america, upside down

The State Against Blacks

2011-01-24T13:48:00.000-08:00

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704881304576094221050061598.html

'Sometimes I sarcastically, perhaps cynically, say that I'm glad that I received virtually all of my education before it became fashionable for white people to like black people," writes Walter Williams in his new autobiography, "Up from the Projects." "By that I mean that I encountered back then a more honest assessment of my strengths and weaknesses. Professors didn't hesitate to criticize me—sometimes to the point of saying, 'That's nonsense.'"

Mr. Williams, an economist at George Mason University, is contrasting being black and poor in the 1940s and '50s with today's experience. It's a theme that permeates his short, bracing volume of reminiscence, and it's where we began our conversation on a recent morning at his home in suburban Philadelphia.

"We lived in the Richard Allen housing projects" in Philadelphia, says Mr. Williams. "My father deserted us when I was three and my sister was two. But we were the only kids who didn't have a mother and father in the house. These were poor black people and a few whites living in a housing project, and it was unusual not to have a mother and father in the house. Today, in the same projects, it would be rare to have a mother and father in the house."

Even in the antebellum era, when slaves often weren't permitted to wed, most black children lived with a biological mother and father. During Reconstruction and up until the 1940s, 75% to 85% of black children lived in two-parent families. Today, more than 70% of black children are born to single women. "The welfare state has done to black Americans what slavery couldn't do, what Jim Crow couldn't do, what the harshest racism couldn't do," Mr. Williams says. "And that is to destroy the black family."

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Zina Saunders

Government programs and regulations are favorite butts of the professor, who is best known today for his weekly column—started in 1977 and now appearing in more than 140 newspapers—and for his stints guest-hosting Rush Limbaugh's popular radio program. Libertarianism is currently in vogue, thanks to the election of a statist president and the subsequent rise of the tea party movement. But Walter Williams was a libertarian before it was cool. And like other prominent right-of-center blacks—Clarence Thomas, Thomas Sowell, Shelby Steele—his intellectual odyssey began on the political left.

"I was more than anything a radical," says Mr. Williams. "I was more sympathetic to Malcolm X than Martin Luther King because Malcolm X was more of a radical who was willing to confront discrimination in ways that I thought it should be confronted, including perhaps the use of violence.

"But I really just wanted to be left alone. I thought some laws, like minimum-wage laws, helped poor people and poor black people and protected workers from exploitation. I thought they were a good thing until I was pressed by professors to look at the evidence."

During his junior year at California State College in Los Angeles, Mr. Williams switched his major from sociology to economics after reading W.E.B. Du Bois's "Black Reconstruction in America," a Marxist take on the South's transformation after the Civil War that will never be confused with "The Wealth of Nations." Even so, the book taught him that "black people cannot make great progress until they understand the economic system, until they know something about economics."

He earned his doctorate in 1972 from UCLA, which had one of the top economics departments in the country, and he says he "probably became a libertarian through exposure to tough-mined professors"—James Buchanan, Armen Alchian, Milton Friedman—"who encouraged me to think with my brain instead of my heart. I learned that you have to evaluate the effects of public policy as opposed to intentions."

Mr. Williams distinguished himself in the mid-1970s through his research on the effects of the Davis-Bacon Act of 1931—which got the government involved in setting wage levels—and on the impact of minimum-wage law on youth and minority unemployment. He concluded that minimum wages caused high rates of teenage unemployment, particularly among minority teenagers. His research also showed that Davis-Bacon, which requires high prevailing (read: union) wages on federally financed or assisted construction projects, was the product of lawmakers with explicitly racist motivations.

One of Congress's goals at the time was to stop black laborers from displacing whites by working for less money. Missouri Rep. John Cochran said that he had "received numerous complaints in recent months about Southern contractors employing low-paid colored mechanics." And Alabama Rep. Clayton Allgood fretted about contractors with "cheap colored labor . . . of the sort that is in competition with white labor throughout the country."

Today just 17% of construction workers are unionized, but Democratic politicians, in deference to the AFL-CIO, have kept Davis-Bacon in place to protect them. Because most black construction workers aren't union members, however, the law has the effect of freezing them out of jobs. It also serves to significantly increase the costs of government projects, since there are fewer contractors to bid on them than there would be without Davis-Bacon.

Analysis of this issue launched Mr. Williams's career as a public intellectual, and in 1982 he published his first book, "The State Against Blacks," arguing that laws regulating economic activity are far larger impediments to black progress than racial bigotry and discrimination. Nearly 30 years later, he stands by that premise.

"Racial discrimination is not the problem of black people that it used to be" in his youth, says Mr. Williams. "Today I doubt you could find any significant problem that blacks face that is caused by racial discrimination. The 70% illegitimacy rate is a devastating problem, but it doesn't have a damn thing to do with racism. The fact that in some areas black people are huddled in their homes at night, sometimes serving meals on the floor so they don't get hit by a stray bullet—that's not because the Klan is riding through the neighborhood."

Over the decades, Mr. Williams's writings have sought to highlight "the moral superiority of individual liberty and free markets," as he puts it. "I try to write so that economics is understandable to the ordinary person without an economics background." His motivation? "I think it's important for people to understand the ideas of scarcity and decision-making in everyday life so that they won't be ripped off by politicians," he says. "Politicians exploit economic illiteracy."

Which is why, he adds, the tea party movement is a positive development in our politics and long overdue. "For the first time in my lifetime—and I'm approaching 75 years old—you hear Americans debating about the U.S. Constitution," he says. "You hear them saying 'This is unconstitutional' or 'We need limits on government'—things that I haven't heard before. I've been arguing them for years, but now there's widespread acceptance of the idea that we need to limit the government."

Still, he's concerned about how far the country has strayed from the type of limited government envisioned by the Founding Fathers. "In 1794, Congress appropriated $15,000 to help some French refugees," he says. In objection, "James Madison stood on the House floor and said he could not take to lay his finger on that article in the Constitution that allows Congress to take the money of its constituents for the purposes of benevolence. Well, if you look at the federal budget today, two-thirds to three-quarters of it is for the purposes of benevolence."

Mr. Williams says that "if there is anything good to be said about the Democratic White House and the [previous] Congress and their brazen attempt to take over the economy and control our lives, it's that the tea party movement has come out of it. But we have gone so far from the basic constitutional principles that made us a great country that it's a question of whether we can get back."

The place to start, says Mr. Williams by way of advice to the new Republican House, is on the spending side of the federal ledger. "We need a constitutional amendment that limits the amount of money the government can spend," he says. "Let's say 18% of GDP to start. The benefit of a spending limitation amendment is that you're going to force Congress to trade off against the various spending constituencies. Somebody says, 'I want you to spend $10 billion on this,' and the congressman can respond, 'My hands are tied, so you have to show me where I can cut $10 billion first.'"

Mr. Williams says he hopes that the tea party has staying power, but "liberty and limited government is the unusual state of human affairs. The normal state throughout mankind's history is for him to be subject to arbitrary abuse and control by government."

He adds: "A historian writing 100 or 200 years from now might well say, 'You know, there was this little historical curiosity that existed for maybe 200 years, where people were free from arbitrary abuse and control by government and where there was a large measure of respect for private property rights. But then it went back to the normal state of affairs.'"

Hoping to end our conversation on a sunnier note, I pose a final question about race. "A Man of Letters," Thomas Sowell's fabulous book of correspondence, includes a letter the Stanford economist sent in 2006 to Mr. Williams, whom he's known for four decades. "[B]ack in the early years," writes Mr. Sowell, "you and I were pretty pessimistic as to whether what we were writing would make an impact—especially since the two of us seemed to be the only ones saying what we were saying. Today at least we know that there are lots of other blacks writing and saying similar things . . . and many of them are sufficiently younger that we know there will be good people carrying on the fight after we are gone."

Asked if he shares his friend's optimism, Mr. Williams responds that he does. "You find more and more black people—not enough in my opinion but more and more—questioning the status quo," he says. "When I fill in for Rush, I get emails from blacks who say they agree with what I'm saying. And there are a lot of white people questioning ideas on race, too. There's less white guilt out there. It's progress."

Mr. Riley is a member of The Journal's editorial board.

here's exactly how the federal reserve makes us poorer, even if stock prices go up

2011-01-21T11:01:00.001-08:00

http://www.businessinsider.com/david-einhorn-slams-ben-bernanke-and-says-no-ones-buying-his-little-strong-em-is-causing-commodities-inflation-argument-2011-1

Reserve Bank Chairman Ben Bernanke gave a speech in Jackson Hole, Wyoming where he hinted that the Fed would provide additional monetary easing (translation - printing money). At the time, the S&P 500 was down more than 3% for the year. From that point through the end of the year, the s&P rallied 19%. At the same time, oil prices rose 16%, copper prices rose 32%, coffee prices rose 34%, corn prices rose 43%, and cotton prices rose 57%.

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/david-einhorn-slams-ben-bernanke-and-says-no-ones-buying-his-little-strong-em-is-causing-commodities-inflation-argument-2011-1#ixzz1BhKf86CS

Why Liberals Should Love The Second Amendment

2011-01-19T10:43:00.000-08:00

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/4/21/19133/5152

Liberals love the Constitution.

Ask anyone on the street. They'll tell you the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) is a liberal organization.

I know liberal couples who give each other pocket size copies of the Constitution for Christmas.

Ask liberals to list their top five complaints about the Bush Administration, and they will invariably say the words "shredding" and "Constitution" in the same sentence. They might also add "Fourth Amendment" and "due process." It's possible they'll talk about "free speech zones" and "habeus corpus."

There's a good chance they will mention, probably in combination with several FCC-prohibited adjectives, the former Attorney General Alberto Gonzales.

So.

Liberals love the Constitution. They especially love the Bill of Rights. They love all the Amendments.

Except for one: the Second Amendment.

Kaili Joy Gray's diary :: ::

When it comes to discussing the Second Amendment, liberals check at the door their ability to think rationally. In discussing the importance of any other portion of the Bill of Rights, liberals can quote legal precedent, news reports, and exhaustive studies. They can talk about the intentions of the Founding Fathers.

And they will, almost without exception, conclude the necessity of respecting, and not restricting, civil liberties.

So why do liberals have such a problem with the Second Amendment? Why do they lump all gun owners in the category of "gun nuts"? Why do they complain about the "radical extremist agenda of the NRA"? Why do they argue for greater restrictions?

Why do they start performing mental gymnastics worthy of a position in Bush's Department of Justice to rationalize what they consider "reasonable" infringement of one of our most basic, fundamental, and revolutionary -- that's right, revolutionary -- civil liberties?

Why do they pursue these policies at the risk of alienating voters who might otherwise vote Democrat? Why are they so dismissive of approximately 40% of American households that own one or more guns?

And why is their approach to the Second Amendment so different from their approach to all the others?

Well, if conversations on this blog about the issue of guns are in any way indicative of the way other liberals feel, maybe this stems from a basic misunderstanding.

So, allow me to attempt to explain the Second Amendment in a way that liberals should be able to endorse.

No. 1: The Bill of Rights protects individual rights.

If you've read the Bill of Rights -- and who among us hasn't? -- you will notice a phrase that appears in nearly all of them: "the people."

First Amendment:

...the right of the people peaceably to assemble

Fourth Amendment:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects...

Ninth Amendment:

...shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people

Tenth Amendment:

...are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.

Certainly, no good liberal would argue that any of these rights are collective rights, and not individualrights. We believe that the First Amendment is an individual right to criticize our government.

We would not condone a state-regulated news organization. We certainly would not condone state regulation of religion. We talk about "separation of church and state," although there is no mention of "separation of church and state" in the First Amendment.

But we know what they meant. The anti-Federalists would not ratify the Constitution without a Bill of Rights; they intended for it to be interpreted expansively.

We know the Founding Fathers intended for us to be able to say damn near anything we want, protest damn near anything we want, print damn near anything we want, and believe damn near anything we want. Individually, without the interference or regulation of government.

So why, then, do liberals stumble at the idea of the Second Amendment as an individual right? Why do they talk about it as a collective right, as if the Founding Fathers intended an entirely different meaning by the phrase "the right of the people" in the Second Amendment, when we are so positively clear about what they meant by the exact same phrase in the First Amendment?

If we can agree that the First Amendment protects not only powerful organizations such as the New York Times or MSNBC, but also the individual commenter on the internet, the individual at the anti-war rally, the individual driving the car with the "Fuck Bush" bumper sticker, can we not also agree that the Second Amendment's use of "the people" has the same meaning?

But it's different! The Second Amendment is talking about the militia! If you want to "bear arms," join the National Guard!
Right?

Wrong.

The United States Militia Code:

(a) The militia of the United States consists of all able-bodied males at least 17 years of age and, except as provided in section 313 of title 32, under 45 years of age who are, or who have made a declaration of intention to become, citizens of the United States and of female citizens of the United States who are members of the National Guard.
(b) The classes of the militia are—
(1) the organized militia, which consists of the National Guard and the Naval Militia; and
(2) the unorganized militia, which consists of the members of the militia who are not members of the National Guard or the Naval Militia.

Aside from the fact that the National Guard did not exist in the 1700s, the term "militia" does not mean "National Guard," even today. The code clearly states that two classes comprise the militia: the National Guard and Naval Militia, and everyone else.

Everyone else. Individuals. The People.

No. 2: We oppose restrictions to our civil liberties.

All of our rights, even the ones enumerated in the Bill of Rights, are restricted. You can't shout "Fire!" in a crowd. You can't threaten to kill the president. You can't publish someone else's words as your own. We have copyright laws and libel laws and slander laws. We have the FCC to regulate our radio and television content. We have plenty of restrictions on our First Amendment rights.

But we don't like them. We fight them. Any card-carrying member of the ACLU will tell you that while we might agree that some restrictions are reasonable, we keep a close eye whenever anyone in government gets an itch to pass a new law that restricts our First Amendment rights. Or our Fourth. Or our Fifth, Sixth, or Eighth.

We complain about free speech zones. The whole country is supposed to be a free speech zone, after all. It says so right in the First Amendment.

But when it comes to the Second Amendment...You could hear a pin drop for all the protest you'll get from liberals when politicians talk about further restrictions on the manufacture, sale, or possession of firearms.

Suddenly, overly broad restrictions are "reasonable." The Washington D.C. ban on handguns -- allhandguns -- is reasonable. (Later this year, the Supreme Court will quite likely issue an opinion to the contrary in the Heller case.)

Would we tolerate such a sweeping regulation of, say, the Thirteenth Amendment?

Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime where of the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.

What if a politician -- say, a Republican from a red state in the south -- were to introduce a bill that permits enslaving black women? Would we consider that reasonable? It's not like the law would enslave all people, or even all black people. Just the women. There's no mention of enslaving women in the Thirteenth Amendment. Clearly, when Lincoln wanted to free the slaves, he didn't intend to freeall the slaves. And we restrict all the other Amendments, so obviously the Thirteenth Amendment is not supposed to be absolute. What's the big deal?

Ridiculous, right? We'd take to the streets, we'd send angry letters to our representatives in Washington, we'd call our progressive radio programs to quote, verbatim, the Thirteenth Amendment. Quite bluntly, although not literally, we'd be up in arms. (Yeah, pun intended.)

And yet...A ban on all handguns seems reasonable to many liberals. Never mind that of 192 million firearms in America, 65 million -- about one third -- are handguns.

This hardly seems consistent.

No. 3: It's not 1776 anymore.

When the Founding Fathers, in their infinite wisdom, drafted the Bill of Rights, they could not have imagined machine guns. Or armor-piercing bullets (which are not available to the public anyway, and are actually less lethal than conventional ammunition). Or handguns that hold 18 rounds. A drive-by shooting, back in 1776, would have been a guy on a horse with a musket.

