tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-20353626746467183272024-02-07T20:29:40.750-08:00Right-Wing Genius's BlogNo Talking Points, Just Facts (and Some Commentary)Unknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger137125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-36919101643864032902015-11-02T10:31:00.000-08:002015-11-05T10:35:35.203-08:00Two Wunderkinds Take on New Jobs, Great Challenges<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8bnsu7EvsijsCwH6AYMt8i2qhStZ0SUaFUmsoKkC-fpzrX8J_lgjE5Mp95mTaP8Pipybw-MDu3mFCTEnnwgueyxFv9m_Bq5xo_lSvXz14MYP4FMQzWjI1MylH37iIw4m_PGPQ5dpKX54C/s1600/Stidham%252CRyanNaction.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="189" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEi8bnsu7EvsijsCwH6AYMt8i2qhStZ0SUaFUmsoKkC-fpzrX8J_lgjE5Mp95mTaP8Pipybw-MDu3mFCTEnnwgueyxFv9m_Bq5xo_lSvXz14MYP4FMQzWjI1MylH37iIw4m_PGPQ5dpKX54C/s320/Stidham%252CRyanNaction.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">(Composite photo.)</span></div>
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Last week, two rising stars in their respective fields both assumed new roles with tremendous opportunities following sudden, unexpected events.</div>
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On Monday, it was revealed that <a href="http://www.baylorbears.com/sports/m-footbl/spec-rel/102615aad.html">Baylor quarterback Seth Russell will undergo "season-ending" neck surgery</a>. Russell, whose performance as starting QB this season for the 2nd-ranked Bears has been nothing short of amazing, suffered a fractured bone in his neck trying to run for a first down in the fourth quarter of Baylor's Homecoming game against Iowa State. BU won the game but lost Russell.</div>
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That means that what Yahoo! Sports columnist Pat Forde called <a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/news/12-takeaways-from-another-tumultuous-college-football-saturday-053543700-ncaaf.html;_ylt=AwrTceA3UDdWygQAKv0PxQt.;_ylu=X3oDMTByb2lvbXVuBGNvbG8DZ3ExBHBvcwMxBHZ0aWQDBHNlYwNzcg--">"the most fun position in football"</a> will now be filled by 19-year-old true freshman <a href="http://www.baylorbears.com/sports/m-footbl/mtt/jarrett_stidham_953392.html">Jarrett Stidham</a>, a highly-prized recruit from Stephenville High School. (Yes, the same Stephenville High School whose football team won four state championships under Coach Art Briles. They won a fifth state championship in 2012 when Stidham was a sophomore.) The FBS's top offense will be depending on young Stidham to deliver as they pursue a berth in the college-football playoff and, God willing, a national championship.</div>
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Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., Rep. <a href="http://paulryan.house.gov/">Paul Ryan</a> (R-WI) <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/10/29/house-elects-ryan-as-speaker/">was elected and sworn in as the new Speaker of the House</a> on Thursday, succeeding the leathery, emotional <a href="http://boehner.house.gov/">John Boehner</a>, who had held the post since January of 2011 and <a href="https://www.yahoo.com/politics/john-boehner-to-resign-as-speaker-leave-house-129845772731.html">shocked the nation</a> last month when he announced his sudden resignation.</div>
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Like Stidham, Ryan is taking on huge responsibility with the support of a team that is excited to have him but can't be certain how he'll fare in his new role. Fans of both (or either) have reason for confidence, however, as neither man is a neophyte. Ryan is currently serving his ninth term in Congress and has already chaired two important House committees: <a href="http://www.house.gov/budget/">Budget</a> and <a href="http://waysandmeans.house.gov/">Ways & Means</a>. Stidham has played in every game this season, thanks to Baylor's habit of building up runaway leads well before the end of regulation.</div>
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Actually, not only are Ryan and Stidham experienced, but both already have some exceptional accomplishments on their resumes. Stidham put up crazy numbers in his senior year at Stephenville, passing for 2,934 yards and 35 touchdowns and running for an additional 969 yards and 15 TDs, and Ryan took on the third rail of politics--entitlement reform--as a little-known congressman from a Democratic-leaning district when Republicans were the minority party. <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pSGGYOvv7WU">Sports writers, analysts and college coaches around the country took note of Stidham's prowess and achievements and dubbed him one of the top recruits in the country</a>, just as Republicans recognized Ryan as the asset he was and moved him into position to take over as chairman of the House Budget Committee when they regained the majority in that chamber five years ago. <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/D?d106:4:./temp/~bdhqIq:@@@L&summ2=m&|/home/LegislativeData.php?n=BSS;c=106|">Ryan saw his first bill become law as a freshman.</a> Stidham's first-ever pass in a college game was a touchdown. </div>
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Similarly, both men will face tests early on in their new roles, as greater challenges loom large in the near future. Stidham will debut as Baylor's starting QB this Thursday against the <a href="http://www.kstatesports.com/sport/m-footbl">Kansas State Wildcats</a>, who are 0-4 in conference play this season. This is a game the Bears should win, and a decisive victory will probably be necessary to show that Stidham can handle the upcoming Big 12 tilts against Oklahoma, Oklahoma State and TCU, all of whom have defeated K-State this year. Ryan's first real test as speaker will likely be passing a long-term bill to fund highway programs. Beyond that, he will have to deal with his own fractious conference, troublemaking Democrats and a hostile White House on weightier necessities, such as an omnibus spending bill, as one of the most critical elections of our lifetimes draws nearer. </div>
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Both men also have the advantage/burden of taking the helm at a time when their party/team is enjoying historic success, with their sights set on even higher goals. Republicans started this year with their biggest congressional majority in 84 years, and they'd like to keep that majority and win the presidency next year to boot. Baylor's football team is gunning for their third consecutive Big 12 title and first-ever appearance in a national championship game. Their offense has led the FBS in both yards per game and points per game the past two seasons and is currently first in both categories this season.</div>
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The similarities are not endless, however. For example, <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2015/10/08/rep-paul-ryan-wisconsin-house-speakers-job-thanks-but-no-thanks/73588750/">Ryan never desired the position he now holds</a> and only sought it <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2015/10/paul-ryan-house-speaker-republicans-tick-tock-214988">after much cajoling and pressure from his party</a>, whereas <a href="http://theflashtoday.com/2014/12/19/stephenville-qb-stidham-picks/">Stidham was already contemplating getting "the starting job" when he committed to Baylor last December</a>. Then there are the stark differences between their predecessors. While <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2015/10/08/rep-paul-ryan-wisconsin-house-speakers-job-thanks-but-no-thanks/73588750/"></a>John Boehner turned
out to be a disappointment (and, some would argue, a traitor) to his own
people as speaker, Seth Russell proved himself worthy of <span id="goog_721553494"></span><a href="https://www.blogger.com/">the position he inherited from
Bryce Petty<span id="goog_721553495"></span></a>. <a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/ncaaf-dr-saturday/baylor-qb-seth-russell-to-have-season-ending-neck-surgery-184238477.html;_ylt=AwrXnCEfvjFW_T4ArAZNbK5_;_ylu=X3oDMTEyNjVuNzY3BGNvbG8DZ3ExBHBvcwMzBHZ0aWQDQjAzMDNfMQRzZWMDc2M-">As reported by Graham Watson (“Dr. Saturday”)</a>, “Russell leads the
FBS in passing efficiency (189.7), passing touchdowns (29), passing yards per
completion (17.68), points responsible for per game (30.0) and passing yards
per attempt (10.52).” He threw for 2,104 yards and ran for 402 more for a total of 35 touchdowns this season, stats that are made all the more impressive when you consider that he did not even play all four quarters in any of his seven starts.</div>
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So, Stidham has some big shoes (or cleats) to fill, but I for one am confident he's capable of delivering for Baylor just as Russell was prepared to do. As for Paul Ryan,
there is a reason—or two (or several)—that his image was one selected to grace
the banner of this blog and <a href="http://www.right-winggenius.com/">our web site</a>. His intellect, work product and
passionate advocacy for conservative policies has earned him a place alongside
the late, great Edmund Burke, Milton Friedman and William F. Buckley, Jr. Here's hoping these two white knights exceed expectations and that the best is yet to come for the Baylor Bears and the GOP.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-53633080861307196292014-12-02T14:22:00.001-08:002014-12-03T10:40:31.512-08:00Contrarian View: Low Voter Turnout Isn't Necessarily a Bad Thing<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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If you're young and single like me and live in the Cultural District of one of the nicest cities in America, then you don't have to look very far to find something interesting to occupy your time and attention on weekends (or anytime). I still pick up a copy of <em>Fort Worth Weekly </em>once a week, though, if only to keep up on what's going on in my neck of the woods. <em>FW Weekly</em> has the social scene in Cowtown covered, and I sometimes enjoy their articles on local, off-beat stories as well. When it comes to political commentary, though, the publication leaves a lot to be desired. Example: <a href="http://www.fwweekly.com/2014/11/19/apocalypse-by-apathy/">an opinion piece</a> by one Ken Wheatcroft-Pardue in last week's issue entitled "Apocalypse by Apathy." </div>
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Wheatcroft-Pardue laments the "tragedy" of "how few" people voted in the recent midterm elections. He starts off with an anecdote about an elderly woman he encountered while block-walking on the North Side a few weeks before the election. (For those of you not familiar with Fort Worth, the "North Side" is a largely Hispanic, poorer-than-average area on--where else--the north side of town. To many locals, it has two components: the Stockyards and "the ghetto". It is an important source of votes for Democrats.) This woman told him that she was "sick of the government and all the things they’re doing." He deduced that she would not be voting in this election and offered one possible cause: "the grab bag of pseudo-hysterical news coverage, much of it without context or common sense, that she and the rest of us had endured these past months." </div>
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I can't say I take issue with his characterization of the media coverage of and seemingly incessant punditry concerning ISIS and Ebola, two things Wheatcroft-Pardue specifically mentioned in the next sentence, but I don't recall seeing or hearing any "pseudo-hysterical news coverage, much of it without context or common sense," of things the <em><strong>government</strong></em> has been doing (save for the inane ramblings of MSNBC's on-air talent about crazy conservatives enacting voter ID laws and curtailing women's "reproductive rights", a newly popular euphemism for butchering unborn children), which, according to the writer, was what this woman actually referenced as making her "sick". </div>
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But to the meat of the article: Wheatcroft-Pardue reminds us of President Obama's post-election statement that he’d heard "everyone who voted" as well as "the two-thirds of voters who chose not to" and suggests, "Maybe we should all try to do likewise. This poor woman I talked with on a Saturday morning in October represents so many of those who chose not to vote." </div>
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Stop right there. The sentiment, which Wheatcroft-Pardue evidently shares, that the President expressed with his one-third/two-thirds remark is based on an assumption that the Americans who were eligible to vote in this election but chose not to were sending a message by not voting just as those of us who did vote sent a message with our choices at the polls. If you agree with that, then it begs the question: What message do you think these non-voters sent by not voting? To attribute the deliberate choice millions of Americans made this year to <em><strong>not</strong></em> vote to "apathy" is unfair and incorrect. Do Wheatcroft-Pardue and others who think like him (I assure you there are many.) honestly believe that none of these people determined that they had no good options on the ballot or nothing worth voting for or made another thoughtful, principled decision not to vote? </div>
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The cynical explanation for low voter turnout propounded in this article and elsewhere also allows individuals and groups whose policies and ideas were soundly rejected in the latest election to delude themselves--and try to convince others--that a lot more people actually agree with them and share their vision for America; they just didn't turn out to show their support when they had the chance. I have to admit: that is a tempting thought, and I almost fell victim to it in 2012, though I quickly realized that there was nothing to substantiate it. Also, 2012 was not nearly as bad for Republicans as 2014 has been for Democrats. Even as we were devastated by the re-election (by a substantial margin) of Barack Obama and Democratic victories in nearly every tight U.S. Senate race, <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PmeiUGQfz5M&list=UUZNi-8GbLZ6Oej05zAHc5Fw">ill-gotten though they were</a>, those of us on the right could take solace in the fact that the GOP retained a sizable majority in the U.S. House of Representatives and dominated the election at the state level. There is no comparable consolation prize for left-wingers in the results of this election cycle. </div>
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Wheatcroft-Pardue goes on:</div>
<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #666666; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size-adjust: none; font-size: xx-small; font-stretch: normal; font: 13px/20.79px Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing: normal; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"></span><br />
<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #666666; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size-adjust: none; font-size: xx-small; font-stretch: normal; font: 13px/20.79px Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing: normal; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">In this go-round, 17 percent of the electorate — generally older, whiter, more affluent than the general population — got to change the course of our nation and perhaps our planet, effectively vetoing what a larger, more representative electorate OK’d in 2012. I don’t think anyone should feel good about that.</span></blockquote>
