The Fundamentals of Nov 2nd, 2010

indyfromaz|

Newsweek’s Ben Adler was aghast at the clause in the GOP’s Pledge to America that Republicans will provide a “citation of constitutional authority” for every proposed piece of legislation. “We have a mechanism for assessing the constitutionality of legislation, which is the independent judiciary,” Adler wrote. “An extraconstitutional attempt to limit the powers of Congress is dangerous even as a mere suggestion, and it constitutes an encroachment on the judiciary.”
A progressive blogger, meanwhile, writes in U.S. News & World Report that such talk of requiring constitutionality is “just plain wacky.”
Before we get to the historical niceties, a question:
Does anyone, anywhere, think legislators should vote for legislation they think is unconstitutional? Anyone? Anyone?
How about presidents? Should they sign such legislation into law?
Yet, according to this creepy logic, there’s no reason for congressmen to pass, obey or even consider the supreme law of the land. Re-impose slavery? Sure! Let’s see if we can catch the Supreme Court asleep at the switch. Nationalize the TV stations? Establish a king? Kill every first-born child? Why not? It ain’t unconstitutional until the Supreme Court says so!
Nationalize Health Care, sure, why not. Mandate that all citizens will have health care or else they will pay a fine (that is actually a tax but we don’t call it that except in court when we have to) or possibly go to jail.
Yeah, that’s the ticket!
Mandate that Companies must provide Health care or pay a fine (that is actually a tax but we don’t call it that except in court when we have to).
Whoops!, sorry the Democrats ALREADY DID THAT.
And of course, that means the president can’t veto legislation because it’s unconstitutional, because that’s apparently not his job. Wouldn’t want to “encroach” on the judiciary!
Especially, the judiciary we’ve been packing with Liberals for a generation or two.
Like suing a State of The Union, Arizona.
Get a Liberal judge to rule that if we want to ignore Border Security you can’t do anything about it! ~ 
Oh, and you’re a “racist” if you disagree with us.
Of course, reasonable people understand how absurd all of this is.
There’s nothing in the Constitution — nothing! — that says the Supreme Court is the final or sole arbiter of what is or is not constitutional.
But for Liberals, let’s just pass whatever the hell we want, when we want it, and if we can get a Liberal enough judge to agree we can do it, Go for it!
Nor is there anything in Marbury v. Madison, the Supreme Court case that famously established judicial review. Nor is there in Cooper v. Aaron, the 1958 case in which the court ruled that its findings are the law of the land.
George Washington vetoed an apportionment bill in 1792 because it was unconstitutional. What was he thinking? If only he had a Ben Adler around to tell him what a fool he was.
Andrew Jackson vetoed the reauthorization of the national bank in 1832 because he believed it was unconstitutional. He added at the time that, “It is as much the duty of the House of Representatives, of the Senate, and of the President to decide upon the constitutionality of any bill or resolution which may be presented to them for passage or approval as it is of the supreme judges when it may be brought before them for judicial decision.”
“Even the Supreme Court has never claimed that it is the only branch with the power or duty to interpret the Constitution,” says Jeff Sikkenga, a constitutional historian at Ashland University’s Ashbrook Center. “In fact, it has said that certain constitutional questions like war and peace are left to the political branches to decide.”
The debate over whether the courts are the final word on the Constitution is more than 200 years old. The debate over whether they are the sole arbiter of constitutionality is extremely recent and extremely silly.
But it’s also necessary because too many politicians — in both parties — have abdicated their most solemn duty: to support and defend the U.S. Constitution. George W. Bush signed campaign finance reform even though he thought much of it was unconstitutional. Nancy Pelosi thinks the Constitution has as much relevance as a pet rock. When asked if the health-care bill was Constitutional, her perpetually wide-open eyes grew perceptibly wider as she incredulously asked, “Are you serious?”
The real issue is quite simple. If more politicians were faithful to the Constitution, the government would be restrained. And restraining government is “weird,” “wacky” and “dangerous” to so many liberals today. (Jonah Goldberg).
And people who propose it, The Tea Party Movement, are “racists”, “stupid”, “morons” ,”idiots” ,”dumb”,”ignorant”,”fools”.
Fascinating.