Of course, they couldn't have imagined the internet, either. But do we question the right of our gracious host, Markos, to say whatever the hell he wants on his blog? (The wisdom, perhaps, but not the right.)

Similarly, the Founding Fathers could not have imagined 24-hour cable news networks. When they drafted the First Amendment, did they really mean to protect the rights of Bill O'Reilly to make incredibly stupid, and frequently inaccurate, statements for an entire hour, five nights a week?

Actually, yes. They did. Bill O'Reilly bilious ravings, and Keith Olbermann's Special Comments, and Bill Moyer's analysis of the corruption of the Bush Administration, and the insipid chatter of the entire cast of the Today show are, and were intended to be, protected by the First Amendment.

We liberals are supposed to understand that just because we don't agree with something doesn't mean it is not protected. At least when it comes to the First Amendment.

But as for the Second Amendment? When discussing the Second Amendment, liberals become obtuse in their literalism. The Second Amendment does not protect the right to own all guns. Or allammunition. It doesn't protect the right of the people as individuals.

Liberals will defend the right of Cindy Sheehan to wear an anti-war T-shirt, even though the First Amendment says nothing about T-shirts.

They will defend the right of citizens to attend a Bush rally wearing an anti-Bush button, even though the First Amendment says nothing about buttons.

They will defend the rights of alleged terrorists to a public trial, even though, when writing the Sixth Amendment, the Founding Fathers certainly could not have imagined a world in which terrorists would plot to blow up building with airplanes. The notion of airplanes would have shocked most of them (with the possible exception of Thomas Jefferson. He was always inventing things.)

No. 4: It's not like you can use it anyway.

Fine, you say. Have your big, scary guns. It's not like you actually stand a chance in fighting against the United States government. The Army has bigger, badder weapons than any private citizen. Your most deadly gun is no match for their tanks, their helicopters, their atom bombs. Maybe two hundred years ago, citizens stood a chance in a fight against government, but not today. The Second Amendment is obsolete.

Tell that to the USSR, held at bay for about six years by pissed off Afghanis with WWI rifles.

Tell that to the Iraqi "insurgents" who are putting up a pretty good fight against our military might with fairly primitive weapons.

The Second Amendment is obsolete?

What other rights might be considered obsolete in today's day and age?

No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner to be prescribed by law.

When was the last time a soldier showed up at your door and said, "I'll be staying with you for the indefinite future"?

I'm guessing it's been a while. But of course, were it to happen, you'd dust off your Third Amendment and say, "I don't think so, pal."

And you'd be right.

And hasn't our current administration made the Sixth Amendment obsolete?

In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to a speedy and public trial, by an impartial jury of the State and district where in the crime shall have been committed, which district shall have been previously ascertained by law, and to beinformed of the nature and cause of the accusation; to be confronted with the witnesses against him; to have compulsory process for obtaining witnesses in his favor, and to have the Assistance of Counsel for his defense.

Shall we ask all of those "unlawful combatants" whether the Sixth Amendment still applies?

The President merely has to categorize you as an "unlawful combatant," and whoosh! No more rights to a speedy and public trial, an impartial jury, or even knowledge of the charges and identification of the witnesses who will testify against you. With one fell swoop of the pen, the President can suspend your Sixth Amendment rights.

Since it has no effect, whenever the President feels like it, why do we even need the Sixth Amendment anymore?

What about the Twenty-Sixth Amendment? How much use does that get?

The right of citizens of the United States, who are eighteen years of age or older, to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of age.

We all know the youth vote is typically pretty abysmal. Those lazy kids can barely get out of bed before noon, let alone get themselves to the voting booth. If they're not going to use their Twenty-Sixth Amendment rights, shouldn't we just delete the damn thing altogether?

Of course not! I voted when I was eighteen, and I was proud to do so. In fact, most liberals will argue for greater enfranchisement. They support the rights of convicted felons to vote. Liberals are all about getting out the vote and rocking the vote. They sit at tables at their local farmer's market, trying to register new voters. They make calls to likely voters, even offering to give them a lift to the polling station.

For liberals, the Twenty-Sixth Amendment (for teens), the Fifteenth Amendment (for blacks), and the Nineteenth Amendment (for women) barely scratch the surface.

But the Second Amendment?

Crickets. Or, worse, loud calls for greater restrictions. More laws. Less access. Regulate, regulate, regulate -- until the Second Amendment is nearly regulated out of existence because no one needs to have a gun anyway.

And that, sadly, is the biggest mistake of all.

Because, to paraphrase a recent comment by mlandman:

The Second Amendment is not about hunting or even guns anymore than the First Amendment is about quill pens and hand-set type.

We do not quibble about the methods by which we practice our First Amendment rights because that is not the point. And red herring arguments about types of ammunition or handguns versus rifles (even scary looking ones) are just that -- red herrings. They distract us from what is at the true meaning of the Second Amendment. And that brings me to my final point.

No. 5: The Second Amendment is about revolution.

In no other country, at no other time, has such a right existed. It is not the right to hunt. It is not the right to shoot at soda cans in an empty field. It is not even the right to shoot at a home invader in the middle of the night.

It is the right of revolution.

Let me say that again: It is the right of revolution.

Consider the words of that most forward thinking of Founding Fathers, Thomas Jefferson:

The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to bear arms is, as a last resort,to protect themselves against tyranny in government.

Tyranny in government. That was Mr. Jefferson's concern. And he spoke from experience, of course. He knew the Revolutionary War was not won with hand-painted banners or people chanting slogans. It was a long and bloody war of attrition where the colonials took on the biggest military machine in the world.

And we all know how that turned out.

Whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness it is the right of the people to alter or abolish it, and to institute new government.

To alter or abolish the government. These are not mild words; they are powerful. They are revolutionary.

Mr. Jefferson might never have imagined automatic weapons. But he probably also never imagined a total ban on handguns either.

The beauty of the Second Amendment is that it will not be needed until they try to take it.

We talk about the First Amendment as a unique and revolutionary concept -- that we have the right to criticize our government. Does it matter whether we do so while standing on a soapbox on the corner of the street, or on a blog? No. Because the concept, not the methodology, is what matters.

And the Second Amendment is no different. We liberals tend to get bogged down in the details at the expense of being able to understand, and appreciate, the larger idea.

The Second Amendment is not about how much ammunition is "excessive." Or what kinds of guns are and are not permissible. We should have learned by now that prohibition is ineffective. That's why we repealed the Eighteenth Amendment, prohibiting the "manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors." It didn't work.

That's why our War on Drugs has been such an utter failure. Prohibition does not prevent people from smoking pot; it just turns pot smokers into criminals. (And what would our hemp-growing Founding Fathers think of that?)

And so it is with gun laws. They certainly don't prevent gun crimes. A total ban on handguns in DC has hardly eliminated violent crimes in DC. Although it may be correlation, rather than causation, crime tends to be lower in areas with more guns. After Florida and Texas passed concealed carry laws, crime rates went down.

So.

What is the point? Is this a rallying cry for liberals to rush right out and purchase a gun? Absolutely not. Guns are dangerous when used by people who are not trained to use them, just as cars are dangerous when driven by people who have not been taught how to drive.

No, this is a rallying cry for the Constitution. For the Bill of Rights. For all of our rights.

This is an appeal to every liberal who says, "I just don't like guns."

This is an appeal to every liberal who says, "No one needs that much ammunition."

This is an appeal to every liberal who says, "That's not what the Founding Fathers meant."

This is an appeal to every liberal who says, "Columbine and Virginia Tech prove we need more laws."

This is an appeal to every liberal who supports the ACLU.

This is an appeal to every liberal who has complained about the Bush Administration's trading of our civil liberties for the illusion of greater security. (I believe I’ve seen a T-shirt or two about Benjamin Franklin’s thoughts on that.)

This is an appeal to every liberal who believes in fighting against the abuses of government, against the infringement of our civil liberties, and for the greater expansion of our rights.

This is an appeal to every liberal who thinks, despite some poor judgment on the issues of, say, slavery or women's suffrage, the Founding Fathers actually had pretty good ideas about limiting government power and expanding individual rights.

This is an appeal to every liberal who never wants to lose another election to Republicans because they have successfully persuaded the voters that Democrats will take their guns away.

This is an appeal to you, my fellow liberals. Not merely to tolerate the Second Amendment, but to embrace it. To love it and defend it and guard it as carefully as you do all the others.

Because we are liberals. And fighting for our rights -- for all of our rights, for all people -- is what we do.

Because we are revolutionaries.

A Liberal Gun Owner on the Second Amendment

2011-01-19T10:42:00.000-08:00

http://www.reddit.com/r/guns/comments/f57dg/as_a_liberal_gun_owner_ive_had_a_lot_of_debates/

THE FIRST RULE OF EFFECTIVE ADVOCACY IS TO NOT PISS PEOPLE OFF OR INSULT THEM

I can't stress that boldly enough. If you're one of those people who think that being an advocate for the 2nd amendment means saying "IT'S MY RIGHT!", please don't. You're hurting more than you're helping. As The Dude, eminent scholar that he is, stated to Walter after he yells "AM I WRONG?!?!"

"You're not wrong, you're just an asshole!"

Remember that. Being right is nice, but it isn't everything.

Ok, now that we've covered that. Lets talk about technique and rhetoric. The first thing you need to do is build rapport with them. Nobody will take anything you say seriously if you come off as an opponent. Take their sides with some things right off the bat, because despite our differences, anti-gunners and pro-gunners tend to actually have a lot of the same goals in mind.

The first one is that we all want to see gun violence decrease. Nobody wants to see good people harmed by people using firearms. Even if you're a total psychopath, you can see that tragedies like the shooting in Tuscon make life more difficult for us pro-gunners.

So right off the bat, I'm sure you'll hear some sort of a plea from them about some story in the news that they've heard about where some innocent person was harmed by someone with a gun. Agree with them! State right off the bat that you are on their side. We all want to see gun violence decrease, we simply disagree on how to do that. They'll probably also say that the world would be a more peaceful place if there weren't any guns, and agree with them there too! If guns didn't exist, then people couldn't be killed with guns. Even if you don't agree with my premise there, it doesn't matter. We all know that a world without guns is just about as likely as a world without jealousy, so the point isn't factual, it's about building a rapport.

Once you've worked up a personal rapport with them and they're looking at you as just another dude and not an enemy, you can get into the details.

So we all agree that having less people die from gun violence is a good thing. But how do you go about it? The majority of the arguments that you'll hear from anti's tend to be that guns make it easier for people to kill other people (true), and therefore if there weren't any guns then nobody would get killed with them (also true). But try to steer the conversation into the details. How do you get rid of the guns that are here?

Facts:

There are well over 300 million guns in this country. The vast majority of them are not registered with any government agency. Therefore the notion of simply having cops go to gun owners houses and taking them away is futile. Also note that the vast majority of gun owners would never give them up. This demonstrates the futility of a simple banning of guns.
Point out the durability of guns. We still shoot guns that were manufacturered in the 19th century, which were made prior to modern manufacturing and metallurgy. Guns manufactured these days will likely last 200-300 years if maintained. This demonstrates that guns aren't going anywhere anytime soon.
Point out that all the laws we could ever write regarding gun crimes are already on the books. Also point out the glaringly obvious fact that criminals don't obey laws. When discussing some of the current gun control proposals coming out of Washington DC, have a thought-experiment about how those laws would have prevented or made the crime that Loughner committed that day more difficult. Nobody who is serious will think that making it a felony to carry a gun within 1000 feet of a federal official is a law that a murderer will abide by. Nor will making CCW illegal prevent criminals from concealing their weapons.

Those three facts tend to provide a solid foundation for demonstrating the futility of trying to ban firearms in the United States. Now we need to demonstrate the benefits of widespread firearm ownership in our society.

Facts:

The UK has a ban on firearms. Because of that, burglars in the UK are 50% more likely to break into homes while they are occupied by the owner than burglars in the United States are. This is for the obvious reason that in the UK there is a much lesser chance of getting shot by the homeowner.
Firearms do not cause people to become crazy. In the UK, a big problem there is something called "glassing". It's when you get into a disagreement with someone at a pub, and they smash a pint glass over your face. I don't recall that being a problem in the United States.
Every single time that relaxation of gun restrictions is put up for a vote, the anti-gunners make these drastic arguments about how we're all incapable of being civil to eachother. When Florida passed a law in 03 (I believe) stating that it's within the law to use a firearm to defend yourself if you feel that your life is at risk, either in your home or if you're carrying in public, the anti's wrote a lot of op-eds saying that if the law was passed we would see people getting into shootouts over fender benders and other crazy talk. None of that materialized. Instead, crime has dropped.
Washington DC had a complete ban on firearms that was lifted after the heller decision at the supreme court. After that law was lifted, crime has fallen dramatically.
Point out all the times that average citizens like you and I used their firearms to protect themselves and others. I'm sure that someone has compiled a database of news stories on this subject, if anyone knows where we can find it, that would be a great resource.
Show how most gun laws are written by people who don't know anything about firearms, and are therefore usually bans based solely upon cosmetic features of the gun.

After all this, I'm pretty sure that if they're not persuaded, they'll probably just fall back on the utopian fantasy about how nobody could cause gun crime if there weren't any guns. Usually they're just a lost cause at this point, but lastly point out that what they're arguing for is a Utopian dream, and that every single Utopian movement in history has sown terror. The great thing about America is our dedication to pluralism and diversity. Every movement in this country that's tried to eliminate things that people want (or things that simply can never be eliminate) has resulted in death, pain, and most importantly, hasn't worked. The temperance movement of the early 20th century. The war on drugs today. The actions of the KKK. The war on terror. All these movements have in common is their Utopian goals, and those Utopian goals have directly resulted in the dehumanization of good people. And every one of those movements has left a stain upon society.

I know it's a long post, but I thought it'd be good to lay all this out. If you have anything you've found helpful, please post it here.

Oh, and lastly, take em out shooting! Shooting guns is just objectively fun, and I know most anti's tend to be so out of an ignorance of how guns work. No better way to show how firearms operate than to actually put one in their hands. And hey, who doesn't love getting a little range time?

-Mark

Concerning an Armed Citizenry

2011-01-17T16:51:00.000-08:00

What happened in Arizona is a tragedy, and the person who is guilty should be prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law. Despite the tragedy, that does not negate the freedoms that our founders protected from the reach of the government.

Thomas Jefferson

“No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms. The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government.” –Thomas Jefferson, proposed Virginia constitution, June 1776. Thomas Jefferson Papers, 334 (C. J. Boyd, Ed., 1950)

“Laws that forbid the carrying of arms disarm only those who are neither inclined nor determined to commit crimes. Such laws make things worse for the assaulted and better for the assailants; they serve rather to encourage than prevent homicides, for an unarmed man may be attacked with greater confidence than an armed man.” –Thomas Jefferson, quoting 18th century criminologist Cesare Beccaria in “On Crimes and Punishment”, 1764

When the government fears the people, there is liberty. When the people fear the government, there is tyranny –Thomas Jefferson

“And what country can preserve it’s liberties, if the rulers are not warned from time to time that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take up arms. The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” –Thomas Jefferson, Letter to William S. Smith, 1787

“The Constitution of most of our states, and the United States, assert that all power is inherent in the people; that they may exercise it by themselves: that it is their right and duty to be at all times armed; that they are entitled to freedom of person, freedom of religion, freedom of property, and freedom of the press.” Thomas Jefferson, Proposed Virginia Constitution, 1776

Samuel Adams

“Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: first, a right to life, secondly to liberty, thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can.” –Samuel Adams

“The Constitution shall never be construed to prevent the people of the United States who are peaceable citizens from keeping their own arms.” –Samuel Adams, During the Massachusetts U.S. Constitution ratification convention, 1788

“If you love wealth better than liberty, the tranquillity of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.” — Samuel Adams, 1776

Benjamin Franklin

“Those who would give up essential Liberty, to purchase a little temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety.” –Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), reply of the Pennsylvania Assembly to the governor, November 11, 1755 <>

Noah Webster

“Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed; as they are in almost every kingdom of Europe. the supreme power in America cannot enforce unjust laws by the sword; because the whole body of the people are armed, and constitute a force superior to any bands of regular troops that can be, on any pretense, raised in the United States.” –Noah Webster, An Examination into the Leading Principles of the federal Constitution (1787) in Pamphlets to the Constitution of the United States (P. Ford, 1888).

