The survey of Palestinians indicates that 61% reject a two-state solution,73% agreed with a quote from the Hamas charter (and Islamic hadith) about the need to kill Jews hiding behind stones and trees, 80% agreed with a quote from the Hamas Charter about the need for battalions from the Arab and Islamic world to defeat the Jews.
The survey also says that "among Palestinians in general 65% preferred talks and 20% violence." Someone explain that one to me, because if a strong majority don't support a two-state solution, what exactly do they want to talk about? "Bibi, let's sit down and talk about how we can work together to destroy the State of Israel."
Saturday, July 16, 2011
Survey Of Palestinians: 61% Reject A Two-State Solution
Edwin Meese: The Obamacare Case Proves That It’s Time For Judicial Engagement
Former Attorney General Edwin Meese writes that "The recent ruling by the Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upholding the Affordable Care Act’s mandate that all individuals purchase health insurance shows what happens when judges try to do constitutional law without actually judging." To read the full article visit http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/271672/obamacare-case-proves-its-time-judicial-engagement-edwin-meese-iii Tweet
Thursday, July 14, 2011
Pentagon: 24,000 Files Stolen
The Pentagon suffered one of its largest-ever cyber thefts this spring when more than 24,000 files were stolen by a foreign government, officials disclosed on Thursday.Tweet
William Lynn, the deputy secretary of defense, said at the National Defense University in Washington that the files were stolen from a defense industry computer in a single intrusion in March.
“It is a significant concern that over the past decade, terabytes of data have been extracted by foreign intruders from corporate networks of defense companies,” he said at the start of an afternoon speech laying out the Defense Department’s first unified strategy for cyber security. “Indeed, in a single intrusion this March, 24,000 files were taken.”
Lynn said the massive attack was not by an individual but by another country. “It was done, we think, by a foreign intelligence service,” he said, declining to identify the country. Theft “was data-related,” he said.
That cyber break-in and others have galvanized the Pentagon to develop new cybersecurity rules aimed at guarding against attacks coming from within the military and outside it.
“It is critical to strengthen our cyber capabilities to address the cyber threats we’re facing,” Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said in a statement ahead of Lynn’s speech. “I view this as an area in which we’re going to confront increasing threats in the future and think we have to be better prepared to deal with the growing cyber challenges that will face the nation.”
Shock And Grief Hit Orthodox Hassidic Jewish Community In Brooklyn As 8 Year Old Boy Leiby Kletzky Gruesomly Murdered
This is shocking not so much in its depravity, but more so that it could take place in a community like this one. Anyone that could in any way partake in the dismemberment of an 8 year old boy has no right to draw another breath on this earth. Make no mistake about it, this monster should face the death penalty, and New York's Supreme Court abolishing within the last decade was the wrong move precisely because of cases like this one where 8 year old body parts are found in someone's fridge. This less than worthless piece of crap will rot in hell and I think it's a shame that the laws of New York won't send him there sooner rather than later.
Jews traditionally say the following when they go to the house of a Jewish person mourning the loss of a close relative:
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המקום ינחם אתכם בתוך שאר אבלי ציון וירושלים
May the Omnipresent comfort the Kletzky family among all the mourners of Zion and Jerusalem
Wednesday, July 13, 2011
Former Montana University Law Professor Rob Natelson: "Time Mag’s Constitutional Baby Babble"
To read this important refutation by Rob Natelson of the completely asinine article on the Constitution that appeared in Time Magazine visit http://constitution.i2i.org/2011/06/26/time-mag%E2%80%99s-constitutional-baby-babble/ Tweet
"Shared Sacrifice" Sense Of The Senate Resolution (Alternatively Known As The Tax The Rich Resolution) Defeated
The “sense of the Senate” resolution that called for shared sacrifice was defeated. Tweet
Sgt. Leroy Petry Receives The Medal Of Honor, Second Living Recipient Since Vietnam
Here is the Medal of Honor webpage for Sgt. Petry.
Here is an Army news story about his recovery and robotic hand.
