Why Arizona Drew a Line
ON Friday, Gov. Jan Brewer of Arizona signed a law — SB 1070 — that prohibits the harboring of illegal aliens and makes it a state crime for an alien to commit certain federal immigration crimes. It also requires police officers who, in the course of a traffic stop or other law-enforcement action, come to a “reasonable suspicion” that a person is an illegal alien verify the person’s immigration status with the federal government.
Predictably, groups that favor relaxed enforcement of immigration laws, including the American Civil Liberties Union and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Education Fund, insist the law is unconstitutional. Less predictably, President Obama declared it “misguided” and said the Justice Department would take a look.
Presumably, the government lawyers who do so will actually read the law, something its critics don’t seem to have done. The arguments we’ve heard against it either misrepresent its text or are otherwise inaccurate. As someone who helped draft the statute, I will rebut the major criticisms individually:
It is unfair to demand that aliens carry their documents with them. It is true that the Arizona law makes it a misdemeanor for an alien to fail to carry certain documents. “Now, suddenly, if you don’t have your papers ... you’re going to be harassed,” the president said. “That’s not the right way to go.” But since 1940, it has been a federal crime for aliens to fail to keep such registration documents with them. The Arizona law simply adds a state penalty to what was already a federal crime. Moreover, as anyone who has traveled abroad knows, other nations have similar documentation requirements.
“Reasonable suspicion” is a meaningless term that will permit police misconduct. Over the past four decades, federal courts have issued hundreds of opinions defining those two words. The Arizona law didn’t invent the concept: Precedents list the factors that can contribute to reasonable suspicion; when several are combined, the “totality of circumstances” that results may create reasonable suspicion that a crime has been committed.
For example, the Arizona law is most likely to come into play after a traffic stop. A police officer pulls a minivan over for speeding. A dozen passengers are crammed in. None has identification. The highway is a known alien-smuggling corridor. The driver is acting evasively. Those factors combine to create reasonable suspicion that the occupants are not in the country legally.
The law will allow police to engage in racial profiling. Actually, Section 2 provides that a law enforcement official “may not solely consider race, color or national origin” in making any stops or determining immigration status. In addition, all normal Fourth Amendment protections against profiling will continue to apply. In fact, the Arizona law actually reduces the likelihood of race-based harassment by compelling police officers to contact the federal government as soon as is practicable when they suspect a person is an illegal alien, as opposed to letting them make arrests on their own assessment.
It is unfair to demand that people carry a driver’s license. Arizona’s law does not require anyone, alien or otherwise, to carry a driver’s license. Rather, it gives any alien with a license a free pass if his immigration status is in doubt. Because Arizona allows only lawful residents to obtain licenses, an officer must presume that someone who produces one is legally in the country.
State governments aren’t allowed to get involved in immigration, which is a federal matter. While it is true that Washington holds primary authority in immigration, the Supreme Court since 1976 has recognized that states may enact laws to discourage illegal immigration without being pre-empted by federal law. As long as Congress hasn’t expressly forbidden the state law in question, the statute doesn’t conflict with federal law and Congress has not displaced all state laws from the field, it is permitted. That’s why Arizona’s 2007 law making it illegal to knowingly employ unauthorized aliens was sustained by the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit.
In sum, the Arizona law hardly creates a police state. It takes a measured, reasonable step to give Arizona police officers another tool when they come into contact with illegal aliens during their normal law enforcement duties.
And it’s very necessary: Arizona is the ground zero of illegal immigration. Phoenix is the hub of human smuggling and the kidnapping capital of America, with more than 240 incidents reported in 2008. It’s no surprise that Arizona’s police associations favored the bill, along with 70 percent of Arizonans.
President Obama and the Beltway crowd feel these problems can be taken care of with “comprehensive immigration reform” — meaning amnesty and a few other new laws. But we already have plenty of federal immigration laws on the books, and the typical illegal alien is guilty of breaking many of them. What we need is for the executive branch to enforce the laws that we already have.
Unfortunately, the Obama administration has scaled back work-site enforcement and otherwise shown it does not consider immigration laws to be a high priority. Is it any wonder the Arizona Legislature, at the front line of the immigration issue, sees things differently?
Friday, April 30, 2010
Wednesday, April 28, 2010
Obama's Stupid Actions Against Israel
Barack Obama's top ten insults against Israel
By Nile Gardiner
Last week Israel celebrated its 62nd year as a nation, but there was major cause for concern amid the festivities as the Israeli people faced the looming menace of a nuclear-armed Iran, as well as the prospect of a rapidly deteriorating relationship with Washington. The Israel-bashing of the Obama administration has become so bad that even leading Democrats are now speaking out against the White House. New York Senator Chuck Schumer blasted Barack Obama’s stance towards Israel in a radio interview last week, stating his “counter-productive” Israel policy “has to stop”.
At the same time a poll was released by Quinnipiac University which showed that US voters disapproved of the president’s Israel policy by a margin of 44 to 35 percent. According to the poll, “American voters say 57 – 13 percent that their sympathies lie with Israel and say 66 – 19 percent that the president of the United States should be a strong supporter of Israel.”
I recently compiled a list of Barack Obama’s top ten insults against Britain, America’s closest ally in the world. This is a sequel of sorts, a list of major insults by the Obama administration against America’s closest ally in the Middle East, Israel. As I wrote previously on Obama’s treatment of both Britain and Israel:
In the space of just over a year, Barack Obama has managed to significantly damage relations with America’s two closest friends, while currying favour with practically every monstrous dictatorship on the face of the earth. The doctrine of “smart power” has evolved into the shameless appeasement of America’s enemies at the expense of existing alliances. There is nothing clever about this approach – it will ultimately weaken US global power and strengthen the hand of America’s enemies, who have become significantly emboldened and empowered by Barack Obama’s naïve approach since he took office.
The Obama presidency is causing immense damage to America’s standing in the free world, while projecting an image of weakness in front of hostile regimes. Its treatment of both Israel and Britain is an insult and a disgrace, and a grim reflection of an unbelievably crass and insensitive foreign policy that significantly undermines the US national interest.
So here’s my top 10 list of Obama administration insults against Israel after just 15 months in power:
1. Obama’s humiliation of Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House
In March, the Israeli Prime Minister was humiliated by Barack Obama when he visited Washington. As The Telegraph reported, “Benjamin Netanyahu was left to stew in a White House meeting room for over an hour after President Barack Obama abruptly walked out of tense talks to have supper with his family”, after being presented with a list of 13 demands. As I wrote at the time:
This is no way to treat America’s closest ally in the Middle East, and a true friend of the United States. I very much doubt that even third world tyrants would be received in such a rude fashion by the president. In fact, they would probably be warmly welcomed by the Obama White House as part of its “engagement” strategy, while the leaders of Britain and Israel are frequently met with arrogant disdain.
2. Engaging Iran when Tehran threatens a nuclear Holocaust against Israel
In contrast to its very public humiliation of close ally Israel, the Obama administration has gone out of its way to establish a better relationship with the genocidal regime of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, which continues to threaten Israel’s very existence. It has taken almost every opportunity to appease Tehran since it came to office, and has been extremely slow to respond to massive human rights violations by the Iranian regime, including the beating, rape and murder of pro-democracy protesters.
3. Drawing a parallel between Jewish suffering in the Holocaust with the current plight of the Palestinians
In his Cairo speech to the Muslim world, President Obama condemned Holocaust denial in the Middle East, but compared the murder of six million Jews during World War Two to the “occupation” of the Palestinian territories, in a disturbing example of moral equivalence:
“On the other hand, it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people – Muslims and Christians – have suffered in pursuit of a homeland. For more than sixty years they have endured the pain of dislocation. Many wait in refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza, and neighboring lands for a life of peace and security that they have never been able to lead. They endure the daily humiliations – large and small – that come with occupation. So let there be no doubt: the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable. America will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own.”
4. Obama’s attack on Israeli “occupation” in his speech to the United Nations
In his appalling speech to the UN General Assembly last September, President Obama dedicated five paragraphs to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, without once referring directly to Palestinian terrorism by name, but declaring to loud applause “America does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements.” He also lambasted the Israeli “occupation”, and drew a connection between rocket attacks on Israeli civilians with living conditions in Gaza. The speech served as a ghastly PR exercise aimed at appeasing anti-Israel sentiment in the Middle East, while bashing the Israelis over the head.
5. Obama’s accusation that Israel is the cause of instability in the Middle East
As The Wall Street Journal noted, “the Obama Administration seems increasingly of the view that Israel is the primary cause of instability in the Middle East”, citing a recent press conference where he stated:
“It is a vital national security interest of the United States to reduce these conflicts because whether we like it or not, we remain a dominant military superpower, and when conflicts break out, one way or another we get pulled into them. And that ends up costing us significantly in terms of both blood and treasure.”
6. The Obama administration’s establishment of diplomatic relations with Syria
While actively appeasing Iran, the Obama administration has also sought to develop closer ties with the other main state sponsor of terrorism in the Middle East, Syria, establishing diplomatic relations with Damascus in February. Syria remains a major backer of Hamas and Hizbollah, both responsible for a large number of terrorist attacks against Israel.
7. Hillary Clinton’s 43-minute phone call berating Netanyahu
As The Telegraph reported, Hillary Clinton sought to dictate terms to Israel in the wake of Vice President Joe Biden’s visit to Jerusalem:
“In a telephone call, Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, ordered Mr. Netanyahu to reverse a decision to build 1,600 homes for Israeli settlers in occupied East Jerusalem that sparked the diplomatic row. She also instructed him to issue a formal pledge that peace talks would focus on core issues such as the future of Jerusalem and the borders of a Palestinian state. In addition, the Israeli prime minister was urged to make a substantial confidence-building gesture to the Palestinians. Mrs. Clinton suggested this could take the form of prisoner releases, an easing of the blockade of Gaza and the transfer of greater territory in the West Bank to Palestinian control.”
Last time I checked, Israel was still an independent country, and not a colonial dependency of the Obama White House. Yet that still hasn’t stopped the Secretary of State from acting like an imperial Viceroy.
8. David Axelrod’s attack on Israeli settlements on “Meet the Press”
It is extremely unusual for a White House official to launch an attack on a close US ally on live television, but this is exactly what the President’s Senior Adviser David Axelrod did in an interview in March with NBC’s Meet the Press, designed to cause maximum humiliation to Israel, where he stated in reference to new settlement construction in East Jerusalem:
“This was an affront, it was an insult but most importantly it undermined this very fragile effort to bring peace to that region. For this announcement to come at that time was very destructive.”
9. Hillary Clinton’s call on Israel to show “respect”
As The Telegraph revealed, the Secretary of State lectured the Israelis at a dinner attended by the Israeli ambassador and the ambassadors of several Arab states in mid-April, urging Israel to “refrain from unilateral statements” that could “undermine trust or risk prejudicing the outcome of talks”. In Clinton’s words:
“Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu has embraced the vision of the two-state solution. But easing up on access and movement in the West Bank, in response to credible Palestinian security performance, is not sufficient to prove to the Palestinians that this embrace is sincere. We encourage Israel to continue building momentum toward a comprehensive peace by demonstrating respect for the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinians, stopping settlement activity and addressing the humanitarian needs in Gaza.”
10. Robert Gibbs’ disparaging remarks about Israel
Not one to shy away from criticizing America’s friends when the opportunity arises, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs entered the fray in an interview on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace in March where he attacked the Israeli government for weakening “the trust that’s needed for both sides to come together and have honest discussions about peace in the Middle East.” In condescending terms he stated that Benjamin Netanyahu should start “coming to the table with constructive ideas for constructive and trustful dialogue about moving the peace process forward.”
By Nile Gardiner
Last week Israel celebrated its 62nd year as a nation, but there was major cause for concern amid the festivities as the Israeli people faced the looming menace of a nuclear-armed Iran, as well as the prospect of a rapidly deteriorating relationship with Washington. The Israel-bashing of the Obama administration has become so bad that even leading Democrats are now speaking out against the White House. New York Senator Chuck Schumer blasted Barack Obama’s stance towards Israel in a radio interview last week, stating his “counter-productive” Israel policy “has to stop”.
At the same time a poll was released by Quinnipiac University which showed that US voters disapproved of the president’s Israel policy by a margin of 44 to 35 percent. According to the poll, “American voters say 57 – 13 percent that their sympathies lie with Israel and say 66 – 19 percent that the president of the United States should be a strong supporter of Israel.”
I recently compiled a list of Barack Obama’s top ten insults against Britain, America’s closest ally in the world. This is a sequel of sorts, a list of major insults by the Obama administration against America’s closest ally in the Middle East, Israel. As I wrote previously on Obama’s treatment of both Britain and Israel:
In the space of just over a year, Barack Obama has managed to significantly damage relations with America’s two closest friends, while currying favour with practically every monstrous dictatorship on the face of the earth. The doctrine of “smart power” has evolved into the shameless appeasement of America’s enemies at the expense of existing alliances. There is nothing clever about this approach – it will ultimately weaken US global power and strengthen the hand of America’s enemies, who have become significantly emboldened and empowered by Barack Obama’s naïve approach since he took office.
The Obama presidency is causing immense damage to America’s standing in the free world, while projecting an image of weakness in front of hostile regimes. Its treatment of both Israel and Britain is an insult and a disgrace, and a grim reflection of an unbelievably crass and insensitive foreign policy that significantly undermines the US national interest.
So here’s my top 10 list of Obama administration insults against Israel after just 15 months in power:
1. Obama’s humiliation of Benjamin Netanyahu at the White House
In March, the Israeli Prime Minister was humiliated by Barack Obama when he visited Washington. As The Telegraph reported, “Benjamin Netanyahu was left to stew in a White House meeting room for over an hour after President Barack Obama abruptly walked out of tense talks to have supper with his family”, after being presented with a list of 13 demands. As I wrote at the time:
This is no way to treat America’s closest ally in the Middle East, and a true friend of the United States. I very much doubt that even third world tyrants would be received in such a rude fashion by the president. In fact, they would probably be warmly welcomed by the Obama White House as part of its “engagement” strategy, while the leaders of Britain and Israel are frequently met with arrogant disdain.
2. Engaging Iran when Tehran threatens a nuclear Holocaust against Israel
In contrast to its very public humiliation of close ally Israel, the Obama administration has gone out of its way to establish a better relationship with the genocidal regime of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, which continues to threaten Israel’s very existence. It has taken almost every opportunity to appease Tehran since it came to office, and has been extremely slow to respond to massive human rights violations by the Iranian regime, including the beating, rape and murder of pro-democracy protesters.