“Congress have no power to disarm the militia. Their swords, and every other terrible implement of the soldier, are the birthright of an American… The unlimited power of the sword is not in the hands of either the federal or state government, but, where I trust in God it will ever remain, in the hands of the people” –Tench Coxe, Pennsylvania Gazette, Feb. 20, 1788

“As civil rulers, not having their duty to the people duly before them, may attempt to tyrannize, as the military forces which must be occasionally raised to defend our country, might pervert their power to the injury of their fellow citizens, the people are confirmed by the article in their right to keep and bear their private arms.” Tench Coxe, in “Remarks on the First Part of the Amendments to the Federal Constitution.” Philadelphia Federal Gazette, June 18, 1789

John Adams

“Arms in the hands of citizens may be used at the individual discretion, in private self-defense.” John Adams, A Defense of the Constitutions of Government of the United States of America, 1787-88

Alexander Hamilton

“The best we can hope for concerning the people at large is that they be properly armed.” Alexander Hamilton, The Federalist Papers at 184-8

Richard Henry Lee

“A militia when properly formed are in fact the people themselves and include all men capable of bearing arms. To preserve liberty it is essential that the whole body of people always possess arms and be taught alike, especially when young, how to use them.” Richard Henry Lee, Initiator of the Declaration of Independence, and member of the first Senate, which passed the Bill of Rights. Additional Letters From the Federal Farmer 53, 1788

Patrick Henry

“Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect everyone who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are ruined. The great object is that every man be armed. Every man who is able may have a gun.” –Patrick Henry, During Virginia’s ratification convention, 1788

James Madison

“The Constitution preserves the advantage of being armed which Americans possess over the people of almost every other nation where the governments are afraid to trust the people with arms.” James Madison, The Federalist No. 46

“The right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. A well regulated militia, composed of the body of people, trained in arms, is the best and most natural defense of a free country.” –James Madison, I Annuals of Congress 434 (June 8, 1789)

George Mason

“I ask sir, what is the militia? It is the whole people. To disarm the people is the best and most effectual way to enslave them.” –George Mason, during Virginia’s ratification convention, 1788

Thomas Paine

“Arms discourage and keep the invader and plunderer in awe, and preserve order in the world as well as property. Horrid mischief would ensue were the law-abiding deprived the use of them.” –Thomas Paine, Thoughts on Defensive War, 1775

George Washington

“A free people ought to be armed. When firearms go, all goes, we need them by the hour. Firearms stand next to importance to the Constitution itself. They are the American people’s liberty teeth and keystone under independence.” –George Washington, Boston Independence Chronicle, January 14, 1790

Major, Bizarre Fish Die-Off Along Lakefront

2011-01-11T05:55:00.000-08:00

http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2011/01/11/major-bizarre-fish-die-off-along-lakefront/

CHICAGO (STMW) – A bizarre scene is evolving on the Chicago lakefront, with Canada geese and mallard ducks gulping down dead or dying gizzard shad.

A major die-off of what appears to be the 2010 class is happening in Chicago harbors. Thousands, perhaps far more than that, of dead gizzard shad in the 3- to 5-inch range are frozen in the ice of Chicago harbors or floating around in open patches of water.

“Gizzard shad are pretty sensitive,’’ Lake Michigan Program biologist Dan Makauskas said. “On the toughness scale, the herrings are pretty soft.’’

Gizzard shad, members of the herring family, are more sensitive to drops in oxygen levels than most fish. And thick ice came early to Chicago harbors in December.

The massive die-off was first documented Thursday by Carl Vizzone, a North Side fisherman who sits on the board of Perch America. What caught his eye was Canada geese and mallards eating dying shad at open water by DuSable and Diversey harbors. “This is not normal,’’ he said.

He’s right, agreed naturalist Joel Greenberg, author of A Natural History of the Chicago Region. Canada geese and mallards normally don’t eat fish, but, Greenberg said, “They are opportunistic.”

Other species of fish do not appear to be involved in the die-off.

Makauskas, who speculated that the young shad may not have built up enough reserves to survive the early onslaught of extreme cold, agreed the die-off is abnormal.

Here's more strange animal deaths:
http://americaupsidedown.blogspot.com/2011/01/summary-of-strange-animal-deaths.html

summary of strange animal deaths, updated with bright green river in canada

2011-01-05T14:42:00.001-08:00

victoria river (canada) mysteriously turns bright green:

http://news.nationalpost.com/2010/12/30/victoria-river-mysteriously-turns-bright-green/

400,000 dead crabs, England:

http://www.thestar.com/news/world/article/916503--40-000-crabs-join-slew-of-animal-death-mysteries

dead birds, sweden:

http://www.businessinsider.com/dead-birds-fall-out-of-the-sky-in-central-sweden-2011-1

dead birds, new zealand:

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/carpet-of-dead-snapper-on-nz-beach/story-fn6e0s1g-1225982229775

dead fish, florida:

http://www.wftv.com/news/26367953/detail.html

dead birds, texas:

http://www.ktre.com/global/story.asp?s=13787277

dead birds, arkansas:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2011/01/05/AR2011010502625.html

dead birds, louisiana:

http://www.internetbits.com/blackbird-rain-death-from-stress-and-trauma/56495/

4,000 birds fall from the sky and 100,000 fish dead in arkansas river

2011-01-03T23:16:00.000-08:00

the last few days:

(1) 4,000 birds fall dead from the sky in arkansas. govt officials "walking around in [hazmat] suits"

(2) 500 birds fall dead from the sky in louisiana

http://www.cnn.com/2011/US/01/03/arkansas.falling.birds/index.html?hpt=T2 and video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ooZxZhpMSl0&feature=player_embedded

(3) 100,000 dead fish in arkansas river

video http://www.todaysthv.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=136401&catid=2

history:

1994, Washington state, "gelatin" falls from the sky http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EvRusfXUaW4

1940s, findings published Oct 1 2010, "American public health officials deliberately infected 700 Guatemalans with [venereal diseases]." http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/02/health/research/02infect.html?_r=1

Cold War era - scientists performing radiation tests on humans at Brooks Air Force Base in Texas http://www.gwu.edu/~nsarchiv/radiation/dir/mstreet/commeet/meet13/brief13/tab_f/br13f3.txt

1999 Executive Order 13139 - soldiers ordered to take experimental vaccines not approved by the FDA. http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/Executive_Order_13139

In Entitlement America, The Head Of A Household Of Four Making Minimum Wage Has More Disposable Income Than A Family Making $60,000 A Year

2010-12-16T05:53:00.000-08:00

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/entitlement-america-head-household-making-minimum-wage-has-more-disposable-income-family-mak

Tonight's stunning financial piece de resistance comes from Wyatt Emerich of The Cleveland Current. In what is sure to inspire some serious ire among all those who once believed Ronald Reagan that it was the USSR that was the "Evil Empire", Emmerich analyzes disposable income and economic benefits among several key income classes and comes to the stunning (and verifiable) conclusion that "a one-parent family of three making $14,500 a year (minimum wage) has more disposable income than a family making $60,000 a year." And that excludes benefits from Supplemental Security Income disability checks. America is now a country which punishes those middle-class people who not only try to work hard, but avoid scamming the system. Not surprisingly, it is not only the richest and most audacious thieves that prosper - it is also the penny scammers at the very bottom of the economic ladder that rip off the middle class each and every day, courtesy of the world's most generous entitlement system. Perhaps if Reagan were alive today, he would wish to modify the object of his once legendary remark.

From Emmerich:

You can do as well working one week a month at minimum wage as you can working $60,000-a-year, full-time, high-stress job.

My chart tells the story. It is pretty much self-explanatory.

Stunning? Just do it yourself.

Almost all welfare programs have Web sites where you can call up "benefits calculators." Just plug in your income and family size and, presto, your benefits are automatically calculated.

The chart is quite revealing. A one-parent family of three making $14,500 a year (minimu wage) has more disposable income than a amily making $60,000 a year.

And if that wasn't enough, here is one that will blow your mind:

If the family provider works only one week a month at minimum wage, he or she makes 92 percent as much as a provider grossing $60,000 a year.

Ever wonder why Obama was so focused on health reform? It is so those who have no interest or ability in working, make as much as representatives of America's once exalted, and now merely endangered, middle class.

First of all, working one week a month, saves big-time on child care. But the real big-ticket item is Medicaid, which has minimal deductibles and copays. By working only one week a month at a minimum wage job, a provider is able to get total medical coverage for next to nothing.

Compare this to the family provider making $60,000 a year. A typical Mississippi family coverage would cost around $12,000, adding deductibles and copays adds an additional $4,500 or so to the bill. That's a huge hit.

There is a reason why a full time worker may not be too excited to learn there is little to show for doing the "right thing."

The full-time $60,000-a-year job is going to be much more demanding than woring one week a month at minimu wage. Presumably, the low-income parent will have more energy to attend to the various stresses of managing a household.

It gets even scarier if one assumes a little dishonesty is throwin in the equation.

If the one-week-a-month worker maintains an unreported cash-only job on the side, the deal gets better than a regular $60,000-a-year job. In this scenario, you maintain a reportable, payroll deductible, low-income job for federal tax purposes. This allows you to easily establish your qualification for all these welfare programs. Then your black-market job gives you additional cash without interfering with your benefits. Some economists estimate there is one trillion in unreported income each year in the United States.

This really got me thinking. Just how much money could I get if I set out to deliberately scam the system? I soon realized that getting a low-paying minimum wage job would set the stage for far more welfare benefits than you could earn in a real job, if you were weilling to cheat. Even if you dodn't cheat, you could do almost as well working one week a month at minimum wage than busting a gut at a $60,000-a-year job.

Now where it gets plainly out of control is if one throws in Supplemental Security Income.

SSI pays $8,088 per year for each "disabled" family member. A person can be deemed "disabled" if thy are totally lacking in the cultural and educational skills needed to be employable in the workforce.

If you add $24,262 a year for three disability checks, the lowest paid welfare family would now have far more take-home income than the $60,000-a-year family.

Best of all: being on welfare does not judge you if you are stupid enough not to take drugs all day, every day to make some sense out of this Mephistophelian tragicomedy known as living in the USA:

Most private workplaces require drug testing, but there is no drug testing to get welfare checks.

Alas, on America's way to to communist welfare, it has long since surpassed such bastions of capitalism as China:

The welfare system in communist China is far stringier. Those people have to work to eat.

We have been writing for over a year, how the very top of America's social order steals from the middle class each and every day. Now we finally know that the very bottom of the entitlement food chain also makes out like a bandit compared to that idiot American who actually works and pays their taxes. One can only also hope that in addition to seeing their disposable income be eaten away by a kleptocratic entitlement state, that the disappearing middle class is also selling off its weaponry. Because if it isn't, and if it finally decides it has had enough, the outcome will not be surprising at all: it will be the same old that has occurred in virtually every revolution in the history of the world to date.

Wal-Mart Proud to embrace the Stasi, Launches Citizen Spy Program

2010-12-07T06:46:00.001-08:00

On December 6th, Wal-Mart and the Department of Homeland Security made an announcement that in 600 Wal-Mart stores, the DHS will be playing video of Janet Napolitanto telling patrons "if you see something, say something." You can read the press release here: http://www.dhs.gov/ynews/releases/pr_1291648380371.shtm

I wrote to Wal-Mart to express concern about this textbook step toward fascism. A citizen spy program is a core tenet of any growing oppressive state. I didn't think a bellwether of American business and capitalism would be interested in supporting something like this. It was the very freedom American stands for that allows Wal-Mart to exist, and be successful. Wal-Mart used to be as "American as apple pie."

I received a response from them last night, which I've posted in full, below. Not only are they not standing up to this oppressive statism, but they are fully embracing it.

The terrorist is the state, and Wal-mart has failed to protect American freedom our ancestors worked so hard to preserve.

from	Walmart Customer Service
to		********************@gmail.com
date		Mon, Dec 6, 2010 at 8:15 PM
subject		Response from Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (Ref #000000027173246)
mailed-by		wal-mart.com

Thank you for your message.

Dear Nathan,

Thank you for contacting Walmart stores regarding "If you see something, say something." .

- It's important to Walmart to help protect the safety of the communities we serve all across the country.
- We're proud to be the first national retail partner of the Department of Homeland Security's awareness campaign.
- Everyone has a role to play and we urge our customers and associates to join us.
- A short video message from Secretary Napolitano will play at select checkout locations reminding customers to report any suspicious activity to local law enforcement.
- Beginning December 6th, all Walmart stores that are equipped with video screens ( nearly 600 ) at the checkouts will feature this message.
- For more information, customers can be encouraged to visit our website @ walmartstores.com/pressroom and look under 'recent news'

Sincerely,
Walmart Customer Care

For further correspondence regarding this issue, please reply to this email.

Feds Warrantlessly Tracking Americans’ Credit Cards in Real Time

2010-12-03T14:11:00.000-08:00

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/12/realtime/

This sounds ridiculous, however, here you can read the ACTUAL documentation from the Department of Justice, explaining to employees how to ask the credit card companies to initiate real time tracking with a warrant. This is an actual government document:

http://www.scribd.com/doc/44542244/DOJ-powerpoint-presentation-on-Hotwatch-surveillance-orders-of-credit-card-transactions

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/12/realtime/

Feds Warrantlessly Tracking Americans’ Credit Cards in Real Time

By Ryan Singel
December 2, 2010 |
5:06 pm |
Categories: Surveillance

Federal law enforcement agencies have been tracking Americans in real-time using credit cards, loyalty cards and travel reservations without getting a court order, a new document released under a government sunshine request shows.

The document, obtained by security researcher Christopher Soghoian, explains how so-called “Hotwatch” orders allow for real-time tracking of individuals in a criminal investigation via credit card companies, rental car agencies, calling cards, and even grocery store loyalty programs. The revelation sheds a little more light on the Justice Department’s increasing power and willingness to surveil Americans with little to no judicial or Congressional oversight.

For credit cards, agents can get real-time information on a person’s purchases by writing their own subpoena, followed up by a order from a judge that the surveillance not be disclosed. Agents can also go the traditional route — going to a judge, proving probable cause and getting a search warrant — which means the target will eventually be notified they were spied on.

The document suggests that the normal practice is to ask for all historical records on an account or individual from a credit card company, since getting stored records is generally legally easy. Then the agent sends a request for “Any and all records and information relating directly or indirectly to any and all ongoing and future transactions or events relating to any and all of the following person(s), entitities, account numbers, addresses and other matters…” That gets them a live feed of transaction data.

DOJ powerpoint presentation on Hotwatch surveillance orders of credit card transactions

It’s not clear what standards an agent would have to follow to get a “Hotwatch” order. The Justice Department told Sogohian the document is the only one it could find relating to “hotwatches” — which means there is either no policy or the department is witholding relevant documents.

The Justice Department did not return a call for comment.