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I do. Here's why: Aside from the obvious importance of <a href="https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&frm=1&source=web&cd=1&cad=rja&uact=8&ved=0CCAQFjAA&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.nationalreview.com%2Fnrd%2Farticles%2F391468%2Fundemocratic-freedoms&ei=sjZ-VOHgA8KrNsbKgeAB&usg=AFQjCNHTs4Z-qEQtmNKW8FgpU3WkVniCbA&sig2=fh5J_qLAQ-XYu6aUl1THwQ">protecting minority rights from the tyranny of the majority</a>, voters who vote in every election are by definition more "engaged" than those who only vote in presidential election cycles. While Ken is correct that the midterm electorate is typically "older, whiter [and] more affluent than the general population," we are also better-informed and more likely to keep up on important issues and know where the candidates stand on the issues and understand the consequences of our votes than the electorate in years when the presidency is on the ballot. It's curious (and disturbing) that Wheatcroft-Pardue appears to be more concerned about a minority of the country "effectively vetoing what a larger, more representative electorate OK’d in 2012" than he is about the decisions of clueless drones overwhelming the will of intelligent voters who make reasoned, well-informed choices based on truth and reality. </div>
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Not surprisingly, he then proposes something terrible: <span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #666666; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size-adjust: none; font-size: xx-small; font-stretch: normal; font: 13px/20.79px Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing: normal; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"> </span></div>
<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #666666; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size-adjust: none; font-size: xx-small; font-stretch: normal; font: 13px/20.79px Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing: normal; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"></span><br />
<span style="-webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; background-color: white; color: #666666; display: inline !important; float: none; font-size-adjust: none; font-size: xx-small; font-stretch: normal; font: 13px/20.79px Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; letter-spacing: normal; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; word-spacing: 0px;"><blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">I think it’s time we try an idea from Down Under: In Australia, if you don’t vote, you get a ticket. Surely voting is as much a civic duty as serving on a jury or paying our taxes. Since we already pay a fine if we shirk jury duty or dodge paying taxes, why shouldn’t we pay a penalty for not voting?</span></blockquote>
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Because, Ken, votes have consequences for the country as a whole, and unlike the consequences for "shirk[ing] jury duty" or not paying taxes, the consequences of uninformed or misinformed people voting are long-lasting and can't be effectively remedied. Millions of Americans who voted to re-elect President Obama may have buyer's remorse, but we're stuck with the guy as our commander-in-chief 'til 2017, unless he dies or quits. And, no, voting is so <strong><em>not</em></strong> "as much a civic duty as serving on a jury or paying our taxes." Voting is more like military service. You should be allowed to do it if you want and meet certain basic requirements, but no one should be forced to do it. And, just like joining the Armed Services, it's very important that you know what you're doing, and you should only do it for the right reasons, though the government shouldn't prevent you from voting just because it doesn't like your motive(s).</div>
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Wheatcroft-Pardue also takes a parting shot at our state's voter ID law and trots out the oft-repeated but completely baseless claim that it is "blatantly designed to suppress the votes of the poor, college students, and minorities". This is one of <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2014/10/28/voter_id_myth_crashes_124470.html">multiple claims about voter ID laws that have been thoroughly discredited</a>, but I digress. Making it easier to register to vote and cast your ballot may be a good idea, but making it easier to commit voter fraud isn't. Neither is penalizing eligible voters for not participating in elections. Being governed by politicians you don't like seems to me punishment enough for not voting when you have the right. </div>
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He says that "we should all be outraged by" low voter turnout. This is a classic example of outrage directed at one of the consequences of a problem, rather than at the problem itself. What's causing low voter turnout? Again I say that if you're not well-informed, then you shouldn't vote. And, if eligible voters are staying away from the polls because they can't, or don't know enough to, make a well-informed decision, then Wheatcroft-Pardue and others who are so upset over how low turnout was in this election should refocus their ire on the failure of would-be voters to pay attention to what's going on, form opinions, and study the candidates and their positions (as well as the merits of any ballot measures).
Curiously, Wheatcroft-Pardue closes by stating that "there can be no true consent of the governed if so very few bother to vote." That may be so, but just like consenting to participate in a dangerous sport or undergo an invasive medical procedure, it must be <em><strong>informed</strong></em> consent to be meaningful. </div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-55763538397131946532014-11-12T12:34:00.001-08:002014-11-26T12:15:18.076-08:00WaPo: In nearly every race, Republican Senate candidates outperformed the polls<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Here's another thing for me to file under "I wanted to do something like this, but now I don't have to because someone else did it." </div>
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<em>Washington Post</em> reporter Philip Bump has <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2014/11/05/in-nearly-every-race-republican-senate-candidates-outperformed-the-polls/">a short but sweet post</a> on <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/">The Fix</a> that includes this neat little graphic: </div>
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbOSWlGn4fp94-ZAEFZWZg1N8-46jG6v76X4mIS-kouD_pKUA8b5-Jg7G7HXzDUjc4_y1VUlegV58Zyrssjyte5xTOlup_HoYy_YMPZCC60UTcnJdGakC2dwNfl_IrBnSAULupIpTqxvAB/s1600/imrs.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="320" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbOSWlGn4fp94-ZAEFZWZg1N8-46jG6v76X4mIS-kouD_pKUA8b5-Jg7G7HXzDUjc4_y1VUlegV58Zyrssjyte5xTOlup_HoYy_YMPZCC60UTcnJdGakC2dwNfl_IrBnSAULupIpTqxvAB/s320/imrs.png" width="285" /></a></div>
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A week before Election Day, <a href="http://right-winggenius.blogspot.com/2014/10/what-2010-can-tell-us-about-how.html">I posited on the accuracy of the polls in key Senate races and compared candidates' poll positions in Senate contests in the same states four years ago with the 2010 election results</a>. I found that, in every U.S. Senate race except the one in Colorado, the candidate who was ahead in the RealClearPolitics rolling average of polls won, but in many states, the polls greatly exaggerated or undertold the winner's eventual margin of victory. By comparison, Bump's analysis shows that, this year, the polls were more skewed in one direction, although - with the exception of North Carolina - they were correct about who would win. </div>
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The most important line from Bump's piece was its last sentence: "In this case, the polls largely predicted the correct winners, but -- with select exceptions such as the Des Moines Register poll last weekend that showed Joni Ernst (R) ahead by as wide a margin as occurred -- the scale of the victories was way off." This is what I suggested could be the case in my October 28 post.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-46072009051004917672014-11-12T08:30:00.001-08:002015-11-05T11:19:59.649-08:00Senator Scott Explains Why Some Groups' "Scorecards" for Members of Congress are Stupid<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Sen. <a href="http://www.scott.senate.gov/">Tim Scott</a> (R-SC), who <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2012/12/17/haley-south-carolina-senate-demint-appointment%2f">became the first black U.S. Senator from South Carolina last year after Gov. Nikki Haley (R) appointed him to replace Sen. Jim DeMint (R)</a>, who resigned to take over the Heritage Foundation, and <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2014/11/04/politics/south-carolina-tim-scott-digital/index.html">became the first black U.S. Senator elected from the South since Reconstruction and the first African-American in U.S. history to be elected to both the House and the Senate</a> by winning a special election on Tuesday to fill the remainder of DeMint's term, appeared on MSNBC's <em>Morning Joe</em> last week. In response to a question about his "agenda" from fellow guest Joe Klien, Scott said that he was "very interested in creating a foundation of education for . . . kids living in poverty, kids like myself who perhaps live in the wrong ZIP code, going to underperforming schools." Thomas Roberts, one of the more muted left-wing ideologues on the network, took issue with that. He challenged the Senator: <br />
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<em>Sir, you said . . . you are concerned about kids
that are growing up in the wrong zip code and like yourself that had a tough
start on the way out, but if we look at agencies that are following some of
your voting records, [then] they have concern, and the NAACP has given you an
"F" on their annual scorecard. They also say you voted against the
ACA; you voted to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress; you
oppose the Congressional Black Caucus' budget, delayed funding on a settlement
between the U.S. and black farmers who say that they were prejudiced against
because of their race. So how do you respond to that, if your true concern is
about lower income families and kids?</em></blockquote>
Scott's response is priceless:<br />
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Note the apparent (and erroneous) assumption underlying Roberts's question: that these "agencies that are following some of [the Senator's] voting records" also "have concern" about what Senator Scott said he is "concerned about". I am sure that there are groups that track the voting records of members of Congress and are genuinely concerned about children living in poverty who are deprived of the opportunities other children have because of where they're growing up, but the example Roberts cited was the NAACP. As I mentioned in <a href="http://right-winggenius.blogspot.com/2012/10/will-obamas-machine-save-him.html">a post</a> over two years ago, the NAACP has become a partisan entity, but a number of voters (including, it would seem, Thomas Roberts) still see it as a trustworthy, independent source of information. If the NAACP is truly concerned about kids
that are growing up in the wrong ZIP code and have "a tough start on the way out," as Roberts suggested, then why is the organization <a href="http://articles.baltimoresun.com/1997-07-17/news/1997198022_1_charter-schools-vouchers-school-performance">officially opposed to school voucher plans and state takeovers of poorly performing school districts</a>, especially in light of <a href="http://www.naacp.org/programs/entry/education-programs">its National Education Program's professed objective "to ensure that all students have access to an equal and high-quality public education by eliminating education-related racial and ethnic disparities in our public schools"</a>? Not only does the NAACP adamantly oppose school choice, but it has actively joined legal efforts in <a href="http://tbo.com/news/breaking-news/lawsuit-floridas-school-voucher-program-unconstitutional-20140828/">Florida</a> and <a href="http://www.carolinamercury.com/2014/02/nc-naacp-amicus-brief-outlines-history-of-private-school-vouchers-in-nc/">North Carolina</a> challenging the constitutionality of those states' voucher programs. <br />
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Notice also the list of votes Roberts ticked off that evidently earned Scott his failing grade on the NAACP's scorecard. What exactly does voting against Obamacare, voting to hold Attorney General Holder in contempt, opposing the Congressional Black Caucus' budget, or delaying funding on a settlement between the U.S. and black farmers have to do with being concerned about kids who are growing up in the wrong ZIP code and going to underperforming schools? Roberts did not say, and I can't fathom a connection. The Senator appropriately brought up something he had voted on that was related to the issue. The D.C. Opportunity Scholarship, he pointed out, "has produced [a] higher percentage of kids going to college:" "91% of the kids graduating from high school versus 56% for those who are simply in everyday schools in D.C." (Scott misspoke; he was referring to the graduation rate among students in the program versus public school students in D.C., not what percentage of high school graduates the program has produced, but his numbers check out. <a href="http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/2011/08/school-choice-in-america-2011-educational-opportunity-reaches-new-heights#_ftn118">91% of students who used a voucher to attend private school graduated high school</a>, while <a href="http://profiles.dcps.dc.gov/pdf/dunbar2012.pdf">the DCPS (District of Columbia Public Schools) graduation rate last year was 56%</a>.) Curiously absent from the votes Roberts listed was <a href="http://clerk.house.gov/cgi-bin/vote.asp?year=2011&rollnumber=204">the House of Representatives 2011 vote on H.R. 471</a>, <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/cpquery/R?cp112:FLD010:@1(hr036)">the Scholarships for Opportunity and Results Act</a>, which restored the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship Program and increased the scholarship amounts for the 2011-2012 school year. In addition to voting for the SOAR Act, <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d112:HR00471:@@@P">Scott was a cosponsor of the legislation</a>. Shortly before the vote, the NAACP stated in <a href="http://naacp.3cdn.net/9a563659dd0b370cd2_uzm6b901c.pdf">an "urgent action alert"</a> that they were "vigorously opposed to this legislation . . . due to the fact that the 5 year pilot program in D.C. was, by all accounts, a failure; neither the majority of D.C. residents nor their democratically elected representatives want the program; and due to our underlying opposition to school vouchers." <br />
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Without delving into the obvious biases and inaccuracies in the NAACP's stated reasons for opposing the restoration of a program that <a href="http://ies.ed.gov/ncee/pubs/20104018/pdf/20104018.pdf">an independent, federally-mandated evaluation</a> determined was "a success," I can see why Roberts wouldn't call attention to Scott's support for, or the NAACP's opposition to, the D.C. Opportunity Scholarship program. This brief exchange between the two men provides an example of how loosely tethered some of these "scorecards" for elected officials are to the purported missions of the groups doing the scoring.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-32591696644681117112014-10-28T12:48:00.000-07:002014-10-29T12:54:27.306-07:00What 2010 Can Tell Us about How Accurate the Polls Are a Week from Election Day<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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With polls showing Republicans in good shape as Election Day approaches, one may wonder: Are these polls accurate? In the battle for control of the U.S. Senate, we can look to the previous midterm election for some empirical data to help answer that question before we actually see the results on election night. It's especially helpful because most of the states with competitive Senate races this year--including New Hampshire, North Carolina, Georgia, Louisiana, Arkansas, Iowa, Kansas, Colorado and Alaska--all had Senate races in 2010 as well. So, how were the Senate candidates in those states doing in the polls one week out from Election Day four years ago? </div>