A Reminder:
Unless something totally unforeseen occurs, Democrats are poised to take a real beating in November. Their response to the impending disaster has run the gamut. Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi is in denial: “One thing I know for sure is that Democrats will retain their majority in the House of Representatives.” Massachusetts Senator John Kerry is condescending: “We have an electorate that doesn’t always pay that much attention to what’s going on, so people are influenced by a simple slogan rather than the facts or the truth or what’s happening.” President Obama is angry: “It is inexcusable for any Democrat or progressive right now to stand on the sidelines in this midterm election.” Why is the electorate ready to kick Democrats to the curb? Here’s why:
* An “unstimulated” economy. The original Mother of All Stimulus packages, $787 billion dollars, quickly grew to an astounding $865 billion. It wasn’t enough. Congress pumped out another $26 billion in “supplemental” stimulus in August. The results? Unemployment in the private sector remains well above the eight percent Democrats promised, even as public sector workers who support Democrats were rewarded; our Democratically-controlled Congress has amassed more debt in the last four years than nearly the previous two hundred and thirty combined; the Keynesian economic model Democrats stand by is a colossal failure; the Summer of Recovery was a propaganda fiasco.
* The health care bill. The absolute epitome of ideological, public-be-damned arrogance. A horrendous compendium of bribes, exploding bureaucracy, runaway costs, written in secret and unread by those who passed it. It includes a mandate, likely un-Constitutional, forcing people to buy health insurance or pay a fine. The same administration which originally claimed the commerce clause of the Constitution made such a fine possible is now saying that the federal governments’s “power to tax” justifies it. Irrelevant. 60% of Americans want this monstrosity repealed, ASAP.
* The federal lawsuit against the state of Arizona. Again, it’s the arrogance, stupid. Despite all the hectoring from Democrats and the Obama administration about racist this, and xenophobic that, fair-minded Americans recognized four things: people have a right to protect their life and property, and if the federal government can’t or won’t do it, they have a right to do it themselves; the idea that anyone opposing the “rights” of illegal aliens is a bigot is nonsense on stilts; the ruling class in Washington, D.C. is holding genuine border control hostage to “comprehensive reform;” the glaring double-standard of suing Arizona for violating federal immigration statues, even as the feds turn a blind eye to hundreds of “sanctuary cities” with illegal protection directives unquestionably in conflict with federal law.
* The demonization of the Tea Party movement. Take your pick: teabaggers, racists, angry white men, fringe elements, bigots, Astro-turfers, etc. etc. Democrats and the media have tried every one, and every one has been a miserable failure for one overwhelmingly simple reason: decent Americans know they’re decent, and getting insulted by Democrats running the country into the ground has only stiffened their resolve. Progressives want to demonize people who believe in smaller government, fiscal responsibility and a desire to return to Constitutional principles? Why not attack people who believe in guns, and religion too? Oh wait. The president already did that as well.
* A hopelessly compromised media. Air America tanked, CNN is tanking, and ABC, NBC and CBS news programs have been shedding viewers at historically unprecedented rates—even as Fox and the Wall Street Journal prosper. Americans don’t mind people in the media expressing their opinions, as long as they’re characterized as opinions, but they seethe when such opinions are portrayed as “hard news.” They get even angrier when certain stories are “omitted” by those same organizations, especially when Americans recognize such omissions are calculated to protect the progressive agenda. I wonder if it occurs to either Democrats or their media water-carriers that a majority Americans may savor whacking both groups in November. Depressed looks on the faces of Nancy Pelosi and Katie Couric? In theater circles, that’s known as a “two-fer.”
* The Ground Zero mosque. Yet another reminder of the contempt progressives and their media enablers have for ordinary Americans who had the “temerity” to allow their feelings to be known. Despite every attempt to characterize these Americans as Islamo-phobic bigots, the public wasn’t buying, again for one overwhelmingly simple reason: decent Americans once again demonstrated their decency by separating the legality of the project from the appropriateness of it.
* The complete disconnect between the First Family and ordinary Americans. The golfing, the soirees, and the high-priced vacations have created the perception that we are living through another “let them eat cake” moment in history. On Tuesday, the president called the public schools in Washington, D.C. a “‘struggling’ system that doesn’t measure up to the needs of first daughters, Sasha and Malia.” Those would be the same public schools Congressional Democrats tossed 3,300 low-income kids back into when they killed funding for vouchers that had freed those kids from D.C.’s educational ghetto. The First Lady is hectoring Americans to eat healthier. Perhaps more Americans would if they could afford to: the Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) stated in their Producer Price Index that the price of food increased 2.4% for March 2010. That’s the biggest increase in almost 30 years.
* The war on terror. A politically correct contingency operation against unnamed insurgents with a specific draw-down date? Democrats once again prove that all the talk about Afghanistan being the “good war” was complete rubbish. They want out, and victory—along with the heroic efforts of our men and women in harm’s way—be damned. Once again: has America ever fought another war where they knew the exact location of the enemy, had the ability to inflict possibly irreparable damage on them—and decided to split the difference instead? If you answered “Vietnam,” another progressively-instigated catastrophe resulting in the deaths of fifty-eight thousand American soldiers and three million innocent Asians, go to the head of the class. And when is that civilian trial of the 9/11 perpetrators scheduled to begin?
* Czars and nationalization. The Obama administration and Congressional Democrats may bristle when Americans call them socialists, but the nationalization of banks, car and insurance companies, student loans and healthcare sure isn’t free-market capitalism. Neither is wiping out oil jobs in Louisiana with a government-mandated ban on offshore drilling—after the feds completely bungled their role in cleaning up the spill which engendered it. Unelected czars who answer to no one but the president, along with out-of-control government agencies such as the EPA have made it clear to many Americans that this administration often considers Congress a completely unnecessary component of governance, especially if they don’t kowtow to the president’s agenda.
* “Unexceptional” America. Progressive contempt for the values and traditions which make this the greatest country on earth can no longer be disguised. An American president who “believe(s) in American exceptionalism, just as I suspect that the Brits believe in British exceptionalism and the Greeks believe in Greek exceptionalism” has made it plain that this is not a great nation which needs tweaking, but a fundamentally flawed one needing a complete progressive make-over. Once one understands this basic premise, everything this administration and Democratically-controlled Congress does makes sense. All of it centers around the ridiculous premise that America owes the world an apology for any number of shortcomings, many of which can only be alleviated by government-mandated “social justice.” That would be the same social justice which demanded—and still demands—that Americans manifestly unqualified to own homes be given mortgages, regardless.
Unknown to the majority of Americans, this precise mindset was part of the financial “reform” bill which also requires banks to lend a certain percentage of capital to minority-owned businesses, even if it means lowering their lending standards. Apparently progressives won’t be satisfied with their odious social-engineering schemes until every sector of the American economy bears a striking resemblance to the housing sector. So far, Americans support financial reform because it’s been framed as “Main Street versus “Wall Street.” It’s not. Like every other initiative undertaken by this Congress and this administration, it’s the elevation of irresponsible and dishonest Americans over those willing to accept the consequences of their own behavior.
There you have it. Democratic control for four years in Congress, and two in the White House has been exactly what many predicted: an ideologically-driven disaster of epic proportions. For years, progressives obfuscated their true intentions, because even they knew most Americans couldn’t stomach them. The elections of 2006 and 2008 changed everything. Progressives bought into their own hype, believing they had pulled off a multi-generational transformation of the American mindset. As a result, they showed Americans their true colors: unbridled arrogance, utter contempt for the average citizen’s intellect, and a ham-fisted, never let a crisis go to waste determination to bend the electorate to their will, using government as a club.
That’s why they’re going down in November. And the most satisfying aspect of the whole scenario is this: despite every attempt they’ve made to blame anyone and everyone else for their problems, they brought it on themselves. (Arnold Ahlert)
And don’t forget the LARGEST TAX INCREASE IN AMERICAN HISTORY during a recession (or “jobless recovery”) that Congress was too chicken to vote on stopping.

