilt to the fraudulent charges, but most importantly, it now protects them against class-action lawsuits from all those who lost money on those sub-prime investment purchases. So where's the deterrent to keep them from doing it again? Where's the justice? And help me again with this but what exactly do we tell the 14-million Americans out of work - as a result of the economic and financial down draft caused by all this?
Bruce McLellan
Republican Candidate for Congress
Tennessee's Sixth District
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Press Release
Subject: Contract from America
For Immediate Release
Sixth District Republican Candidate Bruce McLellan has added his name to the
"Contract from America".
The contract states in part :
We, the citizens of the United States of America, call upon those seeking to represent us in public office to sign the Contract from America and by doing so commit to support each of its agenda items and advocate on behalf of individual liberty, limited government, and economic freedom.
1) Protect the Constitution
2) Reject Cap & Trade
3) Demand a Balanced Budget
4) Enact Fundamental Tax Reform
5) Restore Fiscal Responsibility & Constitutionally Limited Government
6) End Runaway Government Spending
7) Defund, Repeal, & Replace Government-run Health Care
8) Pass an ‘All-of-the-Above” Energy Policy
9) Stop the Pork
10) Stop the Tax Hikes
McLellan said it was an easy choice for him to make, considering his past statements and all that he talks about continually on his website.
McLellan concluded by saying that he would make it his mission to address all of the above issues in the first weeks of the new session of Congress, along with a number of issues he has already outlined on his website found under "Issues Before Us".
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Press Release
Subject: Murfreesboro is No New York City
For Release: July 21st, 2012
You all know where I stand on the proposed Islamic Faith Center in Murfreesboro, it has been a matter of record for several weeks now, as can be witnessed further below in these press releases. But, in regards to the controversy in New York City, I come down firmly against that one.
What may, on the surface, appear to be a similar situation to that of Murfreesboro, where an attempt is being made to build a mosque near Ground Zero. It is, in fact, not similar, nothing close to similar and I'll tell you why. All I needed to hear was that they were going to call it "Cordoba House", a 13- story Islamic mosque and educational center, which would be built adjacent to the hole in the ground that use to be the Twin Towers. Every Muslim in the world would know the significance of calling it that, and by announcing their intentions, it was a deliberate slap in the face of America.
It refers to Cordoba, Spain, and the conquering of that country by Muslims in the year 711 over the Christian Spaniards. And adding insult to injury they transformed one of their churches into the third largest mosque complex in the world at that time. And the Islamic world knows that the "Cordoba House" as it became known, was symbolic with Islamic conquest.
Building a mosque in New York City, next to where one of New York's famous landmarks, the Twin Towers once stood where 19 jihadists resulted in the murders of over 3000 Americans that day, and announcing its proposed name as "Cordoba House" is a "test" of our country's passivity and the historic ignorance of the American people. Sadly, the little man running that city and his ignorant liberal planning commission have failed the test, and appear to moving forward with the project despite the huge outcry from that city's residents. Another monumental cluster_____ from New York City's political dhimmi who are probably equally as ignorant to that term as they are to what they are about to commit by allowing that mosque to
be built.
The fact that there are over 100 mosques already in New York City, has never even entered the equation and the fact that the proponents of the project refuse to answer questions on where the funding is coming from is another disturbing highlight that ought to be raising an eyebrow, somewhere, anywhere.
To outgrow one's religious meeting halls and needing to build a larger structure to accommodate the faithful in Murfreesboro, is one thing.
To try and force through a plan to build a 13 story megamosque at the site of the worst surprise attack in American history by Islamic radicals and announce to the Islamic world you are going to call it "Cordoba House" is an insult not just to the residents of New York City, but to all of America. But not as insulting as the little man running New York City that's
allowing this to happen, thinking he can be our next U-S President.
Now that's something worth protesting.
My name is Bruce McLellan and I AM your Republican candidate for Congress
in Tennessee's Sixth District.
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