Every year, the Justice Department does have to report to Congress the numbers of criminal and national security wiretaps undertaken, as well as the number of National Security Letters issued. Tens of thousands of NSLs are issued yearly — most with gag orders that forbid ISPs or librarians from ever saying they have ever been served with such a subpoena.

But the Justice Department does not report or make public the number of times it got real time or historic cell phone location information, nor how often it is using these so-called “hotwatch” orders.

Criticize the TSA? Get put on the terror watch list

2010-12-03T14:08:00.000-08:00

http://www.prisonplanet.com/cnn-reporter-put-on-watch-list-after-criticizing-tsa.html

CNN Reporter Put On Watch List After Criticizing TSA

Big Sis has a history of pursuing political witch hunts

Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Friday, December 3, 2010

In light of new reports alleging that the TSA is creating a watch list of individuals who criticized the agency as a form of collective punishment, it’s revealing to note that CNN journalist Drew Griffin was also put on a TSA watch list immediately after he filed reports critical of the organization back in 2008.

As we highlighted earlier this week, a reported TSA memo was circulated at the height of last month’s opt out controversy which “officially addresses those who are opposed to, or engaged in the disruption of the implementation of the enhanced airport screening procedures as ‘domestic extremists’.”

In response to the story, former Congressman Bob Barr filed a Freedom of Information Act request which demanded to know if the TSA had categorized those leading the charge against invasive security measures, namely Matt Drudge, Alex Jones, and John Tyner, via the websites drudgereport.com and prisonplanet.com, as “domestic extremists”.

There can be no doubt whatsoever that Homeland Security has engaged in political witch hunts against Americans critical of big government. Earlier this year, Big Sis was caught spying on Tea Party groups as well as State Representative Daryl Metcalfe.

The TSA itself has also listed journalists critical of its policies as potential terrorists, ostensibly as a punishment and a warning to other reporters that if they broadcast anything negative about the agency then they will be bracketed together with Al-Qaeda members and be forced to endure copious amounts of hassle and harassment every time they wish to fly.

Shortly after he began a series of investigative reports that were critical of the TSA in May 2008, CNN journalist Drew Griffin was placed on a watch list that at the time had swelled to over a million names. TSA claimed that he was unfortunate enough to share the name with another Drew Griffin who had been legitimately placed on the list, but then denied that he was on the list altogether and blamed the airlines. The airlines responded by saying they were merely following a list provided to them by the TSA.

“Coincidentally, this all began in May, shortly after I began a series of investigative reports critical of the TSA,” said Griffin. “Eleven flights now since May 19. On different airlines, my name pops up forcing me to go to the counter, show my identification, sometimes the agent has to make a call before I get my ticket,” Griffin reported. “What does the TSA say? Nothing, at least nothing on camera. Over the phone a public affairs worker told me again I’m not on the watch list, and don’t even think that someone in the TSA or anyone else is trying to get even.”

Given the fact that the TSA has made a habit out of deceiving the American people and spinning the truth about airport security, the notion that Griffin was deliberately targeted by the TSA as a punishment for his critical reports about the agency is almost a given.

The fact that the TSA curtailed its so-called ‘imperative’ security measures for several days around Thanksgiving as a political ploy to deflate the opt out day protest shows that the agency will go to any lengths to deflect criticism.

The TSA has now announced that it will check the name of every traveler against a government watch list 72 hours before they fly, greasing the skids for “domestic extremists” who exercise their first amendment right to speak out against the TSA to be harassed and hindered.

Former Homeland Security chief Michael Chertoff was later confronted on the Griffin case by Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee. Chertoff parroted the TSA line in claiming that Griffin merely had the same name as another suspected terrorist.

The outcome of Bob Barr’s FOIA request is eagerly awaited as it will give an insight into how the TSA responded internally to the national outrage surrounding body scanners and pat downs, while also giving an indication as to whether people like Matt Drudge and Alex Jones were placed on a watch list for having the temerity to stand up to children being sexually molested by low-paid thugs in uniforms.

*********************

Saudi Arabia is dictating US foreign policy and is the terrorist of the middle east

2010-11-28T11:45:00.001-08:00

1) Fox News always calls for the US to attack Iran

source: http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/04/kristol-us-strike-on-iran-israeli-strike/

source: http://homelandsecuritynewswire.com/bolton-israel-should-attack-irans-reactor-weeks-end

source: http://mediamatters.org/iphone/research/201011230041

2) the Saudi Prince is the largest shareholder of Fox News, outside the Murdoch family

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/News_Corporation Prince Alwaleed bin Talal al-Saud of Saudi Arabia, through his Kingdom Holding Company, owns 7% of News Corp.'s shares, making Kingdom Holdings the second largest shareholder.^[22]^[23]^[24]

3) US diplomat communications revealed today discuss Saudi Arabia imploring the US to attack Iran. "...the King's frequent exhortations to the US to attack Iran and so put an end to its nuclear weapons program. 'He told you to cut off the head of the snake.' "

source: http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/world/statessecrets.html?hp

4) Saudi Arabia is classified by the United States as a state sponsor of terror and "

the principal financial backer of Afghanistan' s odious Taliban movement since at least 1996." (

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=3841)

Why does Saudi Arabia get to dictate US policy and wars?

Wake up.

How Private Property Saved the Pilgrims

2010-11-25T18:22:00.001-08:00

http://volokh.com/2010/11/25/how-private-property-rights-saved-the-pilgrims/

How Private Property Saved the Pilgrims

Ilya Somin • November 25, 2010 11:00 am

Today is Thanksgiving. So it’s time for my annual post on how private property rights saved the Pilgrims. Economist Benjamin Powell tells the storyhere:

Many people believe that after suffering through a severe winter, the Pilgrims’ food shortages were resolved the following spring when the Native Americans taught them to plant corn and a Thanksgiving celebration resulted. In fact, the pilgrims continued to face chronic food shortages for three years until the harvest of 1623. Bad weather or lack of farming knowledge did not cause the pilgrims’ shortages. Bad economic incentives did.
In 1620 Plymouth Plantation was founded with a system of communal property rights. Food and supplies were held in common and then distributed based on equality and need as determined by Plantation officials. People received the same rations whether or not they contributed to producing the food, and residents were forbidden from producing their own food. Governor William Bradford, in his 1647 history, Of Plymouth Plantation, wrote that this system was found to breed much confusion and discontent and retard much employment that would have been to their benefit and comfort. The problem was that young men, that were most able and fit for labour, did repine that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children without any recompense. Because of the poor incentives, little food was produced.
Faced with potential starvation in the spring of 1623, the colony decided to implement a new economic system. Every family was assigned a private parcel of land. They could then keep all they grew for themselves, but now they alone were responsible for feeding themselves. While not a complete private property system, the move away from communal ownership had dramatic results.
This change, Bradford wrote, had very good success, for it made all hands very industrious, so as much more corn was planted than otherwise would have been. Giving people economic incentives changed their behavior. Once the new system of property rights was in place, the women now went willingly into the field, and took their little ones with them to set corn; which before would allege weakness and inability.
Once the Pilgrims in the Plymouth Plantation abandoned their communal economic system and adopted one with greater individual property rights, they never again faced the starvation and food shortages of the first three years. It was only after allowing greater property rights that they could feast without worrying that famine was just around the corner.

This 1999 article by Tom Bethell has a more detailed account.

Happy Thanksgiving to all!

UPDATE: Reason TV has more on this subject here.

T.S.A. Infecting U.S.? Latex coverings 'have been in crotches, armpits, touching people who may be ill'

2010-11-23T06:37:00.001-08:00

"agents wear the same gloves to pat down dozens, perhaps hundreds, of passengers, not changing them"

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=231733

Those latex gloves Transportation Security Administration agents wear while giving airline passengers those infamous full-body pat-downs apparently aren't there for the safety and security of passengers – only the TSA agents.

That's the word being discussed on dozens of online forums and postings after it was noted that the agents wear the same gloves to pat down dozens, perhaps hundreds, of passengers, not changing them even though the Centers for Disease Control in its online writings has emphasized the important of clean hands to prevent the exchange of loathsome afflictions.

"Herpes via latex glove ... ewwww," wrote one participant on the independence-minded AR15 website forum.

Responding to the question, "Does the TSA change latex gloves after each sexual assault?" another wrote on the same forum, "I seriously doubt it. Gloves are for their protection, not yours."

In fact, TSA officials in both national and regional offices declined to respond to WND inquiries about the policy for changing gloves to prevent an infection that may be on the clothes or body of one passenger during a pat-down by TSA agents from being transmitted to otherpassengers, including children, in line.

Martha Donahue in a commentary at Resistnet said she'd spent 30 years in the medical industry.

"For those of you who fly and opt for the 'pat down,' you need to demand the TSA thugs change their gloves. I've been watching on the news how they operate. People are being searched [with] dirty gloves ... gloves that have been in crotches, armpits, touching people who may be ill, people who pick their noses. Do you want those gloves touching you?

"These thugs are protecting themselves from you. You need to be protected from them," she wrote. "In a hospital, nursing home, in-home care, or even labs, that would never even be considered an option."

ABC reported one of its news employees documented how a TSA worker reached inside her underwear.

"The woman who checked me reached her hands inside my underwear and felt her way around," the ABC employee said in the network's report. "It was basically worse than going to the gynecologist. It was embarrassing. It was demeaning. It was inappropriate."

Asked today about the possibility of contamination being spread from one passenger to another on the gloves of TSA agents, a spokesman for the CDC bailed.

"Please contact the Dept of Homeland Security and/or TSA on this issue," the spokesman told WND.

But in its online writings, the CDC repeatedly makes clear the importance of maintaining clean hands to avoid such transmission of communicable and contagious afflictions.

Dr. Julie Gerberding, at the time the chief of the CDC, said during a special presentation on hand cleanliness, "We know that hand hygiene is a critical component of safe and healthy health care."

At the same time, Dr. John Boyce, lead author of the organization's hand-washing guidelines and the chairman of the Hand Hygiene Task Force, said, "There's a large study that was conducted at the University of Geneva Hospital in Switzerland where they demonstrated significant improvement in the adherence of health care workers to hand hygiene practices and they also showed that the incidence of antibiotic resistance to staph infections went down and that the overall prevalence of health care-acquired infections went down ... ."

Suggested Gerberding in the context of health care, "Hand hygiene saves lives. We're recommending a comprehensive evidence-based approach in hospitals that consists of handwashing with soap and water when the goal is to remove unsightly debris; hand alcohol preps for enhancing appearance and reducing bacterial counts; and gloving when people have contact with blood or other body fluids in accordance with universal precautions."

She said even in a "community setting," "washing with soap and water remains a very sensible strategy for hand hygiene."

Other health standards across the country routinely warn against hand contact with sores, lesions or other sources of viruses or contamination. The Lincoln, Neb., health site notes, "This includes hand contact."

Officials at the Canadian Center for Occupational Health noted that "hand washing is the single most effective way to prevent the spread of infections.

"You can spread certain 'germs' (a general term for microbes like viruses and bacteria) casually by touching another person. You can also catch germs when you touch contaminated objects or surfaces and then you touch your face (mouth, eyes, and nose)," it said.

In a forum on The Hill, writer Carol Felsenthal said agents should, simply in the course of their work, change gloves between passengers.

"Anyone who has visited a fast food joint, a doctor's office or a hospital has watched as workers change gloves between servings or exams. And if they don't, the customer/patient would surely say something," she wrote. "How often do the TSA agents doing the 'enhanced pat-downs' change gloves?"

She wrote that she was wondering "about the possibility of screeners passing everything from bedbugs to skin infections from one passenger to another."

She continued, "Latex glove issues might seem minor, but there ought to be procedures to require TSA screeners to don fresh gloves each time they encounter a new passenger."

On a TSA blog promoting the agency's actions and policies, one screener explained, "Changing gloves is fairly simple ... . When I gate screen I carry about 10-12 pairs in my pockets."

Respondents to the comment were outraged, "That's just plain disgusting and most certainly not acceptable ... procedures as set forth by the CDC for usage of gloves for protection," said one. "Reasoning being is that the bacteria count in your pockets is about the same is your mouth or armpit."

Wrote another forum participant, "Those gloves are soiled if they come out of your pockets and before handling my stuff you will be expected to obtain a clean, from the original container, pair. ... Who knows what filth inhabits your pockets!"

Officials at the city-owned Denver International Airport, some 20 miles northeast of downtown, said they had no participation in making any health policy regarding the gloves used by TSA screeners on Denver passengers, and, in fact, did not know if there was a policy.

On the Above Top Secret blog, the author was trying to provide a public service.

"Those gloves are worn for the protection of the agent," wrote the commentator. "You must request that they change the gloves in your presence or you risk acquiring venereal disease resulting from a fondle/molest search."

TSA - "we don't store the naked body scans" Gizmodo - "we obtained naked body scans with a Freedom of Information Act request"

2010-11-16T08:50:00.000-08:00

Here's where the TSA promised not to store the naked body scans:

http://www.usatoday.com/travel/flights/2010-11-16-airportpatdowns16_ST_N.htm?csp=hf&loc=interstitialskip

Napolitano says the machines are safe, "cannot store, export, print or transmit images," and have successfully ferreted out weapons.

Here are the naked body scans they stored:

http://gizmodo.com/5690749/

former assistant TSA administrator - "if we need to violate people's 4th amendment, so be it" - ARREST THIS MAN - Mo McGowan

2010-11-15T13:50:00.001-08:00

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ni4GVWvT2Zs

Arrest this man for an outright assault on the constitution!

TSA employees molesting children at airports

2010-11-12T08:53:00.001-08:00

The father said the officer described the procedure before conducting it. Then he patted down the boy in the open security area, using the backside of his hands to check his genital area, he said. "We spend my child's whole life telling him that only mom, dad and a doctor can touch you in your private area, and now we have to add TSA agent and that's just wrong," he told Reuters. "At some point the terrorists have won."

http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6AA55S20101111

We’re trying to get everyone into the machine - TSA

2010-11-11T13:40:00.001-08:00

I asked him if he was looking forward to conducting the full-on pat-downs. “Nobody’s going to do it,” he said, “once they find out that we’re going to do.”

In other words, people, when faced with a choice, will inevitably choose the Dick-Measuring Device over molestation? “That’s what we’re hoping for. We’re trying to get everyone into the machine.” He called over a colleague. “Tell him what you call the back-scatter,” he said. “The Dick-Measuring Device,” I said. “That’s the truth,” the other officer responded.

SOURCE:

http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/10/for-the-first-time-the-tsa-meets-resistance/65390/

You can read more about the negative health effects of shooting x-rays directly into your body:

http://epic.org/privacy/airtravel/backscatter/

Here is the detail the government can see. They are looking at your genitalia when you go through this scanner:

http://www.tsa.gov/graphics/images/approach/backscatter_large.jpg

Mike Huckabee: The Benedict Arnold of Today’s Tea Party Movement

2010-11-08T11:50:00.000-08:00

Mike Huckabee: The Benedict Arnold of Today’s Tea Party Movement

by Stephen Gordon

“If a libertarian thinks he’s a better Republican and calls people like me a RINO or a liberal, I have a real problem with that.” – former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee in a recent television interview.

Of all of the politicians likely to become presidential candidates in 2012, it’s probably former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee who scares me the most. He’s got a unique ability to praise small-government types in one breath then dis them with the next. People, especially in the Tea Party movement, either aren’t aware of how he REALLYfeels about them or tend to forget such important details as his actual quotes and voting record.