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Lawsuit Filed Challenging The Constitutionality Of Criminalizing Polygamy
And so the slippery slope continues. The Salt Lake Tribune reports:
Utah’s complicated history with polygamy will start a new chapter Wednesday when an attorney for a reality-show family files a lawsuit that could send the state’s ban on plural marriage to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Nationally-known constitutional law professor Jonathan Turley said the lawsuit to be filed in U.S. District Court in Salt Lake City will not call for plural marriages to be recognized by the state. Instead, it asks for polygamy between consenting adults like his clients, former Utahn Kody Brown and his wives, to no longer be considered a crime.
"We are only challenging the right of the state to prosecute people for their private relations and demanding equal treatment with other citizens in living their lives according to their own beliefs," Turley said in a press release. The Browns star in the TLC network show "Sister Wives." There is no word yet on whether they will appear in a press conference scheduled for Wednesday.
Utah Attorney General Mark Shurtleff said the country’s ongoing legal wrangling over same-sex marriage will necessarily grow to include plural marriage — quite possibly centered around this case.
"I’m confident that we can [defend] a challenge all the way to the Supreme Court," Shurtleff said.
"Ultimately, this decision is going to have to go there. You see it coming," he added.
The Supreme Court toyed with taking on polygamy five years ago, when they asked for briefs in the case of polygamous police officer Rodney Holm, who was accused of having sex with a 16-year-old plural wife. The justices ultimately refused to hear his appeal.
"The whole case was tainted by [sexual contact with a minor]. We didn’t die on the courthouse steps, we died inside," said attorney Rod Parker, who represented Holm. "I don’t know if [the Brown case] will be the one, but sooner or later one’s going to go there ... if it’s factually clean."
From the New York Times:
The lawsuit is not demanding that states recognize polygamous marriage. Instead, the lawsuit builds on a 2003 United States Supreme Court decision, Lawrence v. Texas, which struck down state sodomy laws as unconstitutional intrusions on the “intimate conduct” of consenting adults. It will ask the federal courts to tell states that they cannot punish polygamists for their own “intimate conduct” so long as they are not breaking other laws, like those regarding child abuse, incest or seeking multiple marriage licenses…
The questions surrounding whether same-sex couples should be allowed to marry are significantly different from those involved in criminal prosecution of multiple marriages, Ms. Pizer noted. Same-sex couples are seeking merely to participate in the existing system of family law for married couples, she said, while “you’d have to restructure the family law system in a pretty fundamental way” to recognize polygamy.
Professor Turley called the one-thing-leads-to-another arguments “a bit of a constitutional canard,” and argued that removing criminal penalties for polygamy “will take society nowhere in particular.”
The truth is that these folks should win their lawsuit if the Supreme Court meant what it said in Lawrence v. Texas (2003) regarding the right to "autonomy of self," and if they were serious about the Constitution apparently protecting "freedom...beyond spatial bounds" and "liberty...in its spatial and more transcendent dimensions," whatever the hell that means. Tweet
Tuesday, July 12, 2011
MSNBC's O'Donnell: Putting A Quote From Palin On The Cover Of Newsweek Is A "Lie"
As Tim Graham at Newsbusters puts it, “O’Donnell never has a problem when Newsweek is offering its long, adoring profiles to Barack or Michelle Obama. But Palin-boosting is corrupt, since it promotes the corrupt conservatives.”
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Dennis Miller Interviews Major Kyndra Rotunda On The Disenfranchising Of Military Voters
Dennis Miller interviews JAG Officer in the U.S. Army Individual Ready Reserve and Associate Professor of Military & International Law at Chapman University School of Law Kyndra Rotunda, who details her efforts with her students to ensure that every service member's vote counts. The status quo will outrage you.
Visit http://www.dennismillerradio.com/b/Disenfranchising-Military-Voters/-961432178854507347.html to hear about this scandal.
