A textbook example of media bias. The subtext of the story “smart conservatives agree with Obama” and they push that bias by presenting a partisan view as “the expert’s view”
You might be thinking “Now wait a minute, it was fair because they had Jay Sekulow on”. That sounds good but look at the story again. NBC has Jay Sekulow on for the 29 states opposing ObamaCare, but then they have the Maryland politician who advocates the Obama point of view which is that the commerce clause gives the government unlimited power to control our lives, err I mean the economy [because you cannot control the economy with out controlling people /wink wink, nod nod].
So we have one advocate from each side, OK that is fair so far, but then the “expert” is brought in. We know this because NBC put the word “expert” right under Tom Goldstein’s name. Of course Tom Goldstein has experience covering the court, but he is no more of an expert than Jay Sekulow or Mark Levin. What they don’t tell you is that Tom Goldstein was a lawyer for Al Gore.
When NBC or an elite media outfit looks for a talking head they wish to present as “the experts”, they do not pick an expert at random and ask him “What do you think?”. They find a person they can present as an expert who will say exactly what they want said. This is a very common practice in news rooms all across the country.
Of course ObamaCare is unconstitutional. The Maryland politician says that everyone uses health care so the Commerce Clause covers it. Well everyone eats too, and everyone needs shelter, everyone needs clothes. So was it the intent of the Founding Fathers to have a government that is totally unlimited? ObamaCare is unconstitutional because it takes the entire idea of limited government and tosses it right out the window. James Madison, the Father of the Constitution, addressed the idea of reinterpreting a clause in the Constitution to give the federal Government total power.
If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare, and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare, they may take the care of religion into their own hands; they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish and pay them out of their public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union; they may assume the provision of the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads; in short, everything, from the highest object of state legislation down to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress…. Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America.
So where did this crazy idea of a nearly unlimited Commerce Clause come from? Shortly before WWII FDR was not able to advance parts of his socialist progressive plan because the Supreme Court kept striking down laws his party was passing. So FDR threatened to add members to the Supreme Court using Article II of the Constitution to add perhaps a dozen seats to the Supreme Court all filled with cronies. In fear of this the Supreme Court capitulated ” and expanded the Commerce Clause in a way that had never been intended to please FDR. This became known as FDR’s court packing threat.
If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare, and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare, they may take the care of religion into their own hands;they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish and pay them out of their public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union; they may assume the provision of the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads; in short, everything, from the highest object of state legislation down to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress…. Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America.
What is interesting is that after the Egyptian lawyer says that Muslim men should not rape Jewish women, but rather should just sexually harass them, she goes on to justify the rape of Jewish women and say that if it happens they have no right to complain.
A video shot on Fresno State’s campus shows students signing a petition to ban conservatives like Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh from radio and television.
One student can be heard saying he believes in free speech but then admits he has no idea what the First Amendment is.
Over and over students say they believe in free speech but think they can actually ban someone from saying something they don’t like.
If you thought that video was priceless, wait till you see this one…
Update – American Thinker has a great post called Obama’s Revisionist History when it comes to our Middle-East policy. It corrects the record while providing a great history lesson.
Daniel Mach, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s program on Freedom of Religion and Belief, and Jamil Dakwar, director of the ACLU’s Human Rights program, recently co-authored an article on the Huffington Post attacking legislative efforts to prohibit the application of foreign laws inconsistent with the rights granted by the U.S. and state constitutions or state public policy.
The article posits a series of disjointed, hypothetical misapplications of the legislative efforts to prevent sharia from encroaching into our legal system. Yet, the authors cite no actual examples of misapplications of laws already passed and in force, in Tennessee, Louisiana, and Arizona. The authors fail to distinguish this American Laws for American Courts (ALAC) legislation from other legislative efforts, such as the Oklahoma constitutional amendment, which do not explicitly reference the protection of constitutional rights and public policy in prohibiting application of sharia or foreign law.