3. Drawing a parallel between Jewish suffering in the Holocaust with the current plight of the Palestinians
In his Cairo speech to the Muslim world, President Obama condemned Holocaust denial in the Middle East, but compared the murder of six million Jews during World War Two to the “occupation” of the Palestinian territories, in a disturbing example of moral equivalence:
“On the other hand, it is also undeniable that the Palestinian people – Muslims and Christians – have suffered in pursuit of a homeland. For more than sixty years they have endured the pain of dislocation. Many wait in refugee camps in the West Bank, Gaza, and neighboring lands for a life of peace and security that they have never been able to lead. They endure the daily humiliations – large and small – that come with occupation. So let there be no doubt: the situation for the Palestinian people is intolerable. America will not turn our backs on the legitimate Palestinian aspiration for dignity, opportunity, and a state of their own.”
4. Obama’s attack on Israeli “occupation” in his speech to the United Nations
In his appalling speech to the UN General Assembly last September, President Obama dedicated five paragraphs to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, without once referring directly to Palestinian terrorism by name, but declaring to loud applause “America does not accept the legitimacy of continued Israeli settlements.” He also lambasted the Israeli “occupation”, and drew a connection between rocket attacks on Israeli civilians with living conditions in Gaza. The speech served as a ghastly PR exercise aimed at appeasing anti-Israel sentiment in the Middle East, while bashing the Israelis over the head.
5. Obama’s accusation that Israel is the cause of instability in the Middle East
As The Wall Street Journal noted, “the Obama Administration seems increasingly of the view that Israel is the primary cause of instability in the Middle East”, citing a recent press conference where he stated:
“It is a vital national security interest of the United States to reduce these conflicts because whether we like it or not, we remain a dominant military superpower, and when conflicts break out, one way or another we get pulled into them. And that ends up costing us significantly in terms of both blood and treasure.”
6. The Obama administration’s establishment of diplomatic relations with Syria
While actively appeasing Iran, the Obama administration has also sought to develop closer ties with the other main state sponsor of terrorism in the Middle East, Syria, establishing diplomatic relations with Damascus in February. Syria remains a major backer of Hamas and Hizbollah, both responsible for a large number of terrorist attacks against Israel.
7. Hillary Clinton’s 43-minute phone call berating Netanyahu
As The Telegraph reported, Hillary Clinton sought to dictate terms to Israel in the wake of Vice President Joe Biden’s visit to Jerusalem:
“In a telephone call, Hillary Clinton, the US secretary of state, ordered Mr. Netanyahu to reverse a decision to build 1,600 homes for Israeli settlers in occupied East Jerusalem that sparked the diplomatic row. She also instructed him to issue a formal pledge that peace talks would focus on core issues such as the future of Jerusalem and the borders of a Palestinian state. In addition, the Israeli prime minister was urged to make a substantial confidence-building gesture to the Palestinians. Mrs. Clinton suggested this could take the form of prisoner releases, an easing of the blockade of Gaza and the transfer of greater territory in the West Bank to Palestinian control.”
Last time I checked, Israel was still an independent country, and not a colonial dependency of the Obama White House. Yet that still hasn’t stopped the Secretary of State from acting like an imperial Viceroy.
8. David Axelrod’s attack on Israeli settlements on “Meet the Press”
It is extremely unusual for a White House official to launch an attack on a close US ally on live television, but this is exactly what the President’s Senior Adviser David Axelrod did in an interview in March with NBC’s Meet the Press, designed to cause maximum humiliation to Israel, where he stated in reference to new settlement construction in East Jerusalem:
“This was an affront, it was an insult but most importantly it undermined this very fragile effort to bring peace to that region. For this announcement to come at that time was very destructive.”
9. Hillary Clinton’s call on Israel to show “respect”
As The Telegraph revealed, the Secretary of State lectured the Israelis at a dinner attended by the Israeli ambassador and the ambassadors of several Arab states in mid-April, urging Israel to “refrain from unilateral statements” that could “undermine trust or risk prejudicing the outcome of talks”. In Clinton’s words:
“Prime Minister [Benjamin] Netanyahu has embraced the vision of the two-state solution. But easing up on access and movement in the West Bank, in response to credible Palestinian security performance, is not sufficient to prove to the Palestinians that this embrace is sincere. We encourage Israel to continue building momentum toward a comprehensive peace by demonstrating respect for the legitimate aspirations of the Palestinians, stopping settlement activity and addressing the humanitarian needs in Gaza.”
10. Robert Gibbs’ disparaging remarks about Israel
Not one to shy away from criticizing America’s friends when the opportunity arises, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs entered the fray in an interview on Fox News Sunday with Chris Wallace in March where he attacked the Israeli government for weakening “the trust that’s needed for both sides to come together and have honest discussions about peace in the Middle East.” In condescending terms he stated that Benjamin Netanyahu should start “coming to the table with constructive ideas for constructive and trustful dialogue about moving the peace process forward.”
The Mexicans Are Hypocrites
How Mexico Treats Illegal Aliens
by Michelle Malkin
Mexican President Felipe Calderon has accused Arizona of opening the door "to intolerance, hate, discrimination and abuse in law enforcement." But Arizona has nothing on Mexico when it comes to cracking down on illegal aliens. While open-borders activists decry new enforcement measures signed into law in "Nazi-zona" last week, they remain deaf, dumb or willfully blind to the unapologetically restrictionist policies of our neighbors to the south.
The Arizona law bans sanctuary cities that refuse to enforce immigration laws, stiffens penalties against illegal alien day laborers and their employers, makes it a misdemeanor for immigrants to fail to complete and carry an alien registration document, and allows the police to arrest immigrants unable to show documents proving they are in the U.S. legally. If those rules constitute the racist, fascist, xenophobic, inhumane regime that the National Council of La Raza, Al Sharpton, Catholic bishops and their grievance-mongering followers claim, then what about these regulations and restrictions imposed on foreigners?
Michelle Malkin
-- The Mexican government will bar foreigners if they upset "the equilibrium of the national demographics." How's that for racial and ethnic profiling?
-- If outsiders do not enhance the country's "economic or national interests" or are "not found to be physically or mentally healthy," they are not welcome. Neither are those who show "contempt against national sovereignty or security." They must not be economic burdens on society and must have clean criminal histories. Those seeking to obtain Mexican citizenship must show a birth certificate, provide a bank statement proving economic independence, pass an exam and prove they can provide their own health care.
-- Illegal entry into the country is equivalent to a felony punishable by two years' imprisonment. Document fraud is subject to fine and imprisonment; so is alien marriage fraud. Evading deportation is a serious crime; illegal re-entry after deportation is punishable by ten years' imprisonment. Foreigners may be kicked out of the country without due process and the endless bites at the litigation apple that illegal aliens are afforded in our country (see, for example, President Obama's illegal alien aunt -- a fugitive from deportation for eight years who is awaiting a second decision on her previously rejected asylum claim).
-- Law enforcement officials at all levels -- by national mandate -- must cooperate to enforce immigration laws, including illegal alien arrests and deportations. The Mexican military is also required to assist in immigration enforcement operations. Native-born Mexicans are empowered to make citizens' arrests of illegal aliens and turn them in to authorities.
-- Ready to show your papers? Mexico's National Catalog of Foreigners tracks all outside tourists and foreign nationals. A National Population Registry tracks and verifies the identity of every member of the population, who must carry a citizens' identity card. Visitors who do not possess proper documents and identification are subject to arrest as illegal aliens.
All of these provisions are enshrined in Mexico's Ley General de Población (General Law of the Population) and were spotlighted in a 2006 research paper published by the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Security Policy. There's been no public clamor for "comprehensive immigration reform" in Mexico, however, because pro-illegal alien speech by outsiders is prohibited.
Consider: Open-borders protesters marched freely at the Capitol building in Arizona, comparing GOP Gov. Jan Brewer to Hitler, waving Mexican flags, advocating that demonstrators "Smash the State," and holding signs that proclaimed "No human is illegal" and "We have rights."
But under the Mexican constitution, such political speech by foreigners is banned. Noncitizens cannot "in any way participate in the political affairs of the country." In fact, a plethora of Mexican statutes enacted by its congress limit the participation of foreign nationals and companies in everything from investment, education, mining and civil aviation to electric energy and firearms. Foreigners have severely limited private property and employment rights (if any).
As for abuse, the Mexican government is notorious for its abuse of Central American illegal aliens who attempt to violate Mexico's southern border. The Red Cross has protested rampant Mexican police corruption, intimidation and bribery schemes targeting illegal aliens there for years. Mexico didn't respond by granting mass amnesty to illegal aliens, as it is demanding that we do. It clamped down on its borders even further. In late 2008, the Mexican government launched an aggressive deportation plan to curtain illegal Cuban immigration and human trafficking through Cancun.
Meanwhile, Mexican consular offices in the United States have coordinated with left-wing social justice groups and the Catholic Church leadership to demand a moratorium on all deportations and a freeze on all employment raids across America.
Mexico is doing the job Arizona is now doing -- a job the U.S. government has failed miserably to do: putting its people first. Here's the proper rejoinder to all the hysterical demagogues in Mexico (and their sympathizers here on American soil) now calling for boycotts and invoking Jim Crow laws, apartheid and the Holocaust because Arizona has taken its sovereignty into its own hands:
Hipócritas.
by Michelle Malkin
Mexican President Felipe Calderon has accused Arizona of opening the door "to intolerance, hate, discrimination and abuse in law enforcement." But Arizona has nothing on Mexico when it comes to cracking down on illegal aliens. While open-borders activists decry new enforcement measures signed into law in "Nazi-zona" last week, they remain deaf, dumb or willfully blind to the unapologetically restrictionist policies of our neighbors to the south.
The Arizona law bans sanctuary cities that refuse to enforce immigration laws, stiffens penalties against illegal alien day laborers and their employers, makes it a misdemeanor for immigrants to fail to complete and carry an alien registration document, and allows the police to arrest immigrants unable to show documents proving they are in the U.S. legally. If those rules constitute the racist, fascist, xenophobic, inhumane regime that the National Council of La Raza, Al Sharpton, Catholic bishops and their grievance-mongering followers claim, then what about these regulations and restrictions imposed on foreigners?
Michelle Malkin
-- The Mexican government will bar foreigners if they upset "the equilibrium of the national demographics." How's that for racial and ethnic profiling?
-- If outsiders do not enhance the country's "economic or national interests" or are "not found to be physically or mentally healthy," they are not welcome. Neither are those who show "contempt against national sovereignty or security." They must not be economic burdens on society and must have clean criminal histories. Those seeking to obtain Mexican citizenship must show a birth certificate, provide a bank statement proving economic independence, pass an exam and prove they can provide their own health care.
-- Illegal entry into the country is equivalent to a felony punishable by two years' imprisonment. Document fraud is subject to fine and imprisonment; so is alien marriage fraud. Evading deportation is a serious crime; illegal re-entry after deportation is punishable by ten years' imprisonment. Foreigners may be kicked out of the country without due process and the endless bites at the litigation apple that illegal aliens are afforded in our country (see, for example, President Obama's illegal alien aunt -- a fugitive from deportation for eight years who is awaiting a second decision on her previously rejected asylum claim).
-- Law enforcement officials at all levels -- by national mandate -- must cooperate to enforce immigration laws, including illegal alien arrests and deportations. The Mexican military is also required to assist in immigration enforcement operations. Native-born Mexicans are empowered to make citizens' arrests of illegal aliens and turn them in to authorities.
-- Ready to show your papers? Mexico's National Catalog of Foreigners tracks all outside tourists and foreign nationals. A National Population Registry tracks and verifies the identity of every member of the population, who must carry a citizens' identity card. Visitors who do not possess proper documents and identification are subject to arrest as illegal aliens.
All of these provisions are enshrined in Mexico's Ley General de Población (General Law of the Population) and were spotlighted in a 2006 research paper published by the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Security Policy. There's been no public clamor for "comprehensive immigration reform" in Mexico, however, because pro-illegal alien speech by outsiders is prohibited.
Consider: Open-borders protesters marched freely at the Capitol building in Arizona, comparing GOP Gov. Jan Brewer to Hitler, waving Mexican flags, advocating that demonstrators "Smash the State," and holding signs that proclaimed "No human is illegal" and "We have rights."
But under the Mexican constitution, such political speech by foreigners is banned. Noncitizens cannot "in any way participate in the political affairs of the country." In fact, a plethora of Mexican statutes enacted by its congress limit the participation of foreign nationals and companies in everything from investment, education, mining and civil aviation to electric energy and firearms. Foreigners have severely limited private property and employment rights (if any).
As for abuse, the Mexican government is notorious for its abuse of Central American illegal aliens who attempt to violate Mexico's southern border. The Red Cross has protested rampant Mexican police corruption, intimidation and bribery schemes targeting illegal aliens there for years. Mexico didn't respond by granting mass amnesty to illegal aliens, as it is demanding that we do. It clamped down on its borders even further. In late 2008, the Mexican government launched an aggressive deportation plan to curtain illegal Cuban immigration and human trafficking through Cancun.
Meanwhile, Mexican consular offices in the United States have coordinated with left-wing social justice groups and the Catholic Church leadership to demand a moratorium on all deportations and a freeze on all employment raids across America.
Mexico is doing the job Arizona is now doing -- a job the U.S. government has failed miserably to do: putting its people first. Here's the proper rejoinder to all the hysterical demagogues in Mexico (and their sympathizers here on American soil) now calling for boycotts and invoking Jim Crow laws, apartheid and the Holocaust because Arizona has taken its sovereignty into its own hands:
Hipócritas.
Saturday, April 24, 2010
Packin' It To Church
“Bring Your Pieces to Church” Sunday
By Joel McDurmon
Imagine the following scenario: At church this Sunday, while reviewing the list of announcements and upcoming events for your church, your pastor added, “Oh, and don’t forget: on Sundays we have our regular target practice. Make sure to bring your rifles. Make sure to bring your pieces to church.”
Absurd, right? Not so. It used to be the American way. For example, a 1631 law in Virginia required citizens to own firearms, to engage in practice with them, and to do so publicly on holy days. It demanded that the people “bring their pieces to the church.” Somewhere along the line we have lost this mindset. Today the ideas of church and arms are assumed to be at odds, as if loving your neighbor has nothing to do with the preservation and defense of life and property.