But don’t worry, it’s all those damn Republican’s fault!!
And George W. Bush.
The Banks.
CEOs
Corporate America.
Wall Street.
Teabaggers.
The Right Wingers.
Christians.
“The Rich”
FOX News
Rupert Murdoch (who owns Fox)
Talk Radio
Did I leave anyone out?
Oh, yeah, DEMOCRATS!

Did I Say That?

indyfromaz|

In the “WHOOPS! Did I say that?” Department:
As reported a few days ago about Colin Powell’s comments about illegal Aliens. Well, he’s gone into full reverse  mode!
In the interview , Powell said a path to legal status should be offered to illegal immigrants in the U.S. because they “are doing things we need done in this country.”
He added: “They’re all over my house, doing things whenever I call for repairs, and I’m sure you’ve seen them at your house. We’ve got to find a way to bring these people out of the darkness and give them some kind of status.”
This morning, however, comes word from Powell’s office that he “misspoke.”
Political Speak for I told you the truth of what I believe, but now it’s been pointed out that it’s bad politically to say it, so I am backpedaling like a maniac and a liar.
At least he didn’t say “misquoted” or “taken out of context”.
“I don’t hire illegal immigrants,” Powell says in a statement today. “On Meet the Press yesterday, I referred to illegal immigrants working around my house. I was referring to the many service contractors who work in my neighborhood, using mostly immigrant workers, who do good work. Some may well be ‘illegal.’ There are 11 million illegal immigrants in this country and most are working somewhere in our economy.”
An order of Foot (Foot in Mouth)  with side order of Crow for the General
*********************************************
Since the Media is now obsessed with politicians lives before their national prominence (cue Christine O’Donnell) here’s this ditty from The Washington Post  January 3,2007:
Long before the national media spotlight began to shine on every twist and turn of his life’s journey, Barack Obama had this to say about himself: “Junkie. Pothead. That’s where I’d been headed: the final, fatal role of the young would-be black man. . . . I got high [to] push questions of who I was out of my mind.”
The Democratic senator from Illinois and likely presidential candidate offered the confession in a memoir written 11 years ago, not long after he graduated from law school and well before he contemplated life on the national stage. At the time, 20,000 copies were printed and the book seemed destined for the remainders stacks.
As a presidential candidate, Bill Clinton thought marijuana use could be enough of a liability in 1992 that he felt compelled to say he had not inhaled. And President Bush has managed to deflect endless gossip about his past by acknowledging that he had an “irresponsible” youth but offering no details.
Through his book, Obama has become the first potential presidential contender to admit trying cocaine.
Do you think the media will be obsessed with this, or with what a teenager said once 12 years ago??
Depends on the party affliation.
Liberal Democrat: No
Republican and/Or Tea Party: 24/7 obsession.
But don’t worry, it’s “fair” and “balanced”.
And that matters to the Liberals.