Further, the authors contend that these laws, explicitly protecting established constitutional rights, are superfluous because the First Amendment already protects these rights, and then allege that these laws violate the religious freedom granted by the First Amendment. The authors thereby dangerously conflate the judiciary’s interpretation and enforcement of secular law with interpretation and enforcement of religious doctrine. The freedom of religion and establishment clauses of the First Amendment do not address the application of foreign law, including sharia, in American courts, and, as demonstrated below, have not been applied to prevent such application.
Additionally, American courts have repeatedly held that freedom of religion does not require the judiciary to void secular laws which may incidentally conflict with religious doctrine, and that the First Amendment prohibits the judiciary from interpreting or enforcing religious doctrine. For example, in the case of S.D. v. M.J.R., the New Jersey Superior Court of Appeal reversed a trial court judge who did not find sexual assault to have been proven when a husband admitted forcing his wife to engage in sex, because the husband lacked criminal intent as he was a Muslim, and sharia, as described by an imam, mandated that a wife submit to her husband’s sexual advances. The New Jersey appellate court cited several U.S. Supreme Court decisions that held that freedom of religion does not include violating criminal laws, including Reynolds v. United States and Cleveland v. United States regarding polygamy, and Employment Div., Dep’t of Human Res. of Oregon v. Smith regarding smoking peyote, even when religious doctrine permits or mandates the prohibited practice. The U.S. Supreme Court, in Presbyterian Church in the United States v. Mary Elizabeth Blue Hull Memorial Presbyterian Church and its progeny, have also consistently held that deciding disputes over religious doctrine violates the establishment clause of the First Amendment.
Most egregiously, the title of the article, “Anti-Sharia Law: A Solution In Search Of A Problem,” suggests that the enforcement of sharia law in the United States is simply not a problem worth addressing. The authors completely ignore dozens of published state appellate decisions in which American courts addressed litigants who demanded the enforcement of sharia, and on many occasions succeeded.
A recent study entitled “Shariah Law and American State Courts: An Assessment of State Appellate Court Cases,” released by The Center for Security Policy, identifies 50 such appellate court cases from 23 states. Many of these cases involve blatant violations of constitutional rights, usually to the detriment of women and children, including the enforcement of foreign custody orders to wrest children from their mothers.
For example, a Maryland appellate court in Hosain v. Malik enforced a Pakistani custody order, issued under a sharia rule granting sole custody to the father when the child reaches age seven, handing a little girl brought to America by her mother over to the father. The Maryland court bowed to the Pakistani court order even though the mother did not appear for the Pakistani proceedings, because, although she may have been arrested for adultery if she returned to Pakistan for the hearing, and been subject to “public whipping or death by stoning,” the court found such punishments were “extremely unlikely.” The judges explicitly proclaimed that the best interest of the child should not be “determined based on Maryland law, i.e., American cultures and mores,” but rather “by applying relevant Pakistani customs, culture and mores.” The court, explaining that “in the Pakistani culture, the well being of the child … is thought to be facilitated by adherence to Islamic teachings,” intentionally applied Islamic, rather than American, cultural and legal precepts.
More than 77,000 federal government employees throughout the country — including computer operators, more than 5,000 air traffic controllers, 22 librarians and one interior designer — earned more than the governors of the states in which they work.
Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels $95,000 /yr
The findings, from a Congressional Research Service report requested by Sen. Tom Coburn, Oklahoma Republican, were released at a time when public workers’ salaries and benefits are under scrutiny across the country as governments try to streamline.
CRS reviewed 2009 salary figures, the most recent available, and found 77,057 employees who earned more in annual pay than their respective governors. Of those workers, 18,351 were doctors — the highest percentage. The second-highest total was for 5,170 air traffic controllers — likely both front-line controllers and their supervisors.
In Maryland, 7,283 federal employees — about 7 percent of all full-time federal employees in the state — earned more than Gov. Martin O’Malley’s $150,000 salary. Maryland was topped by Colorado, which in 2009 had 10,875 employees who made more than the $90,000 salary of the governor, Bill Ritter.