But the idea of Christian society and an armed, skilled populace actually have deep historical roots. Alfred the Great codified the laws of England in the 9th Century, often resorting to biblical law in order to do so (where he departed from biblical law, the integrity of his famous law code is quite poor). Alfred applied the Deuteronomic laws of kings that forbad a standing army (Deut. 17), and as a result developed a national defense based on militia:
By the Saxon laws, every freeman of an age capable of bearing arms, and not incapacitated by any bodily infirmity, was in case of a foreign invasion, internal insurrection, or other emergency, obliged to join the army.…[1]
This required and encouraged an armed citizenry:
Every landholder was obliged to keep armor and weapons according to his rank and possessions; these he might neither sell, lend, nor pledge, nor even alienate from his heirs. In order to instruct them in the use of arms, they had their stated times for performing their military exercise; and once in a year, usually in the spring, there was a general review of arms, throughout each county.[2]
Imagine! Imagine the government poking its nose in every year not to register and license weapons for possible future confiscation, but to ensure that each house indeed possessed weapons. Imagine that instead of imposing fees for licensing schemes, the government levied fines for not owning a firearm. This was the case in Massachusetts in 1644. The state required that “every freeman or other inhabitant of this colony provide for himself and each under him able bear arms a sufficient musket and other serviceable piece” as well as “two pounds of powder and ten pounds of bullets.”[3] Those who neglected this duty could receive fines up to ten shillings (for laborers, roughly a day’s wages).
In 1623, Virginia statute forbade anyone to travel unless they were “well armed,” and required that all men working in fields likewise be armed.[4] 1631 laws repeated the same requirements and added to them: all able men should bear arms and engage in practice with their arms. The law specifically required “All men that are fitting to bear arms,” and to “bring their pieces to the church upon pain of every offence.”[5] (Equally shocking to most modern evangelicals is the fine for not obeying these laws: landowners who did not so arm their laborers and workers were required “to pay 2 lbs. of tobacco,” and this fine in tobacco was “to be disposed by the church-wardens, who shall levy it by distress.…”[6]
Imagine that: the government desiring, commanding that every able citizen own weapons and be skilled in using them! And to do so on “holy days” and at Church.[7] (It’s even more unbelievable that the government assumed all men were going to church every Sunday. Perhaps we could increase their numbers if we could reinstate target practice fellowship.)
The legacy of arms and freedom as Christian virtues continued into American Revolution. The Lutheran pastor John Peter Muhlenberg is perhaps the most famous of the “fighting parsons.” He answered George Washington’s personal call to raise troops using his own pulpit and Ecclesiastes 3 to do so. Other ministers of the gospel were well known to preach with loaded guns in the pulpit with them. Pennsylvania preacher John Elder provides a great example: “Commissioned a captain by the Pennsylvania government, he led a company of rangers and was accustomed to preach with his loaded musket across the pulpit.”[8] Likewise, Rev. Thomas Allen, a later collaborator in writing the Massachusetts State Constitution, himself fired the first shot at the Battle of Bennington. In the context of the War for Independence, ministers saw guns as tools of liberty and defense against tyranny.
In a later context, some ministers saw the continued usefulness of firearms. A former cowboy and confederate soldier turned Methodist circuit rider, Rev. Andrew Jackson Potter, preached among tough neighborhoods in the old West. He would regularly walk up, lay his two colt revolvers across the pulpit, and begin to preach. He retained order and security, and encouraged an atmosphere of respect. In this scenario, arms served less as tools of national liberty and more as tools of preservation of life and individual liberty and property.
This same scenario goes on today, by the way. As recently as last fall, pastors in the Detroit area have begun to arms themselves in the pulpit and while on church property. Rises in Detroit crime in general as well as attacks in church buildings in particular have awakened the attention of many Christians. While it is illegal in most states to carry guns on church property, Michigan allows it for the pastor and those he approves.
Christians should be aware that the use of force in preservation of life is a biblical doctrine (Ex. 22:2–3; Prov. 24:10–12; Est. 8–9; Neh. 4; cp. John 15:13–14). Likewise, those who possessed weapons in Scripture are often said to be well skilled in the use of them (Judg. 20:15–16; 1 Chron. 12:1–2, 21–22). We can only surmise that 1) God gave them talent in this regard, and that 2) they engaged in target practice regularly. Further, under biblical law, to be disarmed was to be enslaved and led to a disruption of the economic order due to government regulations and monopolies (1 Sam 13:19–22). But the mere presence of a couple weapons had psychological effects that put criminals to flight (1 Sam 13). There is a reason why Scripture tells these stories: they illustrate the defense of life, liberty, and property in the midst of a fallen world (and fallen governments).
The American Second Amendment did not spring into existence from nowhere. It had a long pedigree. The Christian society emerging from the old laws of Alfred continued to include the ideal of an armed populace as a means of securing human liberties. The Founders, many of them lawyers, had studied that legal tradition and would have read William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765–1769). The first part of the first volume elaborates on the subject of our “principal absolute rights… of personal security, personal liberty, and private property [i.e. life, liberty, and property].” It then covers five means of securing and protecting these rights “inviolate”:
The fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject, that I shall at present mention, is that of having arms for their defence, suitable to their condition and degree, and such as are allowed by law. Which is also declared by the same statute I W. & M. st.2. c.2. and is indeed a public allowance, under due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self-preservation, when the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression.[9]
Within that same legal tradition, and more than a generation earlier, the English philosopher John Locke voiced the sanctity of life, liberty, and property as well as our duty even to use force to preserve it:
Every one, as he is bound to preserve himself… so by the like reason, when his own preservation comes not in competition, ought he, as much as he can, to preserve the rest of mankind, and may not, unless it be to do justice on an offender, take away, or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of the life, the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another.
Locke elaborated these views within the context of belief in God’s ultimate sovereignty, ownership, and law-order over all of creation:
being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions: for men being all the workmanship of one omnipotent, and infinitely wise maker; all the servants of one sovereign master, sent into the world by his order, and about his business; they are his property, whose workmanship they are, made to last during his, not one another’s pleasure…[10]
Thomas Jefferson clearly took his phrase “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” from Locke, likely via Blackstone. It is no irony that Jefferson kept a portrait of Locke on his parlor wall. Both hated tyranny, and saw freedom as requiring the defense of person and property via use of force if necessary. Both derived this from the Christian legal tradition they inherited.
Today Christians are so brainwashed and affected by progressive propaganda that we have an uneasy feeling even broaching the subject of guns. Constant liberalism in the media and years of government-school indoctrination have eroded the foundations of liberty in this nation. Today Christians think themselves conservative when they back everything the military does. Conservatives think that to oppose the military is to be a leftist. They have no idea that 1) the tradition of imperialistic war grows out of liberal, not conservative, ideology, and 2) the Bible forbids nations to have standing armies or stockpile offensive weapons. The Bible calls for national defense through an armed populace and militia upon necessity. A standing army is an affront to God. But for some reason, alleged conservative politicians easily persuade Christian voters that the next military maneuver is of necessity an expression of conservative values, and the Christians cheer.
We are further brainwashed into thinking (and feeling) that guns are somehow dirty and evil, and that Christians should have nothing to do with them. In this view, we have departed from the Scriptures, Christian legal history, as well as America’s Christian history.
As a remedy for the situation, we should both learn and exercise our gun rights. This article provides merely a beginning of the necessary education. We need much more. Every Christian should read and understand the laws of their particular state. Good places to start are www.handgunlaw.us and opencarry.org (the former site includes coverage of concealed carry laws; the latter deals mainly with open carry). Not only should you know about laws pertaining directly to carrying, but also to those pertaining to the use of deadly force. These vary per state, and Christians should be aware.
But we should also begin to exercise our inviolable rights. Every able Christian should own a firearm, and each should seek instruction and training in how to use them. This includes handguns, shotguns, and rifles, each of which has a particular strength in self- and home-defense. Elders and pastors should teach on the topic and its history, and should help aid church members in obtaining fitting pieces and proper training in legal settings.
One great expression of both education and practice, I have recently learned, appears in the Appleseed Project. These yearly training camps are steeped in American history and wish to advance the forgotten legacy of the American rifleman. Using focused and professional training events across the country, this project teaches and hones shooting skills toward the goal of making you accurate at 500 yards.
In addition to that great project, I recommend taking classes in handgun defense. These are offered by small gun shops and firing ranges around the country. Make use of them.
In states that oppress the inviolable right to bear arms, the best we can do is to organize politically and locally to change the laws. This is not easy, of course, but Christian society demands it as a measure to stop the tyranny of governments and the advance of individual crime. To allow unjust gun laws to continue unchallenged is to fail in loving your neighbor and to vote in favor of Egyptian and Philistine-style servitude. This, of course, demands its own article, but deserves at least mentioning here.
Christians need to understand and act upon these biblical ideals. While this article hardly provides the last word on the subject, we ignore the lessons of the Bible and history to the peril of our freedoms. Evil ever advances upon our families, churches, and states. Evil seeks positions of power, such as government, and from there seeks to eliminate the avenues of power that threaten it (an armed people). Thus tyrannical government seek to pass gun control laws. Wise Christians see past the propaganda and stand for freedom.
With relentless expression of our rights through education, publication, exercising the right, and challenging unjust laws, Christians can at least create a society hungrier for freedom. At best we may roll back the various infringements upon those freedoms. If we change the laws well enough, we may indeed once again hear pastor say, “Oh, and don’t forget: on Sundays we have our regular target practice. Make sure to bring your pieces to church.”
Endnotes:
1. Francis Grose, Military Antiquities Respecting a History of the British Army, from the Conquest to the Present Time, 2 vol. (London: Egerton and Kearsley, 1801), 1:1. [↩]
2. Francis Grose, Military Antiquities, 1:2. [↩]
3. William Brigham, ed., The Compact with the Charter and Laws of the Colony of New Plymouth (Boston: Dutton and Wentworth, 1836), 31. [↩]
4. William Hening, The Statutes at Large: Being a Collection of All the Laws of Virginia from the First Session of the Legislature in 1619, (New York, 1823), 173–174, http://vagenweb.org/hening/vol01-07.htm (accessed April 22, 2010); I have modernized the English taken from this work. [↩]
5. William Hening, The Statutes at Large, 174, http://vagenweb.org/hening/vol01-07.htm (accessed April 22, 2010). [↩]
6. William Hening, The Statutes at Large, 174, http://vagenweb.org/hening/vol01-07.htm (accessed April 22, 2010). [↩]
7. William Hening, The Statutes at Large, 174–175, http://vagenweb.org/hening/vol01-07.htm (accessed April 22, 2010). [↩]
8. Louis B. Wright, “The Westward Advance of the Atlantic Frontier,” The Huntingdon Library Quarterly 11/3 (May 1948): 271 [↩]
9. William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England, 4 vol., 1:139. [↩]
10. Two Treatises on Civil Government, Book II, Chapter II, Sec. 6. [1689], http://www.lonang.com/exlibris/locke/loc-202.htm (accessed April 22, 2010). [↩]
By Joel McDurmon
Imagine the following scenario: At church this Sunday, while reviewing the list of announcements and upcoming events for your church, your pastor added, “Oh, and don’t forget: on Sundays we have our regular target practice. Make sure to bring your rifles. Make sure to bring your pieces to church.”
Absurd, right? Not so. It used to be the American way. For example, a 1631 law in Virginia required citizens to own firearms, to engage in practice with them, and to do so publicly on holy days. It demanded that the people “bring their pieces to the church.” Somewhere along the line we have lost this mindset. Today the ideas of church and arms are assumed to be at odds, as if loving your neighbor has nothing to do with the preservation and defense of life and property.
But the idea of Christian society and an armed, skilled populace actually have deep historical roots. Alfred the Great codified the laws of England in the 9th Century, often resorting to biblical law in order to do so (where he departed from biblical law, the integrity of his famous law code is quite poor). Alfred applied the Deuteronomic laws of kings that forbad a standing army (Deut. 17), and as a result developed a national defense based on militia:
By the Saxon laws, every freeman of an age capable of bearing arms, and not incapacitated by any bodily infirmity, was in case of a foreign invasion, internal insurrection, or other emergency, obliged to join the army.…[1]
This required and encouraged an armed citizenry:
Every landholder was obliged to keep armor and weapons according to his rank and possessions; these he might neither sell, lend, nor pledge, nor even alienate from his heirs. In order to instruct them in the use of arms, they had their stated times for performing their military exercise; and once in a year, usually in the spring, there was a general review of arms, throughout each county.[2]
Imagine! Imagine the government poking its nose in every year not to register and license weapons for possible future confiscation, but to ensure that each house indeed possessed weapons. Imagine that instead of imposing fees for licensing schemes, the government levied fines for not owning a firearm. This was the case in Massachusetts in 1644. The state required that “every freeman or other inhabitant of this colony provide for himself and each under him able bear arms a sufficient musket and other serviceable piece” as well as “two pounds of powder and ten pounds of bullets.”[3] Those who neglected this duty could receive fines up to ten shillings (for laborers, roughly a day’s wages).
In 1623, Virginia statute forbade anyone to travel unless they were “well armed,” and required that all men working in fields likewise be armed.[4] 1631 laws repeated the same requirements and added to them: all able men should bear arms and engage in practice with their arms. The law specifically required “All men that are fitting to bear arms,” and to “bring their pieces to the church upon pain of every offence.”[5] (Equally shocking to most modern evangelicals is the fine for not obeying these laws: landowners who did not so arm their laborers and workers were required “to pay 2 lbs. of tobacco,” and this fine in tobacco was “to be disposed by the church-wardens, who shall levy it by distress.…”[6]
Imagine that: the government desiring, commanding that every able citizen own weapons and be skilled in using them! And to do so on “holy days” and at Church.[7] (It’s even more unbelievable that the government assumed all men were going to church every Sunday. Perhaps we could increase their numbers if we could reinstate target practice fellowship.)
The legacy of arms and freedom as Christian virtues continued into American Revolution. The Lutheran pastor John Peter Muhlenberg is perhaps the most famous of the “fighting parsons.” He answered George Washington’s personal call to raise troops using his own pulpit and Ecclesiastes 3 to do so. Other ministers of the gospel were well known to preach with loaded guns in the pulpit with them. Pennsylvania preacher John Elder provides a great example: “Commissioned a captain by the Pennsylvania government, he led a company of rangers and was accustomed to preach with his loaded musket across the pulpit.”[8] Likewise, Rev. Thomas Allen, a later collaborator in writing the Massachusetts State Constitution, himself fired the first shot at the Battle of Bennington. In the context of the War for Independence, ministers saw guns as tools of liberty and defense against tyranny.
In a later context, some ministers saw the continued usefulness of firearms. A former cowboy and confederate soldier turned Methodist circuit rider, Rev. Andrew Jackson Potter, preached among tough neighborhoods in the old West. He would regularly walk up, lay his two colt revolvers across the pulpit, and begin to preach. He retained order and security, and encouraged an atmosphere of respect. In this scenario, arms served less as tools of national liberty and more as tools of preservation of life and individual liberty and property.
This same scenario goes on today, by the way. As recently as last fall, pastors in the Detroit area have begun to arms themselves in the pulpit and while on church property. Rises in Detroit crime in general as well as attacks in church buildings in particular have awakened the attention of many Christians. While it is illegal in most states to carry guns on church property, Michigan allows it for the pastor and those he approves.