“Christine O’Donnell is clearly a criminal, and like any crook she should be prosecuted,” CREW Executive Director Melanie Sloan said in a release. “(Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington).

So Charlie Rangel, President Obama,Maxine Waters, Chris Dodd & Barney Frank, John Kerry,And other Democrats are next!

Too Bad the late Sen. Robert Byrd, Former Grand Wizard of the KKK isn’t still around.

Is that Hell Freezing over? Yes, I think it is…

The GOP’s chosen nominee for senator from Delaware is being asked to defend comments about the occult. Hey, it’s not as if she “dabbled” in the KKK or Marxism or seanced with a very dead Eleanor Roosevelt. Be careful whom you date in high school or what you dabble in to humor a boyfriend. Those skeletons in your closet may come back to haunt you, particularly if you become a conservative Tea Party candidate fighting to stop creeping socialism in America. Last Friday, comedian Bill Maher, whose cable show “Real Time” is considered by liberals as a real news source (unlike, say, Fox News), dug up and showed an 11-year-old interview from 1999 in which O’Donnell, then 30 years old, said she “dabbled in witchcraft” because she “hung around people who were doing these things” in high school.
O’Donnell graduated from Moorestown (N.J.) High School in 1987, a dozen years before the Maher appearance. If political candidates are to be judged by what they did or hung with in high school, we are taking the vetting process to extremes.
Two days later, pundit Karl Rove, whose primary night critique of O’Donnell caused a stir, was on “Fox News Sunday” saying: “In Delaware, where there are a lot of churchgoing people, they’re going to want to know what this is all about.”
Perhaps, but they also want to know about her position on the repeal of ObamaCare and extending the Bush tax cuts.
Delaware voters, many of whom probably check their horoscope before they go to church, might indeed want to know what a Delaware teenager was up to back then. She might even have dabbled in marijuana without inhaling.
But we suspect they might also want to know about her opponent, Chris Coons, dabbling in Marxism in college, writing a paper about his transformation to a “bearded Marxist.”
“There’s been no witchcraft since. If there was, Karl Rove would be a supporter now,” O’Donnell jokingly told a GOP picnic in southern Delaware on Sunday. To be fair, two groups started by Rove, Crossroads GPS and American Crossroads, have contributed mightily to Sen. Majority Leader Harry Reid’s Tea Party opponent, Sharron Angle. This makes Rove’s continued criticism curious.
Voters, we would think, would be more interested in Democrat Coons’ disastrous record as Newcastle County chief executive. During his tenure, spending increased 10% and he shifted the burden for his irresponsibility to taxpayers with property tax hikes of 5%, 17.5% and 25%. In 2008, Fitch Ratings downgraded the county’s “rating outlook” from stable to negative because the county’s cash balances were decreasing under Coons’ stewardship.
Republican voters have already decided that O’Donnell was a better choice to represent them than establishment Congressman and two-term former Delaware Gov. Mike Castle. If O’Donnell starts out behind in the polls, well, that’s why we have campaigns.
West Virginia voters tolerated Sen. Robert Byrd, who in his relative youth dabbled in racism and bigotry as a grand kleagle in the Ku Klux Klan. Byrd’s association wasn’t a high school fad. He joined the KKK in 1942, when he was 25; four years later, he was still talking about his hope for a KKK renaissance in West Virginia. And 18 years after that, he famously filibustered the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
“He once had a fleeting association with the Ku Klux Klan,” President Bill Clinton said of Sen. Byrd. “What does that mean? I’ll tell you what it means. He was a country boy from the hills and hollows from West Virginia. He was trying to get elected.” At least he didn’t dabble in Wicca.
Hillary Clinton, during her time as first lady, participated in seance-type sessions that included strange moments of imaginary conversation with a deceased Eleanor Roosevelt from the solarium atop the White House, according to Grove City College professor Paul Kengor’s biography, “God and Hillary Clinton.”
Keep rocking the establishment, Christine. Continue to do that voodoo that you do so well. (IBD)
Leftist Richard Cohen on “Witchcraft” : The unseen effects of witchcraft are clearly the reason about one-fifth of Americans believe Obama is a Muslim. In fact, as time goes by, more and more people subscribe to this belief — a phenomenon so at odds with logic or rational thinking that the explanation has to lie in the darkest of arts — witchcraft and voodoo.
This fatuous infatuation with the Constitution, particularly the 10th amendment, is clearly the work of witches, wiccans and wackos. It has nothing to do with America’s real problems and, if taken too seriously, would cause an economic and political calamity.
O’Donnell is where the GOP has been heading for some time. The party’s leaders have steadfastly refused to take a stand against any idiocy, even suggesting they agree that Obama might not be a Christian. Their intellectuals have supported and advanced the know-nothingness of Sarah Palin. Nothing to them is beyond the pale. This party is not fit to govern. It would support the Joker but not Batman, who hangs too much with Robin.
So now it has a candidate in Delaware who truly is a career politician. She seems to have no means of support except campaign funds. She supposedly lives in her headquarters, although this is somewhat in dispute. Whatever the case, she has no job and no views worth a moment’s consideration. (She even appalls Karl Rove.)
She’s not likely to win, but the way things are going this year, she just might. People are angry. People are mad. The night is dark. Witch way out of here?
Isn’t the dripping condescension and the ad hominems just glorious arrogant?
And it’s perfectly liberal.
You aren’t smart enough to see the hypocrites on the left for what they are.
And if the people voted for her, she now has to stand on her own against thre liberal attack machine, or just go quietly.
We’ll see.
But one things for sure, The Ministry of Truth will be digging through her birth records and interviewing every person (including the waiter at restaurant when she 2 that she spit up on ) she ever met in her entire life because they care about the facts and nothing but the facts, it’s not personal.
Sorry…Have to stop…. now…Hell… froze… over…