“Across America, governors are being asked to do more with less, often at lower pay than federal employees in their states. The pay gap between governors and federal employees should prompt Congress to take a closer look at federal salaries,” Mr. Coburn said. “With our debt and deficits spiraling out of control, now is the time to ask agencies — not just governors — to do more with less.”
What happens when your photo is taken for the newspaper with your fluffy little bunny rabbit? Great publicity, right? Well, not if a U.S Department of Agriculture agent buys a copy of that paper! Enter the Rabbit Police!
Yes, you read correctly, the RABBIT POLICE, and the above story is how my buddy Gary Maurer in Hilton Head Island, S.C., was “busted” in the summer of 2006!
Gary is a full-time performer working heavily during the tourist season at numerous resort areas and tourist attractions on the island. One day, the local newspaper showed up at the show and took some photos to accompany a short blurb about the tourist area. The photo that ran included one of Gary’s beautiful Angora Rabbits.
Imagine Gary’s surprise when, a couple of weeks later, a field inspector from the USDA contacted him explaining that he needed to have a license to use the rabbits in his show. He was so surprised, in fact, that he though it was a joke! He was quickly informed it was indeed no joke.
They made arrangements for the inspector to make the three-hour trek from Columbia, S.C., to Hilton Head and Gary went through the process to become licensed.
More (you just cannot make this stuff up):
Just a few weeks ago, Mark called and asked me to write this as an article rather than a post on the board, because he’d heard of yet another instance of the Rabbit Police striking in another state! He put me onto the trail of Brad Machette, one of the busiest fair and festival workers on the East Coast. Before I had a chance to call Brad to interview him, Mark called back and said, “You’ve got to talk to Marty Hahne of Dazzling Magic, too. He has an incredible story.” Since I have so much free time, I called both of them.
First, Brad’s bust: While working an agricultural fair in North Carolina, Brad discovered an issue which required local veterinarians to examine his livestock which include a rabbit and a chicken.Yes, Brad uses a chicken. We won’t get too deep in this issue other than to say if you are in North Carolina (and possibly other states) and use livestock that is handled or petted by the public (i.e. the people watching your show), you have to have a hand-washing station within sight of where you display the animals.
Brad didn’t have a hand-washing station. So, being the professional he is, Brad improvised and made what he called the “Redneck Handwashing Station.” He even called it that in his show.
The regulation required Brad to actually stop his show at the “point of petting” for he and the audience member to go over to the Redneck Handwashing Station to wash their hands. This improvised sanitation facility consisted of a few bales of hay, a longneck garden sprayer, a garden hose, a plastic container, soap and paper towels. Before you ask, no, hand sanitizer is not an acceptable substitute.
After Brad thought he’d satisfied all the regulations, along came the RP (Rabbit Police), N.C. Division!
They informed Brad of the law and told him they could have fined him on the spot for not having a license, even if he didn’t know about it. I’d guess that comes down to the “ignorance of the law is no excuse” clause. As I understand the law, you cannot use your rabbit legally even after you’ve applied for the license until you actually receive the documents, which have to be with you at all times.
Fortunately for Brad, they inspected and licensed him “on the spot” and gave him his license number even though he didn’t physically have his license. Interestingly enough, Brad was told his rabbit had to have at least as much off stage time as it did on stage time. Now THAT’S funny. Apparently, there is a rabbit union out there as well!
Marty’s story dates back to the summer of 2005 and has some really interesting moments in it. If you know Marty, you realize he has a very lively sense of humor. Keep that in mind as we proceed.
Marty was busted at a library show. He was working a library system he’d never worked before. He was all set up for his show, rabbit loaded and just about ready to start. Suddenly, the librarian came to him and said, “Marty, I need to see you in my office immediately” with a look of dread in her eyes. Marty couldn’t possibly imagine what was wrong.
Once they got in to her office, she informed him that there was an inspector from the USDA in the audience and that she would give him trouble about his rabbit. Marty, being quick on his feet, replied, “What rabbit?” “Exactly,” said the librarian, “Let’s hide him in my office until she leaves!” Sounded like a good plan.