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The short answer is: In all of the aforementioned states except Alaska (where incumbent Sen. <a href="http://lisamurkowski.com/main/about/">Lisa Murkowski</a> (R) was campaigning as a write-in candidate against Republican <a href="http://joemiller.us/">Joe Miller</a> and Democrat <a href="http://scottmcadams.org/">Scott McAdams</a>), the Republican candidate for U.S. Senate led his/her Democratic opponent in all or most of the polls heading into the final week of the campaign. Were the polls correct? Well, sort of...</div>
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In New Hampshire, Republican Kelly Ayotte had a nine-point lead over her Democratic adversary, then-Congressman Paul Hodes, in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/senate/nh/new_hampshire_senate_ayotte_vs_hodes-1093.html">the RealClearPolitics Average of polls</a> on October 26, 2010 (one week before Election Day 2010). Ayotte continued to expand her lead and ended up routing Hodes, 60% to 37%, in the general election. This year, the Senate race in New Hampshire is much closer: As of today, the incumbent, Sen. <a href="http://www.jeanneshaheen.org/">Jeanne Shaheen</a> (D), holds a lead of 2.2 percentage points in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/nh/new_hampshire_senate_brown_vs_shaheen-3894.html">the RCP Average</a> over her challenger, former Sen. <a href="http://scottbrown.com/">Scott Brown</a> (R-MA). If Brown finishes strong the way Ayotte did in 2010, then he may yet return to the U.S. Senate. </div>
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Similarly, in Iowa, the Senate race in 2010 wasn't competitive, unlike the one this year. Four years ago, Sen. <a href="http://www.grassleyforsenate.com/">Charles Grassley</a> (R) was such a heavy favorite to win re-election that there wasn't much polling of the race, at least not by independent (unaffiliated) outfits. <a href="http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20101031/NEWS09/101031012">A <em>Des Moines Register</em> poll</a> conducted in late October nailed Grassley's margin of victory over former U.S. Attorney <a href="http://www.roxanneforiowa.com/">Roxanne Conlin</a> (D): 31 percentage points. This year, <a href="http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/politics/iowa-poll/2014/10/11/iowa-poll-ernst-braley-race-tightens/17114281/">the <em>Register</em>'s latest poll</a> found state Sen. <a href="http://www.joniforiowa.com/">Joni Ernst</a> (R) ahead of Rep. <a href="http://www.brucebraley.com/">Bruce Braley</a> (D) by just one percentage point, 47% to 46%. That comports with <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/ia/iowa_senate_ernst_vs_braley-3990.html">the current RCP Average of polls</a>, which has Ernst leading Braley by 1.7 percentage points. <br />
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Same story in Georgia: The Senate race in 2010 wasn't competitive at all; this year it's a nail-biter. However, there was something unique about the Georgia Senate race four years ago. Sen. <a href="http://johnnyisakson.com/">Johnny Isakson</a> (R) handily defeated his Democratic challenger, State Labor Commissioner <a href="http://www.mikethurmond2010.com/">Mike Thurmond</a>, 58% to 39%, but polls overestimated his margin of victory. <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/senate/ga/georgia_senate_isakson_vs_thurmond-1477.html">All the publicly released poll results in late October that year showed Isakson winning by anywhere from 21 to 30 percentage points.</a> This year, the polls are showing a virtual tie between businessman <a href="https://perduesenate.com/">David Perdue</a> (R) and Points of Light CEO <a href="http://www.michellenunn.com/">Michelle Nunn</a> (D); Perdue's lead over Nunn in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/ga/georgia_senate_perdue_vs_nunn_vs_swafford-5253.html">the RCP Average</a> today is one-half a percentage point. Because this race will go to a runoff if no candidate wins an outright majority of the vote in the general election, and because all the polls are indicating that is exactly what will happen, further analysis of this race seems premature right now. <br />
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Admittedly, the dynamics of an open race are so different from a race with an incumbent in it that trying to use one to predict what will happen in the other may not be empirically sound. So, what races can we look to for an apples-to-apples comparison? Try Arkansas, where Sen. <a href="http://www.blancheforsenate.com/home">Blanche Lincoln</a> (D) was probably the most vulnerable incumbent in the U.S. Senate in 2010, and she lost in a landslide to then-Congressman <a href="http://www.boozmanforarkansas.com/">John Boozman</a> (R), who won Lincoln's seat with 58% of the vote. (Lincoln received 37%, almost exactly her poll position in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/senate/ar/arkansas_senate_boozman_vs_lincoln-1186.html">the RCP Average</a>--37.8%--on October 26, 2010.) Late deciders must have broken for Boozman, who stood at 54.5% in the RCP average one week out. If history repeats itself this year, then the lone remaining Democrat in Arkansas's congressional delegation, Sen. <a href="http://pryorforsenate.com/">Mark Pryor</a> (D), will soon be replaced by Rep. <a href="http://www.tomcotton.com/">Tom Cotton</a> (R), who today leads Prior by five percentage points in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/ar/arkansas_senate_cotton_vs_pryor-4049.html">the RCP Average</a>, 46.8% to 41.8%. <br />
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Colorado was one state where the pollsters really missed the mark in 2010. A week before Election Day that year, Weld County District Attorney <a href="http://buckforcolorado.com/latest-from-the-campaign">Ken Buck</a> (R) led Sen. <a href="http://bennetforcolorado.com/">Michael Bennet</a> (D), who had been appointed to the seat in 2009, by one percentage point in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/senate/co/colorado_senate_buck_vs_bennet-1106.html">the RCP Average</a>. By Election Day, however, that lead had grown to three percentage points. Buck appeared to have the momentum going into the election, but Bennett managed to pull out one of the tightest victories that year, winning election to a full term by less than 2% of the vote. (Buck received 46.4% of the vote, significantly less than his 49.3% standing in the RCP average on Election Day, while Bennett took 48.08%, slightly more than the 46.3% the RCP average of polls had him winning. What probably happened is that a lot of voters who were going to vote for Buck ended up voting for one of the third-party or "Independent" candidates on the ballot, or maybe they just didn't vote.) This year, Rep. <a href="http://corygardnerforsenate.com/">Cory Gardner</a> (R) has a slightly larger lead over incumbent Sen. <a href="http://markudall.com/">Mark Udall</a> (D), 3.3 percentage points in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/co/colorado_senate_gardner_vs_udall-3845.html">the RCP Average</a>, and he hasn't made a lot - or really <strong><em>any</em></strong> - of the stupid mistakes Buck made four years ago. Republicans are also determined this year not to get caught off guard again by the Democrats' ground game. Suppose for a minute, though, that this race plays out from here just like the 2010 contest did. That would mean Gardner would continue to gain in the polls and head into Election Day with a lead of between five and six percentage points in the RCP average. If the actual election results then showed a four-point swing towards Udall, then Gardner would still win. It's also worth noting that Udall is polling much lower than Bennett was four years ago. However, there are also more "undecided" voters than there were at this point in the 2010 race, so while Udall has more ground to make up than Bennett did in the last week of the campaign, there are also more potential late deciders who could swing this race. <br />
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In North Carolina, the polls were much more accurate in 2010. Incumbent Sen. Richard Burr (R) led his Democratic challenger, then-North Carolina Secretary of State Elaine Marshall, by 10.7 percentage points in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/senate/nc/north_carolina_senate_burr_vs_marshall-1111.html">the RCP Average</a> on October 26th, and he won re-election by a twelve-point margin, 55% to 43%. (One interesting thing to note is that, in that race, undecided voters appear to have split evenly between the two candidates, something we don't usually see in a race where one candidate has a comfortable lead in the polls and is expected to win.) That may be good news for Sen. <a href="http://www.kayhagan.com/">Kay Hagan</a> (D), who is currently <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/nc/north_carolina_senate_tillis_vs_hagan_vs_haugh-5136.html">clinging to a one-percentage-point lead</a> over her Republican challenger, State House Speaker <a href="http://thomtillis.com/">Thom Tillis</a> (R). Unlike Marshall in 2010, however, Tillis appears to be chipping away at the incumbent's lead, which was 3.8 percentage points in the RCP Average at the beginning of this month. But Hagan may be helped by the Libertarian candidate in the race, <a href="https://seanhaugh.nationbuilder.com/">Sean Haugh</a>, who was not a factor in 2010. </div>
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In Louisiana four years ago, Democrats tried to pick off incumbent Sen. and probable prostitute patron <a href="http://www.davidvitter.com/site/c.ktJUJ7MNIuE/b.5131285/k.BE82/Home.htm">David Vitter</a> (R) with Rep. <a href="http://www.charliemelancon.com/home">Charlie Melancon</a> (D). In another state where a candidate must receive a majority of the vote to win, Vitter avoided a runoff, winning 57% of the vote to Melancon's 38%. One week before Election Day, Vitter led Melancon by exactly sixteen percentage points in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2010/senate/la/louisiana_senate_vitter_vs_melancon-1095.html">the RCP Average</a>. This year, it's Republicans who are trying to pick off a Democratic incumbent, and let's just say it's going to a runoff; <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/la/louisiana_senate_primary-4070.html">the latest polls</a> indicate that Sen. <a href="http://www.marylandrieu.com/">Mary Landrieu</a> (D) will likely receive a plurality of the vote in the "jungle primary" next week but not even close to the 50% needed to avoid a runoff, which would likely be won by Rep. <a href="http://billcassidy.com/">Bill Cassidy</a> (R). <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/la/louisiana_senate_cassidy_vs_landrieu-3670.html">In a one-on-one matchup, Cassidy leads Landrieu by 4.5 percentage points in the RCP Average.</a> </div>
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Although there were also Senate races in Kansas and Alaska in 2010, those races were so different from the ones in those states this year that I don't think it's useful to look at them. Also, while there was a Senate race in Kentucky four years ago, I don't really consider the race between incumbent Sen. <a href="http://www.teammitch.com/">Mitch McConnell</a> (R) and Kentucky Secretary of State <a href="http://alisonforkentucky.com/">Alison Lundergan Grimes</a> (D) to be "competitive" at this point; <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2014/senate/ky/kentucky_senate_mcconnell_vs_grimes-3485.html">McConnell has a small but consistent lead</a>, and Grimes is showing no traction whatsoever.<br />
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What about the "generic ballot"? Republicans have a six-point advantage among likely voters in the <em>Washington Post</em>/ABC News <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/page/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/2014/10/28/National-Politics/Polling/release_371.xml"><span style="color: #125687;">poll</span></a> out this week. That's even <strong><em>better</em></strong> than they were doing four years ago, <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/10/28/new-poll-dems-faring-worse-than-2010/">writes</a> FOX News digital politics editor Chris Stirewalt: <br />
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<span lang="EN" style="color: #222222; font-family: Lora; font-size: 9pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;">
<strong>Double, double, toil and trouble -</strong></span><span lang="EN" style="color: #222222; font-family: Lora; font-size: 9pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast;"> Struggling with female voters and young voters,
Democrats fare worse in the latest WaPo/ABC poll than they did at the same point ahead of the disastrous 2010
election and at the same level as the punishing 1994 midterm elections that
cost them both houses of Congress. Without any significant increase in
Democratic intensity since the previous polling cycle, the auguries are getting
dire for the president’s party.</span></blockquote>
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Among registered voters,
Democrats lead Republicans in the poll, 47% to 44%, but <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/poll-midterm-momentum-belongs-to-gop/2014/10/27/6cb63a74-5e0d-11e4-9f3a-7e28799e0549_story.html">that's "identical to the difference recorded at this point in 2010."</a> That poll may actually be good news for Democrats when compared with the results of <a href="http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/10/26/poll-gop-expands-advantage-days-before-midterm-election/">a recent <em>Wall Street Journal</em>/NBC News/Annenberg survey</a>, in which 52% of likely voters in the survey said they wanted the election to produce a Republican-led Congress, while 41% favored Democratic control. </div>
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"By historical measures, an 11-point lead on the question of which party should control Congress is large," Janet Hook wrote for the <em>WSJ</em>. "Republicans held a seven-point lead on the question at this point in the 2010 election in a Journal/NBC survey, which used a different method to determine which voters were most likely to cast ballots." </div>
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Finally, if you're one of those statistics-mongers who just can't get enough data and analysis, or if you're looking for a number to put on the GOP's odds of taking over the U.S. Senate this cycle, then consider this: </div>
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Today, One week out from Election Day 2014, Nate Silver’s infamous <a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/interactives/senate-forecast/">FiveThirtyEight</a> gives the GOP a 64.6% chance of winning the Senate, and "<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/newsgraphics/2014/senate-model/">the Upshot</a>" (a similar thing affiliated with the<em> New York Times</em>) says there’s a 70% likelihood of the same. The <em>Washington Post</em>’s <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dre/politics/election-lab-2014">Election Lab</a>, meanwhile, forecasts that Republicans will see a net gain of seven Senate seats and projects a 93% chance Republicans take the upper chamber. Make of this what you will; I'm going back to running my law practice.