Reality is a Dish best Served Cold

Optimists think that if we manage to turn a few things around, their kids may have it . . . almost as good. The country they inherit may be . . . almost as good. And it’s kind of a shock to think like this; pessimism isn’t in our DNA. But it isn’t pessimism, really, it’s a kind of tough knowingness, combined, in most cases, with a daily, personal commitment to keep plugging.
But do our political leaders have any sense of what people are feeling deep down? They don’t act as if they do. I think their detachment from how normal people think is more dangerous and disturbing than it has been in the past. I started noticing in the 1980s the growing gulf between the country’s thought leaders, as they’re called—the political and media class, the universities—and those living what for lack of a better word we’ll call normal lives on the ground in America. The two groups were agitated by different things, concerned about different things, had different focuses, different world views.
But I’ve never seen the gap wider than it is now. I think it is a chasm. In Washington they don’t seem to be looking around and thinking, Hmmm, this nation is in trouble, it needs help. They’re thinking something else. I’m not sure they understand the American Dream itself needs a boost, needs encouragement and protection. They don’t seem to know or have a sense of the mood of the country.
And so they make their moves, manipulate this issue and that, and keep things at a high boil. And this at a time when people are already in about as much hot water as they can take.
To take just one example from the past 10 days, the federal government continues its standoff with the state of Arizona over how to handle illegal immigration. The point of view of our thought leaders is, in general, that borders that are essentially open are good, or not so bad. The point of view of those on the ground who are anxious about our nation’s future, however, is different, more like: “We live in a welfare state and we’ve just expanded health care. Unemployment’s up. Could we sort of calm down, stop illegal immigration, and absorb what we’ve got?” No is, in essence, the answer.
An irony here is that if we stopped the illegal flow and removed the sense of emergency it generates, comprehensive reform would, in time, follow. Because we’re not going to send the estimated 10 million to 15 million illegals already here back. We’re not going to put sobbing children on a million buses. That would not be in our nature. (Do our leaders even know what’s in our nature?) As years passed, those here would be absorbed, and everyone in the country would come to see the benefit of integrating them fully into the tax system. So it’s ironic that our leaders don’t do what in the end would get them what they say they want, which is comprehensive reform.
When the adults of a great nation feel long-term pessimism, it only makes matters worse when those in authority take actions that reveal their detachment from the concerns—even from the essential nature—of their fellow citizens. And it makes those citizens feel powerless.
Inner pessimism and powerlessness: That is a dangerous combination. (Peggy Noonan)

And as one who was not abundant, and still isn’t, when I see what I see and the complete disconnect from reality that is the Twilight Zone at the Beltway around D.C. I do wonder about this.
I have no kids, I probably never will.
But that doesn’t mean I don’t look at the kids I see on the street and wonder what life is going to be like for them when they are my age.
And I don’t think it will be that good, certainly not like their childhood.
And that is a sad legacy.
But to pick up on Mrs. Noonan’s point about Arizona. (as an aside, where is the lawsuit against Missouri for slapping the government in the face? Are there not enough Latinos in the state to warrant it?).
IBD: In federal lawsuits, defendants may answer litigation filed against them with a counterclaim against the plaintiff for damages or other relief.
The Constitution of the United States mandates at Article 4: “The United States shall guarantee to every state in this Union a republican form of government … that the United States shall protect each of them (the states) against invasion and … against domestic violence.”
“Republican form of government” is defined as a republic that is a system of government in which the people hold sovereign power and elect representatives to exercise that power.
To “guarantee” means to warrant or undertake that something has happened or will happen. The term “invasion” is (regarding a country or territory ) a hostile incursion.
The term “shall” used in the third person singular denotes an imperative, without discretion or choice. Thus, the phrase “shall guarantee” leaves no wiggle room.
Remedies for breach of guarantee are damages (expenses incurred in repairing guaranteed product) or rescission (return of product for refund of purchase price — i.e., “money back” guarantee).
Recently, the federal government — the present regime in particular — has not only violated the guarantee of republican form of government and the pledge to protect Arizona from invasion and domestic violence, but has actively worked to achieve the exact opposite result.
By the federal government’s determined resistance to enforcing existing federal law against illegal immigration and attempting to penalize Arizona for attempting to cope with illegal immigration on its own, the federal government has crassly flouted its obligation to guarantee a republican form of government for the state of Arizona.
One of the most effective means for destroying a republic is to bankrupt it and beggar its people.SB
It’s the only thing Obama & Co ARE good at. :)