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Monday, July 11, 2011
Excerpt From Sixth Circuit Court Of Appeals Dissent Of Judge Graham In Thomas More Law Center v. Obama On Obamacare Mandate
Judge Graham wrote in dissent on June 29, 2011:
"The government recites the common refrain that the health insurance market is unique and attributes this to some blend of free-riding, adverse selection, universal participation, and unpredictability as to when and how much care might be needed. This should comfort the court, the government says, because Congress will not need to resort to such measures as the mandate again, or at least not very often. The free-riding problem is substantially one of Congress’s own creation, and the adverse selection problem will be exacerbated by the guaranteed issue provision, in that supply will be guaranteed to high-risk individuals. Though these policies might be reasonable, Congress’s compassion does not allow it to exceed the limits of its constitutional powers. Again, the mandate does not wait until an individual participates in the market for health care. This assurance is troubling on many levels and should hardly be heard to come from a body with limited powers. The uniqueness that justifies one exercise of power becomes precedent for the next contemplated exercise."
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"If the exercise of power is allowed and the mandate upheld, it is difficult to see what the limits on Congress’s Commerce Clause authority would be. What aspect of human activity would escape federal power? The ultimate issue in this case is this: Does the notion of federalism still have vitality? To approve the exercise of power would arm Congress with the authority to force individuals to do whatever it sees fit (within boundaries like the First Amendment and Due Process Clause), as long as the regulation concerns an activity or decision that, when aggregated, can be said to have some loose, but-for type of economic connection, which nearly all human activity does. Such a power feels very much like the general police power that the Tenth Amendment reserves to the States and the people. A structural shift of that magnitude can be accomplished legitimately only through constitutional amendment."
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Sunday, July 10, 2011
Tim Pawlenty On Homosexuality: "There's No Scientific Conclusion That It's Genetic"
Political Ticker reports:
Tweet“As I understand the science, there’s no current conclusion that it’s genetic,” Pawlenty said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.”
Saying he preferred to “defer to the scientists” about the issue, the former Minnesota governor said it was unclear if being gay or lesbian was a lifestyle choice.
“There’s no scientific conclusion that it’s genetic. We don’t know that. So, we don’t know to what extent it’s behavioral,” Pawlenty said. “That’s something that has been debated by scientists for a long time.”
North Carolina Creates New US History Class Focusing On "Founding Principles"
TweetHigh school students across the state can look forward to spending more quality time with America’s Founding Fathers. In fact, they won’t be able to graduate without doing so.
A bill signed into law by Gov. Bev Perdue last week, known as “The Founding Principles Act,” requires local school boards to develop a semester course focused on the founding philosophy of the U.S. government by the 2014-2015 school year.
The act states that students must understand Founders’ writings in order to preserve the country’s republican form of government.
The course will emphasize founding documents, such as the Declaration of Independence, in addition to concepts within the documents, including inalienable rights and the separation of powers. Students must pass the course to graduate...
In a poll conducted by the Daily Beast earlier this year, only 12 percent of Americans could name one of the authors of the Federalist Papers. Sixty-five percent incorrectly stated the purpose of the Constitutional Convention.
The act also permits schools to post documents that influenced the development of the U.S. legal system, including the Ten Commandments. Displays of religious documents must be accompanied by a sign quoting the First Amendment, according to the bill.
William Marshall, a UNC law professor with expertise on church and state issues, said the display’s context would be considered if it was challenged in court.
“The Establishment Clause is very imprecise,” he said. “I think that the court would look at how it’s implemented.”
Presidential "Fourteenth Amendment Solution" To Debt Ceiling Is Unconstitutional
Legal scholars are discrediting the idea that the president has the power to circumvent the debt ceiling set by Congress in order to avoid a government default.Tweet
This so-called "14th amendment solution" relies on an interpretation of the amendment that would make it illegal for the federal government to default. Advocates argue that if negotiations to broker an agreement on raising the debt limit break down ahead of an Aug. 2 deadline the president could bypass Congress to avoid defaulting.
Talk of the idea, which has persisted over the past few weeks of rapidly intensifying partisan battles over the debt ceiling and the budget deficit, provoked 12 Republican Senators to co-sign a resolution proposed Friday by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) that would censor the president for attempting to raise or bypass the debt ceiling on his own.
"In the last 30 years, particularly starting with the Reagan presidency, you've had lawyers arguing that the president can do anything that the constitution doesn't bar him from doing," said Garrett Epps, a law professor at the University of Baltimore Law School.