Christians should be aware that the use of force in preservation of life is a biblical doctrine (Ex. 22:2–3; Prov. 24:10–12; Est. 8–9; Neh. 4; cp. John 15:13–14). Likewise, those who possessed weapons in Scripture are often said to be well skilled in the use of them (Judg. 20:15–16; 1 Chron. 12:1–2, 21–22). We can only surmise that 1) God gave them talent in this regard, and that 2) they engaged in target practice regularly. Further, under biblical law, to be disarmed was to be enslaved and led to a disruption of the economic order due to government regulations and monopolies (1 Sam 13:19–22). But the mere presence of a couple weapons had psychological effects that put criminals to flight (1 Sam 13). There is a reason why Scripture tells these stories: they illustrate the defense of life, liberty, and property in the midst of a fallen world (and fallen governments).
The American Second Amendment did not spring into existence from nowhere. It had a long pedigree. The Christian society emerging from the old laws of Alfred continued to include the ideal of an armed populace as a means of securing human liberties. The Founders, many of them lawyers, had studied that legal tradition and would have read William Blackstone’s Commentaries on the Laws of England (1765–1769). The first part of the first volume elaborates on the subject of our “principal absolute rights… of personal security, personal liberty, and private property [i.e. life, liberty, and property].” It then covers five means of securing and protecting these rights “inviolate”:
The fifth and last auxiliary right of the subject, that I shall at present mention, is that of having arms for their defence, suitable to their condition and degree, and such as are allowed by law. Which is also declared by the same statute I W. & M. st.2. c.2. and is indeed a public allowance, under due restrictions, of the natural right of resistance and self-preservation, when the sanctions of society and laws are found insufficient to restrain the violence of oppression.[9]
Within that same legal tradition, and more than a generation earlier, the English philosopher John Locke voiced the sanctity of life, liberty, and property as well as our duty even to use force to preserve it:
Every one, as he is bound to preserve himself… so by the like reason, when his own preservation comes not in competition, ought he, as much as he can, to preserve the rest of mankind, and may not, unless it be to do justice on an offender, take away, or impair the life, or what tends to the preservation of the life, the liberty, health, limb, or goods of another.
Locke elaborated these views within the context of belief in God’s ultimate sovereignty, ownership, and law-order over all of creation:
being all equal and independent, no one ought to harm another in his life, health, liberty, or possessions: for men being all the workmanship of one omnipotent, and infinitely wise maker; all the servants of one sovereign master, sent into the world by his order, and about his business; they are his property, whose workmanship they are, made to last during his, not one another’s pleasure…[10]
Thomas Jefferson clearly took his phrase “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” from Locke, likely via Blackstone. It is no irony that Jefferson kept a portrait of Locke on his parlor wall. Both hated tyranny, and saw freedom as requiring the defense of person and property via use of force if necessary. Both derived this from the Christian legal tradition they inherited.
Today Christians are so brainwashed and affected by progressive propaganda that we have an uneasy feeling even broaching the subject of guns. Constant liberalism in the media and years of government-school indoctrination have eroded the foundations of liberty in this nation. Today Christians think themselves conservative when they back everything the military does. Conservatives think that to oppose the military is to be a leftist. They have no idea that 1) the tradition of imperialistic war grows out of liberal, not conservative, ideology, and 2) the Bible forbids nations to have standing armies or stockpile offensive weapons. The Bible calls for national defense through an armed populace and militia upon necessity. A standing army is an affront to God. But for some reason, alleged conservative politicians easily persuade Christian voters that the next military maneuver is of necessity an expression of conservative values, and the Christians cheer.
We are further brainwashed into thinking (and feeling) that guns are somehow dirty and evil, and that Christians should have nothing to do with them. In this view, we have departed from the Scriptures, Christian legal history, as well as America’s Christian history.
As a remedy for the situation, we should both learn and exercise our gun rights. This article provides merely a beginning of the necessary education. We need much more. Every Christian should read and understand the laws of their particular state. Good places to start are www.handgunlaw.us and opencarry.org (the former site includes coverage of concealed carry laws; the latter deals mainly with open carry). Not only should you know about laws pertaining directly to carrying, but also to those pertaining to the use of deadly force. These vary per state, and Christians should be aware.
But we should also begin to exercise our inviolable rights. Every able Christian should own a firearm, and each should seek instruction and training in how to use them. This includes handguns, shotguns, and rifles, each of which has a particular strength in self- and home-defense. Elders and pastors should teach on the topic and its history, and should help aid church members in obtaining fitting pieces and proper training in legal settings.
One great expression of both education and practice, I have recently learned, appears in the Appleseed Project. These yearly training camps are steeped in American history and wish to advance the forgotten legacy of the American rifleman. Using focused and professional training events across the country, this project teaches and hones shooting skills toward the goal of making you accurate at 500 yards.
In addition to that great project, I recommend taking classes in handgun defense. These are offered by small gun shops and firing ranges around the country. Make use of them.
In states that oppress the inviolable right to bear arms, the best we can do is to organize politically and locally to change the laws. This is not easy, of course, but Christian society demands it as a measure to stop the tyranny of governments and the advance of individual crime. To allow unjust gun laws to continue unchallenged is to fail in loving your neighbor and to vote in favor of Egyptian and Philistine-style servitude. This, of course, demands its own article, but deserves at least mentioning here.
Christians need to understand and act upon these biblical ideals. While this article hardly provides the last word on the subject, we ignore the lessons of the Bible and history to the peril of our freedoms. Evil ever advances upon our families, churches, and states. Evil seeks positions of power, such as government, and from there seeks to eliminate the avenues of power that threaten it (an armed people). Thus tyrannical government seek to pass gun control laws. Wise Christians see past the propaganda and stand for freedom.
With relentless expression of our rights through education, publication, exercising the right, and challenging unjust laws, Christians can at least create a society hungrier for freedom. At best we may roll back the various infringements upon those freedoms. If we change the laws well enough, we may indeed once again hear pastor say, “Oh, and don’t forget: on Sundays we have our regular target practice. Make sure to bring your pieces to church.”
Endnotes:
1. Francis Grose, Military Antiquities Respecting a History of the British Army, from the Conquest to the Present Time, 2 vol. (London: Egerton and Kearsley, 1801), 1:1. [↩]
2. Francis Grose, Military Antiquities, 1:2. [↩]
3. William Brigham, ed., The Compact with the Charter and Laws of the Colony of New Plymouth (Boston: Dutton and Wentworth, 1836), 31. [↩]
4. William Hening, The Statutes at Large: Being a Collection of All the Laws of Virginia from the First Session of the Legislature in 1619, (New York, 1823), 173–174, http://vagenweb.org/hening/vol01-07.htm (accessed April 22, 2010); I have modernized the English taken from this work. [↩]
5. William Hening, The Statutes at Large, 174, http://vagenweb.org/hening/vol01-07.htm (accessed April 22, 2010). [↩]
6. William Hening, The Statutes at Large, 174, http://vagenweb.org/hening/vol01-07.htm (accessed April 22, 2010). [↩]
7. William Hening, The Statutes at Large, 174–175, http://vagenweb.org/hening/vol01-07.htm (accessed April 22, 2010). [↩]
8. Louis B. Wright, “The Westward Advance of the Atlantic Frontier,” The Huntingdon Library Quarterly 11/3 (May 1948): 271 [↩]
9. William Blackstone, Commentaries on the Laws of England, 4 vol., 1:139. [↩]
10. Two Treatises on Civil Government, Book II, Chapter II, Sec. 6. [1689], http://www.lonang.com/exlibris/locke/loc-202.htm (accessed April 22, 2010). [↩]
Wednesday, April 21, 2010
Obama's 'Constitution'
Obama and the Constitution
Submitted by Bob Beauprez on April 20, 2010
You have to give Barack Obama credit for at least one thing; he sure knows how to get people fired up.
Across America citizens by the tens of thousands rallied at Tea Party events last week against a government out of control and politicians who refuse to listen. Many pointed to a trampling of civil liberties and the Constitution.
Obama’s hostility and disdain for the Constitution, which he laments as a “charter of negative liberties,” is well established. When Obama pledged “to bring about the change that won't just win an election, but will transform America,” he apparently had transforming the Law of the Land squarely in his sights. His actions in only the first year in office are an alarming and unprecedented assault that must have shaken the Framers of the Constitution in their eternal resting places.
Indeed, more than a dozen state Attorneys General along with private organizations have filed suit against the federal government claiming the recently passed ObamaCare, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), is unconstitutional by mandating every citizen purchase a commercial product, even one as important as health insurance. The AGs raise the right questions citing Article 1, Section 8 that specifically prescribes Congressional limited authorities, and the Tenth Amendment that reserves “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
"The Constitution nowhere authorizes the United States to mandate, either directly or under threat of penalty, that all citizens and legal residents have qualifying health care coverage," the lawsuit reads.
Obama caused another flare up by ignoring the Senate’s Advice and Consent Authority in Article 2, Section 2 of the Constitution with 15 Easter week recess appointments to federal positions. For sure, other Presidents of both parties have made scores of recess appointments in the past. But one of Obama’s pushed the limit.
Most flagrant was the appointment of Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board. Becker’s nomination “died…in the Senate” when it fell eight votes short of passing cloture in February. But, Obama ignored the Senate action as provided for in the Constitution and forced Becker on the NRLB anyway. Becker is an attorney for the AFL-CIO and SEIU and ardent advocate of doing away with secret ballot elections (Card Check) as currently required by law to organize workers into a labor union. Recognizing the reality that Congress likely cannot pass Card Check legislation, the unions have advocated it be done through the “administrative process” – i.e. by changing the regulation by bureaucratic fiat, essentially deeming a change in the law without ever voting on it – and Becker is likely their designated bureaucrat to get it done.
Just two months into his new job, Obama fired the management at General Motors, a private corporation. He moved swiftly to install his own puppets, confiscate the equity of secured creditors, and redistribute it to labor unions and the government. He did all of this without any identifiable authority in the Constitution or in statutes, no vote from Congress, nor an order from any Court. He just did it – a frightening precedent to establish in the United States of America.
The recent announcement that Justice John Paul Stevens plans to retire this summer will give Obama his second appointment to the Supreme Court. With his first nominee to the SCOTUS, Obama selected a well documented activist judge, Sonia Sotomayor, who arrogantly rejected the Constitutional separation of powers and publicly bragged that “the Court is where policy is made.” Speculation around Obama’s next nominee has largely focused on “how far left” he will go with his selection. It’s a given that his pick will be from the liberal edge of possibilities. Two high profile liberal women are often mentioned, Elena Kagan and Diana Wood. Regardless of who is ultimately selected, it is a foregone conclusion that the nominee will “indulge their own liberal values by deeming what the law is,” rather than applying the Constitution as written.
How do we know? Because, Obama said so.
In a 2001 Chicago public radio interview, Illinois State Senator Barack Obama provided great insight to the frustration and low regard that the man who would become President had even then for the Constitution. Referencing the Earl Warren Supreme Court of the 1950-60s, widely regarded as the most liberal and activist Court in the nation’s history, Obama said “it wasn’t that radical.” He lamented the Warren Court, “didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution.”
Obama might not have thought the Warren Court pushed the envelope, but President Eisenhower sure did. The activism of that Court caused Ike, who nominated Warren, to reflect on that decision as “the biggest damned-fool mistake I ever made.”
The Warren Court according to Obama, “never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth and sort of more basic issues of political and economic justice in this society.” Flying directly in the face of the Founders, and particularly the vision embodied in The Federalist Papers, Obama decried the Constitution as, “a charter of negative liberties. It says what the states can’t do to you, it says what the federal government can’t do to you, but it doesn’t say what the federal government or the state government must do on your behalf.”
Obama’s vision of what government “must do” is centered on what he called even in 2001 “redistributed change.” Even an activist court isn’t sufficiently aggressive for Obama. “The Court’s just not very good at it (redistributed change),” he said. While important in Obama’s overall strategy, he recognizes it is but one of many members in “coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributed change.”
While we await the name Obama’s next SCOTUS nominee, rest assured they will share his vision and be pledged to further his assault on free-market capitalism in America and our fundamental liberties. Look no further than the closing statement of that radio interview in which he speaks of “bringing about economic change through the courts.” That is the transformation of America – the “change” - of which he spoke.
As if to put an exclamation point on his 2001 interview, Presidential candidate Obama said this six years later during the Presidential campaign when asked about his criteria for judicial nominees:
"We need somebody who's got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it's like to be a young teenage mom. The empathy to understand what it's like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old. And that's the criteria by which I'm going to be selecting my judges."
Barack Obama: Planned Parenthood Conference, July 17, 2007
Caring for the needy and the disenfranchised, and government’s proper roll, has occupied countless hours of debate within Congress since the nation’s founding. The generosity and benevolence of America for our own as well as countless millions around the world is unprecedented in world history. Some will forever believe we still come up short, while others are convinced we spend and waste too much. Regardless, the Founders clearly established that “all men are created equal” and thus entitled to equal opportunity and treatment – but, not necessarily equal outcome. Protection of equal treatment is principally within the jurisdiction of the courts, while the legislature will forever tug and push at outcomes.
Obama has embraced the “living constitution” ideology of the radical left who don’t like rules, or legal constraints, or limits on government intrusion into our lives and our freedom as envisioned by our Founders. Instead of the wisdom of Hancock, Franklin, Jefferson, and Adams who believed that, “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,” Obama is more closely aligned with a form of government that denies individual liberty and freedom, centralizes power within the institutions of government rather than the people, confiscates and redistributes personal wealth and property, and is founded on the one fundamental principal of believers in redistributive change; “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”
Mr. President, there are places in the world where tyrannical governments imposes that dictum on fearful people. But, it is not the United States of America.
Submitted by Bob Beauprez on April 20, 2010
You have to give Barack Obama credit for at least one thing; he sure knows how to get people fired up.
Across America citizens by the tens of thousands rallied at Tea Party events last week against a government out of control and politicians who refuse to listen. Many pointed to a trampling of civil liberties and the Constitution.
Obama’s hostility and disdain for the Constitution, which he laments as a “charter of negative liberties,” is well established. When Obama pledged “to bring about the change that won't just win an election, but will transform America,” he apparently had transforming the Law of the Land squarely in his sights. His actions in only the first year in office are an alarming and unprecedented assault that must have shaken the Framers of the Constitution in their eternal resting places.
Indeed, more than a dozen state Attorneys General along with private organizations have filed suit against the federal government claiming the recently passed ObamaCare, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA), is unconstitutional by mandating every citizen purchase a commercial product, even one as important as health insurance. The AGs raise the right questions citing Article 1, Section 8 that specifically prescribes Congressional limited authorities, and the Tenth Amendment that reserves “The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.”