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-86065010041192166822014-10-08T16:18:00.000-07:002014-10-13T17:22:10.748-07:00Day of the Upset ... but not in Austin<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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I am admittedly a little late getting this post up, but then, I don't write about sports for a living. (To loyal readers and followers of this blog, sorry it has been so long since I've posted something. I've had ideas, believe me, but starting a law practice from scratch and keeping it afloat are very time-consuming.) </div>
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It's been a while since there's been so much upheaval in the NCAA football rankings in one week, or even in one day. On Saturday, <a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/ncaaf/alabama-crimson-tide-ole-miss-rebels-201410040077/">11th-ranked Mississipi ("Ole Miss") beat No. 3 Alabama</a>, <a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/ncaaf/oklahoma-sooners-tcu-horned-frogs-201410040085/">No. 4 Oklahoma lost to TCU</a>, which had just made it into the AP Top 25 this season, and <a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/ncaaf/texas-am-aggies-mississippi-state-bulldogs-201410040078/">12th-ranked Mississippi State battered some stupid cow college that was ranked No. 6</a>. Add to that <a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/ncaaf/arizona-wildcats-oregon-ducks-201410020060/">No. 2 Oregon's embarrassing home loss to unranked Arizona</a>, and you had four of the top six teams losing this week, causing a scrambling of the rankings at the top of the AP poll. No. 17 Wisconsin and 18th-ranked Brigham Young University also lost to unranked teams, (Northwestern and Utah State, respectively). </div>
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Other top-ranked schools avoided being upset, most importantly No. 7 Baylor, <a href="http://www.baylorbears.com/sports/m-footbl/recaps/100414aaa.html">which handed Texas its third loss at home this year</a>. The Bears almost shut out the Longhorns, but two costly penalties against Baylor's defense on UT's last possession of the game allowed them to score a touchdown with 2:14 remaining. </div>
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The 'horns nearly scored twice in the first half, but Baylor defensive lineman Beau Blackshear successfully blocked a 52-yard field goal attempt, and safety Terrell Burt scooped up the ball and returned it 62 yards for his second career touchdown. Then, right before halftime, Texas quarterback Tyrone Swoopes fumbled the snap at the 1-yard line, and Blackshear was there to recover the ball. </div>
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The most spectacular drive of the game was easily the one kept alive by Baylor punter Spencer Roth’s faked punt and 19-yard run on fourth-and-5 in the third quarter. Three plays later, quarterback Bryce Petty completed a pass to Antwan Goodley, who ran it into the end zone for a 30-yard touchdown. </div>
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The 28-7 final score could easily have been more lopsided, but the referees took six points for Baylor off the scoreboard in the second quarter after an official review determined that Petty was stopped short of the goal line when he ran with the ball on 2nd & Goal from the 5. Texas's surprisingly strong defense managed to keep Baylor out of the end zone on its ensuing two attempts, resulting in a turnover on downs. </div>
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Much to my chagrin, the Bears chose to let our QB take a knee on the last play of the game, when Baylor had the ball on the Texas 7-yard line with one second remaining on the clock. The obvious call for me would have been to let Chris Callahan attempt a field goal. I know we didn't need the extra points, but our poor kicker could have used a confidence boost after missing five of his six field goal attempts so far this season, and to deny him that opportunity, when there was nothing on line, came across (to me, at least) as a slight at the young man. </div>
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For those of you not familiar with the history and dynamics of the Big Twelve, let me explain why this game was such a big deal. Texas used to be the big dog, the king of the conference. They're the most recent Big 12 team to win a national championship (in 2006). They are the school that produced Earl Campbell and Dallas Cowboys icons Tom Landry and Tex Schramm. Movies have been made about Texas football, <a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0331933/">even about their cheerleaders</a>. </div>
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But, in recent years, the mighty have fallen. As mentioned earlier in this post, Texas has lost three home games already this season, putting them at 2-3 overall and 1-1 against conference opponents. They are 14½-point underdogs going in to this Saturday's game against Oklahoma, perenially played at the Cotton Bowl in Dallas. <a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/blogs/ncaaf-dr-saturday/report-mack-brown-step-down-texas-head-coach-202433735--ncaaf.html;_ylt=AwrBEiFJDThUpXwAGQhNbK5_">Longtime coach Mack Brown, who led them to that national championship and another Big 12 conference title in 2009, stepped down at the end of the 2013 season</a>, and the team has apparently not been doing well under his successor, Charlie Strong. </div>
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Even before Brown’s exit, the school's football program was clearly in decline. I'm told that that their 8-5 record last year made Brown the first coach in Texas history to have four straight seasons with at least four losses. </div>
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Texas's decline overlapped with Baylor's rapid ascent. In the past four years, my alma mater has played in four consecutive bowl games--a first in school history--turned out a Heisman trophy winner--another first--and won its first Big 12 title. Oh, and we've got a fancy new stadium on the north bank of the Brazos River now, too. </div>
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The unofficial passing of the torch may have come last December when Baylor defeated Texas 30-10 to win that conference title. </div>
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The feelings of resentment among other teams, especially Texas, are stark, as Jordan Garrettson <a href="http://www.sportingnews.com/ncaa-football/preview/201410040083/baylor-bears--texas-longhorns/RK=0/RS=xTlOjfyXtiUPrv3P4D6tIV.FwDs-">reported</a> for the AP last week: </div>
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"They're still Baylor," said John Harris, who leads Texas with 336 receiving yards. "Just because they started playing better, that's good for them. We're still Texas."</blockquote>
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Those remarks came about six months after Longhorns linebacker Steve Edmond was reprimanded by the Big 12 for his disrespectful comments toward the Bears after spring practice.</blockquote>
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"I really don't like Baylor. I still feel they're trash," Edmond said. "Y'all think it's funny, but I'm dead serious. They've had some good players. But I don't understand how we lost to Baylor."</blockquote>
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These players' jeers at the new king of the Big 12 underscore what is becoming an undeniable fact: the upper echelon of the NCAA bowl subdivision (the FBS) is, to many schools, an elite club of historically dominant teams, and they don't like it when schools they used to beat the tar out of improve themselves and break into that upper echelon. I'm sure it hasn't been fun for Texas, Oklahoma or Baylor's old archrival, Texas A&M, to hear sportscasters gush over Baylor this season and last and how we're now the stars of the Big 12 and had the No. 1 offense in the FBS last season after years of ridicule and derision.</div>
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Baylor's upcoming game against TCU is also significant for many reasons, including some of the same. See, no matter what they say now, TCU was grateful to be a part of the Big 12 after the conference reshuffling in 2011-12. For years, the Horned Frogs felt that their football team was underrated and underranked. A 13-0 record and a Rose Bowl victory in 2011 brought them national renown on a level they had not enjoyed since the days of Abe Martin. (I'm sure former Horned Frog LaDainian Tomlinson's star power helped as well.) It's fair to say that a lot of TCU students, alums and other fans expected them to be the talk of the Big 12 when they joined the conference in 2012. </div>
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But it was not to be. Roughly eleven months after the Horned Frogs capped their undefeated season with their first Rose Bowl win, <a href="http://right-winggenius.blogspot.com/2011/12/not-your-typical-saturday.html">Robert Griffin III won the Heisman Trophy</a>, a high honor in a remarkable season for Baylor. RG3 proved to be not only a stellar quarterback but a recruiting boon like nothing Baylor's football program had ever had before. Although they had some adjustments to make in its first season post-RG3, the Bears still managed to finish a respectable 8-5, including a stunning upset of then No. 1-ranked Kansas State and a Holiday Bowl victory over UCLA. Meanwhile, despite a 49-21 rout of Baylor in October, TCU finished their debut season as a Big 12 team with a bowl game loss to Michigan State and a 7-6 record overall (4-5 in conference games). They ended the year unranked for the first time since 2007. More importantly, Baylor was picking up a lot of high school talent that would otherwise have gone to other schools, such as TCU. <a href="http://baylor.scout.com/story/1150618-no-shock-linwood-flips-to-baylor">One of BU's most potent weapons this year and last, running back Shock Linwood, was once <span style="font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 11pt; line-height: 115%; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-fareast; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;">a</span> commit to TCU.</a> So was current Baylor defensive lineman Andrew Billings. </div>
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The long-running Baylor-TCU rivalry (which I've just learned has been nicknamed "The Revivalry") got even hotter last year, when Baylor defeated the Horned Frogs 41-38 in Fort Worth on their way to that Big 12 title. After the game, TCU coach Gary Patterson <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fr2ZEVmOKJY">unloaded</a> on his Baylor counterpart. Sports columnist Gil LeBreton <a href="http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/11/30/5381748/tcus-patterson-rips-into-baylors.html">wrote</a> for the<em> Fort Worth Star-Telegram</em>:</div>
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“The bottom line,” Patterson said, “is he’s picking on the wrong guy.”</div>
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It was one of a steamy series of Patterson-issued “bottom lines” Saturday. His voice shook with anger, even though Patterson claimed he wasn’t mad.</div>
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He professed, more than once, that he had “respect for him” and “respect for his program,” even as he questioned the Bears’ class.</div>
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At the root of it, Patterson tried to explain, was Baylor senior safety Ahmad Dixon’s targeting penalty on Frogs receiver Trevone Boykin and what Briles did or didn’t do in the wake of it.</div>
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“Here’s the bottom line to it,” Patterson said, “No. 6 [Dixon] beats a guy up at the beginning of the season and he didn’t get suspended. He takes a shot today, and I want him kicked out.</div>
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And the head coach comes across the field at me.”</div>
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Patterson contended that while officials were discussing the penalty, Briles came onto the field and yelled something at him.</div>
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Their postgame handshake later, Patterson reported, was brief, but went right to the sore spot at hand.</div>
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“I didn’t say anything,” the TCU coach said. “He said, ‘Leave it on the field.’</div>
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I said not. You come across the field at me and later you want me to leave it on the field? No.”</div>
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Dixon was arrested on a misdemeanor assault charge in a September incident. He was not suspended from the team, leading Patterson to say Saturday, “They didn’t correct the problem a long time ago.”</div>
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Instead of Briles admonishing Dixon for Saturday’s illegal third-quarter hit, Patterson became further agitated that TV cameras spotted the ejected player still sitting on the Baylor bench.</div>
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“I’ve got coaches up in the box saying he’s laughing on TV underneath his towel,” Patterson said. “Well, I didn’t think it was that funny.”</div>
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Patterson continued, “The bottom line is, we’re not going to do that. Gary Patterson lives in Fort Worth. If he’s got a problem with me, here’s where I live.”<br />
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Read <br />
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“No, I just told him his kids did a great job and good luck during the rest of the year and then in recruiting,” Briles said.</div>
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But Patterson took the brief interchange more personally.</div>
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“He comes across the field at me?” Patterson said. “Nuh-uh.</div>
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“I didn’t build this program to back down to anybody, and I’m not going to do it to him. Not in recruiting or in anything we do.”</div>
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Briles, expectedly, responded to Patterson's rant with customary Baylor class: </div>
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“No, I just told him his kids did a great job and good luck during the rest of the year and then in recruiting,” Briles said.</div>
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But Patterson took the brief interchange more personally.</div>
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“He comes across the field at me?” Patterson said. “Nuh-uh.</div>
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I didn’t build this program to back down to anybody, and I’m not going to do it to him. Not in recruiting or in anything we do.”</div>
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Perhaps Patterson, who deserves credit for what he's done as TCU head coach, was truly upset about what Dixon did (BTW, Gary, football is called a "contact sport" for a reason.) and what he perceived as Baylor's failure to "correct the problem" sooner, but methinks it was <a href="http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/11/06/5313048/gary-patterson-is-no-longer-the.html?rh=1">a column by the very popular and respected Randy Galloway in the <em>Star-Telegram</em></a> earlier that month that really got the notoriously hot-tempered coach's goat. Under the biting headline "Gary Patterson is no longer the flavor of the fall," the doyen of Texas sports writers described the recent (and sudden) reversal of fortune for the Horned Frogs' football program and its illustrious coach thusly: </div>
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What the heck happened to Gary in Fort Worth?</div>
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Just one year ago, after taking a backup quarterback into Austin on Thanksgiving night and beating Texas, there were columns being written on why Gary Patterson should NOT be the leading candidate to replace Mack Brown.</div>
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Those columns were in response to Austin stories that the UT money boys wanted to hire GP, hire him like right now. But with all the outside crap involved with that particular job, a dug-in Patterson didn’t seem to be a guy who would tolerate the program’s built-in distractions.</div>
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Even in a somewhat disappointing first season (2012) in the Big 12, Patterson’s reputation didn’t lose luster. In August, in a conference poll of players, the question was what coach would you like to play for other than your own?</div>
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Patterson was the players’ choice.</div>
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But at the moment, with TCU struggling, GP has dropped off the hot list of college coaches. He’s not even lukewarm.</div>
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Guess who Randy called "the new football flavor of the fall"? </div>
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I'll give you three guesses, and the first two don't count. But you can see him and his team in action Saturday afternoon against TCU.