The theory behind the idea would make a 14th amendment solution legal because "the debt limit is [stopping] you from doing something the Constitution requires you to do," Epps said.
Many Democrats and Republicans quickly latched onto the possibility that President Obama may actually have legal authority to raise the debt ceiling without Congressional authorization, prompting questions about the possibility in White House briefings that the president appeared to avoid without flat-out dismissing the idea.
The Treasury Department appeared to fan the flames when in early July, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner said threatening a default was "not a credible negotiating strategy" due to the 14th amendment.
Geithner's statement resulted in widespread speculation that the Obama administration was considering disregarding Congress if it voted not to raise the debt ceiling.
Roughly a week later, the Treasury Department released a response stating that Geithner was not arguing that the 14th amendment authorized Obama to raise the debt ceiling on his own.
"The Constitution explicitly places the borrowing authority with Congress, not the President," Treasury Department General Counsel George W. Madison wrote.
"Like every previous Secretary of the Treasury who has confronted the question, Secretary Geithner has always viewed the debt limit as a binding legal constraint that can only be raised by Congress."
The letter was a denial from the White House that it was considering raising the debt ceiling based on the 14th Amendment, but with the deficit debates still at an impasse and the Treasury Department's default deadline coming soon on Aug. 2, the idea is still being debated.
David B. Rivkin, Jr., an attorney who served in the Department of Justice during the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations, said the DOJ would never advise the president to use the 14th amendment as a legal run-around on the debt ceiling.
"It's so absurd," Rivkin said. "It is an empty threat. Not even a threat, it is a legal impossibility. … It's not just a question of opinion, it's a question of case law.”
Still, Republican push-back over the threat of a 14th amendment solution has been swift and fierce. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) said Republicans would take the president to court over it, while Tim Scott (R-S.C.) said it would be "an impeachable act."
Rivkin agreed. "Any president who did something like this would be engaging in the most outrageous conduct of any president in … constitutional history. There's no doubt that this would be an impeachable offense," he said.
Republican concerns seem to come from the idea of a president willing to usurp Congressional authority, and Rivkin said the GOP response was appropriate.
"I don't think the White House would ever do this, but if you're presented with even the not-very-likely threat to do something outrageous, something to totally subvert our constitutional fabric, the proper response is one of push-back and outrage,” Rivkin said.
The White House and the Treasury Department have sought to downplay the idea. White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said this week that White House lawyers have no plans to look into the legality of using the 14th amendment as grounds to extend the Treasury's borrowing authority. “I don’t know that anybody is studying it,” Carney said.
However, some Senate Democrats have expressed interest in exploring the 14th amendment as an option either now or, as Sen. Charles Schumer (D-N.Y.) has suggested, in future debt ceiling talks.
The issue had been raised in "some private debate between senators," according to Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) last week, with many advocating taking a "strong second look."
"The attractiveness of this argument for some was the possibility that it would create a fait accompli, that regardless of the merits of the argument that they [the White House] might be able to block any judicial review of the argument that would leave the administration unchallengeable," according to George Washington University Professor Jonathan Turley, a legal scholar.
"But what it would also do is trigger a very intense fight between the legislative and executive branches. I think that both sides realized that this was not a time when we should be playing constitutional chicken."
It might not be a serious threat, but Republicans are taking it seriously.
"I wouldn't call it empty [as a threat] because there are some legal authorities who seem to think it has some merit," said Robert A. Levy, chairman of the Cato Institute.
"I do think politically it's a dead issue," Levy said, because "there's no political upside." The president would end up under fire for circumventing Congress, and would likely face a drawn-out legal battle.
Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) said something similar in a Senate Democrat policy hearing on Thursday. “The political bitterness and the vitriol would be amplified” by using a 14th amendment solution," he said.
According to Levy, the sticking point is the difference between the debt ceiling and the possibility of a government default.
Levy and Rivkin both said that meant that a default is unconstitutional. However, Levy said, hitting the debt ceiling does not necessarily produce a default.
"All that debt ceiling does is shut off one source of funding," Levy said. The debt ceiling caps the U.S. ability to borrow. "The president still has lots of options [to avoid a default]," he said.
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