"The Constitution nowhere authorizes the United States to mandate, either directly or under threat of penalty, that all citizens and legal residents have qualifying health care coverage," the lawsuit reads.
Obama caused another flare up by ignoring the Senate’s Advice and Consent Authority in Article 2, Section 2 of the Constitution with 15 Easter week recess appointments to federal positions. For sure, other Presidents of both parties have made scores of recess appointments in the past. But one of Obama’s pushed the limit.
Most flagrant was the appointment of Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board. Becker’s nomination “died…in the Senate” when it fell eight votes short of passing cloture in February. But, Obama ignored the Senate action as provided for in the Constitution and forced Becker on the NRLB anyway. Becker is an attorney for the AFL-CIO and SEIU and ardent advocate of doing away with secret ballot elections (Card Check) as currently required by law to organize workers into a labor union. Recognizing the reality that Congress likely cannot pass Card Check legislation, the unions have advocated it be done through the “administrative process” – i.e. by changing the regulation by bureaucratic fiat, essentially deeming a change in the law without ever voting on it – and Becker is likely their designated bureaucrat to get it done.
Just two months into his new job, Obama fired the management at General Motors, a private corporation. He moved swiftly to install his own puppets, confiscate the equity of secured creditors, and redistribute it to labor unions and the government. He did all of this without any identifiable authority in the Constitution or in statutes, no vote from Congress, nor an order from any Court. He just did it – a frightening precedent to establish in the United States of America.
The recent announcement that Justice John Paul Stevens plans to retire this summer will give Obama his second appointment to the Supreme Court. With his first nominee to the SCOTUS, Obama selected a well documented activist judge, Sonia Sotomayor, who arrogantly rejected the Constitutional separation of powers and publicly bragged that “the Court is where policy is made.” Speculation around Obama’s next nominee has largely focused on “how far left” he will go with his selection. It’s a given that his pick will be from the liberal edge of possibilities. Two high profile liberal women are often mentioned, Elena Kagan and Diana Wood. Regardless of who is ultimately selected, it is a foregone conclusion that the nominee will “indulge their own liberal values by deeming what the law is,” rather than applying the Constitution as written.
How do we know? Because, Obama said so.
In a 2001 Chicago public radio interview, Illinois State Senator Barack Obama provided great insight to the frustration and low regard that the man who would become President had even then for the Constitution. Referencing the Earl Warren Supreme Court of the 1950-60s, widely regarded as the most liberal and activist Court in the nation’s history, Obama said “it wasn’t that radical.” He lamented the Warren Court, “didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution.”
Obama might not have thought the Warren Court pushed the envelope, but President Eisenhower sure did. The activism of that Court caused Ike, who nominated Warren, to reflect on that decision as “the biggest damned-fool mistake I ever made.”
The Warren Court according to Obama, “never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth and sort of more basic issues of political and economic justice in this society.” Flying directly in the face of the Founders, and particularly the vision embodied in The Federalist Papers, Obama decried the Constitution as, “a charter of negative liberties. It says what the states can’t do to you, it says what the federal government can’t do to you, but it doesn’t say what the federal government or the state government must do on your behalf.”
Obama’s vision of what government “must do” is centered on what he called even in 2001 “redistributed change.” Even an activist court isn’t sufficiently aggressive for Obama. “The Court’s just not very good at it (redistributed change),” he said. While important in Obama’s overall strategy, he recognizes it is but one of many members in “coalitions of power through which you bring about redistributed change.”
While we await the name Obama’s next SCOTUS nominee, rest assured they will share his vision and be pledged to further his assault on free-market capitalism in America and our fundamental liberties. Look no further than the closing statement of that radio interview in which he speaks of “bringing about economic change through the courts.” That is the transformation of America – the “change” - of which he spoke.
As if to put an exclamation point on his 2001 interview, Presidential candidate Obama said this six years later during the Presidential campaign when asked about his criteria for judicial nominees:
"We need somebody who's got the heart, the empathy, to recognize what it's like to be a young teenage mom. The empathy to understand what it's like to be poor, or African-American, or gay, or disabled, or old. And that's the criteria by which I'm going to be selecting my judges."
Barack Obama: Planned Parenthood Conference, July 17, 2007
Caring for the needy and the disenfranchised, and government’s proper roll, has occupied countless hours of debate within Congress since the nation’s founding. The generosity and benevolence of America for our own as well as countless millions around the world is unprecedented in world history. Some will forever believe we still come up short, while others are convinced we spend and waste too much. Regardless, the Founders clearly established that “all men are created equal” and thus entitled to equal opportunity and treatment – but, not necessarily equal outcome. Protection of equal treatment is principally within the jurisdiction of the courts, while the legislature will forever tug and push at outcomes.
Obama has embraced the “living constitution” ideology of the radical left who don’t like rules, or legal constraints, or limits on government intrusion into our lives and our freedom as envisioned by our Founders. Instead of the wisdom of Hancock, Franklin, Jefferson, and Adams who believed that, “Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed,” Obama is more closely aligned with a form of government that denies individual liberty and freedom, centralizes power within the institutions of government rather than the people, confiscates and redistributes personal wealth and property, and is founded on the one fundamental principal of believers in redistributive change; “From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”
Mr. President, there are places in the world where tyrannical governments imposes that dictum on fearful people. But, it is not the United States of America.
Wednesday, April 14, 2010
Obama’s Supreme Court Short List Falls Short
Obama’s Supreme Court Short List
Elena Kagan stepped down as dean of Harvard Law School to become solicitor general. Like Obama, she has her law degree from Harvard and taught at the University of Chicago.
The Daily Caller reports about Kagan's extremist views:
"Kagan's boldest foray into public life was, as dean of Harvard Law School, throwing the military off campus over its 'don't ask, don't tell' policy on gay soldiers. Kagan called the policy, implemented by her former boss President Bill Clinton, 'a profound wrong — a moral injustice of the first order.' She pursued the matter all the way to the Supreme Court, where the justices unanimously slapped down her arguments, forcing Harvard to allow the military to return....
"On the Defense of Marriage Act, Kagan damned with faint praise — she defended the law, but not without first saying the Obama administration opposed it, thought it was discriminatory and hoped to overturn it. Pro-homosexual marriage lawyer Dale Carpenter wrote the move was a 'gift to the gay-marriage movement' because the administration was 'helping knock out a leg from under the opposition to gay marriage.'...
"Long ago, Kagan wrote a memo while clerking for the late Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall that said religious organizations that provide care for teen pregnancies shouldn't get federal funds because of a strict line separating church and state."
Needless to say, Kagan is a bomb-thrower, who would rule as a pro-homosexual, pro-abortion, anti-Christian activist, and she must be filibustered if nominated.
Diane Wood is an appeals court judge in Chicago who has worked at the State Department, the Justice Department and in private practice. Like Obama, she taught at the University of Chicago Law School.
Kagan and Wood appear to be the most hostile toward pro-life Judeo Christian views.
LifeSiteNews.com reports about Wood:
Diane Wood is considered a leading liberal justice in the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, and is considered a radical supporter of legalized abortion. After graduating with her law degree in 1975, Wood clerked for Justice Harry Blackmun, the author of the Roe v. Wade decision.
Wood went on to author the decision of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in the case National Organization for Women v. Scheidler, in which she sided with NOW's attempt to silence Scheidler, the Pro-Life Action Network, and Operation Rescue, extract large monetary damages, and prevent them from protesting at abortion clinics. Wood's decision was unanimously overturned by the Supreme Court in 2006.
Wood also wrote a dissenting opinion in Christian Legal Society v. Walker, in which she disagreed with the majority opinion that Southern Illinois University was wrong to revoke official student group status of a CLS chapter because it required its members to be Christian.
Again, Wood is a bomb-thrower, who will rule as a pro-homosexual, pro-abortion, anti-Christian activist, and must be filibustered if nominated.
Merrick Garland, of the federal appeals court in Washington, is a former high-ranking Justice Department official.
Ed Whelan of The National Review said, "I have zero illusions that a Justice Garland would help move the Court in the right direction in undoing the damage of decades of liberal judicial activism. I merely have reasonable hopes that he'd move more slowly than the other leading candidates in compounding the damage...For what it's worth, I'd bet my bottom dollar that Garland would vote to uphold the constitutionality of Obamacare, including the individual mandate." And yet, of the candidates that President Obama might plausibly nominate to the Court, "all the others strike me as markedly worse than Garland," Whelan wrote.
Janet Napolitano, the homeland security chief, is a former Arizona governor and a former federal prosecutor.
LifeSiteNews.com already reports wide-spread opposition by pro-lifers to her nomination.
"Secretary Napolitano has already won notoriety among the pro-life community for labeling opposition to abortion as a warning sign of violent "rightwing extremism." A Homeland Security report detailing such "rightwing extremism" as characterized by pro-life and other normative conservative values was eventually pulled after an uproar ensued...
"As governor of Arizona prior to her cabinet appointment, Napolitano was known as an extreme abortion supporter, having vetoed several pro-life bills, including a ban on partial-birth abortion and a bill protecting the conscience rights of pharmacists."
Leah Ward Sears, the first black female to serve as the chief justice of the Georgia Supreme Court, is now in private practice after a long career on the bench.
Lifenews.com reports:
Sears would give Obama the distinction of appointing the first "black woman" Supreme Court Justice -- "an important distinction for a nation that puts so much stock into identity politics."
However, Sears would receive opposition from pro-life groups because she is a member of the left-leaning American Constitution Society.
Americans United for Life (AUL) highlighted Sears when she made the short list of potential Supreme Court appointments last year, though Obama ultimately went with pro-abortion Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
Justice Sears has not issued any known decision on life-related issues, but AUL indicates "Sears has evidenced a broad conception of substantive constitutional privacy -- the very basis upon which Roe v. Wade is predicated."
Sears has "referred to the responsibility of courts to protect constitutional rights against 'morals legislation' the majority," AUL notes, which concerns it regarding abortion issues.
Sidney Thomas, a Montana lawyer who now sits on the extremist 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, the most liberal of all 13 appeals courts in the nation, is not only a judicial activist, but according to Ed Whelan of The National Review, "Thomas is on the far Left of that far-Left court." He is certainly worthy of vociferous opposition and filibuster.
Jennifer Granholm, the Michigan governor and former federal prosecutor and Michigan attorney general, is not a good choice.
Granholm's political experience might be attractive, but her chances are hurt by her "controversial tenure" as governor during Michigan's economic hard times, said Larry Sabato, director at the University of Virginia's Center for Politics.
"Let's face it; she's not one of the more popular governors," Sabato said.
"I don't see why it would make sense politically or legally" to nominate Granholm, said Brian Kalt, an associate law professor at Michigan State University, expressing concerns about Granholm's liberal political background, in an interview with The Free Press.
Elena Kagan stepped down as dean of Harvard Law School to become solicitor general. Like Obama, she has her law degree from Harvard and taught at the University of Chicago.
The Daily Caller reports about Kagan's extremist views:
"Kagan's boldest foray into public life was, as dean of Harvard Law School, throwing the military off campus over its 'don't ask, don't tell' policy on gay soldiers. Kagan called the policy, implemented by her former boss President Bill Clinton, 'a profound wrong — a moral injustice of the first order.' She pursued the matter all the way to the Supreme Court, where the justices unanimously slapped down her arguments, forcing Harvard to allow the military to return....
"On the Defense of Marriage Act, Kagan damned with faint praise — she defended the law, but not without first saying the Obama administration opposed it, thought it was discriminatory and hoped to overturn it. Pro-homosexual marriage lawyer Dale Carpenter wrote the move was a 'gift to the gay-marriage movement' because the administration was 'helping knock out a leg from under the opposition to gay marriage.'...
"Long ago, Kagan wrote a memo while clerking for the late Supreme Court Justice Thurgood Marshall that said religious organizations that provide care for teen pregnancies shouldn't get federal funds because of a strict line separating church and state."
Needless to say, Kagan is a bomb-thrower, who would rule as a pro-homosexual, pro-abortion, anti-Christian activist, and she must be filibustered if nominated.
Diane Wood is an appeals court judge in Chicago who has worked at the State Department, the Justice Department and in private practice. Like Obama, she taught at the University of Chicago Law School.
Kagan and Wood appear to be the most hostile toward pro-life Judeo Christian views.
LifeSiteNews.com reports about Wood:
Diane Wood is considered a leading liberal justice in the 7th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, and is considered a radical supporter of legalized abortion. After graduating with her law degree in 1975, Wood clerked for Justice Harry Blackmun, the author of the Roe v. Wade decision.
Wood went on to author the decision of the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in the case National Organization for Women v. Scheidler, in which she sided with NOW's attempt to silence Scheidler, the Pro-Life Action Network, and Operation Rescue, extract large monetary damages, and prevent them from protesting at abortion clinics. Wood's decision was unanimously overturned by the Supreme Court in 2006.
Wood also wrote a dissenting opinion in Christian Legal Society v. Walker, in which she disagreed with the majority opinion that Southern Illinois University was wrong to revoke official student group status of a CLS chapter because it required its members to be Christian.
Again, Wood is a bomb-thrower, who will rule as a pro-homosexual, pro-abortion, anti-Christian activist, and must be filibustered if nominated.
Merrick Garland, of the federal appeals court in Washington, is a former high-ranking Justice Department official.
Ed Whelan of The National Review said, "I have zero illusions that a Justice Garland would help move the Court in the right direction in undoing the damage of decades of liberal judicial activism. I merely have reasonable hopes that he'd move more slowly than the other leading candidates in compounding the damage...For what it's worth, I'd bet my bottom dollar that Garland would vote to uphold the constitutionality of Obamacare, including the individual mandate." And yet, of the candidates that President Obama might plausibly nominate to the Court, "all the others strike me as markedly worse than Garland," Whelan wrote.
Janet Napolitano, the homeland security chief, is a former Arizona governor and a former federal prosecutor.
LifeSiteNews.com already reports wide-spread opposition by pro-lifers to her nomination.
"Secretary Napolitano has already won notoriety among the pro-life community for labeling opposition to abortion as a warning sign of violent "rightwing extremism." A Homeland Security report detailing such "rightwing extremism" as characterized by pro-life and other normative conservative values was eventually pulled after an uproar ensued...
"As governor of Arizona prior to her cabinet appointment, Napolitano was known as an extreme abortion supporter, having vetoed several pro-life bills, including a ban on partial-birth abortion and a bill protecting the conscience rights of pharmacists."
Leah Ward Sears, the first black female to serve as the chief justice of the Georgia Supreme Court, is now in private practice after a long career on the bench.
Lifenews.com reports:
Sears would give Obama the distinction of appointing the first "black woman" Supreme Court Justice -- "an important distinction for a nation that puts so much stock into identity politics."
However, Sears would receive opposition from pro-life groups because she is a member of the left-leaning American Constitution Society.