Because of this, I find it important to remind people of Huckabee’s past whenever his name pops up on the electoral horizon. In my latest attempt at statist Whack-a-Mole, I tried to remind folks of the Huckster’s true record. As a refresher course for folks visiting this site, he’s what he told HuffPo no so very long ago:

The greatest threat to classic Republicanism is not liberalism; it’s this new brand of libertarianism, which is social liberalism and economic conservatism, but it’s a heartless, callous, soulless type of economic conservatism because it says “look, we want to cut taxes and eliminate government. If it means that elderly people don’t get their Medicare drugs, so be it. If it means little kids go without education and healthcare, so be it.” Well, that might be a quote pure economic conservative message, but it’s not an American message. It doesn’t fly. People aren’t going to buy that, because that’s not the way we are as a people. That’s not historic Republicanism.

Lest anyone think this is merely some random quote taken out of context, let’s see what Time does in an interview with Huckabee about his book:

In a chapter titled “Faux-Cons: Worse than Liberalism,” Huckabee identifies what he calls the “real threat” to the Republican Party: “libertarianism masked as conservatism.” He is not so much concerned with the libertarian candidate Ron Paul’s Republican supporters as he is with a strain of mainstream fiscal-conservative thought that demands ideological purity, seeing any tax increase as apostasy and leaving little room for government-driven solutions to people’s problems. “I don’t take issue with what they believe, but the smugness with which they believe it,” writes Huckabee, who raised some taxes as governor and cut deals with his state’s Democratic legislature. “Faux-Cons aren’t interested in spirited or thoughtful debate, because such an endeavor requires accountability for the logical conclusion of their argument.” Among his targets is the Club for Growth, a group that tarred Huckabee as insufficiently conservative in the primaries and ran television ads with funding from one of Huckabee’s longtime Arkansas political foes, Jackson T. Stephens Jr.

It seems that my rant caught the attention of Judge Andrew Napolitano’s producer Austin Peterson. Over the weekend, Napolitano interviewed the former governor on Fox’s Freedom Watch.

“But you don’t believe that the federal government should be concerned with people blowing smoke in other people’s faces,” asked Napolitano.

Huckabee’s responses blew smoke — not in people’s faces — but up a totally different orifice. He avoided answering a question about Constitutional authority, then came out sounding a bit more libertarian on privacy issues.

When Great Britain’s King George III raised taxes and caused other grievous injustices to the colonists, we knew who the enemy was. For the last two years, President Obama, House Speaker Pelosi, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and others have played a similar role. During the Revolutionary War, the enemy was easy to spot and distinguish: They wore red coats. The traitors were more problematic, though. By squeaking out small-government noises lately, Mike Huckabee has become the Benedict Arnold of today’s Tea Party movement.

In the interview, Huckabee didn’t provide us with a shermanesque statement about his 2012 presidential ambitions. I’ve called out Huckabee’s record on countless blogs and media interviews, and even suggested to Rachel Maddow that Tax Hike Mike can’t tell if his tea bags swing to the left or to the right. Because Huckabee dons new uniforms like Benedict Arnold, it’s imperative that we all continue to tag Tax Hike Mike with “a RINO or a liberal” label as often as possible unless we wish to see the GOP nominate another John McCain as their presidential nominee.

Here’s the “Huckabee & Libertarians” segment on Fox:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yZ9XzTpdqgI&feature=player_embedded

How Did A Single Unconstitutional Agency Become The Most Powerful Organization In America?

2010-11-07T14:42:00.000-08:00

http://www.businessinsider.com/fed-is-unconstitutional-2010-11

Prime suspect in cargo plane bomb plot: Anwar al-Awlaki

2010-11-02T11:14:00.001-07:00

wake up.

Prime suspect in cargo plane bomb plot: Anwar al-Awlaki:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/oct/31/cargo-plane-bomb-suspect-anwar-al-awlaki

Anwar al-Awlaki dined at the Pentagon months before 9-11:
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/10/20/al-qaeda-terror-leader-dined-pentagon-months/

Why should you keep and bear arms?

2010-10-26T10:45:00.001-07:00

"The strongest reason for the people to retain the right to keep and bear arms is, as a last resort, to protect themselves against tyranny in government."

- Thomas Jefferson

EXCLUSIVE: Al Qaeda Leader Dined at the Pentagon Just Months After 9/11

2010-10-20T12:57:00.000-07:00

(and in case you are still not aware, here's the CIA talking about how they trained Bin Laden http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wn61PJQGCUo&feature=player_embedded - so not only are we training them, we are dining with them. ask yourself WHO is the enemy?)

EXCLUSIVE: Al Qaeda Leader Dined at the Pentagon Just Months After 9/11

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/10/20/al-qaeda-terror-leader-dined-pentagon-months/

Anwar Al-Awlaki may be the first American on the CIA's kill or capture list, but he was also a lunch guest of military brass at the Pentagon within months of the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, Fox News has learned.

Documents exclusively obtained by Fox News, including an FBI interview conducted after the Fort Hood shooting in November 2009, state that Awlaki was taken to the Pentagon as part of the military’s outreach to the Muslim community in the immediate aftermath of the attacks.

Click here to read a portion of the documents.

The incident was flagged by a current Defense Department employee who came forward and told investigators she helped arrange the meeting after she saw Awlaki speak in Alexandria, Va.

The employee "attended this talk and while she arrived late she recalls being impressed by this imam. He condemned Al Qaeda and the terrorist attacks. During his talk he was 'harassed' by members of the audience and suffered it well," reads one document.

According to the documents, obtained as part of an ongoing investigation by the specials unit "Fox News Reporting," there was a push within the Defense Department to reach out to the Muslim community.

"At that period in time, the secretary of the Army (redacted) was eager to have a presentation from a moderate Muslim."

In addition, Awlaki "was considered to be an 'up and coming' member of the Islamic community. After her vetting, Aulaqi (Awlaki) was invited to and attended a luncheon at the Pentagon in the secretary of the Army's Office of Government Counsel."

Awlaki, a Yemeni-American who was born in Las Cruces, N.M., was interviewed at least four times by the FBI in the first week after the attacks because of his ties to the three hijackers Nawaf al-Hazmi, Khalid al-Mihdhar and Hani Hanjour. The three hijackers were all onboard Flight 77 that slammed into the Pentagon.

Awlaki is now believed to be hiding in Yemen after he was linked to the alleged Ft. Hood shooter Major Nidal Malik Hasan, who e-mailed Awlaki prior to the attack.

Sources told Fox News that Awlaki, who is a former Muslim chaplain at George Washington University, met with the Christmas Day bomber Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab in Yemen and was the middle-man between the young Nigerian and the bombmaker. Awlaki was also said to inspire would-be Times Square bomber Faisal Shahzad.

Apparently, none of the FBI's information about Awlaki was shared with the Pentagon. Former Army Secretary Tommy White, who led the Army in 2001, said he doesn't have any recollection of the luncheon or any contact with Awlaki.

"If this was a luncheon at the Office of Government Counsel, I would not necessarily be there," he said.

The Pentagon has offered no explanation of how a man, now on the CIA kill or capture list, ended up at a special lunch for Muslim outreach. Army public affairs official Gary Tallman was asked for comment five times between Oct. 13-19, but has responded only by asking how Fox News knew about the event.

However, after the lunch was first reported on Fox News on Wednesday, a spokesman for the Army said he would provide additional information.

He insisted the lunch was not an Army event, but rather a “Defense Department" activity.

He also noted that the FBI document referred to the “Office of Government Counsel” but should read “Office of General Counsel.”

A former high-ranking FBI agent told Fox News that at the time Awlaki went to lunch at the Pentagon, there was tremendous "arrogance" about the vetting process at the Pentagon.

"They vetted people politically and showed indifference toward security and intelligence advice of others," the former agent said.

Obama Is Failing Because He Doesn't Understand He Can't Create Jobs

2010-08-23T11:12:00.000-07:00

http://www.businessinsider.com/stimulus-money-is-not-the-answer-2010-8

Billions in stimulus money have failed to make the economy soar. Douglas Schoen on how Obama has hurt the recovery by flooding America with free cash.

Recent reports from the Federal Reserve, the Labor Department , and the Commerce Department clearly and demonstratively show that the Obama Administration’s policies have not succeeded – indeed they have failed in ways that are clear and unambiguous.

The Obama administration’s policies and programs are not producing real, long lasting results, and there has been no real growth.

Put another way, an unprecedented degree of federal government spending and intervention vis-à-vis the $787 billion dollar economic stimulus package, the $81 billion dollar bailouts of GM and Chrysler, and the enactment of health care and financial regulatory and reform bills have done nothing to stimulate our anemic recovery and have fundamentally failed at creating private sector jobs, or generating economic growth necessary for a sustainable, healthy recovery.

Indeed, they have done little more than generate an unsustainable national debt, which now exceeds $13 trillion. The Federal Reserve reported that the pace of recovery in the United States “has slowed in recent months” – with a growth rate of just 2.4 percent in the second quarter down from 3.7 percent in the first quarter of 2010, and an annual rate of 5 percent at the end of 2009.

Obama's $787 billion economic stimulus package has failed to live up to the lofty expectations and predictions of the administration, and has failed to create the amount of jobs necessary to significantly reduce the unemployment rate.Exports are down, lending by banks continues to contract, employers are reluctant to hire, and consumer spending is at a historically weak level for a recovery period.

In February 2009, the administration released a report called "The Job Impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan." The report, drafted by former Council of Economic Advisers chairwoman Christina Romer, predicted that if Congress passed a stimulus plan, unemployment would plateau below 8 percent last fall and by this month register at 7 percent.

But with total nonfarm payroll employment declining by 131,000 in July, and the unemployment rate remaining at 9.5% for the second consecutive month, it is clear that the stimulus package has created few new private sector jobs, and will probably not create any new economic opportunities for them any time soon. The economy lost 8.4 million jobs in 2008 and 2009. This year, private employers have added only 559,000 jobs.

At best, it produced short-term boosts to the economy through subsidization of the public sector, with government stimulus programs like Cash for Clunkers, Home Buyer Tax Credit and construction projects.

To be sure, these programs provided an incentive to buy cars and houses in the short-term. And indeed, there was a big spike in automobile purchases when the Cash for Clunkers program went into effect last July, allowing consumers to trade in their older-model vehicles for $4,500 rebates toward more fuel-efficient new cars between July 1 and November 1, 2009.

But it is still unclear whether it has had any effect on increasing demand in the long-term. Indeed, by the end of 2009, auto sales plunged 35% right back to where they were before the stimulus was enacted. Today, the automotive industry work force is 30 percent smaller than prerecession, as evidenced in the July jobs report.

And upon thorough examination, it is clear that not only have the Obama administration’s interventions in the auto industry failed to produce the desired long-term results, it is responsible for making the situation worse in the short-term.

Take, for example, the Administration’s auto industry intervention – adding $60 billion to the bailout, and making the government the majority shareholder in GM and the United Auto Workers (UAW) union the majority shareholder in Chrysler. To be sure, the Administration’s actions did help stabilize the auto industry. But the way that they did it added to the overall cost of the bailout, and substantially reduced automotive industry employment.

According to an audit prepared by the inspector general of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, President Obama’s auto Task Force pressed General Motors and Chrysler to close scores of dealerships and accelerated job losses. Indeed, Neil M. Barofsky, the special inspector general for the Troubled Asset Relief Program of the Treasury Department, has said that the Administration "made a series of decisions that may have substantially contributed to the accelerated shuttering of thousands of small businesses and thereby potentially adding tens of thousands of workers to the already lengthy unemployment rolls…[B]ased on a theory and without sufficient consideration of the decision's broader economic impact.”

Meanwhile, "by reaching into virtually every sector of economic life,” argues Verizon CEO Ivan Seidenberg, “government is injecting uncertainty into the marketplace and making it harder to raise capital and create new businesses," while implementing various programs have discouraged hiring by increasing the cost of labor.

The tax increases and regulations associated with the health care reform and financial regulation bills have exacerbated uncertainty and have effectively discouraged consumer spending.

There is a general uncertainty about the implications of Obamacare and its "bewildering array of new government agencies, regulations and mandates, " as stated in a report by Republican Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas, GOP Rep. Kevin Brady of Texas and the minority staff of the Joint Economic Committee.

Indeed, twenty states and the National Federation of Independent Business have filed a lawsuit against the health care overhaul because they face imminent harm from its mandates. Finally, the passage of the financial regulation bill, which was signed into law by President Barack Obama last month, has left our financial system even more vulnerable to abuse than it was before its passage. The big banks are still too big to fail, controlling a larger share of the nation’s deposits than before the crisis, and the bill failed to address reorganizing Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae.

Meanwhile, none of the 533 new regulations, 60 studies and 93 reports included in the financial regulatory overhaul provide effective restrictions or controls on mortgage-backed securities and similar financial instruments that permitted giant banks to disguise predatory lending decisions from unknowing investors.

The net result of these failed policies is that consumers are reluctant to spend, entrepreneurs are reluctant to invest, and employers are reluctant to hire to the degree necessary to spur economic growth.

We need a bold new focus from the President and his party.

Put simply, they must abandon their failed policies and adopt a bold new commitment to fiscal discipline and targeted fiscal stimulus of the private sector and entrepreneurship.

They must put forth a set of focused initiatives aimed at reducing the debt and cutting spending, with an emphasis on tax cuts, fiscal stimulus, and a series of initiatives to stimulate and encourage job creation. Specifically, the Administration should:

Extend the Small Business Innovation Research program, and expand lending through the Small Business Administration’s loan program to encourage more start-ups and enable small businesses to hire and train more workers

Declare a payroll tax holiday for new businesses so they can invest in new jobs.

Jumpstart the economy by investing in green technology and create new jobs and make the United States a leader in clean energy manufacturing, especially solar, and expand the innovation and development of renewable energy.

Expand the federal research and development tax credit to businesses that invest in research and development, and increase research grants to small businesses that are developing new technologies.

Close tax loopholes for the rich to provide real tax reduction for middle-class and working families without increasing the deficit.

Create a National Infrastructure Bank as proposed by President Obama in his 2008 campaign. This Bank will take infrastructure decisions out of the hands of politicians and out of the world of pork barrel politics, end the infamous “bridges to nowhere,” and make infrastructure decisions that contribute to growth

Above all, the Obama Administration must accept the fact that ONLY private enterprise can create jobs – more stimulus money is not the answer.

Douglas Schoen is a political strategist and author of the upcoming book "Mad as Hell: How the Tea Party Movement is Fundamentally Remaking Our Two-Party System," to be published by Harper, an imprint of HarperCollins on September 14. This post originally appeared at the Daily Beast and is republished here with permission.

TSA lies to public about storing body imaging at airport screening stations

2010-08-04T11:01:00.000-07:00

Do you trust the government for anything?

Jan 13th 2010, the TSA informs us "All functionality to store, export or print images is disabled before these machines are delivered to airport checkpoints. There is no way for Transportation Security Officers in the airport environment to place the machines into test mode."

http://blog.tsa.gov/2010/01/advance-imaging-technology-storing.html

today,

Feds admit storing checkpoint body scan images

TSA's X-ray backscatter scanning with "privacy filter"

(Credit: TSA.gov)

For the last few years, federal agencies have defended body scanning by insisting that all images will be discarded as soon as they're viewed. The Transportation Security Administration claimed last summer, for instance, that "scanned images cannot be stored or recorded."

Now it turns out that some police agencies are storing the controversial images after all. The U.S. Marshals Service admitted this week that it had surreptitiously saved tens of thousands of images recorded with a millimeter wave system at the security checkpoint of a single Florida courthouse.

This follows an earlier disclosure (PDF) by the TSA that it requires all airport body scanners it purchases to be able to store and transmit images for "testing, training, and evaluation purposes." The agency says, however, that those capabilities are not normally activated when the devices are installed at airports.