This is what befell Rome, which went from a republic to what would now be called a dictatorship as a result of the financial drain on the country resulting from the empire.
In the case of Arizona, recent figures disclose that illegal immigration costs the state $2.5 billion annually. This amounts to approximately $400 for every man, woman and child in the state, which has a population of less than 7 million.
The federal government has not only filed litigation against Arizona, but informed an association of Arizona sheriffs that it intends to prosecute as an example at least one deputy for enforcing Arizona’s anti-illegal immigration legislation (SB 1070).
There are reports the administration is seeking ways to cease doing business with Arizona and is encouraging other states to do the same, to exercise economic coercion on the state.
The administration has praised the efforts of states such as California for economically boycotting Arizona. The sanctions the administration has imposed on Arizona are hardly less draconian than those that the same administration has imposed on Iran to prevent Iran’s acquisition of nuclear weapons. All this for Arizona’s daring to exercise its republican form of government and passing widely popular legislation in a manner completely consistent with Arizona’s Constitution.
The Obama administration has thus tried to take control of Arizona and abridge/suppress its republican government in substance and in process.
Also violated by the federal government is the pledge to protect Arizona from invasion. The enormous influx of illegal immigrants into Arizona—uninvited, demanding and belligerent—clearly constitutes a hostile incursion.
The surge in illegal immigration has brought with it crime and violence. Phoenix is now the kidnap capital of America as a result of the Mexican gangs that have invaded Arizona using kidnapping as a form of turf acquisition and protection.
Notably, on the Independence Day weekend this year a Mexican drug gang announced that the border with Mexico and Arizona was “moved” several miles into Arizona whereby Interstate Highway 8 would now be the border. There was no response to this by the Obama administration.

I feel I should point out that Insterstate 8 is not “several miles from the border. It is a LOT of miles from the border!!
Interstate 8 starts/ends at  Interstate 10 just south of  Casa Grande, AZ. THAT IS 40 Miles from My house in South Phoenix!!!!
That is 134 miles from the Nogales, AZ on the border!!!
What we do have at the border are signs warning Americans to stay away from the gangs and cartels!!



It is undeniable that the federal government has shamelessly and willfully violated its guarantee and pledges under Article 4, constituting suitable grounds for counterclaims by Arizona against the federal government.
The question is whether the remedy for such violation should be rescission or damages. If the latter, a figure of $2.5 billion annually could be employed per the latest studies projected backward as well as forward. As to the rescission alternative (the “money back” guarantee, whereby the contract is undone or rescinded), this would constitute rescission of the breached agreement whereby Arizona entered the union in 1912.
Gaspers in disbelief regarding rescission/secession should know that there is nothing sacrosanct about the federal government; only the Constitution is inviolable. When the federal government willfully refuses to comply with a constitutional mandate, the Constitution can be upheld only by implementing its provisions, in this case the “money back” guarantee.
An independent Arizona can contract with the federal government for defense, as do small cities with the counties in which they are located, for police/fire protection. The outsourcing of defense by an independent Arizona might be expensive, but with the money saved from illegal immigration, Arizona could afford it.
The federal government might even make money on the deal and, for the first time, turn a profit on something.
To those who would label this “draconian,” the answer is this is a race to a precipice with a sheer drop greater than that of Arizona’s crown jewel, the Grand Canyon.
Personally, we’d go for damages. What’s 10 or 20 billion nowadays anyway? If the verdict came down in the early-ish morning, the Obama administration could have the money printed up by lunchtime.
After all, after the $4 Trillion Dollars in 19 Months with nothing to so for it,so what if they’d spend what another few billion… :)
It’s not like it’s real money to them anyhow… :(


Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly. I can never be what I ought to be until you are what you ought to be. This is the interrelated structure of reality. –Martin Luther King, Jr.
The challenge that is already with us is the temptation to accept as true freedom what in reality is only a new form of slavery. —Pope John Paul II

Crisis Inverted

He’s just so darn presidential. You better know who I’m talking about . . . because if you don’t, I know whose ass to kick.
In a recent interview with NBC’s “Today” show, President Obama said this: “I don’t sit around talking to experts because this is a college seminar. We talk to these folks because they potentially have the best answers, so I know whose ass to kick.” Scoot over, Gettysburg Address. There’s a new No. 1 speech in town.
Some have been oddly surprised by the president’s unpresidential approach. Here are a few possible reasons why they’re so shocked:

1. They were asleep when Obama said this in July of 2009 with respect to the arrest of Henry Louis Gates Jr.: “Now, I don’t know, not having been there and not seeing all the facts . . . But I think it’s fair to say, number one, any of us would be pretty angry; number two, that the Cambridge police acted stupidly. . . ” (So what if he didn’t have the facts! What’s next, people? Are you going to insist that he read laws before publicly condemning them? You right-wing extremists!)
2. They took their dog for a walk and missed Obama’s commentary in April of 2010 regarding Palin’s critique of his administration’s nuclear policy: “I really have no response to that. The last I checked, Sarah Palin is not much of an expert on nuclear issues.” (Translation: She’s no match for me. She may have run a state and been Chair of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission, but did she vote “present” nearly 130 times as a state senator? I think not.)
3. They were busy cooking and didn’t catch Obama saying this to John McCain at the health care summit in February of 2010: “Let me just make this point, John, because we’re not campaigning anymore. The election’s over.” (Translation: I won. You lost. Nani nani poo poo.)
4. They were enjoying a film at the corner theatre and missed Obama saying this in August of 2009: “ . . . I don’t want the folks who created the mess to do a lot of talking. I want them just to get out of the way so we can clean up the mess.” (In other words, hand over your money and shut the heck up.)
5. They were hanging out at a local café and didn’t hear our president’s complete (and disturbing, in my opinion) mischaracterization of the new Arizona immigration law in April of 2010: “ . . . you can imagine if you are a Hispanic American in Arizona, your great, great grandparents may have been there before Arizona was even a state. But now suddenly if you don’t have your papers and you took your kid out to get ice cream, you’re going to be harassed . . . ” (Translation: I don’t have to read pertinent documents. I went to Harvard. Enough said.)

If you’ve been paying attention since day one, Obama’s tone with respect to the oil spill shouldn’t be in the least bit shocking. I just wish he wasn’t so busy playing the role of big man on campus. Maybe then he would’ve had time this year to hear the majority of Americans oppose his health care law and/or support Arizona’s immigration law. But hey, with golf and Bush-hating Paul McCartney to fit in, let’s cut him some slack.
As an entertaining side note, Obama was recently asked to respond to comments made by BP CEO Tony Hayward, including “I’d like my life back” and “ . . . everything we can see at the moment suggests that the overall environmental impact will be very, very modest.” Hayward’s comments were distasteful at best, but check out what Obama had to say in reply: “He wouldn’t be working for me after any of those statements.” Culture of Corruption author Michelle Malkin must have enjoyed a full-on fit of laughter after that one.
Mr. President, it’s not presidential to make bold public statements based on assumptions, without taking the time to do your research. It’s not presidential to essentially tell a whole bunch of Americans to sit down and shut up. It’s not presidential to condescend to a war hero and long-standing American Senator. And while we’re at it, it’s not any more presidential to repeatedly blast Fox News than it was to have joked during the 2008 presidential campaign that, “I’ll put Mr. Burgess up against Sean Hannity. He’ll tear him up.”
Maybe I’m old-fashioned, but I’d like my president to act like one. Save the ass-kicking for someone else.(Jedediah Bila)