Marty does the show, the whole thing, while scoping out the audience trying to figure out which person was the inspector. Then he spotted her. A burly-looking lady wearing boots, jeans and a denim shirt. He smoothly omitted the rabbit routine, and the show went fine. Afterwards, several moms were asking about his shows for schools, birthday parties, etc. Then, suddenly, the conversation was halted by a badge being shoved into the mix.
“I’m with the USDA, and I need to see the permit for your rabbit,” she said.
“There wasn’t a rabbit in the show,” Marty replied.
“I know, but there’s a rabbit with you in this photo from the show yesterday!” she countered. I forgot to mention that this was Marty’s second day of shows for this system.
Marty was able to put her off until she could come to his home for a proper inspection. Figuring he’d appeased the inspector, he planned on using his rabbit for the remainder of the shows. Upon getting to the second show that day, however, the librarian told him that she’d heard of the problems his rabbit had caused. Word traveled fast thanks to email! Every other librarian in the system — and even the entire county — had heard about the “problem” Marty’s rabbit had caused.
Finally, it was time for the inspection at the Hahne’s home. Marty decided to ask some questions.
“My friend has a snake,” he said. The inspector quickly told him they don’t regulate snakes.
“No,” Marty said, “I mean he feeds his snake rabbits. He breaks their necks and drops them in the cage for the snake’s food. Does he have to have a permit for that?” Again, she told him there’s no regulation for that.
“So I could break my rabbit’s neck and feed him to my friend’s snake and I wouldn’t need a license?” Marty asked.
“Correct,” she said, “But you need a license to use him in your magic show.”
Above is a photo of Congressman Giffords from her recent interview. She looks as lovely as ever. What a remarkable recovery she has had and indications are that she will continue to improve.
Everyone knows her story, but the key part of this story which consistently goes under reported is just how preventable the shooting was.
In short the college administration, members of the faculty, as the campus police knew Loughner was schizophrenic, or at least had serious mental issues severely impacting his ability to perceive reality correctly. The local sheriff’s department also knew it. Loughner’s mother is a supervisor in the county parks department and there have been reports that she used her contacts in county government to help keep Loughner out of serious trouble.
The State of Arizona has a toll free line that can be issued to have someone forcibly evaluated so that they are not a danger to themselves and others. The campus police, the sheriff’s department, parents, teachers etc could have called that number as there is no way (judging by police reports) that Loughner could have passed such an exam. One single examination saying he was unfit and properly reported would have prevented Loughner from being able to buy any kind of gun, but all the laws in the world do no good when the people on the ground do not do their duty. That may seem like a harsh indictment, but the trial will likely reveal the numerous contacts Loughner had with police agencies while he was having a psychiatric episode.
For the schizophrenic the senses do not perceive reality correctly and the cognitive skill center to the brain is compromised. While you are I or even a teenager could examine a modestly complex problem and easily come up with the same solution, the schizophrenic would come up with a solution that is beyond irrational and believe it as surely as 2+2=4. This is not easy for someone who has no experience in dealing with the mentally ill to grasp, but in short it is likely that Loughner did what he did because in his own very ill mind reason demanded it.
The man arrested at the shooting, Jared Loughner has pleaded not guilty to 49 charges stemming from the Jan. 8 shooting. He’s being forcibly medicated with psychotropic drugs at a Missouri prison in an effort to make him mentally competent to stand trial.
In Monday’s broadcast, Giffords and Kelly both expressed their concern that Loughner did not get the help he needed.
“If he had received some treatment, this probably never would have happened,” Kelly said.
“If you are not careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.” – Malcolm X
Daniel Mach, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s program on Freedom of Religion and Belief, and Jamil Dakwar, director of the ACLU’s Human Rights program, recently co-authored an article on the Huffington Post attacking legislative efforts to prohibit the application of foreign laws inconsistent with the rights granted by the U.S. and state constitutions or state public policy.
What happens when your photo is taken for the newspaper with your fluffy little bunny rabbit? Great publicity, right? Well, not if a U.S Department of Agriculture agent buys a copy of that paper! Enter the Rabbit Police!
Political Arena 