Americans United for Life (AUL) highlighted Sears when she made the short list of potential Supreme Court appointments last year, though Obama ultimately went with pro-abortion Justice Sonia Sotomayor.
Justice Sears has not issued any known decision on life-related issues, but AUL indicates "Sears has evidenced a broad conception of substantive constitutional privacy -- the very basis upon which Roe v. Wade is predicated."
Sears has "referred to the responsibility of courts to protect constitutional rights against 'morals legislation' the majority," AUL notes, which concerns it regarding abortion issues.
Sidney Thomas, a Montana lawyer who now sits on the extremist 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco, the most liberal of all 13 appeals courts in the nation, is not only a judicial activist, but according to Ed Whelan of The National Review, "Thomas is on the far Left of that far-Left court." He is certainly worthy of vociferous opposition and filibuster.
Jennifer Granholm, the Michigan governor and former federal prosecutor and Michigan attorney general, is not a good choice.
Granholm's political experience might be attractive, but her chances are hurt by her "controversial tenure" as governor during Michigan's economic hard times, said Larry Sabato, director at the University of Virginia's Center for Politics.
"Let's face it; she's not one of the more popular governors," Sabato said.
"I don't see why it would make sense politically or legally" to nominate Granholm, said Brian Kalt, an associate law professor at Michigan State University, expressing concerns about Granholm's liberal political background, in an interview with The Free Press.
Communist Goals (1963) Congressional Record
You are about to read a list of 45 goals that found their way down the halls of our great Capitol back in 1963. As you read this, 39 years later, you should be shocked by the events that have played themselves out. I first ran across this list 3 years ago but was unable to attain a copy and it has bothered me ever since. Recently, Jeff Rense posted it on his site and I would like to thank him for doing so. http://www.rense.com
Communist Goals (1963) Congressional Record--Appendix, pp. A34-A35 January 10, 1963
Current Communist Goals EXTENSION OF REMARKS OF HON. A. S. HERLONG, JR. OF FLORIDA IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Thursday, January 10, 1963 .
Mr. HERLONG. Mr. Speaker, Mrs. Patricia Nordman of De Land, Fla., is an ardent and articulate opponent of communism, and until recently published the De Land Courier, which she dedicated to the purpose of alerting the public to the dangers of communism in America.
At Mrs. Nordman's request, I include in the RECORD, under unanimous consent, the following "Current Communist Goals," which she identifies as an excerpt from "The Naked Communist," by Cleon Skousen:
[From "The Naked Communist," by Cleon Skousen]
1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.
2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.
3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament [by] the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength.
4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.
5. Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.
6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.
7. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.
8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the German question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.
9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the United States has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.
10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.
11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces. (Some Communist leaders believe the world can be taken over as easily by the U.N. as by Moscow. Sometimes these two centers compete with each other as they are now doing in the Congo.)
12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.
13. Do away with all loyalty oaths.
14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.
15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.
16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.
17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers' associations. Put the party line in textbooks.
18. Gain control of all student newspapers.
19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.
20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book-review assignments, editorial writing, policy-making positions.
21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and motion pictures.
22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms."
23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. "Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art."
24. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.
25. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio, and TV.
26. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as "normal, natural, healthy."
27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity, which does not need a "religious crutch."
28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state."
29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.
30. Discredit the American Founding Fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man."
31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of the "big picture." Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.
32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture--education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.
33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.
34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.
35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.
36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.
37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.
38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand [or treat].
39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.
40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.
41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.
42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use ["]united force["] to solve economic, political or social problems.
43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.
44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.
45. Repeal the Connally reservation so the United States cannot prevent the World Court from seizing jurisdiction [over domestic problems. Give the World Court jurisdiction] over nations and individuals alike.
Sources at end.
In the early hours of November 22nd (1963) we learned of the quiet passing of C.S. Lewis and hours later we were brought to our knees when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated and our nation mourned.
On June 17, 1963 the U.S. Supreme Court concluded that any Bible reciting or prayer, in public schools, was deemed unconstitutional.
While American's have endured great prosperity over the past 40 years we have also lost our moral compass and direction. In reviewing the research, data supports 1963 as a focal point, demonstrating a downward slope in our moral and social decline through 2001.
Sources:
Note by Webmaster: The Congressional Record back this far (2001) has not be digitized and posted on the Internet.
It will probably be available at your nearest library that is a federal repository. Call them and ask them. Your college library is probably a repository. This is an excellent source of government records. Another source are your Congress Critters. They should be more than happy to help you in this matter. You will find the Ten Planks of the Communist Manifesto interesting at this point.
Webmaster Forest Glen Durland found the document in the library.
Sources are listed below.
Microfilm: California State University at San Jose Clark Library, Government Floor Phone (408)924-2770 Microfilm Call Number: J 11.R5
Congressional Record, Vol. 109 88th Congress, 1st Session Appendix Pages A1-A2842 Jan. 9-May 7, 1963 Reel 12
1963- The Year That Changed America
Communist Goals (1963) Congressional Record--Appendix, pp. A34-A35 January 10, 1963
Current Communist Goals EXTENSION OF REMARKS OF HON. A. S. HERLONG, JR. OF FLORIDA IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Thursday, January 10, 1963 .
Mr. HERLONG. Mr. Speaker, Mrs. Patricia Nordman of De Land, Fla., is an ardent and articulate opponent of communism, and until recently published the De Land Courier, which she dedicated to the purpose of alerting the public to the dangers of communism in America.
At Mrs. Nordman's request, I include in the RECORD, under unanimous consent, the following "Current Communist Goals," which she identifies as an excerpt from "The Naked Communist," by Cleon Skousen:
[From "The Naked Communist," by Cleon Skousen]
1. U.S. acceptance of coexistence as the only alternative to atomic war.
2. U.S. willingness to capitulate in preference to engaging in atomic war.
3. Develop the illusion that total disarmament [by] the United States would be a demonstration of moral strength.
4. Permit free trade between all nations regardless of Communist affiliation and regardless of whether or not items could be used for war.
5. Extension of long-term loans to Russia and Soviet satellites.
6. Provide American aid to all nations regardless of Communist domination.
7. Grant recognition of Red China. Admission of Red China to the U.N.
8. Set up East and West Germany as separate states in spite of Khrushchev's promise in 1955 to settle the German question by free elections under supervision of the U.N.
9. Prolong the conferences to ban atomic tests because the United States has agreed to suspend tests as long as negotiations are in progress.
10. Allow all Soviet satellites individual representation in the U.N.
11. Promote the U.N. as the only hope for mankind. If its charter is rewritten, demand that it be set up as a one-world government with its own independent armed forces. (Some Communist leaders believe the world can be taken over as easily by the U.N. as by Moscow. Sometimes these two centers compete with each other as they are now doing in the Congo.)
12. Resist any attempt to outlaw the Communist Party.
13. Do away with all loyalty oaths.
14. Continue giving Russia access to the U.S. Patent Office.
15. Capture one or both of the political parties in the United States.
16. Use technical decisions of the courts to weaken basic American institutions by claiming their activities violate civil rights.
17. Get control of the schools. Use them as transmission belts for socialism and current Communist propaganda. Soften the curriculum. Get control of teachers' associations. Put the party line in textbooks.
18. Gain control of all student newspapers.
19. Use student riots to foment public protests against programs or organizations which are under Communist attack.
20. Infiltrate the press. Get control of book-review assignments, editorial writing, policy-making positions.
21. Gain control of key positions in radio, TV, and motion pictures.
22. Continue discrediting American culture by degrading all forms of artistic expression. An American Communist cell was told to "eliminate all good sculpture from parks and buildings, substitute shapeless, awkward and meaningless forms."
23. Control art critics and directors of art museums. "Our plan is to promote ugliness, repulsive, meaningless art."
24. Eliminate all laws governing obscenity by calling them "censorship" and a violation of free speech and free press.
25. Break down cultural standards of morality by promoting pornography and obscenity in books, magazines, motion pictures, radio, and TV.
26. Present homosexuality, degeneracy and promiscuity as "normal, natural, healthy."
27. Infiltrate the churches and replace revealed religion with "social" religion. Discredit the Bible and emphasize the need for intellectual maturity, which does not need a "religious crutch."
28. Eliminate prayer or any phase of religious expression in the schools on the ground that it violates the principle of "separation of church and state."
29. Discredit the American Constitution by calling it inadequate, old-fashioned, out of step with modern needs, a hindrance to cooperation between nations on a worldwide basis.
30. Discredit the American Founding Fathers. Present them as selfish aristocrats who had no concern for the "common man."
31. Belittle all forms of American culture and discourage the teaching of American history on the ground that it was only a minor part of the "big picture." Give more emphasis to Russian history since the Communists took over.
32. Support any socialist movement to give centralized control over any part of the culture--education, social agencies, welfare programs, mental health clinics, etc.
33. Eliminate all laws or procedures which interfere with the operation of the Communist apparatus.
34. Eliminate the House Committee on Un-American Activities.
35. Discredit and eventually dismantle the FBI.
36. Infiltrate and gain control of more unions.
37. Infiltrate and gain control of big business.
38. Transfer some of the powers of arrest from the police to social agencies. Treat all behavioral problems as psychiatric disorders which no one but psychiatrists can understand [or treat].
39. Dominate the psychiatric profession and use mental health laws as a means of gaining coercive control over those who oppose Communist goals.
40. Discredit the family as an institution. Encourage promiscuity and easy divorce.
41. Emphasize the need to raise children away from the negative influence of parents. Attribute prejudices, mental blocks and retarding of children to suppressive influence of parents.
42. Create the impression that violence and insurrection are legitimate aspects of the American tradition; that students and special-interest groups should rise up and use ["]united force["] to solve economic, political or social problems.
43. Overthrow all colonial governments before native populations are ready for self-government.
44. Internationalize the Panama Canal.
45. Repeal the Connally reservation so the United States cannot prevent the World Court from seizing jurisdiction [over domestic problems. Give the World Court jurisdiction] over nations and individuals alike.
Sources at end.
In the early hours of November 22nd (1963) we learned of the quiet passing of C.S. Lewis and hours later we were brought to our knees when President John F. Kennedy was assassinated and our nation mourned.
On June 17, 1963 the U.S. Supreme Court concluded that any Bible reciting or prayer, in public schools, was deemed unconstitutional.
While American's have endured great prosperity over the past 40 years we have also lost our moral compass and direction. In reviewing the research, data supports 1963 as a focal point, demonstrating a downward slope in our moral and social decline through 2001.
Sources:
Note by Webmaster: The Congressional Record back this far (2001) has not be digitized and posted on the Internet.
It will probably be available at your nearest library that is a federal repository. Call them and ask them. Your college library is probably a repository. This is an excellent source of government records. Another source are your Congress Critters. They should be more than happy to help you in this matter. You will find the Ten Planks of the Communist Manifesto interesting at this point.
Webmaster Forest Glen Durland found the document in the library.
Sources are listed below.
Microfilm: California State University at San Jose Clark Library, Government Floor Phone (408)924-2770 Microfilm Call Number: J 11.R5
Congressional Record, Vol. 109 88th Congress, 1st Session Appendix Pages A1-A2842 Jan. 9-May 7, 1963 Reel 12
1963- The Year That Changed America
Tuesday, April 13, 2010
Enviro Wacos Are Coming For You
Is 'Green Goon Squad' at your front door?
Just when you thought the government couldn't get any more invasive than the 2010 Census and requirements under "Obamacare" that your medical records be posted on the Internet, a coming book called "Climategate" by veteran meteorologist Brian Sussman warns that soon there could be a "green goon squad" visiting at your door.
Sussman's book, the newest title by WND books and scheduled for release April 22 "Earth Day," has been charting for several weeks already among Amazon's top 10 preordered titles. It arrives just as people who thought the campaign over global warming was being dropped over revelations of apparent manipulation by researchers in the field are becoming concerned that Washington still has it on the fast-track.
Sussman writes in "Climategate" that not only are promoters of the belief that starting a car in Texas or heating a home in North Dakota contributes to a cataclysmic environmental warping are continuing their campaign, Washington already has parts of it in writing.
In Chapter 10 of his book, he cites the 2009 America Clean Energy and Security Act which already has passed the U.S. House.
"Buried in the 2009 America Clean Energy and Security Act are federally mandated energy-efficient building regulations, which supersede all local and state codes and which will be enforced by a national, green goon squad, funded in part by revenues from energy taxes, as well as by an annual $25 million from the Department of Energy 'to provide necessary enforcement of a national energy efficiency building code,'" he confirms.
"The legislation also authorizes the Secretary of Energy to 'enhance compliance by conducting training and education of builders and other professionals in the jurisdiction concerning the national energy efficiency building code.'
"The plan is modeled on building code enforcement in California. Each time a home is built, remodeled, or – in the case of the federal plan – preparing to be sold, a G-man wearing a federal badge and armed with a clipboard will show up at your house to make sure ... all of your appliances have been updated with the most recent Energy Star-approved internal communication devices, and that the Home Area Network has been properly installed and connected to your new SmartMeter, whether you like it or not," he says.
Be the first to see the full documentation of how your life could be changed by climate-related laws, taxes and regulations, in "Climategate"
"This is not a helpful plan to assist you in meeting your family budget; it's a social engineering scheme, designed and promoted by the federal government to change your behavior," he said. "By having the capability to read your meter many times a day, the utility company is able to effectively establish demand pricing schedules; thus, using too much electricity during the peak periods is going to cost you."
Further, he writes, part of the Big Brother spy system actually already is embedded in the law..
"The term SmartGrid [made law in 2007] refers to a distribution system that allows for flow of information from a customer's meter in two directions: both inside the house to thermostats and appliances and other devices, and back to the utility. … Once the…SmartMeter [is] connected to the SmartGrid, Big Brother will become the new authority figure in your home. Want to do a load of laundry or read at 3 p.m. on a hot afternoon in August? Good luck. With a bureaucratic keystroke, anything attached to your [home] could be selectively turned off – or on – without your approval."
The book details, among other things, the warping of the scientific process over global warming, the massive enrichment of its supporters, President Obama's early and continuing support and the anti-American roots of environmental alarmism.
Sussman, formerly a highly acclaimed San Francisco meteorologist, also is the newest morning host at KSFO Radio (560 AM), the highest-rated talk show in the San Francisco Bay Area and the fourth-largest radio market in the country.
In the original scandal that spawned the name Climategate, the hacked e-mails of Phil Jones, head of the Climate Research Unit in Norwich, England, and others uncovered schemes to employ "tricks" with warming trends, squelch skeptics and defame journals that published them.
But Sussman reveals that Jones' work at the University of East Anglia wasn't alone in its apparent manipulation of research. He charges that James Hansen, director at NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies, has treated his position as "activist-scientist."