Body scanners penetrate clothing to provide a highly detailed image so accurate that critics have likened it to a virtual strip search. Technologies vary, with millimeter wave systems capturing fuzzier images, and backscatter X-ray machines able to show precise anatomical detail. The U.S. government likes the idea because body scanners can detect concealed weapons better than traditional magnetometers.

This privacy debate, which has been simmering since the days of the Bush administration, came to a boil two weeks ago when Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano announcedthat scanners would soon appear at virtually every major airport. The updated list includes airports in New York City, Dallas, Washington, Miami, San Francisco, Seattle, and Philadelphia.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center, a Washington, D.C.-based advocacy group, has filed a lawsuitasking a federal judge to grant an immediate injunction pulling the plug on TSA's body scanning program. In a separate lawsuit, EPIC obtained a letter (PDF) from the Marshals Service, part of the Justice Department, and released it on Tuesday afternoon.

These "devices are designed and deployed in a way that allows the images to be routinely stored and recorded, which is exactly what the Marshals Service is doing," EPIC executive director Marc Rotenberg told CNET. "We think it's significant."

William Bordley, an associate general counsel with the Marshals Service, acknowledged in the letter that "approximately 35,314 images...have been stored on the Brijot Gen2 machine" used in the Orlando, Fla. federal courthouse. In addition, Bordley wrote, a Millivision machine was tested in the Washington, D.C. federal courthouse but it was sent back to the manufacturer, which now apparently possesses the image database.

The Gen 2 machine, manufactured by Brijot of Lake Mary, Fla., uses a millimeter wave radiometer and accompanying video camera to store up to 40,000 images and records. Brijot boasts that it can even be operated remotely: "The Gen 2 detection engine capability eliminates the need for constant user observation and local operation for effective monitoring. Using our APIs, instantly connect to your units from a remote location via the Brijot Client interface."

TSA's millimeter wave body scan

(Credit: TSA.gov)

This trickle of disclosures about the true capabilities of body scanners--and how they're being used in practice--is probably what alarms privacy advocates more than anything else.

A 70-page document (PDF) showing the TSA's procurement specifications, classified as "sensitive security information," says that in some modes the scanner must "allow exporting of image data in real time" and provide a mechanism for "high-speed transfer of image data" over the network. (It also says that image filters will "protect the identity, modesty, and privacy of the passenger.")

"TSA is not being straightforward with the public about the capabilities of these devices," Rotenberg said. "This is the Department of Homeland Security subjecting every U.S. traveler to an intrusive search that can be recorded without any suspicion--I think it's outrageous." EPIC's lawsuit says that the TSA should have announced formal regulations, and argues that the body scanners violate the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits "unreasonable" searches.

For its part, the TSA says that body scanning is perfectly constitutional: "The program is designed to respect individual sensibilities regarding privacy, modesty and personal autonomy to the maximum extent possible, while still performing its crucial function of protecting all members of the public from potentially catastrophic events."

Charlie Rangel introduces bill to reinstate the draft, ages 18-42

2010-07-26T14:28:00.000-07:00

http://www.govtrack.us/congress/bill.xpd?bill=h111-5741

To require all persons in the United States between the ages of 18 and 42 to perform national service, either as a member of the uniformed services or in civilian service in furtherance of the national defense and homeland security, to authorize the induction of persons in the uniformed services during wartime to meet end-strength requirements of the uniformed services, and for other purposes.

Senate bill would make airport body scanners mandatory

2010-07-12T13:46:00.001-07:00

http://rawstory.com/rs/2010/0710/senate-bill-body-scanners-mandatory/

Senate bill would make airport body scanners mandatory

A bipartisan bill introduced in the Senate requiring all airports to use full-body scanners lacks sufficient privacy safeguards, says a prominent watchdog group.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center says the bill, introduced in the Senate by Sen. Bob Bennett (R-UT) and Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN), "contains particularly weak privacy provision[s] that ignore many of the problems with the devices already uncovered."

The bill (PDF), known as the Securing Aircraft From Explosives Responsibly: Advanced Imaging Recognition ("SAFER AIR") Act, would require all commercial airports in the US to use full-body scanners as their primary screening method by no later than 2013. The bill is a response to criticism among some lawmakers that the DHS has been dragging its feet on implementing the technology.

Full-body scanners have been in testing at some airports in the US for several years, and the Department of Homeland Security ramped up expansion of the screening program after the Christmas Day bombing attempt. Some 48 airports have installed the machines so far, and the DHS has purchased 450 of them.

The bill includes clauses designed to protect passengers' privacy, such as a requirement that the images the scanners create "cannot be stored, transferred, copied or printed." It also forbids security personnel from having cameras near the machinery.

Those clauses are designed to allay the fears of privacy advocates, who worry that images taken by the machines could be used to humiliate travelers or even create child pornography.

However, the bill's privacy measures appear to be little different from the policy already set out by the Department of Homeland Security, which states that body-scanner technology is used in such a way that it "cannot store, print, transmit or save the image."

But, as RAW STORY reported earlier this year, the machines being installed at airports have a setting that allows them to store and transmit the images, and the Senate bill includes no provisions excluding minors from being scanned.

There have been several high-profile cases of screening technology being abused. In one heavily-publicized incident, a TSA worker in Miami who was scanned as part of a training session allegedly assaulted a co-worker who had mocked the size of his genitals.

In another incident, a British airport security worker was reprimanded after making comments about a co-worker's breasts after a screening.

The Electronic Privacy Information Center has filed a lawsuit against DHS asking for program to be suspended "pending an independent review."

But Sens. Bennett and Klobuchar insist there is "no excuse" not to implement the technology.

“As the threats against our nation’s air transportation networks continue to evolve, the screening technologies we rely on to identify and counter these threats must evolve as well,” Klobuchar said in a press release. “With so much at stake, we need to make sure we are using the best security tools and that all security forces are working together to stop potential threats before they get off the ground.”

“Magnetometers are not enough in this post 9/11 world, where threats have increased but screening technology has largely remained the same," Bennett said. "With much more advanced technology on the market, there is absolutely no excuse for the delayed implementation."

Oil Spill Pushes Carbon tax back into spotlight

2010-06-30T06:16:00.000-07:00

Oil Spill Pushes Carbon tax back into spotlight

Why is the govt ignoring the dutch solution to sucking up all the oil?

http://www.financialpost.com/Avertible+catastrophe/3203808/story.html

the goal is to perpetuate the disaster and use it as a means to pass a carbon tax.

"don't let a good crisis go to waste" - rahm emanuel.

Here is an Obama speech citing the oil spill as a reason to pass the carbon tax:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/06/02/obama.oil.spill/index.html

SF Gate - Oil Spill Pushes Carbon tax back into spotlight:

http://articles.sfgate.com/2010-06-22/news/21920379_1_carbon-emissions-fossil-fuels-energy-taxes

Zbigniew Brzezinski - Council on Foreign Relations

2010-05-25T07:13:00.001-07:00

Zbigniew Brzezinski considers himself your "overlord."

Here he is on video. Watch:
http://beforeitsnews.com/news/46/295/Brzezinski_Fears_Global_Awakening_and_Seeks_Concentrated,_Universal_Power.html

He praises the virtues of a "moral imperative..for a concentrated source of power that has universal reach"

Here are some things he has written in his book, The Grand Chessboard:

"To put it in a terminology that harkens back to the more brutal age of ancient empires, the three grand imperatives of imperial geostrategy are to prevent collusion and maintain security dependence among the vassals, to keep tributaries pliant and protected, and to keep the barbarians from coming together." (p.40)

"The attitude of the American public toward the external projection of American power has been much more ambivalent. The public supported America's engagement in World War II largely because of the shock effect of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor.” (pp 24-5)

"Moreover, as America becomes an increasingly multi-cultural society, it may find it more difficult to fashion a consensus on foreign policy issues, except in the circumstance of a truly massive and widely perceived direct external threat." (p. 211)

He is also a part of PNAC (Project for a New American Century). This organization says, in their published documents:

"Further, the process of transformation, even if it brings revolutionary change, is likely to be a long one, absent some catastrophic and catalyzing event, like a new Pearl Harbor..."

mother of all gushers could kill earth's oceans

2010-05-11T20:16:00.000-07:00

Mother of all gushers could kill Earth's oceans

Imagine a pipe 5 feet wide spewing crude oil like a fire hose from what could be the planets' largest, high-pressure oil and gas reserve. With the best technology available to man, the Deepwater Horizon rig popped a hole into that reserve and was overwhelmed. If this isn't contained, it could poison all the oceans of the world.

"Well if you say the fire hose has a 70,000 psi pump on the other end yes! No comparison here. The volume out rises geometrically with pressure. Its a squares function. Two times the pressure is 4 times the push. The Alaska pipeline is 4 feet in diameter and pushes with a lot less pressure. This situation in the Gulf of Mexico is stunning dangerous." -- Paul Noel (May 2, 2010)

Last night we received the following text in an email, author not identified. I passed it by Paul Noel, who is an expert in the field. His response follows thereafter. In calculating the gallons required to kill the oceans, remember that oil goes to the surface, where life is concentrated.

The Oil Mess

[...].

The original estimate was about 5,000 gallons of oil a day spilling into the ocean. Now they're saying 200,000 gallons a day. That's over a million gallons of crude oil a week!

I'm engineer with 25 years of experience. I've worked on some big projects with big machines. Maybe that's why this mess is so clear to me.

First, the BP platform was drilling for what they call deep oil. They go out where the ocean is about 5,000 feet deep and drill another 30,000 feet into the crust of the earth. This it right on the edge of what human technology can do. Well, this time they hit a pocket of oil at such high pressure that it burst all of their safety valves all the way up to the drilling rig and then caused the rig to explode and sink. Take a moment to grasp the import of that. The pressure behind this oil is so high that it destroyed the maximum effort of human science to contain it.
When the rig sank it flipped over and landed on top of the drill hole some 5,000 feet under the ocean.

Now they've got a hole in the ocean floor, 5,000 feet down with a wrecked oil drilling rig sitting on top of is spewing 200,000 barrels of oil a day into the ocean. Take a moment and consider that, will you!

First they have to get the oil rig off the hole to get at it in order to try to cap it. Do you know the level of effort it will take to move that wrecked oil rig, sitting under 5,000 feet of water? That operation alone would take years and hundreds of millions to accomplish. Then, how do you cap that hole in the muddy ocean floor? There just is no way. No way.

The only piece of human technology that might address this is a nuclear bomb. I'm not kidding. If they put a nuke down there in the right spot it might seal up the hole. Nothing short of that will work. [See Paul Noel's ideas above.]

If we can't cap that hole that oil is going to destroy the oceans of the world. It only takes one quart of motor oil to make 250,000 gallons of ocean water toxic to wildlife. Are you starting to get the magnitude of this?
We're so used to our politicians creating false crises to forward their criminal agendas that we aren't recognizing that we're staring straight into possibly the greatest disaster mankind will ever see. Imagine what happens if that oil keeps flowing until it destroys all life in the oceans of this planet. Who knows how big of a reservoir of oil is down there.

Not to mention that the oceans are critical to maintaining the proper oxygen level in the atmosphere for human life.

We're humped. Unless God steps in and fixes this. No human can. You can be sure of that.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

See also: Oil spill Much Much Worse than reported and Not Stopping Soon (Christian Science Monitor)

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Response by Paul Noel
for Pure Energy Systems News

I really do think that the situation is getting further and further out of hand.

By yesterday morning, the nature of the crude had changed, indicating that the spill was collapsing the rock structures. How much I cannot say. If it is collapsing the rock structures, the least that can be said is that the rock is fragmenting and blowing up the tube with the oil. With that going on you have a high pressure abrasive sand blaster working on the kinks in the pipe eroding it causing the very real risk of increasing the leaks.

More than that is the very real risk of causing the casing to become unstable and literally blowing it up the well bringing the hole to totally open condition. Another risk arises because according to reports the crew was cementing the exterior of the casing when this happens. As a result, the well, if this was not properly completed, could begin to blow outside the casing. Another possible scenario is a sea floor collapse. If that happens Katie bar the door.

Possible Fix

I do not see any good possibilities from humans further fracturing the rock particularly at higher levels. That is the cap rock that is holding the deposit together.

I do see a possible use of explosives for favorable outcome. If a properly sized charge were applied in a shaped fashion around the drill pipe at some distance from it say 5 feet or so it is entirely possible that an explosive charge could pinch the pipe off similar to a hydraulic clamp. The resulting situation would vastly reduce the spill. Once you clamped off the pipe much more substantially say down to 1 foot or less opening the resulting pipe could be charge cut above the location and a tapered pipe fitted to it to collect any leaking oil. The end result would be to contain the spill and dramatically control any leaks because drill mud could then be entered into the pipe fitted to the exterior. In the end, the pipe could be controlled that way. The size of a charge to do this would be a few pounds not megatons.

A nuclear detonation carries the real risk of giving us the full doomsday scenario on this well. I just don't like doing that. There is no coming back from the brink when you do that one. If it works, which I see as unlikely, great. If it doesn't work, there is now a maybe a hole 1/4 mile across leaking oil. That looks worse than any possible outcomes otherwise.

Oil Deposit Capacity

The BP people are not talking, but this well is into a deposit that easily could top 500,000 barrels production per day for 10 or 15 years. Letting that all go in one blast seems more than foolish.

The deposit is one I have known about since 1988. The deposit is very big. The central pressure in the deposit is 165 to 170 thousand PSI. It contains so much hydrocarbon that you simply cannot imagine it. In published reports, BP estimated a blow out could reach near 200,000 Barrels per day (165,000) They may have estimated a flow rate on a 5 foot pipe. The deposit is well able to surpass this.

The oil industry has knowledge of the deposit more than they admit. The deposit is 100 miles off shore. They are drilling into the edge of the deposit to leak it down gently to be able to produce from the deposit. The deposit is so large that while I have never heard exact numbers it was described to me to be either the largest or the second largest oil deposit ever found. It is mostly a natural gas deposit. That is another reason not to blast too willy nilly there. The natural gas that could be released is really way beyond the oil in quantity. It is like 10,000 times the oil in the deposit.

It is this deposit that has me reminding people of what the Shell geologist told me about the deposit. This was the quote, "Energy shortage..., Hell! We are afraid of running out of air to burn." The deposit is very large. It covers an area off shore something like 25,000 square miles. Natural Gas and Oil is leaking out of the deposit as far inland as Central Alabama and way over into Florida and even over to Louisiana almost as far as Texas. This is a really massive deposit. Punching holes in the deposit is a really scary event as we are now seeing.

Rig and Pipe Info

The pipe is a fairly rigid pipe and sticks up out of the Blow out prevention device for some distance before it bends over and kinks off. The distance is not long but is enough to do what I suggested. Explosive forming of metals is a standard technology and under water it is easier. The charge focuses very predictably.

Imaging a long straw that is 1 mile long and has kinked over in several locations. This is about what you have. I have seen the submarine photos from early on. Just a really big straw. It has about a 1.5 or 2 foot diameter drill pipe in the center with about a 10 inch hole down the center. I am not exactly sure on the drill pipe size. The casing here is very thick steel. It has to handle massive pressures.

The rig is quite some distance away from the well. It may be a 1/4 mile or more away. It sort of bent over and then kinked the pipe as it went down.

I guess the size here sort of bends the imagination. This rig has a deck area of about 3 to 4 acres. It had a crew quarters on board that had about 120 people in it. (Imagine a big hotel here.) The hotel on the rig was about 4 stories high. You just cannot imagine until you see these rigs how big they are. If you want to see one go to Mobile Bay. Gulf High Island 2 and other rigs in the area can be seen clearly for 90 miles from Pensacola Florida. The towers go up 1100 feet. You can take the ferry right between two rigs if you go from Fort Morgan to Dauphin Island. There is no comparison to these rig anywhere in the world. They are the biggest ever built bar none.