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-87570482792699609522013-11-05T15:06:00.001-08:002013-11-11T14:02:17.489-08:00Are Liberty-Loving Virginians Really This Foolish?<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Democrats seem to have come upon a very successful tactic for winning seemingly unwinnbale elections: Sit back and let the opposition defeat itself. The latest example of this could be the Virginia gubernatorial election, if the race turns out the way polls are indicating it will. The Democratic candidate, former DNC Chairman <a href="http://terrymcauliffe.com/">Terry McAuliffe</a>, leads his Republican opponent, Attorney General <a href="http://www.cuccinelli.com/">Ken Cuccinelli</a>, by nearly eight percentage points in <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2013/governor/va/virginia_governor_cuccinelli_vs_mcauliffe_vs_sarvis-4111.html">the RealClearPolitics average</a> of recent public polls. Cuccinelli hasn't run a terrible campaign, nor has he made any Akin-esque gaffes to speak of. Rather, his biggest problem is actually another candidate named <a href="http://robertsarvis.com/">Robert Sarvis</a>, a lawyer and businessman who's running as the Libertarian candidate for Governor.</div>
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The latest polls of the race show Sarvis, who ran unsuccessfully for the Virginia State Senate in 2011 but has never held public office, garnering anywhere from 3% to 13% support among "likely" Virginia voters. All those polls also show McAuliffe leading Cuccinelli, but in most of them, the Democrat registers less support than Cucinelli and Sarvis combined, and the poll results that break down voter preferences by party identification show Sarvis drawing more support from Republicans than Democrats. It is hard to believe that Sarvis's candidacy isn't benifitting McAuliffe and hurting Cuccinelli.</div>
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Virginia's official motto is, "Sic semper tyrannis" ("Thus always to tyrants."), and Virginians have a long history of preferring liberty to tyranny. The conclusive battle of the Revolutionary War was fought and won by the Americans at Yorktown. In the nineteenth century, Virginia resisted federal encroachment on its sovereignty and, along with ten other states, seceded from the Union to form the Confederacy (though fighting to keep slavery legal didn't exactly put them on the side of liberty, either). <br />
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History also is replete with examples of how Virginans (like so many others) have seen their liberty eroded when the wrong people have been put in charge. Even after the Civil War, Democrats enacted and implemented segregation and other Jim Crow laws that deprived Negroes of their rights and made it clear to all other Virginians that they weren't living in a free society but rather a society in which the government decided which rights people ought to have. (Sound familiar?) <br />
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In recent years, the voting patterns of Virginians have made it difficult to figure out where the voters' sympathies lie. Since the turn of the last century, changing demographics and the growth of the federal government have fueled a Democratic shift at the state, and then the federal, level, particularly in northern Virginia, where a lot of residents are either on the federal payroll or work in industries that depend on government largesse to stay alive. Virginians elected Democratic governors in 2001 and 2005 and traded Republican Sen. George Allen for Democrat Jim Webb in 2006; Democrats won control of the State Senate in 2007; and, in 2008, Barack Obama became the first Democrat to carry Virginia in a presidential election since 1964. (He won the state again, albeit by a narrower margin, in 2012.) Between Obama's election and re-election, however, Virginians appeared to be turning back toward the GOP. Republicans won all three statewide races--for governor, lieutenant governor and attorney general--in 2009, ousted three Democratic incumbents in the U.S. House in 2010, and flipped two State Senate seats in 2011 to regain control of that chamber. <br />
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Since then, however, it's been mostly bad news for Virginians who favor liberty over big government. In 2012, 51% of voters in Old Dominion supported Obama's re-election, and 53% voted for Democrat Tim Kaine in the U.S. Senate race. Popular Republican Gov. Bob McDonnell is dragging his feet on entering the race for U.S. Senate next year, when Sen. Mark Warner (D), elected in the Democratic wave of 2008, will be up for re-election. As previously mentioned, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli is trailing Democrat Terry McAuliffe in the race for governor.<br />
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Whatever the overall mood of the Virginia electorate is at the moment, the fact that the pro-freedom candidates are registering more support in the polls than the anti-freedom candidate suggests that a majority, or at least a plurality, of Virginia voters value liberty more than whatever redeeming qualities big-government hucksters like Terry McAuliffe have to offer, which only worsens the prospective travesty of McAuliffe being elected governor because of his opposition splitting the vote.<br />
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Surely Virginians who are smart enough to know better than to vote for Terry McAuliffe are cognizant of the reality that Sarvis is not going to win, but why then would they vote for him instead of Cuccinelli, thereby handing the election to McAuliffe? It doesn't make sense. Maybe it would if Cuccinelli and Sarvis were worlds apart on major issues, but Cuccinelli's record is more in line with the libertarian-leaning wing of the GOP than the hard-line "conservative" wing; he has worked hard fighting Obamacare in court and enjoyed at least one success when the Supreme Court ruled the Medicaid exapnsion mandated by the law unconstitutionally coercive; he has rolled out a fiscally responsible tax plan that slashes the Commonwealth's income tax rates and <a href="http://www.cuccinelli.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/07/Energy-Plan.pdf">a sensible energy plan</a> that calls for removing bureaucratic red tape and burdensome regulations to expand energy exploration and production; and <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/nrd/articles/358320/cuccinelli-comeback">he "wants to outmaneuver [school] voucher opponents by giving tax credits to those who donate money to provide private- and parochial-school tuition to poor, middle-class, and disabled students,"</a> thus allowing parents greater choice in education. <a href="http://www.cuccinelli.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/2nd-Amendment-Rights.pdf">He has also pledged to </a><a href="http://www.cuccinelli.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/2nd-Amendment-Rights.pdf">protect Virginians' 2nd Amendment rights</a> and has criticized his own party for big-government boondoggles such as Medicare Part D, the No Child Left Behind Act and the Wall Street bailouts. His libertarian bona fides were sufficient to secure <a href="http://www.politico.com/story/2013/10/ron-paul-endorses-ken-cuccinelli-virginia-governor-2013-elections-98208.html">the endorsement of former Congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul (R)</a> and a host of liberty-focused advocacy groups. Indeed, one wonders what makes Sarvis so much more appealing to voters who supposedly cherish their liberty than Cuccinelli. Whatever it is, it's enough to make them willing to aid and abet the election of a big-government Democrat while wasting their vote on a candidate sure to finish a distant third. Oh, well. <em>Sic semper fatuis.</em></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-51394152843564151882013-08-19T11:14:00.002-07:002013-08-19T11:40:06.760-07:00EUROUT<h3 class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: center;">
<o:p><em>Should We "Appreciate" This, Mr. President?</em></o:p></h3>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p>Shortly after taking office in 2009, President Obama emulated one of his (presumed) role models by addressing a throng of enthusiastic Germans. In <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/the_press_office/Remarks-by-President-Obama-at-Strasbourg-Town-Hall/">his speech</a>, he declared, "In America, there's afailure to appreciate Europe's leading role in the world."</o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; mso-bidi-font-size: 12.0pt;"><o:p>I wasn't--and I'm still not--sure what he was referring to, and he didn't cite any specific examples, but America's latest defeat this weekend at the hands of Europe called to mind the President's words in Strasbourg four summers ago. </o:p></span></div>
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In the most recent example of European dominance of the Obama-led United States, <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/golf/2013%2F08%2F18%2Feurope-defeats-usa-solheim-cup/2669485/">a team of European LPGA golfers beat their American counterparts at Colorado Golf Club to win the coveted Solheim Cup</a>. It was the first time<a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/golf/lpga/leaderboard/2013/249"></a> Europe had won the Cup on U.S. soil and the first time the European team had won back-to-back Solheim Cups in the tournament's 23-year history. The Europeans' 18-10 rout was also the most lopsided win by either side since America's 13-7 victory in 1994. Caroline Hedwall of Sweden became the first player in Solheim Cup history to win five out of five matches. </div>
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It's fitting that this crushing blow (or, more accurately, series of painful blows) to the U.S. was dealt in Colorado, a state that Obama twice carried in the Electoral College. Perhaps some good could come from this if enough Coloradans who voted for Obama witnessed this travesty, connected the dots, realized the error of their ways and learned from their (and Obama's) mistakes. (But don't count on it.)<br />
<br />
Normally I leave it to <a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/17429888760983690959">sportsfan</a> to cover sports news, but the embarrassment of this unprecedented fiasco made my blood boil. It's not just that the best of America lost to the best of Europe; the LPGA has become yet another area in which the U.S. has ceded leadership under President Obama.<span style="color: #0066cc;"> <a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/news/europe-retains-solheim-cup-america-003520109--golf.html">As the </a></span><span style="color: black;"><a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/news/europe-retains-solheim-cup-america-003520109--golf.html">AP’s<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><span lang="EN">Doug Ferguson </span>pointed out</a>, "The Americans are without the Solheim Cup, the Ryder Cup, the Walker Cup and the Curtis Cup, the four biggest team events between both sides of the Atlantic."</span><br />
<span style="color: black;"></span><br />
This is also an uncharacteristic reaction to defeat for me. When <a href="http://www.dallascowboys.com/">the Cowboys</a>, <a href="http://texas.rangers.mlb.com/">the Rangers</a>, <a href="http://www.nba.com/mavericks">the Mavericks</a> or my Baylor Bears lose, I get depressed. I got really depressed after last year's elections. But I reacted to this loss with anger. I'm not sure why, but I know who to be angry at.</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-15633520897146961992013-08-08T18:31:00.000-07:002013-08-20T10:28:36.034-07:00Stacy Snaps Sinitic Streak<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-size: x-small;">(Photo
by Wojciech Migda)</span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"></span><br />
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In an encouraging development <span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Verdana","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">f</span>or the hundreds of Americans who are interested in women's golf, <a href="http://traffic.outbrain.com/network/redir?key=b5bde0cd941e3f2015d90f43f4b621c8&rdid=584733425&type=YLD_d/NA_la&in-site=true&idx=2&req_id=536508f5dd9174f4d2a1fecb139582a4&agent=blog_JS_rec&recMode=7&reqType=1&wid=100&imgType=0&refPub=3600&prs=false&scp=false&origSrc=4902296">Stacy Lewis won the Women's British Open this weekend</a>. The reigning <a href="http://search.yahoo.com/r/_ylt=A0oG7n5GlQJSGRsAQClXNyoA;_ylu=X3oDMTEzdDhhYmRpBHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMwRjb2xvA2FjMgR2dGlkA0FDQlkwNV8x/SIG=12t4qeb8u/EXP=1375929798/**http%3a//www.lpga.com/golf/award-winners/lpga/rolex-player-of-the-year.aspx">LPGA player of the year</a> birdied the last two holes on the Old Course in St. Andrews, Scotland, to finish at 72 (even-par) for the day and eight under overall. It was an exciting and impressive victory, as well as a long-awaited occurence for LPGA spectators who were anxious to see a White girl win again. </div>
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Oh, did that sound inappropriate? Sorry; my sense of when it is and isn't appropriate to bring up the race of newsmakers must be out of step with modern social mores. I didn't think there was anything racial about Stacy Lewis winning the Women's British Open, but apparently, I was wrong. </div>