Hansen is quoted in the book with the opinion, "We're leaving a situation for our children and grandchildren which is not of their making, but they're going to suffer because of it. So I think they should start to act up and put some pressure on their elders, and on legislatures, and begin to get some action."
Probably the most visible alarmist over global warming has been former vice president Al Gore, who reportedly has made tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars for himself. Sussman notes that Gore has said "our grandchildren would one day look back on us as a criminal generation that had selfishly and blithely ignored clear warnings that their fate was in our hands."
Sussman even documents how Obama, as a board member for the Joyce Foundation, voted for a $1.1 million grant to launch a privately owned "Chicago Climate Exchange."
Sussman warns it never has been about weather; it's about control of Americans and everything they do.
"It’s obvious to everyone that this global-warming facade is in meltdown mode," said Joseph Farah, publisher of WND Books and founder and CEO of WorldNetDaily.com. "Now Brian's important book comes along just in time to reveal exactly why this Big Lie was foisted on us – and what we can do to stop it cold."
Earth Day is all the evidence of deception needed, said Sussman. First celebrated in 1970 on the 100th anniversary of the birth of communist leader Vladimir Lenin, it was founded by Sen. Gaylord Nelson, D-Wis.; former Stanford student body president Denis Hayes; and author and Stanford professor Paul Ehrlich.
"Lenin's core political philosophy was linked at the hip with these newly fangled environmentalists who maintained that America's government must be altered, its economy planned and regulated, and its citizens better controlled," writes Sussman. "The environment would be the perfect tool to force these changes, and the most efficient way to gain converts would be through the public school system – the earlier the better."
In one of Obama's first acts during his reign, he pushed for the 2009 "Stimulus Bill," which allows $20 billion for programs relating to energy efficiency. $16 billion for weatherization of private home and $11 billion for "modernizing the nation's power grid."
Among WND's previous reports on the global warming dispute was when Energy and Commerce Committee Ranking Member Joe Barton, R-Texas, cited doubts about the integrity of "climate change" science when he wrote a letter demanding an accounting of U.S. taxpayer support for the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC.
The controversy exploded late last year when a series of e-mails was hacked from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in Britain that indicate scientists were hiding and manipulating data and trying to marginalize critics.
The revelations were significant, because the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency signed two findings Dec. 7 that concluded greenhouse gases in the atmosphere "threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations." The EPA's rulings could mean thousands of dollars in additional taxes for individual consumers.
As the allegations of fraud expanded, Sen. James M. Inhofe, R-Okla., has suggested the Justice Department investigate scientists for potentially falsifying data.
The Orange County Register has posted a chart for consumers to try to keep up with all the scandals developing in the "global warming" community.
Among the scandals listed are:
* ClimateGate: The scandal over the CRU e-mails from East Anglia.
* FOIGate: In which British officials are investigating whether East Anglia scientists refused to follow that nation's freedom of information law about their work.
* ChinaGate: In which dozens of weather monitoring stations in rural China apparently have simply disappeared. This would lead to higher temperature averages since city levels frequently are warmer.
* HimalayaGate: In which an Indian climate official admitted in January that he falsely claimed Himalayan glaciers would melt away by 2035 to prod governments into action.
* And PachauriGates I and II, SternGates I and II, AmazonGate (in which a claim that global warming would wipe out rain forests was exposed as a fraud), PeerReviewGate, RussianGate I and II and nearly a dozen others.
WND also reported recently when the St. Louis-based Peabody Energy, the largest private coal company in the world, petitioned the EPA to re-examine its decisions in light of the controversy over the scientists' e-mails.
The company noted the "seriousness of the flaws" in the work.
Given the EPA's "extensive reliance" on those reports, "the "agency has no legal option but to re-examine the Endangerment Finding in light of this new information," the petition said.
On its website, the company said the EPA's earlier ruling "could mean regulation of hundreds of thousands and perhaps millions of buildings, farms, businesses and other facilities in the U.S."
Texas officials also have filed a lawsuit accusing the federal government of using "tainted" information to arrive at the EPA conclusion and it asks that the EPA's decisions be set aside. Virginia's attorney general, Ken Cuccinelli, also filed a petition demanding the EPA reconsider its greenhouse gas finding.
The scientific community actually is anything but unanimous on climate change.
The disunity is documented by the Petition Project, launched some 10 years ago when the first few thousand signatures were gathered. The effort by Art Robinson, a research professor of chemistry and cofounder of the Linus Pauling Institute of Science and Medicine in 1973, now lists tens of thousands of qualified scientists who endorse the following statement:
There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.
Among the original e-mails hacked from East Anglia and posted online was, "The fact is that we can't account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can't. The CERES data published in the August (Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society) 09 supplement on 2008 shows there should be even more warming: but the data are surely wrong. Our observing system is inadequate."
Just when you thought the government couldn't get any more invasive than the 2010 Census and requirements under "Obamacare" that your medical records be posted on the Internet, a coming book called "Climategate" by veteran meteorologist Brian Sussman warns that soon there could be a "green goon squad" visiting at your door.
Sussman's book, the newest title by WND books and scheduled for release April 22 "Earth Day," has been charting for several weeks already among Amazon's top 10 preordered titles. It arrives just as people who thought the campaign over global warming was being dropped over revelations of apparent manipulation by researchers in the field are becoming concerned that Washington still has it on the fast-track.
Sussman writes in "Climategate" that not only are promoters of the belief that starting a car in Texas or heating a home in North Dakota contributes to a cataclysmic environmental warping are continuing their campaign, Washington already has parts of it in writing.
In Chapter 10 of his book, he cites the 2009 America Clean Energy and Security Act which already has passed the U.S. House.
"Buried in the 2009 America Clean Energy and Security Act are federally mandated energy-efficient building regulations, which supersede all local and state codes and which will be enforced by a national, green goon squad, funded in part by revenues from energy taxes, as well as by an annual $25 million from the Department of Energy 'to provide necessary enforcement of a national energy efficiency building code,'" he confirms.
"The legislation also authorizes the Secretary of Energy to 'enhance compliance by conducting training and education of builders and other professionals in the jurisdiction concerning the national energy efficiency building code.'
"The plan is modeled on building code enforcement in California. Each time a home is built, remodeled, or – in the case of the federal plan – preparing to be sold, a G-man wearing a federal badge and armed with a clipboard will show up at your house to make sure ... all of your appliances have been updated with the most recent Energy Star-approved internal communication devices, and that the Home Area Network has been properly installed and connected to your new SmartMeter, whether you like it or not," he says.
Be the first to see the full documentation of how your life could be changed by climate-related laws, taxes and regulations, in "Climategate"
"This is not a helpful plan to assist you in meeting your family budget; it's a social engineering scheme, designed and promoted by the federal government to change your behavior," he said. "By having the capability to read your meter many times a day, the utility company is able to effectively establish demand pricing schedules; thus, using too much electricity during the peak periods is going to cost you."
Further, he writes, part of the Big Brother spy system actually already is embedded in the law..
"The term SmartGrid [made law in 2007] refers to a distribution system that allows for flow of information from a customer's meter in two directions: both inside the house to thermostats and appliances and other devices, and back to the utility. … Once the…SmartMeter [is] connected to the SmartGrid, Big Brother will become the new authority figure in your home. Want to do a load of laundry or read at 3 p.m. on a hot afternoon in August? Good luck. With a bureaucratic keystroke, anything attached to your [home] could be selectively turned off – or on – without your approval."
The book details, among other things, the warping of the scientific process over global warming, the massive enrichment of its supporters, President Obama's early and continuing support and the anti-American roots of environmental alarmism.
Sussman, formerly a highly acclaimed San Francisco meteorologist, also is the newest morning host at KSFO Radio (560 AM), the highest-rated talk show in the San Francisco Bay Area and the fourth-largest radio market in the country.
In the original scandal that spawned the name Climategate, the hacked e-mails of Phil Jones, head of the Climate Research Unit in Norwich, England, and others uncovered schemes to employ "tricks" with warming trends, squelch skeptics and defame journals that published them.
But Sussman reveals that Jones' work at the University of East Anglia wasn't alone in its apparent manipulation of research. He charges that James Hansen, director at NASA's Goddard Institute of Space Studies, has treated his position as "activist-scientist."
Hansen is quoted in the book with the opinion, "We're leaving a situation for our children and grandchildren which is not of their making, but they're going to suffer because of it. So I think they should start to act up and put some pressure on their elders, and on legislatures, and begin to get some action."
Probably the most visible alarmist over global warming has been former vice president Al Gore, who reportedly has made tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars for himself. Sussman notes that Gore has said "our grandchildren would one day look back on us as a criminal generation that had selfishly and blithely ignored clear warnings that their fate was in our hands."
Sussman even documents how Obama, as a board member for the Joyce Foundation, voted for a $1.1 million grant to launch a privately owned "Chicago Climate Exchange."
Sussman warns it never has been about weather; it's about control of Americans and everything they do.
"It’s obvious to everyone that this global-warming facade is in meltdown mode," said Joseph Farah, publisher of WND Books and founder and CEO of WorldNetDaily.com. "Now Brian's important book comes along just in time to reveal exactly why this Big Lie was foisted on us – and what we can do to stop it cold."
Earth Day is all the evidence of deception needed, said Sussman. First celebrated in 1970 on the 100th anniversary of the birth of communist leader Vladimir Lenin, it was founded by Sen. Gaylord Nelson, D-Wis.; former Stanford student body president Denis Hayes; and author and Stanford professor Paul Ehrlich.
"Lenin's core political philosophy was linked at the hip with these newly fangled environmentalists who maintained that America's government must be altered, its economy planned and regulated, and its citizens better controlled," writes Sussman. "The environment would be the perfect tool to force these changes, and the most efficient way to gain converts would be through the public school system – the earlier the better."
In one of Obama's first acts during his reign, he pushed for the 2009 "Stimulus Bill," which allows $20 billion for programs relating to energy efficiency. $16 billion for weatherization of private home and $11 billion for "modernizing the nation's power grid."
Among WND's previous reports on the global warming dispute was when Energy and Commerce Committee Ranking Member Joe Barton, R-Texas, cited doubts about the integrity of "climate change" science when he wrote a letter demanding an accounting of U.S. taxpayer support for the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC.
The controversy exploded late last year when a series of e-mails was hacked from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia in Britain that indicate scientists were hiding and manipulating data and trying to marginalize critics.
The revelations were significant, because the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency signed two findings Dec. 7 that concluded greenhouse gases in the atmosphere "threaten the public health and welfare of current and future generations." The EPA's rulings could mean thousands of dollars in additional taxes for individual consumers.
As the allegations of fraud expanded, Sen. James M. Inhofe, R-Okla., has suggested the Justice Department investigate scientists for potentially falsifying data.
The Orange County Register has posted a chart for consumers to try to keep up with all the scandals developing in the "global warming" community.
Among the scandals listed are:
* ClimateGate: The scandal over the CRU e-mails from East Anglia.
* FOIGate: In which British officials are investigating whether East Anglia scientists refused to follow that nation's freedom of information law about their work.
* ChinaGate: In which dozens of weather monitoring stations in rural China apparently have simply disappeared. This would lead to higher temperature averages since city levels frequently are warmer.
* HimalayaGate: In which an Indian climate official admitted in January that he falsely claimed Himalayan glaciers would melt away by 2035 to prod governments into action.
* And PachauriGates I and II, SternGates I and II, AmazonGate (in which a claim that global warming would wipe out rain forests was exposed as a fraud), PeerReviewGate, RussianGate I and II and nearly a dozen others.
WND also reported recently when the St. Louis-based Peabody Energy, the largest private coal company in the world, petitioned the EPA to re-examine its decisions in light of the controversy over the scientists' e-mails.
The company noted the "seriousness of the flaws" in the work.
Given the EPA's "extensive reliance" on those reports, "the "agency has no legal option but to re-examine the Endangerment Finding in light of this new information," the petition said.
On its website, the company said the EPA's earlier ruling "could mean regulation of hundreds of thousands and perhaps millions of buildings, farms, businesses and other facilities in the U.S."
Texas officials also have filed a lawsuit accusing the federal government of using "tainted" information to arrive at the EPA conclusion and it asks that the EPA's decisions be set aside. Virginia's attorney general, Ken Cuccinelli, also filed a petition demanding the EPA reconsider its greenhouse gas finding.
The scientific community actually is anything but unanimous on climate change.
The disunity is documented by the Petition Project, launched some 10 years ago when the first few thousand signatures were gathered. The effort by Art Robinson, a research professor of chemistry and cofounder of the Linus Pauling Institute of Science and Medicine in 1973, now lists tens of thousands of qualified scientists who endorse the following statement:
There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth.
Among the original e-mails hacked from East Anglia and posted online was, "The fact is that we can't account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can't. The CERES data published in the August (Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society) 09 supplement on 2008 shows there should be even more warming: but the data are surely wrong. Our observing system is inadequate."
Get Rid Of Activist Judges
Good Riddance!
by Thomas Sowell
When Supreme Court Justices retire, there is usually some pious talk about their "service," especially when it has been a long "service." But the careers of all too many of these retiring jurists, including currently retiring Justice John Paul Stevens, have been an enormous disservice to this country.
Justice Stevens was on the High Court for 35 years-- more's the pity, or the disgrace. Justice Stevens voted to sustain racial quotas, created "rights" out of thin air for terrorists, and took away American citizens' rights to their own homes in the infamous "Kelo" decision of 2005.
The Constitution of the United States says that the government must pay "just compensation" for seizing a citizen's private property for "public use." In other words, if the government has to build a reservoir or bridge, and your property is in the way, they can take that property, provided that they pay you its value.
What has happened over the years, however, is that judges have eroded this protection and expanded the government's power-- as they have in other issues. This trend reached its logical extreme in the Supreme Court case of Kelo v. City of New London. This case involved local government officials seizing homes and businesses-- not for "public use" as the Constitution specified, but to turn this private property over to other private parties, to build more upscale facilities that would bring in more tax revenues.
Justice John Paul Stevens wrote the Supreme Court opinion that expanded the Constitution's authorization of seizing private property for "public use" to seizing private property for a "public purpose." And who would define what a "public purpose" is? Basically, those who were doing the seizing. As Justice Stevens put it, the government authorities' assessment of a proper "public purpose" was entitled to "great respect" by the courts.
Let's go back to square one. Just who was this provision of the Constitution supposed to restrict? Answer: government officials. And to whom would Justice Stevens defer: government officials. Why would those who wrote the Constitution waste good ink putting that protection in there, if not to protect citizens from the very government officials to whom Justice Stevens deferred?
John Paul Stevens is a classic example of what has been wrong with too many Republicans' appointments to the Supreme Court. The biggest argument in favor of nominating him was that he could be confirmed by the Senate without a fight.