Controls That Should Have Been In Place

By the way, I am not against drilling it, I am just against doing so without proper controls.

The rig that was drilling was not a US Flagged rig. That means US Inspectors were not allowed on board the rig to inspect it. As a matter of National Security under the GATT the USA has a right to demand US Only in various technology. The USA should never allow a foreign flag vessel to drill for oil in the US Economic Zone (200 mile limit).
Acoustic automated shut of devices should be required.
I think US Federal Inspectors should have to be resident on and inspecting rigs like this 24/7.
I think that the drilling should be required to do some smaller holes that deliberately miss the main deposit that test the structure before main drilling operations happen.
Careful procedures should be in place to set up wells before they hit the main deposit. The well casing should have to be inserted well before the drill hits the deposit and it should have to be cemented in at least 2 weeks prior to finishing the hole down to the oil or gas. This is to give the cement time to set. The casing should have ridging to make this cement have a tight wedged grip on the miles of rock around it. This is required because the lift pressure on a pipe in this case could easily reach 20 million pounds of lift. This is an insane amount of up pressure. Even at 70,000 psi it would lift about 140 million pounds. (almost 64,000 long tons!)

Haste from Economic Pressure

I suspect that the series of disasters we have seen in mines around the world and in the USA regards coal and oil are the product of pushing the crews and developments too fast due to the high economic pressures. This happened the last time (Sago and others) when the economic pressure started rising.

The economic pressures on the energy prices are stunning. Everyone is trying to keep their economy going. You can measure the economic output of a nation directly with the energy consumption day to day. The USA dropped its energy consumption in the current downturn (depression) by about 24%. It is now rising again. We are about 19% down and rising. The current situation is that the developments in oil/gas and coal are not keeping pace with what is going to be the demand shortly. They cannot even hope to meet the demand.

This is why I said that Alternative Energy is the only hope.

They can push the pedal to the metal (figuratively speaking) and there is not going to be a speed up much. Since human demand is going to force increases in supply towards 3 times the current level in less than 30 years, we are looking at a big hole with no hope of fixing it.

Air pollution world wide is reaching levels that are at the limits of the environment to take the demands. This increase in energy has to come from somewhere else.

Nuclear power doesn't have the potential. It turns out to run out of fuel in about 30 years. Worse yet solving the problem with nuclear doesn't do anything but boil away scarce fresh water supplies. All combustion does this. The only solutions are ones where the energy comes from somewhere else. Solar and Wind are good options. As you are also aware, the hard core alternatives are there in magnetic power etc. This has to come.

The alternatives to drilling US Waters for oil if we solve this with oil are to depend more and more on hostile powers for oil. Funding your enemies is insane. Drilling in US waters risks ever increasing threats of what we have going on right now.

The collapse of rock structures is even more scary. Mexico has one entire state that is being held up by nitrogen injection wells that would sink if that gas is released. This is not funny stuff. I know I get punched by the "know nothings" out there with political agenda, but I will risk it. If you will note the Oil and Gas people pretty much don't say anything against me. They know. I have been to some of their events and they actually like what I have to say. They cannot say it for fear of their jobs.

If one estimates the cost of a barrel of oil from the Middle East, the US Armed Forces cost added in would drive it to about $2000/barrel. If people paid this at the pump they would be demanding what I say with force so high you couldn't hear anything else. If you factor in the cost of spills and such domestic oil probably costs $500/barrel or more. This is just insane.

# # #

Paul Noel, 52, works as Software Engineer (as Contractor) for the US Army at Redstone Arsenal, Alabama. He has a vast experience base including education across a wide area of technical skills and sciences. He supplies technical expertise in all areas required for new products development associated with the US Army office he works in. He supplies extensive expertise in understanding the Oil and Gas industry as well.

Born in Lynnwood Washington, he came to Huntsville Alabama, when his father moved to be part of NASA’s effort to put men on the moon. Neal Armstrong may have gotten the ride, but his father’s computers did the driving.

Paul is also a founding member of the New Energy Congress.

http://pesn.com/2010/05/02/9501643_M...Earths_oceans/

Bill allows the govt to collect any personal information from any financial institution for any reason.

2010-05-07T11:01:00.000-07:00

wake up. you are the enemy.

and, use cash as much as possible.

Under section 1022 of their bill the new bureau would collect any information it chooses from businesses and consumers including personal characteristics and financial information.

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/65427

Sen. Richard Shelby (R-Ala.), senior Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, said that provisions in the new financial regulatory bill violate privacy rights by allowing the government to collect any financial information it wants from any financial institution it wants.

Shelby, speaking at a press conference outlining Republican concerns about the financial regulatory overhaul, said that the bill violated Americans’ privacy rights by allowing the government to collect any financial information from any financial firm.

“I’m sure the ACLU – because we’ve heard from them – and others are looking at this very closely. I believe that it violates a lot of people’s privacy,” Shelby said.

Shelby added that Republicans would offer amendments that would attempt to “surgically strike” such objectionable provisions.

Republicans’ privacy concerns stem from the new information-gathering authorities think the bill would give to the federal government allowing it collect any information, including records from Automatic Teller Machines (ATM) and the addresses of depositors, from any financial institution at any time.

One such entity, the Office of Financial Research, is empowered to collect “any data or information” from any financial organization or federal regulator. One of those regulators, Shelby pointed out, would be the Bureau of Consumer Financial Protection (BCFP), which is empowered to collect a person’s ATM receipts and the addresses of depositors.

“The Democrats’ new bureaucracy poses a threat to our privacy,” Shelby said, “Under section 1022 of their bill the new bureau would collect any information it chooses from businesses and consumers including personal characteristics and financial information.

“Individuals could be required to provide the new agency with written answers – under oath – to any question posed by the bureau regarding their personal financial information.”

This information along with all other information collected by federal financial regulators can be used by the Office of Financial Research to monitor the entire financial system for so-called systemic risk.

The Office of Financial Research would serve as the brains behind the Financial Stability Council, which may request “the submission of any data and information” from either the office or another regulator like the BCFP.

“The Office may, on behalf of the Council, require the submission of periodic and other reports from any financial company for the purpose of assessing the extent to which a financial activity or financial market in which the financial company participates, or the financial company itself, poses a threat to the financial stability of the United States,” says the bill.

If banks don’t comply, they can be subpoenaed by the director of the Financial Stability Council.

Democrats saw no problem with the broad information-collecting powers in their bill. Sen. Jack Reed (D-R.I.) said that there “wasn’t any 4^thAmendment issue” in allowing the government to collect any financial data it wants.

The 4^th Amendment protects against “unreasonable searches and seizures” by the government. Reed said that the nation “desperately” needs to have the government monitoring the inner workings of the financial industry, arguing that if government couldn’t collect any information it thought it needed, regulators would be “flying in the dark.”

Sen. Bob Casey (D-Pa.) told CNSNews.com that if privacy issues arose as a result of the new collection powers, then Congress would deal with them at that time.

“I agree [with Reed]. I don’t see it,” Casey said. “If we get a bill passed, and it gets implemented and an issue arises that someone believes is an infringement on privacy, we’d certainly consider that and analyze that.”

CNSNews.com pressed Casey about exactly what activities would be prevented under the bill, pointing out that fraud is already illegal under federal law. Casey could not name any specific banking practice that the new bill would put a stop to or protect consumers from.

“The principle benefit of it is [that] it will hold firms, entities, and individuals accountable on Wall Street that have been allowed to run wild for a long time,” Casey said.

Healthcare under scrutiny

2010-04-29T11:25:00.000-07:00

Is it regulated under interstate commerce? Is it a tax? Good news, it is neither, and neither argument will withstand scrutiny under the Supreme Court.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704446704575206502199257916.html

A"tell" in poker is a subtle but detectable change in a player's behavior or demeanor that reveals clues about the player's assessment of his hand. Something similar has happened with regard to the insurance mandate at the core of last month's health reform legislation. Congress justified its authority to enact the mandate on the grounds that it is a regulation of commerce. But as this justification came under heavy constitutional fire, the mandate's defenders changed the argument—now claiming constitutional authority under Congress's power to tax.

This switch in constitutional theories is a tell: Defenders of the bill lack confidence in their commerce power theory. The switch also comes too late. When the mandate's constitutionality comes up for review as part of the state attorneys general lawsuit, the Supreme Court will not consider the penalty enforcing the mandate to be a tax because, in the provision that actually defines and imposes the mandate and penalty, Congress did not call it a tax and did not treat it as a tax.

View Full Image

Chad Crowe

The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (aka ObamaCare) includes what it calls an "individual responsibility requirement" that all persons buy health insurance from a private company. Congress justified this mandate under its power to regulate commerce among the several states: "The individual responsibility requirement provided for in this section," the law says, ". . . is commercial and economic in nature, and substantially affects interstate commerce, as a result of the effects described in paragraph (2)." Paragraph (2) then begins: "The requirement regulates activity that is commercial and economic in nature: economic and financial decisions about how and when health care is paid for, and when health insurance is purchased."

In this way, the statute speciously tries to convert inactivity into the "activity" of making a "decision." By this reasoning, your "decision" not to take a job, not to sell your house, or not to buy a Chevrolet is an "activity that is commercial and economic in nature" that can be mandated by Congress.

It is true that the Supreme Court has interpreted the Commerce Clause broadly enough to reach wholly intrastate economic "activity" that substantially affects interstate commerce. But the Court has never upheld a requirement that individuals who are doing nothing must engage in economic activity by entering into a contractual relationship with a private company. Such a claim of power is literally unprecedented.

Since this Commerce Clause language was first proposed in the Senate last December, Democratic legislators and law professors alike breezily dismissed any constitutional objections as preposterous. After the bill was enacted, critics branded lawsuits by state attorneys general challenging the insurance mandate as frivolous. Yet, unable to produce a single example of Congress using its commerce power this way, the defenders of the personal mandate began to shift grounds.

On March 21, the same day the House approved the Senate version of the legislation, the staff of the Joint Committee on Taxation released a 157-page "technical explanation" of the bill. The word "commerce" appeared nowhere. Instead, the personal mandate is dubbed an "Excise Tax on Individuals Without Essential Health Benefits Coverage." But while the enacted bill does impose excise taxes on "high cost," employer-sponsored insurance plans and "indoor tanning services," the statute never describes the regulatory "penalty" it imposes for violating the mandate as an "excise tax." It is expressly called a "penalty."

This shift won't work. The Supreme Court will not allow staffers and lawyers to change the statutory cards that Congress already dealt when it adopted the Senate language.

In the 1920s, when Congress wanted to prohibit activity that was then deemed to be solely within the police power of states, it tried to penalize the activity using its tax power. In Bailey v. Drexel Furniture (1922) the Supreme Court struck down such a penalty saying, "there comes a time in the extension of the penalizing features of the so-called tax when it loses its character as such and becomes a mere penalty with the characteristics of regulation and punishment."

Although the Court has never repudiated this principle, the Court now interprets the commerce power far more broadly. Thus Congress may regulate or prohibit intrastate economic activity directly without invoking its taxation power. Yet precisely because a mandate to engage in economic activity has never been upheld by the Court, the tax power is once again being used to escape constitutional limits on Congress's regulatory power.

Supporters of the mandate cite U.S. v. Kahriger (1953), where the Court upheld a punitive tax on gambling by saying that "[u]nless there are provisions extraneous to any tax need, courts are without authority to limit the exercise of the taxing power." Yet the Court in Kahriger also citedBailey with approval. The key to understanding Kahriger is the proposition the Court there rejected: "it is said that Congress, under the pretense of exercising its power to tax has attempted to penalize illegal intrastate gambling through the regulatory features of the Act" (emphasis added).

In other words, the Court in Kahriger declined to look behind Congress's assertion that it was exercising its tax power to see whether a measure was really a regulatory penalty. As the Court said in Sonzinsky v. U.S. (1937), "[i]nquiry into the hidden motives which may move Congress to exercise a power constitutionally conferred upon it is beyond the competency of courts." But this principle cuts both ways. Neither will the Court look behind Congress's inadequate assertion of its commerce power to speculate as to whether a measure was "really" a tax. The Court will read the cards as Congress dealt them.

Congress simply did not enact the personal insurance mandate pursuant to its tax powers. To the contrary, the statute expressly says the mandate "regulates activity that is commercial and economic in nature." It never mentions the tax power and none of its eight findings mention raising any revenue with the penalty.

Moreover, while inserting the mandate into the Internal Revenue Code, Congress then expressly severed the penalty from the normal enforcement mechanisms of the tax code. The failure to pay the penalty "shall not be subject to any criminal prosecution or penalty with respect to such failure." Nor shall the IRS "file notice of lien with respect to any property of a taxpayer by reason of any failure to pay the penalty imposed by this section," or "levy on any such property with respect to such failure."

In short, the "penalty" is explicitly justified as a penalty to enforce a regulation of economic activity and not as a tax. There is no authority for the Court to recharacterize a regulation as a tax when doing so is contrary to the express and actual regulatory purpose of Congress.

So defenders of the mandate are making yet another unprecedented claim. Never before has the Court looked behind Congress's unconstitutional assertion of its commerce power to see if a measure could have been justified as a tax. For that matter, never before has a "tax" penalty been used to mandate, rather than discourage or prohibit, economic activity.

Are there now five justices willing to expand the commerce and tax powers of Congress where they have never gone before? Will the Court empower Congress to mandate any activity on the theory that a "decision" not to act somehow affects interstate commerce? Will the Court accept that Congress has the power to mandate any activity so long as it is included in the Internal Revenue Code and the IRS does the enforcing?

Yes, the smart money is always on the Court upholding an act of Congress. But given the hand Congress is now holding, I would not bet the farm.

Mr. Barnett is a professor of constitutional law at Georgetown and the author of "Restoring the Lost Constitution: The Presumption of Liberty" (Princeton, 2005).

Obama authorizes assassination of U.S. citizen

2010-04-07T11:22:00.000-07:00

I've previously demonstrated that the president can now declare anyone an enemy combatant. I know this sounds ridiculous, but just to remind you:

http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=11574

I've also demonstrated that the FBI has declared libertarian candidate supporters in Missouri as "terrorists." This also sounds ridiculous, but just to remind you of this actually happening this year:

http://www.nolanchart.com/article6227.html

You and your family could be the next terrorist, targeted for elimination, decided without courts, without due process afforded to anyone committed of a crime by the Constitution.

The "war on terror" is against YOU, not a religious fanatic halfway around the world.

http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/04/07/assassinations

Confirmed: Obama authorizes assassination of U.S. citizen

BY GLENN GREENWALD

Wikipedia

Anwar al-Awlaki

(updated below - Update II)

In late January, I wrote about the Obama administration's "presidential assassination program," whereby American citizens are targeted for killings far away from any battlefield, based exclusively on unchecked accusations by the Executive Branch that they're involved in Terrorism. At the time, The Washington Post's Dana Priest had noted deep in a long article that Obama had continued Bush's policy (which Bush never actually implemented) of having the Joint Chiefs of Staff compile "hit lists" of Americans, and Priest suggested that the American-born Islamic cleric Anwar al-Awlaki was on that list. The following week, Obama's Director of National Intelligence, Adm. Dennis Blair, acknowledged in Congressional testimony that the administration reserves the "right" to carry out such assassinations.