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<span class="fn">During the final round of the tournament, one of the male announcers on the Golf Channel mused that "the last 10 tournaments" have all been "won by Asian women." The Sports Xchange</span> began <span class="provider org"><a href="http://sports.yahoo.com/news/lewis-wins-womens-british-open-185127159--golf.html">its article announcing Lewis's win</a> by declaring that the<em> </em>28-year-old</span> "ended a streak of 10 major championships by Asian players with a victory on Sunday...." Countless other sports media noted in one way or another that Lewis’ win breaks a run of 10 straight majors won by "Asian" players. (<a href="http://golfweek.com/news/2013/aug/04/women-british-open-2013-stacy-lewis-win-victory/">Golfweek supplemented this bit of trivia with the fact that Lewis's "victory in the 2011 Kraft Nabisco Championship had been the last major not to fall to an Asian."</a>) <br />
<br />
There's been a lot of efforts recently to inject race into matters of national interest that are not inherently racial: e.g., the George Zimmerman/Travon Martin case, the controversy over New York City's "Stop & Frisk" policy and certain states changing their voting laws. The individuals who have perpetrated these efforts probably have varying motives for doing so, but I can't conceive of a good reason for racializing non-racial things. In the case of Stacy Lewis's victory at St. Andrews, it is significant and a propos that this was the first time an American won a major LPGA tournament since 2011, but why not just say that? Why even bring up the race of the other winners? <br />
<br />
It's no secret that <a href="http://www.newsday.com/sports/golf/asian-players-dominate-lpga-majors-1.5417438">women from the Far East have come to dominate the LPGA Tour</a> in recent years, so I'm not that surprised that nearly every sportscaster and golf journalist who reported on the 2013 Women's British Open made sure to work this Asian-winning-streak talking point into their coverage. I'm just so sick of people injecting race into things that aren't naturally racial.<br />
<br />
When I was a kid, a Japanese friend of mine and his family were sent to an internment camp, like hundreds of thousands of other Japanese-Americans who were guilty of nothing other than sharing a heritage with a nation that had attacked us. It was a sad chapter in American history, and although it didn't seem right to me at the time, I didn't really understand what was going on. Once I was older and understood what was done to my friend and his family and other Japanese families and German-American families and why it was done, I wasn't sure how to feel; I felt angry, confused, furious and saddened. What happened to those Americans was wrong, so very wrong, and of course the people responsible for it rationalized their actions at the time, but then, don't the leaders of any government that oppresses its people always do that?<br />
<br />
So, if you think I'm making a big fuss about something that's just small potatoes, then you need to understand where I'm coming from. Having seen the U.S. progress from a country with internment camps and segregated schools to a society in which so many people value tolerance and diversity above all else, I have an instant dislike for attempts to racialize any issue that isn't (or shouldn't be) racial. Years ago, the late Mike Wallace asked Morgan Freeman <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3cGfrExozQ">in an interview</a>, "How are we going to get rid of racism?" Before Wallace had even finished his question, Freeman responded, "Stop talking about
it." I couldn't agree more.</div>
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sportsfanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17429888760983690959noreply@blogger.com0Arlington, TX, USA32.735687 -97.10806559999997532.5218985 -97.43078909999997 32.9494755 -96.78534209999998tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-332436919114693002013-08-06T21:58:00.000-07:002013-08-20T10:28:36.041-07:00Media censored the race of the victim in brutal Florida school bus mob beating<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="background-color: rgba(255, 255, 255, 0);">This is outrageous.<br /><br />Where is the media attention?<br /><br />Justice for this victim!!<br /><br />I guess Sharpton and the rest of the scum don't care about white victims of brutal, black, drug-pushing thugs........<br /><br />They just care about the thugs. Thugs like Trayvon Martin.<br /><br />These vicious animals should be punished.<br /><br /><a href="http://topconservativenews.com/2013/08/media-censored-the-race-of-the-victim-in-brutal-florida-school-bus-mob-beating/" x-apple-data-detectors-result="0" x-apple-data-detectors-type="link" x-apple-data-detectors="true">http://topconservativenews.com/2013/08/media-censored-the-race-of-the-victim-in-brutal-florida-school-bus-mob-beating/</a></span></div>
The Little Red Henhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09435765118331824903noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-46585149729493750482013-07-23T21:50:00.000-07:002014-10-29T12:54:27.332-07:00How You Know They're Not Serious About "Securing the Border"<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Have you seen <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MTlyoWRmhWw">this ad</a>? We're told that <a href="http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/BILLS-113s744es/pdf/BILLS-113s744es.pdf">S.744</a> (the "comprehensive immigration reform" bill that passed the Senate last month) contains "the tough border security America needs." <a href="http://www.rubio.senate.gov/">Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.)</a><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">, one of the "Gang of Eight" Senators who supposedly drafted this legislation, </span><a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rxrx68Erbak"><span style="color: #4d4d4d;">assures us that</span></a>
the bill “puts in place the
toughest enforcement measures in the history of the United States, potentially
in the world.” Is that a fair statement? <br />
<br />
Last week, I <a href="http://right-winggenius.blogspot.com/2013/07/word-to-wise-on-immigration-reform.html">posted a critique</a> of S.744<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and detailed some of the problems with the bill's approach to immigration reform. I originally endeavored to go into even greater detail about the language of the legislation, but then I decided that the more tedious analysis belonged in a separate post. So, here, I will analyze with greater specificity where and how the Senate's bill comes up short. First, though, a brief passage on the policy lingo of immigration reform is needed.<br />
<br />
The principal responsibility for protecting our country's border security, cybersecurity and economic security
lies with <a href="http://www.dhs.gov/">the Department of Homeland Security</a> (DHS). <a href="http://www.dhs.gov/topics">DHS is also charged with overseeing citizenship and immigration in the United States.</a> The <a href="http://www.uscis.gov/">United States Citizenship & Immigration Services</a> (USCIS) oversees legal immigration to the United States and is the agency that grants immigration and citizenship benefits. <a href="http://www.ice.gov/">Immigration & Customs Enforcement</a> (ICE) is "the principal investigative arm of DHS, and its primary mission is to promote homeland security and public safety through the criminal and civil enforcement of federal laws governing border control, customs, trade, and immigration," according to <a href="http://www.ice.gov/about/overview">this thing</a> somebody referred me to. <br />
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When discussing/debating "legalizing" illegal immigrants, it's important to understand that a pathway to legal status is not necessarily a pathway to citizenship. (To some, any legalization is "amnesty", but that's a topic for a separate post.) S.744 speaks of "registered provisional immigrant status," which if granted would then allow an immigrant to stay in the U.S. legally, without receiving all the rights and benefits of a U.S. citizen. In this post, I'll refer to applications for registered provisional immigrant status by the acronym "ARPISs".<br />
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It's also important to understand that, as was the case with past efforts toward "comprehensive immigration reform", the end game of S.744 is to legalize immigrants who are currently in the U.S. unlawfully <strong>without</strong> requiring them to resort to existing legal channels (which, in most cases, would require them to first leave the U.S. and re-enter the country <strong>legally</strong>). There are some who are categorically opposed to this, but <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2013/06/23/borders-first-a-dividing-line-in-immigration-debate/#poll">most Americans who have an opinion on this subject are not</a>. Most members of Congress, too, are willing to support legislation that would provide illegal aliens with a path to legal status or even citizenship, but a lot of them want any legislation that provides such a pathway to address the problem of illegal immigration with, inter alia, more border security, enhanced & increased "interior enforcement" and measures that discourage the wrong kind of immigration (to wit, illegal immigration and the immigrants who come here legally with an eye toward living off the government).<br />
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Rubio and other Republican proponents of the bill <a href="http://www.rubio.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/press-releases?ID=a4049800-4e0b-443f-bd5b-47dfbfa211fb">have insisted that it contains multiple security "triggers"</a> that must be met before any immigrant currently in this country illegally can be legalized. Skeptics have contended that these "triggers" are weak, meaningless and/or can be easily manipulated/circumvented to fast-track the legalization process. Many Senators offered amendments to S.744 (discussed herein) that would strengthen the triggers or add additional preconditions to legalization. <br />
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You've probably heard of the "border surge" provisions in S.744. In the bill, what some are calling "the Border Surge" is part of the Comprehensive Southern Border Security Strategy. I'll just call it the Border Surge. There's also the "Southern Border Fencing Strategy," which is exactly what it sounds like. (S.744 requires the `Southern Border Fencing Strategy' to identify "where fencing (including double-layer fencing), infrastructure, and technology, including at ports of entry, should be deployed along the Southern border.") "E-verify" refers to a mandatory employment verification system required by <a href="http://www.gpo.gov/fdsys/pkg/USCODE-2011-title8/pdf/USCODE-2011-title8-chap12-subchapII-partVIII-sec1324a.pdf">current law</a> that the federal government never got around to implementing (at least not as originally conceived). <a href="http://www.smartbusinesspractices.com/legal_everifyfaq.php">There is currently a federal employment verification program in place</a>, but <a href="http://www.uscis.gov/USCIS/E-Verify/E-Verify/Final%20E-Verify%20Report%2012-16-09_2.pdf">it is not very potent or effective.</a></div>
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Now to the "triggers." I haven't read and analyzed the entire bill yet, so I can't tell you exactly what's in it. However, I can say what's <strong>not</strong> in it, and that's critical. By looking at what the proponents of this legislation voted <strong>against</strong>, you can see that they're not at all serious about border security.<br />
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Six weeks ago, the Senate <a href="http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=113&session=1&vote=00148">agreed to table</a> (kill) <a href="http://www.judiciary.senate.gov/legislation/immigration/amendments/Grassley/Grassley4-(EAS13439).pdf">an amendment</a> by Sen. <a href="http://www.grassley.senate.gov/">Chuck Grassley</a> (R-IA) that would have allowed DHS to begin processing ARPISs only after the Secretary of Homeland Security has certified to Congress that "the Secretary has maintained effective control of the Southern border for a period of not less 6 months." Such a nebulous standard could hardly be regarded as a serious precondition, so it should come as no surprise that <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/D?d113:35:./temp/~bd4kRY::">Handsome John Thune's amendment</a>, which contained more specific prerequisites, <a href="http://hotair.com/%20archives%2F2013%2F06%2F18/senate-kills-john-thunes-border-fence-amendment-with-help-from-rubio-and-mccain/">was also defeated</a> by a vote of 39 to 54. Thune's amendment would have required 350 miles of Southern border fencing<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>to be completed before the Secretary could commence processing ARPISs and conditioned any<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>adjustment in the status of aliens who have been granted registered provisional status on the Secretary's written certification that: </div>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Times New Roman;"></span></span><br />
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>the Comprehensive Southern Border Security Strategy “has been substantially deployed and is substantially operational;”<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Times New Roman;"> </span></span>
</li>
</ul>
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Times New Roman;"></span></span><br />
<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Times New Roman;"><ul style="text-align: left;">
<li>the Southern Border Fencing Strategy has been submitted to Congress, implemented, and is "substantially completed;"
</li>
<li>700 miles of Southern border fencing “that is double-layered and constructed in a way to effectively restrain pedestrian traffic” has been completed;
</li>
</ul>
<ul style="text-align: left;">
<li> the Secretary has implemented E-verify; and
</li>
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<li>the Secretary is using an electronic exit system at air and sea ports of entry that operates by collecting machine-readable visa or passport information from air and vessel carriers.