Democratic presidents appoint judges who will push their political agenda from the federal bench, even if that requires stretching and twisting the Constitution to reach their goals.
Republicans too often appoint judges whose confirmation will not require a big fight with the Democrats. You can always avoid a fight by surrendering, and a whole wing of the Republican party has long ago mastered the art of preemptive surrender.
The net result has been a whole string of Republican Justices of the Supreme Court carrying out the Democrats' agenda, in disregard of the Constitution. John Paul Stevens has been just one.
There may have been some excuse for President Ford's picking such a man, in order to avoid a fight, at a time when he was an unelected President who came into office in the wake of Richard Nixon's resignation in disgrace after Watergate, creating lasting damage to the public's support of the Republicans.
But there was no such excuse for the elder President Bush to appoint David Souter, much less for President Eisenhower, with back-to-back landslide victories at the polls, to inflict William J. Brennan on the country.
In light of these justices' records, and in view of how long justices remain on the court, nominating such people was close to criminal negligence.
If and when the Republicans return to power in Washington, we can only hope that they remember what got them suddenly and unceremoniously dumped out of power the last time. Basically, it was running as Republicans and then governing as if they were Democrats, running up big deficits, with lots of earmarks and interfering with the market.
But their most lasting damage to the country has been putting people like John Paul Stevens on the Supreme Court.
by Thomas Sowell
When Supreme Court Justices retire, there is usually some pious talk about their "service," especially when it has been a long "service." But the careers of all too many of these retiring jurists, including currently retiring Justice John Paul Stevens, have been an enormous disservice to this country.
Justice Stevens was on the High Court for 35 years-- more's the pity, or the disgrace. Justice Stevens voted to sustain racial quotas, created "rights" out of thin air for terrorists, and took away American citizens' rights to their own homes in the infamous "Kelo" decision of 2005.
The Constitution of the United States says that the government must pay "just compensation" for seizing a citizen's private property for "public use." In other words, if the government has to build a reservoir or bridge, and your property is in the way, they can take that property, provided that they pay you its value.
What has happened over the years, however, is that judges have eroded this protection and expanded the government's power-- as they have in other issues. This trend reached its logical extreme in the Supreme Court case of Kelo v. City of New London. This case involved local government officials seizing homes and businesses-- not for "public use" as the Constitution specified, but to turn this private property over to other private parties, to build more upscale facilities that would bring in more tax revenues.
Justice John Paul Stevens wrote the Supreme Court opinion that expanded the Constitution's authorization of seizing private property for "public use" to seizing private property for a "public purpose." And who would define what a "public purpose" is? Basically, those who were doing the seizing. As Justice Stevens put it, the government authorities' assessment of a proper "public purpose" was entitled to "great respect" by the courts.
Let's go back to square one. Just who was this provision of the Constitution supposed to restrict? Answer: government officials. And to whom would Justice Stevens defer: government officials. Why would those who wrote the Constitution waste good ink putting that protection in there, if not to protect citizens from the very government officials to whom Justice Stevens deferred?
John Paul Stevens is a classic example of what has been wrong with too many Republicans' appointments to the Supreme Court. The biggest argument in favor of nominating him was that he could be confirmed by the Senate without a fight.
Democratic presidents appoint judges who will push their political agenda from the federal bench, even if that requires stretching and twisting the Constitution to reach their goals.
Republicans too often appoint judges whose confirmation will not require a big fight with the Democrats. You can always avoid a fight by surrendering, and a whole wing of the Republican party has long ago mastered the art of preemptive surrender.
The net result has been a whole string of Republican Justices of the Supreme Court carrying out the Democrats' agenda, in disregard of the Constitution. John Paul Stevens has been just one.
There may have been some excuse for President Ford's picking such a man, in order to avoid a fight, at a time when he was an unelected President who came into office in the wake of Richard Nixon's resignation in disgrace after Watergate, creating lasting damage to the public's support of the Republicans.
But there was no such excuse for the elder President Bush to appoint David Souter, much less for President Eisenhower, with back-to-back landslide victories at the polls, to inflict William J. Brennan on the country.
In light of these justices' records, and in view of how long justices remain on the court, nominating such people was close to criminal negligence.
If and when the Republicans return to power in Washington, we can only hope that they remember what got them suddenly and unceremoniously dumped out of power the last time. Basically, it was running as Republicans and then governing as if they were Democrats, running up big deficits, with lots of earmarks and interfering with the market.
But their most lasting damage to the country has been putting people like John Paul Stevens on the Supreme Court.
Saturday, April 10, 2010
Send the Muslims back Home
Time to restrict Muslim immigration to U.S., send them back home
Danish psychologist Nicolai Sennels spent hundreds of hours counseling Muslim youth in Danish prisons, and shared what he learned about Muslim culture in a recently published book, Among Criminal Muslims: A Psychologist's Experience from Copenhagen. An astonishing 70 percent of the prison population in the Copenhagen youth prison are men of Muslim heritage.
The Danes spend 300,000 euros ($400,000 U.S.) a year on social problems created by Muslim immigrants. It would be a far better use of those funds, he argues, to use them to send Muslim immigrants back to countries which share their fundamental values, where perhaps they can serve as ambassadors for more free and democratic societies in their countries of origin by taking with them some of the ideas and ideals they observed in the West.
Sennels recounts some of the sobering lessons he learned about Islam in an interview with EuropeNews, which you can read here.
His sobering conclusion, with which I agree: the integration of Muslims into Western societies is "impossible."
It's time, he says, to "immediately stop all immigration of people from Muslim countries to Europe until we have proven that integration of Muslims is possible."
And secondly, he believes that we should help current Muslim immigrants "build a new and meaningful life in a society that they understand and that understands them." This means, he says, "to assist them in starting a new life in a Muslim country."
Here are the takeaways for the United States. First, the most compassionate thing we can do for Americans is to bring a halt to the immigration of Muslims into the U.S. This will protect our national security and preserve our national identity, culture, ideals and values. Muslims, by custom and religion, are simply unwilling to integrate into cultures with Western values and it is folly to pretend otherwise. In fact, they remain dedicated to subjecting all of America to sharia law and are working ceaselessly until that day of Islamic imposition comes.
The most compassionate thing we can do for Muslims who have already immigrated here is to help repatriate them back to Muslim countries, where they can live in a culture which shares their values, a place where they can once again be at home, surrounded by people who cherish their deeply held ideals. Why force them to chafe against the freedom, liberty and civil rights we cherish in the West?
In other words, simple Judeo-Christian compassion dictates a restriction and repatriation policy with regard to Muslim immigration into the U.S.
Sennels explodes several myths of Muslim integration along the way.
First, he points out that there is a vast difference in cultural background between those who grow up in a Muslim culture and those who grow up in a culture whose values have been shaped by Christianity. There is, he says, "extremely disproportional anti-social and anti-democratic behavior among Muslims." The Danish Bureau of Statistics discovered that Muslim countries take the first eight places on the top-10 list of criminals' country of origin. Denmark - the home country - comes in number nine on its own list.
Second, he concludes that Muslim criminality is caused by Islam or "Muslim culture" rather than by social problems in the countries to which they immigrate.
For example, a sudden explosion of anger is something that causes shame in a culture shaped by Christianity. But in Islam, it is exactly the opposite. If a man's honor is offended in some way, a Muslim is "simply expected to show aggression and often also verbal or physical revenge." So while anger lowers your status in a place like America, it elevates your status in a Muslim subculture.
Even more telling is the strong identification Muslims have with Muslim culture, an identification that supersedes any affiliation with their new country. In Germany, for instance, only 12 percent of Muslims see themselves as more German than Muslim, while in France and Denmark, only 14 percent of Muslims see themselves as more French or Danish than Muslim.
Chillingly, Sennels discovered that prolonged exposure to Western culture doesn't mitigate this as we might hope. There are "no differences of opinion...among Muslims who are born and raised in Muslim countries and the opinion of their children who are born and raised in Danish society."
Thus Muslim ghettos are nurturing "a powerful and growing opposition to Western culture and values."
The third myth he explodes is that the percentage of Muslims with extremist views is small. His experience, in the wake of the deadly riots by young Muslims in 2008, is quite different. Muslims who did not practice the Islamic religion in their daily lives lit fires and attacked the police, and justified it on the grounds that Danish society, by reprinting the Mohammed cartoons, had "proven itself to be racist and against Islam and Muslim culture."
The fourth myth he explodes is that it is poverty among immigrants which leads to social problems. In reality, he says, it's exactly the reverse. It is the social problems they create for themselves that lead to poverty. He discovered that among most Muslims there is a "very low focus on supporting one's children in school and on one's own education," and a lack of motivation for creating a professional career. All this combines to produce endemic poverty among Muslim immigrants. In a word, what is missing is the Protestant work ethic. And that is because, well, they're not Protestants.
Sennels concludes that "there is no research in Europe" that supports the view the Muslim integration is even attainable. "[F]or the largest part integration...of Muslims is not possible." those who argue otherwise are not "bas(ing) their judgment on facts."
The overarching explanation for the virtual impossibility of Muslim assimilation is that "[t]he Muslim and the Western cultures are fundamentally very different." Muslims, in his extensive experience, are either incapable or unwilling to make the changes in basic personality structure that are necessary. Those that do undergo a "long and exhaustive struggle" internally and "often pay a high personal price on the outer level" (think Rifqa Bary here) "because their Muslim friends and families despise and/or disown them for leaving their culture."
It's often been observed that those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it. We are watching a dismal historical experiment in uncontrolled Islamic immigration unfold before our very eyes in Europe, and watching European culture disintegrate before our very eyes. Let's learn - and apply - the lessons from Europe. If we do not, it may soon be too late to save what is left of American culture.
Danish psychologist Nicolai Sennels spent hundreds of hours counseling Muslim youth in Danish prisons, and shared what he learned about Muslim culture in a recently published book, Among Criminal Muslims: A Psychologist's Experience from Copenhagen. An astonishing 70 percent of the prison population in the Copenhagen youth prison are men of Muslim heritage.
The Danes spend 300,000 euros ($400,000 U.S.) a year on social problems created by Muslim immigrants. It would be a far better use of those funds, he argues, to use them to send Muslim immigrants back to countries which share their fundamental values, where perhaps they can serve as ambassadors for more free and democratic societies in their countries of origin by taking with them some of the ideas and ideals they observed in the West.
Sennels recounts some of the sobering lessons he learned about Islam in an interview with EuropeNews, which you can read here.
His sobering conclusion, with which I agree: the integration of Muslims into Western societies is "impossible."
It's time, he says, to "immediately stop all immigration of people from Muslim countries to Europe until we have proven that integration of Muslims is possible."
And secondly, he believes that we should help current Muslim immigrants "build a new and meaningful life in a society that they understand and that understands them." This means, he says, "to assist them in starting a new life in a Muslim country."
Here are the takeaways for the United States. First, the most compassionate thing we can do for Americans is to bring a halt to the immigration of Muslims into the U.S. This will protect our national security and preserve our national identity, culture, ideals and values. Muslims, by custom and religion, are simply unwilling to integrate into cultures with Western values and it is folly to pretend otherwise. In fact, they remain dedicated to subjecting all of America to sharia law and are working ceaselessly until that day of Islamic imposition comes.
The most compassionate thing we can do for Muslims who have already immigrated here is to help repatriate them back to Muslim countries, where they can live in a culture which shares their values, a place where they can once again be at home, surrounded by people who cherish their deeply held ideals. Why force them to chafe against the freedom, liberty and civil rights we cherish in the West?
In other words, simple Judeo-Christian compassion dictates a restriction and repatriation policy with regard to Muslim immigration into the U.S.
Sennels explodes several myths of Muslim integration along the way.
First, he points out that there is a vast difference in cultural background between those who grow up in a Muslim culture and those who grow up in a culture whose values have been shaped by Christianity. There is, he says, "extremely disproportional anti-social and anti-democratic behavior among Muslims." The Danish Bureau of Statistics discovered that Muslim countries take the first eight places on the top-10 list of criminals' country of origin. Denmark - the home country - comes in number nine on its own list.
Second, he concludes that Muslim criminality is caused by Islam or "Muslim culture" rather than by social problems in the countries to which they immigrate.
For example, a sudden explosion of anger is something that causes shame in a culture shaped by Christianity. But in Islam, it is exactly the opposite. If a man's honor is offended in some way, a Muslim is "simply expected to show aggression and often also verbal or physical revenge." So while anger lowers your status in a place like America, it elevates your status in a Muslim subculture.
Even more telling is the strong identification Muslims have with Muslim culture, an identification that supersedes any affiliation with their new country. In Germany, for instance, only 12 percent of Muslims see themselves as more German than Muslim, while in France and Denmark, only 14 percent of Muslims see themselves as more French or Danish than Muslim.
Chillingly, Sennels discovered that prolonged exposure to Western culture doesn't mitigate this as we might hope. There are "no differences of opinion...among Muslims who are born and raised in Muslim countries and the opinion of their children who are born and raised in Danish society."
Thus Muslim ghettos are nurturing "a powerful and growing opposition to Western culture and values."
The third myth he explodes is that the percentage of Muslims with extremist views is small. His experience, in the wake of the deadly riots by young Muslims in 2008, is quite different. Muslims who did not practice the Islamic religion in their daily lives lit fires and attacked the police, and justified it on the grounds that Danish society, by reprinting the Mohammed cartoons, had "proven itself to be racist and against Islam and Muslim culture."
The fourth myth he explodes is that it is poverty among immigrants which leads to social problems. In reality, he says, it's exactly the reverse. It is the social problems they create for themselves that lead to poverty. He discovered that among most Muslims there is a "very low focus on supporting one's children in school and on one's own education," and a lack of motivation for creating a professional career. All this combines to produce endemic poverty among Muslim immigrants. In a word, what is missing is the Protestant work ethic. And that is because, well, they're not Protestants.
Sennels concludes that "there is no research in Europe" that supports the view the Muslim integration is even attainable. "[F]or the largest part integration...of Muslims is not possible." those who argue otherwise are not "bas(ing) their judgment on facts."
The overarching explanation for the virtual impossibility of Muslim assimilation is that "[t]he Muslim and the Western cultures are fundamentally very different." Muslims, in his extensive experience, are either incapable or unwilling to make the changes in basic personality structure that are necessary. Those that do undergo a "long and exhaustive struggle" internally and "often pay a high personal price on the outer level" (think Rifqa Bary here) "because their Muslim friends and families despise and/or disown them for leaving their culture."
It's often been observed that those who do not learn from history are condemned to repeat it. We are watching a dismal historical experiment in uncontrolled Islamic immigration unfold before our very eyes in Europe, and watching European culture disintegrate before our very eyes. Let's learn - and apply - the lessons from Europe. If we do not, it may soon be too late to save what is left of American culture.
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