Today, both The New York Times and The Washington Post confirm that the Obama White House has now expressly authorized the CIA to kill al-Alwaki no matter where he is found, no matter his distance from a battlefield. I wrote at length about the extreme dangers and lawlessness of allowing the Executive Branch the power to murder U.S. citizens far away from a battlefield (i.e., while they're sleeping, at home, with their children, etc.) and with no due process of any kind. I won't repeat those arguments -- they're here and here -- but I do want to highlight how unbelievably Orwellian and tyrannical this is in light of these new articles today.

Just consider how the NYT reports on Obama's assassination order and how it is justified:

The Obama administration has taken the extraordinary step of authorizing the targeted killing of an American citizen, the radical Muslim cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, who is believed to have shifted from encouraging attacks on the United States to directly participating in them, intelligence and counterterrorism officials said Tuesday. . . .
American counterterrorism officials say Mr. Awlaki is an operative of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, the affiliate of the terror network in Yemen and Saudi Arabia. They say theybelieve that he has become a recruiter for the terrorist network, feeding prospects into plots aimed at the United States and at Americans abroad, the officials said.
It is extremely rare, if not unprecedented, for an American to be approved for targeted killing, officials said. A former senior legal official in the administration of George W. Bush said he did not know of any American who was approved for targeted killing under the former president. . . .
"The danger Awlaki poses to this country is no longer confined to words," said an American official, who like other current and former officials interviewed for this article spoke of the classified counterterrorism measures on the condition of anonymity. "He’s gotten involved in plots."

No due process is accorded. No charges or trials are necessary. No evidence is offered, nor any opportunity for him to deny these accusations (which he has done vehemently through his family). None of that.

Instead, in Barack Obama's America, the way guilt is determined for American citizens -- and a death penalty imposed -- is that the President, like the King he thinks he is, secretly decrees someone's guilt as a Terrorist. He then dispatches his aides to run to America's newspapers -- cowardly hiding behind the shield of anonymity which they're granted -- to proclaim that the Guilty One shall be killed on sight because the Leader has decreed him to be a Terrorist. It is simply asserted that Awlaki has converted from a cleric who expresses anti-American views and advocates attacks on American military targets(advocacy which happens to be Constitutionally protected) to Actual Terrorist "involved in plots." These newspapers then print this Executive Verdict with no questioning, no opposition, no investigation, no refutation as to its truth. And the punishment is thus decreed: this American citizen will now be murdered by the CIA because Barack Obama has ordered that it be done. What kind of person could possibly justify this or think that this is a legitimate government power?

Just to get a sense for how extreme this behavior is, consider -- as theNYT reported -- that not even George Bush targeted American citizens for this type of extra-judicial killing (though a 2002 drone attack in Yemen did result in the death of an American citizen). Even more strikingly, Antonin Scalia, in the 2004 case of Hamdi v. Rumsfeld, wrote an Opinion (joined by Justice Stevens) arguing that it was unconstitutional for the U.S. Government merely to imprison (let alone kill) American citizens as "enemy combatants"; instead, they argued, the Constitution required that Americans be charged with crimes (such as treason) and be given a trial before being punished. The full HamdiCourt held that at least some due process was required before Americans could be imprisoned as "enemy combatants." Yet now, Barack Obama is claiming the right not merely to imprison, but to assassinate far from any battlefield, American citizens with no due process of any kind. Even GOP Congressman Pete Hoekstra, when questioning Adm. Blair, recognized the severe dangers raised by this asserted power.

And what about all the progressives who screamed for years about the Bush administration's tyrannical treatment of Jose Padilla? Bush merelyimprisoned Padilla for years without a trial. If that's a vicious, tyrannical assault on the Constitution -- and it was -- what should they be saying about the Nobel Peace Prize winner's assassination of American citizens without any due process?

All of this underscores the principal point made in this excellent new article by Eli Lake, who compellingly and comprehensively documents what readers here well know: that while Obama's "speeches and some of his administration’s policy rollouts have emphasized a break from the Bush era," the reality is that the administration has retained and, in some cases, built upon the core Bush/Cheney approach to civil liberties and Terrorism. As Al Gore asked in his superb 2006 speech protesting Bush's "War on the Constitution":

Can it be true that any president really has such powers under our Constitution?
If the answer is yes, then under the theory by which these acts are committed, are there any acts that can on their face be prohibited?
If the president has the inherent authority to eavesdrop on American citizens without a warrant, imprison American citizens on his own declaration, kidnap and torture, then what can't he do?

Notice the power that was missing from Gore's indictment of Bush radicalism: the power to kill American citizens. Add that to the litany -- as Obama has now done -- and consider how much more compelling Gore's accusatory questions become.

UPDATE: When Obama was seeking the Democratic nomination, the Constitutional Law Scholar answered a questionnaire about executive power distributed by The Boston Globe's Charlie Savage, and this was one of his answers:

5. Does the Constitution permit a president to detain US citizens without charges as unlawful enemy combatants?
[Obama]: No. I reject the Bush Administration's claim that the President has plenary authority under the Constitution to detain U.S. citizens without charges as unlawful enemy combatants.

So back then, Obama said the President lacks the power merely todetain U.S. citizens without charges. Now, as President, he claims the power to assassinate them without charges. Could even his hardest-core loyalists try to reconcile that with a straight face? As Spencer Ackerman documents today, not even John Yoo claimed that the President possessed the power Obama is claiming here.

UPDATE II: If you're going to go into the comment section -- or anywhere else -- and argue that this is all justified because Awlaki is an Evil, Violent, Murdering Terrorist Trying to Kill Americans, you should say how you know that. Generally, guilt is determined by having a trial where the evidence is presented and the accused has an opportunity to defend himself -- not by putting blind authoritarian faith in the unchecked accusations of government leaders, even if it happens to be Barack Obama. That's especially true given how many times accusations of Terrorism by the U.S. Government have proven to be false.

Weatherizing Program Falling Short

2010-03-30T06:35:00.000-07:00

you know, the weatherizing program that was supposed to instantly create "hundreds of thousands" of green collar jobs?

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100327/ap_on_bi_ge/us_stimulus_weatherization

FRESNO, Calif. – After a year of crippling delays, President Barack Obama's $5 billion program to install weather-tight windows and doors has retrofitted a fraction of homes and created far fewer construction jobs than expected.

In Indiana, state-trained workers flubbed insulation jobs. In Alaska,Wyoming and the District of Columbia, the program has yet to produce a single job or retrofit one home. And in California, a state with nearly 37 million residents, the program at last count had created 84 jobs.

The program was a hallmark of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act, a way to shore up the economy while encouraging people to conserve energy at home. But government rules about how to run what was deemed to be a "shovel-ready" project, including how much to pay contractors and how to protect historic homes during renovations, have thwarted chances at early success, according to an Associated Press review of the program.

"It seems like every day there is a new wrench in the works that keeps us from moving ahead," said program manager Joanne Chappell-Theunissen. She has spent the past several months mailing in photographs of old houses in rural Michigan to meet federal historic preservation rules. "We keep playing catch-up."

The stimulus package gave a jolt to the decades-old federalWeatherization Assistance Program. Weatherization money flows from Washington to the states, where it is passed to local nonprofits that hire contractors to spread insulation and install efficient heaters in people's homes.

Energy officials said the stimulus infusion is on track to create thousands of career-pathway jobs and support an industry that lowers carbon emissions while saving consumers money.

"This is the beginning of the next industrial revolution with the explosion of clean energy investments," said assistant U.S. Energy Secretary Cathy Zoi. "These are good jobs that are here to stay."

But after a year, the stimulus program has retrofitted 30,250 homes — about 5 percent of the overall goal — and fallen well short of the 87,000 jobs that the department planned, according to the latest available figures.

As the Obama administration promotes a second home energy-savings program — a $6 billion rebate plan — some experts are asking whether that will pay off for homeowners or for the planet.

"A very rosy picture was painted that energy efficiency would be a great way to create jobs and save money," said Michael Shellenberger, an energy expert who heads the Breakthrough Institute, an Oakland-based think tank that is financed by nonpartisan foundations and works on energy, climate change and health care issues. "The Obama administration risks overpromising again."

Many states held off on weatherizing under the stimulus over concerns about a Depression-era law that requires contractors to pay workers wages equal to those paid for local public works projects. The U.S. Labor Department issued wage rules for every county in the country in September but after receiving about 100 complaints, changed the wage rates again a few months later.

Bureaucratic delays kept officials in Austin, Texas, from weatherizing anything while they waited to hire furnace technicians under a $7.4 million federal grant, of which they received the first installment this month.

The recession itself has compounded the problems, since hiring freezes in some states meant there weren't enough public employees to administer the program.

In California, where Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger ordered many state workers to take "Furlough Fridays," the program had created 84 jobs and weatherized 12 homes at last official count, in December. Officials say 849 homes have been completed and estimate 200 hundred jobs have been created or saved since then.

Energy Department spokeswoman Jen Stutsman said the program produced 8,500 jobs nationwide from October to December 2009, but said she could not provide job creation figures for the last full year since federal guidelines for measuring the program's impact changed in the fall.

Zoi said the number of jobs created and homes completed would rise quickly as the program emerged from its startup phase, and that it was on target to meet overall goals. Now that the money is trickling down more quickly, auditors are fretting over how to make sure it doesn't fall into the wrong hands.

The Energy Department plans to hire one program officer for each state to watch for waste, fraud and mismanagement.

That also will help to ensure crews' performance is up to snuff.

In Illinois, the staff of the department's inspector general, Gregory Friedman, discovered that one agency weatherization inspector missed a dangerous gas leak on a newly installed furnace. State and local officials told auditors they would make sure the leak was fixed and retool statewide training materials.

In Indiana, where workers were required to go through a state weatherization training program, local managers say they have spent hours teaching new recruits to do their jobs properly.

"We keep getting inundated with all kinds of people who want a paycheck, but just aren't qualified to do this kind of work," said Bertha Proctor, who heads a nonprofit contracting agency in Vincennes, Ind.

Still, some of the stimulus program's flexible standards have allowed for innovation.

In Portland, Ore., local officials are reporting an energy-saving boon that has helped minority-owned businesses in the job-starved construction industry. Ohio, which had a strong weatherization program in place at the outset, had completed 6,814 homes by the end of last year, more than a fifth of the total nationwide.

Legislation authorizing a second energy savings program is moving slowly through Congress. Many details of the plan, including how long it will run and its total cost, still need to be worked out. The Obama administration said the "HomeStar" program would reward homeowners who buy energy-saving equipment with an on-the-spot rebate of $1,000 or more, and hope it could become as popular as last year's Cash for Clunkers money-back program for cars and trucks.

Micheline Guilbeault, 65, of Lawton, Okla., whose home was weatherized through the stimulus package, said she thought the new proposal would encourage more homeowners to go green.

"My house doesn't shudder anymore when the wind blows," Guilbeault said. "With the door that they just put in, I'm sure that the bill will go down because myself, I can feel the difference."

Still, some government watchdog groups said taxpayers shouldn't be on the hook paying for home improvements if the government has yet to release figures showing how much weatherizing saves.

"The government should have stayed out of the weatherizing business in the first place," said Leslie Paige of Washington-based Citizens Against Government Waste. "This is a way to rapidly expand and entrench an existing program without ever going back and looking at the rationale or intent or effectiveness."

LEAK: CIA recommendations on how to manipulate French/German public to stay in Afghanistan

2010-03-26T08:49:00.001-07:00

If the war in the middle east is so justified, why does American intelligence need to manipulate Western European citizens into supporting the war? What law allows the CIA to secretly manipulate citizens of other countries into supporting American objectives?

LEAK: CIA recommendations on how to manipulate French/German public to stay in Afghanistan

http://wikileaks.org/#cia-afghanistan

This classified CIA analysis from March, outlines possible PR-strategies to shore up public support in Germany and France for a continued war in Afghanistan. After the Dutch government fell on the issue of dutch troops in Afgha nistan last month, the CIA became worried that similar events could happen in the countries that post the third and fourth largest troop contingents to the ISAF-mission. The proposed PR strategies focus on pressure points that have been identified within these countries. For France it is the sympathy of the public for Afghan refugees and women. For Germany it is the fear of the consequences of defeat (drugs, more refugees, terrorism) as well as for Germany's standing in the NATO. The memo is an recipe for the targeted manipulation of public opinion in two NATO ally countries, written by the CIA. It is classified as Confidential / No Foreign Nationals.

http://file.wikileaks.org/file/cia-afghanistan.pdf

The crazy constitutional logic of the individual insurance mandate

2010-03-25T17:42:00.000-07:00

The crazy constitutional logic of the individual insurance mandate

http://reason.com/archives/2010/03/24/dont-buy-it

A few weeks before Congress passed a law that orders every American to buy health insurance, the Virginia legislature passed a law that says "no resident of this Commonwealth…shall be required to obtain or maintain a policy of individual insurance coverage." Two weeks later, Idaho’s governor signed a law that declares "every person within the state of Idaho is and shall be free to choose or decline to choose any mode of securing health care services without penalty."

Supporters of ObamaCare say such legislation, which more than 30 other states are considering, has no force, since the Constitution makes congressional enactments "the supreme law of the land." But that is true only when federal laws are authorized by the Constitution, and the individual health insurance mandate is not.

The mandate's defenders say Congress is exercising its power to "regulate commerce…among the several states." Yet a law that compels people to engage in an intrastate transaction plainly does not fit within the original understanding of the Commerce Clause, which was aimed at facilitating the interstate exchange of goods by removing internal trade barriers.

Even a Commerce Clause stretched by seven decades of deferential Supreme Court rulings is not wide enough to cover the failure to buy insurance, a noneconomic inactivity. The two cases that led to the Court's broadest readings of the Commerce Clause both involved production of a fungible commodity for which there was an interstate market regulated by Congress.

In the first case, decided in 1942, the Court ruled that a farmer could be penalized for exceeding federal crop limits aimed at controlling supply and boosting prices even though all of the extra wheat he grew was consumed on his farm. The Court reasoned that homegrown wheat "exerts a substantial economic effect on interstate commerce" by reducing the total amount of wheat sold.

In the second case, decided in 2005, the Court ruled that Congress could ban homegrown marijuana used for medical purposes authorized by state law. Although the marijuana, like the wheat, was never sold and never left the state, the Court said, its production undercut the federal government's attempt "to control the supply and demand of controlled substances in both lawful and unlawful drug markets."

Unlike growing wheat or marijuana, the decision not to buy medical insurance does not produce anything, let alone a commodity traded between states. Maybe so, say ObamaCare’s defenders, but that decision has an impact on the demand for insurance and on the health care market (one-sixth of the economy!), which the federal government is trying to control in the same way that it tries to control the marijuana trade (with similar prospects of success).

This sort of reasoning leaves nothing beyond the reach of Congress, since anything you do (or don't do) can be said to affect interstate commerce. In its 1995 decision overturning a federal ban on possessing guns near schools, the Supreme Court cautioned against the temptation "to pile inference upon inference in a manner that would bid fair to convert congressional authority under the Commerce Clause to a general police power of the sort retained by the States." That kind of analysis, the Court warned, threatens to "obliterate the distinction between what is national and what is local."

In a recent Heritage Foundation paper, Georgetown University law professor Randy Barnett and two co-authors note that the decision upholding wheat quotas does not mean "Congress can require every American to buy boxes of Shredded Wheat cereal on the grounds that, by not buying wheat cereal, non-consumers were adversely affecting the regulated wheat market." Likewise, federal regulation of carmakers does not mean "Congress could constitutionally require every American to buy a new Chevy Impala every year."

Yet this is the logic of the health insurance mandate, an unprecedented attempt to punish people for the offense of living in the United States without buying something the federal government thinks they should have. Don't buy it.

Jacob Sullum is a senior editor at Reason and a nationally syndicated columnist.