Didn’t he remind you of the nerdy kid trying to sound like the tough kid? Or of that bad actor who says his lines with no conviction whatsover?
Now next week, Obama has “summoned” the CEO of BP to his office for a dressing down so that he can look tough.
Problem is, I’ve seen better acting on Star Trek: Voyager (and anyone who knows me how much I hate that show!).
But the Ministry of  Truth will do their best to create Mr. Bad Ass. Mr Can Do. Mr I’m Involved and I Care.
But, like most things with this President, it will ultimately ring very hollow.
I’m not going to defend BP, but they sure as hell are doing more than this President about it.
I mean, this President has refused help from 13 countries! 13!!
President Obama is impeding clean-up efforts in the Gulf by kowtowing to unions and members of the American maritime industry, critics have charged in recent days. At issue is the president’s refusal to waive the Jones Act, a century-old law that effectively bars foreign-owned ships from moving between U.S. ports, a necessary component of participating in the cleanup effort.
When asked why President Obama hasn’t waived the Jones Act — which President Bush put on hold to facilitate Katrina rescue efforts — White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said a suspension wasn’t necessary.
Not Necessary!!!????!!!!
Well, we wouldn’t want to Obama to annoy they only people left who love him, Unions.
That’s vastly more important than actually do everything you can to solve the problem!
Heaven forbid you make the Unions mad at you!
And then there was the enviromental impact study that the government had to take a month to do to study the effects of putting sand berms in the way of the advancing oil and when all was said and done approve less than  what the Governor of Louisiana asked for because of concerns over the long term impact.
Too little too late.
And these are the guys  you want running Health Care??!!
Yeah, sand berms are far worse for the environment that raw crude oil by the millions  of gallons!!
There was a manufacturer in Maine who makes oil booms. He has a million yards ready to go, but neither BP or Obama will buy them!
There was even a Science guy on FOX last night that showed a poly-blended cloth that if you pour oil and water through it it retains the oil and the water is strained out cleanly.
But no one wants to here from him.
Territorial  Political Testosterone at it’s finest.
So one has to conclude that the only reason Obama cares, or appears to at all, is because  of politics.
That’s it.
He doesn’t actually want to solve the problem.
That does not interest him at all.
But the Crisis, now that’s an opportunity!
Never Waste a Good Crisis. — Rahm Emmanuel
“Don’t be fooled by Obama’s ‘incompetence’,” warns Stu Tarlowe in a provocative post at the American Thinker blog. “If you think the Gulf oil spill spells trouble for Obama, you’re just not looking at as big a picture as he’s looking at, and you just don’t realize how much trouble we’re all in.”
Tarlowe cites the Cloward-Piven Strategy, which was developed by two Columbia University sociology professors as a way to use political and economic chaos to achieve their radical ends. When viewed through this lens, what the rest of the nation views as a political disaster for Obama could be an opportunity instead.
“…If the oil spill in the Gulf manages to destroy the fishing and tourist industries in that region, shut down oil drilling, raise the price of oil and of food all over the country, and bring more and more Americans to a financial breaking point and thus dependent on food stamps and other government programs, Obama and Co. will smile and nod at one another,” Tarlowe predicts.
Obama’s own behavior indicates that Tarlowe may be right. The president reiterated his cap-and-trade case yesterday, amid another pitch for ending tax breaks for Big Oil and giving them to Big Environmentalists Doing Alternative Energy Projects to push America back into the 19th century.
“…The only way the transition to clean energy will ultimately succeed is if the private sector is fully invested in this future — if capital comes off the sidelines and the ingenuity of our entrepreneurs is unleashed.  And the only way to do that is by finally putting a price on carbon pollution,” Obama said during a speech at Carnegie Mellon University.
“The House of Representatives has already passed a comprehensive energy and climate bill, and there is currently a plan in the Senate – a plan that was developed with ideas from Democrats and Republicans – that would achieve the same goal.  And, Pittsburgh, I want you to know, the votes may not be there right now, but I intend to find them in the coming months,” the president added.
If Obama is indeed following the Cloward-Piven game plan, he will use the BP oil spill crisis to his advantage by forcing the passage of the ruinous cap and trade bill through the Senate before the November elections. (washington examiner)
The end justifies the means.
Since Global Warming and Global Climate Change have crashed he needs a new champion cry to get Cap & Trade rammed down your throats!
OIL!!
The Agenda is The Agenda.
And they have to get as much done before November as they can.
Anything that puts a greater strain on government services — and the inability of those services, through incompetence and complex bureaucracy to actually improve things – advances the goals of Cloward-Piven. The more desperate and demoralized the American people become, and the more preoccupied we are with simple survival, the better our new “leaders” like it, and the closer they get to assuming total and complete control of every aspect of our lives.
It explains that even the patently unconstitutional laws and policies implemented by the Obama regime are a deliberate part of the strategy, because in addition to using financial crises to bring about the desired changes in our way of life, it is necessary to render our Constitution impotent and irrelevant. (American Thinker)
So when you are paying $8 for gas and your electric bill triples due to new regulations and taxes under the guise of “dealing with our dependence on fossil fuels”-oil specifically, you’ll be politically incorrect and shouted down as insensitive if you want to drill for our own oil off our own shores.
“Green energy” or Bust!
Because, then he has you, literally, over a barrel.
The implications of this are irrelevant. Because it’s all about the power.
And NOTHING ELSE.
Now, that’s Politics, The Chicago Way.

The Constitution

Writing in Salon.com, Gabriel Winant (a very Leftist columnist) complains of conservatives’ “weird fetishism for the Constitution.” ‘Nuff said.
US Constitution, Article II, Section 1
Before he enter on the execution of his office, he shall take the following oath or affirmation: “I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States.”
VP: I, (name), do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God.
Well, so much for that…
Chinese proverb “May you live in interesting times.” (sometimes referred to as a curse).
“Any society that would give up a little liberty to gain a little security will deserve neither and lose both.” –Benjamin Franklin
The constitution includes language to imply an expectation for the government’s incapacity to indefinitely respect the inalienable rights of it people and establishes that the ultimate power for the government reside in the people and not a monarchy, president, or congress.   It should not surprise us that our politicians have done exactly what our founders expected them to; allow power to corrupt.  This, after all, is a human characteristic that has been fully recognized and suitably acknowledged for all of recorded human history.   It should surprise us that the very people whose rights have been infringed upon represent the specific group who has enabled these politicians, sworn to “preserve, protect and defend” the constitution, to iteratively abolish their rights.   Indeed, it is the less fortunate, struggling, and working man; attracted to the appeal of big government and frightened by the complexities of our every-changing society, that is most willing to sacrifice constitutional rights in exchange for hollow promises of greater  security.  Sadly, it is this group who would most benefit from the very constitutional rights they are convinced to sacrifice, with little in return.(Scott Mitchell)
The End justifies the Means.
The End is Absolute power.
And absolute power corrupts absolutely.
So it’s crunch time. 5 months to the election.
Gotta get it done now.
The candy store is being foreclosed on.
And We the People will be stuck with the bill.