</li>
</ul>
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Note that both Grassley's and Thune's amendments suffer from the same flaw: The predicate for legalizing illegals is not <strong>actually</strong> securing the borders but rather the Secretary of Homeland Security's <strong>certification</strong> that the southern border is secured. (Grassley's amendment also contained a special carve-out for aliens granted blue card status, which is a special legal status for agricultural workers; Grassley’s home state of Iowa is about 95% farmland.) We already know that <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/05/24/Eric-Holder-Might-Have-a-Perjury-Problem">members of Obama's cabinet have no compunction about lying to Congress</a>, so what good is the DHS Secretary's word on anything? </div>
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Later that same day, <a href="http://www.paul.senate.gov/?p=press_release&id=863">Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., offered a good fix</a>: require Congress to vote annually for five years on whether the border is secure. "If Congress believes that the border is not secure," the Senator explained in <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XUlLunJPcZ4">a speech</a> on the Senate floor, "then the processing of undocumented immigrants stops until it is secure." As David Nakamura of the <em>Washington</em> <em>Post</em> <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2013/06/12/sen-rand-paul-offers-border-security-amendment-to-senate-immigration-bill/?print=1">reported</a> it:<br />
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Paul’s amendment would require the Department of Homeland Security to implement specific border security measures, including hundreds of miles of additional fencing along the U.S.-Mexico border, and provide a report to Congress each year on its progress.</blockquote>
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Then Congress would vote annually as to whether the agency had met its goals. Each year, another group of illegal immigrants would earn legal work visas if the metrics are met, Paul said.</blockquote>
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This short summation--while accurate and concise--does not do Paul's amendment (styled the "Trust But Verify Act of 2013") justice. Indeed, those who crafted this particular legislation appear to have thought of everything. The bill specified what the Secretary must conduct an annual comprehensive review of and provided specific border security metrics, the progress toward which must be reported on. It stated what the joint resolution affirming that the border is secure must say and prevents the resolution from being amended. It even contained a provision limiting debate on the joint resolution "and on all debatable motions and appeals in connection with such resolution" and curtailing the ability of would-be obstructionists to use parliamentary shenanigans to delay a vote on the resolution or dispose of it without a vote. <span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 11.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: Arial; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;"><span style="color: black; font-family: Times New Roman;"></span></span></div>
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Paul's amendment also addressed the problem of DHS officials using their administrative authority to <strong>not</strong> enforce the law (as discussed in <a href="http://right-winggenius.blogspot.com/2013/07/word-to-wise-on-immigration-reform.html">my earlier post</a>) by prohibiting the Secretary from making "any alteration to the Border Patrol sectors in operation or the boundaries of such sectors" without first notifying both the House and Senate Homeland Security Committees of the proposed change "not later than 120 days before any such change would take effect," by which time Congress could act to thwart any undesired changes. It also required the Secretary to establish a Student Visa National Security Registration System and submit an annual report to Congress that describes the effectiveness with which DHS is screening
student visa applicants through the System <strong>and</strong> "indicates whether the System
has been implemented in a manner that is overbroad or results in the
deportation of individuals with no reasonable link to a national security
threat or perceived threat." And, the amendment capped the number of applicants who may be granted registered provisional immigrant status under the law in any calendar year at 2,000,000 (a ridiculously high limit, but apparently too low for some people). <span id="goog_1206412660"></span><a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_1206412659">61 Senators voted to table Paul's "Trust But Verify" amendment</a><a href="http://www.blogger.com/">. <span id="goog_1206412661"></span></a></div>
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Maybe Senator Paul was just asking for too much. (I don't think so, but reasonable minds can differ.) <a href="http://www.vitter.senate.gov/">Sen. David Vitter (R-LA)</a> had a simpler request: <em>Hey, remember that integrated entry & exit data system (a system to track the border comings and goings of foreigners) that was supposed to be developed and implemented under </em><a href="http://www.uscis.gov/ilink/docView/PUBLAW/HTML/PUBLAW/0-0-0-10948.html"><em>a <strong>1996</strong> law</em></a><em>? You know, the one we're still waiting on? Well, forget all the stuff that Paul wanted. Let's just condition the temporary grant of legal status to, or adjustment to citizenship status of, any individual who is unlawfully present in the United States on the Secretary's written certification that that biometric border check-in/check-out system (officially the US-VISIT System) has been fully implemented at every land, sea and airport of entry. Oh, and Congress has to pass a joint resolution stating that this integrated entry and exit data system has been sufficiently implemented, because, you know, we don't trust this administration's word.</em> Senator Vitter proposed <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d113:sp1228:">an amendment</a> to that effect over a month ago. It even included "fast track" procedures for getting the requisite joint resolution through Congress without unnecessary delay. </div>
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Now, it seems that a piece of legislation that basically just says, "Hey, let's incentivize the executive branch to do what they're already <strong>required</strong> to do by conditioning something that they want but that nobody really needs on them doing that thing they're supposed to do." shouldn't be something that a lot of Senators would find a reason to vote against, but if you view <a href="http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=113&session=1&vote=00152">their votes on Senator Vitter's amendment</a>, which was rejected by a vote of 36 to 58, in the context of most of them not giving a damn about securing our borders, then it makes sense. <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/D?d113:40:./temp/~bdpImw::">Another amendment</a>, <a href="http://www.lee.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/2013/6/lee-introduces-congressional-approval-amendment-to-immigration-bill">proposed by</a> <a href="http://www.lee.senate.gov/">Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah)</a>, that would have required “fast-track
congressional approval” of what the Gang of 8 legislation merely requires the
Secretary of Homeland Security to certify <a href="http://www.blogger.com/goog_539084607">was also voted down,<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"> 39 to 59</span></a><a href="http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=113&session=1&vote=00156">.</a></div>
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Enter <a href="http://www.cornyn.senate.gov/">Sen. John Cornyn (R-Texas)</a>, tall, learned and circumspect, a conservative Republican from a state with a large population of illegal immigrants. As the Senate Minority Whip, it's his job to make sure GOP Senators vote the party line on critical pieces of legislation. Cornyn, who was Texas Attorney General before being elected to the U.S. Senate, <a href="http://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/latest-columns/20130604-john-cornyn-immigration-reform-with-results.ece">had criticized</a> the "border-security triggers" in S.744 as "talking points disguised as policy." Could he offer a serious bill for predicating any legalization of illegal immigrants on actual, verified border security measures? Well, a little over a month ago, after the amendments proposed by Senators Grassley, Thune, Paul, Vitter and Lee had all been voted down, Senator Cornyn <a href="http://www.cornyn.senate.gov/public/?a=Files.Serve&File_id=17d62b2a-6326-42b0-8693-0330e5d9fd9c#amendment" target="external">offered an amendment</a> to the immigration bill that would have kept newly legalized immigrants from becoming permanent residents or pursuing citizenship until certain border goals were met. Those goals were: </div>
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<ul>
<li>to achieve and maintain operational control of the Southern border;</li>
<li>to achieve and maintain full situational awareness of the Southern border;</li>
<li>to fully implement a biometric entry and exit system at all land, air and sea ports of entry; and</li>
<li>to implement E-verify. </li>
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All these goals would have to be met "within 5 years of the date of the enactment of this Act," i.e., the comprehensive immigration reform bill. As used in Cornyn's amendment, the term "operational control" meant that, "within each and every sector of the Southern border, a condition exists in which there is an effectiveness rate, informed by situational awareness, of not lower than 90 percent." The term "situational awareness" was defined as "knowledge and an understanding of current illicit cross-border activity, including cross-border threats and trends concerning illicit trafficking and unlawful crossings along the international borders of the United States and in the maritime environment, and the ability to predict future shifts in such threats and trends." The Secretary <strong>and</strong> the <a href="http://www.cbp.gov/">U.S. Customs & Border Protection</a> Commissioner would have to "jointly submit" to the President and Congress a written certification, under penalty of perjury, that the Secretary had met these goals. This submission could not be made sooner than 9½ years after the comprehensive immigration reform bill becomes law and must include "a comprehensive report detailing the data, methodologies, and reasoning" justifying the certification. And, <a href="http://www.gao.gov/about/workforce/ocg.html">the Comptroller General of the United States</a> would be required to "review such certification and provide Congress with a written report reviewing the reliability of such certification" and expressing the Comptroller General's own conclusion as to whether or not the specified border goals have been achieved.</div>
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The Secretary would still be required to submit a strategy "for achieving and maintaining operational control and full situational awareness of the Southern border" to the Comptroller General, and within 60 days of the submission of such strategy, the Secretary would also have to submit "an implementation plan for each of the border security components of the Department to carry out the Strategy." This plan must include, at a minimum: </div>
<ul>
<li>a comprehensive border security technology plan for continuous and systematic surveillance of the Southern border, including a documented justification and rationale for the technologies selected, deployment locations, fixed versus mobile assets, and a timetable for procurement and deployment;</li>
<li>the resources, including personnel, infrastructure and technologies that must be developed, procured and successfully deployed, to achieve and maintain operational control and full situational awareness of the Southern border; and</li>
<li>a set of interim goals and supporting milestones necessary for the Department to achieve and maintain operational control and full situational awareness of the Southern border.</li>
</ul>
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It seemed doomed to fail, but Cornyn's amendment had something the others didn't: an appropriate acronym. The Senator dubbed his amendment, "Requiring Enforcement, Security and safety while Upgrading Lawful Trade and travel Simultaneously (RESULTS)," and it fared better with his colleagues than the other amendments I've described here did. <a href="http://us.yhs4.search.yahoo.com/r/_ylt=A0oGdM8UDPNRPUMA1PsPxQt.;_ylu=X3oDMTByZWgwN285BHNlYwNzcgRwb3MDMQRjb2xvA3NrMQR2dGlkAw--/SIG=1453e1e8d/EXP=1374911636/**http%3a//thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/votes/306823-senate-rejects-cornyn-plan-to-create-a-border-security-trigger">Only 54 Senators voted to kill it.</a> Two Democrats, <a href="http://www.pryor.senate.gov/">Mark Pryor</a> of Arkansas and <a href="http://www.manchin.senate.gov/">Joe Manchin</a> of West Virginia, voted against the Motion to Table, as did Senator Rubio, who had opposed the aforementioned amendments offered by Senators Grassley, Thune, Paul, Vitter and Lee. (Curiously, Rand Paul voted with the anti-enforcement coalition, but that may have been because of the amendment's hefty cost.) Heritage Action ("<span style="font-size: 1em; letter-spacing: 0px; line-height: 1.5em;"><a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/351099/heritage-action-key-votes-against-cornyn-amendment-jonathan-strong">The Heritage Foundation’s lobbying arm</a>"</span>) <a href="http://heritageaction.com/key-votes/key-vote-cornyn-no-on-cornyn-results-amendment">urged Senators to vote “NO” on Cornyn's RESULTS amendment</a> "because it fails to solve the enforcement problems in the underlying bill" and would "serve as political cover for [multiple Senators] to justify their support for the Gang of Eight’s amnesty."</div>
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So, on June 27th, <a href="http://www.senate.gov/legislative/LIS/roll_call_lists/roll_call_vote_cfm.cfm?congress=113&session=1&vote=00168">S.744 passed the Senate</a>, free of any amendments that would require DHS to <strong>actually</strong> secure the borders before illegal aliens could be legalized. It did include language from <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d113:SP01183:">a border security and enforcement amendment</a> proposed by Sen. <a href="http://www.leahy.senate.gov/">Patrick Leahy</a> (D-VT) and modified by the <a href="http://texasgopvote.com/issues/fix-immigration/corker-hoeven-amendment-border-security-faces-cloture-vote-0056011#sthash.Nbiw1jkZ.dpuf">much-touted</a> <a href="http://www.hoeven.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/files/serve?File_id=73d24e01-850f-44bd-a757-621116b3cc7d%20">Corker-Hoeven Amendment</a>, which inludes a lot of stuff that should turn off congressmen and women on both sides of the aisle. (Leahy, who "begrudgingly" supported the changes to his amendment offered by Senators <a href="http://www.corker.senate.gov/">Corker</a> and <a href="http://www.hoeven.senate.gov/">Hoeven</a>, <a href="http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/06/21/Sen-Leahy-Federal-Contracting-Firms-High-Fiving-Corker-Hoeven-Amendment">complained</a> that their legislation “reads like a Christmas wish list for Halliburton.”) While Corker-Hoeven does delay the legalization of illegals (No Registered Provisional Immigrants can receive Green Cards until at least ten years after the bill becomes law) and strengthens the border-security "triggers" to legalization, it fails to cure many of the bill's other deficiencies and focuses on border security but not interior enforcement. Then there's the price tag; the CBO <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/sites/default/files/cbofiles/attachments/s744aspassed.pdf">reported</a> it would add $38 billion to the cost of the act. At the very least, the amendment added language to S.744 aimed at preventing the abuse of federal benefits by illegals who would be legalized under the legislation, including:</div>
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</span></span></span>preventing immigrants who used a fraudulent or false
Social Security number while they were unlawfully present in the U.S. from getting Social
Security credits for that period;<o:p></o:p></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: Symbol; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-font-family: Symbol; mso-bidi-font-size: 9.0pt; mso-fareast-font-family: Symbol;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">·<span style="font-size-adjust: none; font-stretch: normal; font: 7pt/normal "Times New Roman";">
</span></span></span>restricting certain non-immigrant visa holders, such as
tourists and foreign students, from accessing Medicaid, SCHIP and Obamacare
benefits; and<o:p></o:p></div>
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</span></span></span>providing that <a href="http://www.hhs.gov/">the Department of Health & Human Services</a> may not grant waivers to states to allow them to use Temporary
Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) dollars to give cash assistance benefits
to registered provisional immigrants. <o:p></o:p></div>
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That ad I mentioned at the beginning of this post calls the Border Surge "the toughest border security plan ever passed by Congress." That it may be, but again, border security is only part of what we need. S.744 falls short of ensuring the aggressive interior enforcement that is desperately needed and eliminating the government-created magnets for illegal immigrants. Also, it fails to predicate legalization on a congressional affirmation of border security or other objectively verifiable metrics. If any of that bothers you, then please contact your Representative and admonish him or her not to vote for any bill that contains the same flaws as the Senate bill. But first, <a href="http://twitter.com/rightwinggenius">follow us on Twitter</a>. </div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-47828596968379190852013-07-18T21:00:00.001-07:002013-07-28T12:41:32.764-07:00Word to the Wise on Immigration Reform<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<em>(This post was updated at 12:18 a.m. CST on July 28, 2013.)</em></div>
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In the latest example of Congress proving the old adage that those who don't learn from the past are doomed to repeat it, <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/senate-expected-pass-landmark-immigration-bill-165953454.html;_ylt=A2KJ2UjPiOhRnicAbAXQtDMD">the U.S. Senate has now passed a "comprehensive immigration reform" bill</a>. The vote was 68-32, with 14 Republicans joining every Democrat and the two "independent" Senators who caucus with the Democrats in supporting a measure that really could only conceivably benefit Democrats. (More on that later.) </div>
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Those who want the House of Representatives to follow suit and pass this or a substantively similar bill have been trying to convince those of us on the right that <strong><em>this</em></strong> "comprehensive immigration reform" push is different from the last one that blew up in its proponents faces...or the one before that...or the one before that...or <a href="http://www.uscis.gov/ilink/docView/PUBLAW/HTML/PUBLAW/0-0-0-15.html">the '86 law</a> that they'd like us to forget about or ignore. This bill, we're told, is a <strong>conservative</strong> plan for immigration reform, supported by <strong>conservatives</strong> (Look, Marco Rubio supports it!), with tough border security measures. These arguments beg the question, "Why did every Democratic Senator support such a <strong>conservative</strong> policy plan?" The obvious answer is that, whether you're a Blue Dog Democrat from a red state or a self-described Socialist from a state where most voters can't tell their anus from a hole in the ground, <a href="http://info.conservativebookservice.com/egl40/c2.php?EGPB/893833099/1328598/H/N/V/http://www.humanevents.com/2013/07/03/coulter-i-got-30-million-reasons/">this bill will be good for you and your party</a> if it becomes law. Most immigrants vote Democrat. Most of the immigrants who are in this country illegally will, if legalized and allowed to vote, then vote Democrat (or not vote). Their children who are born here and are therefore U.S. citizens will vote Democrat, if they vote at all. It wouldn't matter if this act was passed by a Republican Congress and signed into law by a Republican president; the political beneficiaries of it would be Democrats. </div>
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I'm not opposed to a pathway to legal status for those who are in this country illegally, and I want to see our immigration system reformed to make it easier to <strong>legally</strong> immigrate to the U.S. (provided you have something to offer and aren't going to be a public charge). I think building a fence along the entire U.S.-Mexico border is a dumb idea and a stupid endeavor; if you want to build a fence, then just build one across the chapparal from the Imperial Valley to El Paso. It won't keep illegal immigrants out; it'll just slow them down. In Texas, we have a large river to do that. But, if I were a member of Congress, then I'd be branded an opponent of this legislation, as well as a "nihilist" and an "obstructionist" etc., by the Democrats and their allies in the media because I won't support any bill that will allow even one illegal to start on that pathway to citizenship or legalization before the borders are secure (by objective standards). <a href="http://right-winggenius.blogspot.com/2013/07/how-you-know-theyre-not-serious-about.html">The proponents of this legislation have made it clear that they do not want such an "enforcement first" approach.</a></div>
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Under <a href="http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/bdquery/z?d113:SN00744:">the bill</a> that passed the Senate on Thursday, the government would grant legal status to immigrants living in the United States unlawfully at the same time additional border security was being put into place at a cost of tens of billions of dollars. The legalization could begin as soon as a security plan was drafted (not actually implemented). One problem with this is, of course, that illegal immigrants and undocumented workers could be legalized wtihout our borders being effectively secured, meaning that illegal border crossings would continue. </div>
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<a href="http://heritageaction.com/2013/06/amnesty-and-paper-fences-no-border-security-here/">Pragmatic senators have tried to amend the bill to fix this problem, but to no avail.</a> A bipartisan coalition of senators seems determined to repeat the mistakes of the past. For them, it's not enough to allow the millions of immigrants here illegally to apply for legal status without having to return home (what some have labeled "amnesty"); we have to start legalizing them and just trust that the federal government will secure the border. This despite <a href="http://www.gopusa.com/commentary/2013/06/12/malkin-obamas-definition-of-smarter-enforcement/">the Obama Administration's repeated refusals to enforce existing immigration laws</a>. Here's my question for the supporters of the Senate bill who assure us that it will secure the border: If the legalization of illegals isn't predicated on objectively verified border security, then what is this administration's incentive to secure the border? </div>
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Even if the House and Senate were to miraculously pass a bill that required the feds to secure the borders <strong>before</strong> any illegal alien could be legalized, it's doubtful that President Obama would sign such a bill into law, and even if he did, his administration still probably wouldn't be motivated to do what they're supposed to do. After all, he's been re-elected; he won't be running for president again; so what's in it for him to shore up the Democratic base? (Maybe his wife or daughters have political ambitions, but other than that, I cannot conceive of any realistic impetus for him to secure the borders.) </div>
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This enforcement problem raises another issue that has curiously played a much less prominent role in the current debate than it did in the last great national debate over immigration reform six years ago. Do we really have an illegal immigration "problem" that needs to be addressed by <strong>new</strong> legislation? One of the more dubious lines from those irksome commercials pitching this immigration reform bill is, "Doing nothing is how we got here: Millions here illegally." I don't disagree, but the cause of the problem--"doing nothing"--wasn't the failure of Congress and the president to amnesty millions of illegals and create further magnets for immigrants, both legal and illegal; it's the failure of this and past administrations to <strong>effectively secure our borders and stem the spate of illegal immigration that's been plaguing our country for decades</strong>. Here's an idea: Let's try <strong><u>enforcing current law</u></strong> and see if that doesn't address our illegal immigration problems, including: immigrants unlawfully entering this country; foreigners coming here legally (e.g., on student visas) and then remaining here unlawfully after their visas expire; millions of immigrants <strong>living</strong> here illegally; and Americans hiring illegals. We already have laws addressing these problems, though the last one I listed could use a federal E-verify system. However, enhanced border security--even if effectively implemented--would only tackle the first of these problems; the other three need to be addressed by what's called "interior enforcement." </div>
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In a <a href="http://judiciary.house.gov/hearings/113th/06132013_2/Crane%2006132013.pdf">statement</a> to the House Judiciary Committee last month, Chris Crane, President of <a href="http://iceunion.org/">the National Immigration and Customs Enforcement Council</a> and one of the few union leaders who actually seems to represent the best interests of his members, rightly accused "the individuals and organizations involved in crafting the Gang of Eight legislation" of "purposely ignor[ing] interior enforcement with the intent of continuing the practices [that] have led to the nation’s current immigration problems." Crane pointed out that, while <span style="font-size: small;">visa overstays account for an estimated 40% of the 11 million illegal aliens currently in the United States (4.5 million), the Gang of Eight’s immigration legislation "speaks only of significant increases to border enforcement, not interior enforcement." The visa overstays problem, Crane argues, "cannot be stopped by the United States Border Patrol" and will "never" be addressed by investments in border security. </span>Opponents of the Senate's latest comprehensive immigration reform bill should present a united front and challenge the Obama administration to prove that they're serious about securing the border by enforcing existing laws. </div>
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Yes, I've seen and heard <em>ad nauseum</em> that, under Obama, <a href="http://www.ice.gov/removal-statistics/">illegal aliens have been deported at a record pace</a>, but in fact, there has been a sharp decline in the number of illegal-immigrant removals since June 2011, when ICE Director John Morton issued <a href="http://www.ice.gov/doclib/secure-communities/pdf/prosecutorial-discretion-memo.pdf">the so-called "Morton Memorandum"</a> (officially<span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">entitled "Exercising Prosecutorial Discretion
Consistent with the Civil Immigration Enforcement Priorities of the Agency for
the Apprehension, Detention<span style="font-family: "Times New Roman","serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">,</span> and Removal of Aliens"</span>), the first in a series of significant changes to the agency’s enforcement policies. <a href="http://www.cis.org/kephart/ice-agents-have-standing-sue-dhs-over-daca">Crane and other ICE agents and officers have filed a lawsuit in federal court challenging the validity of the Morton Memorandum and DHS Secretary Janet Napolitano's June 2012 Directive not to enforce immigration laws "against certain young people who were brought to this country as children and know only this country as home."</a> (This was part of the Obama Administration’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals plan, or DACA.) At an evidentiary hearing in April, <a href="http://cis.org/Vaughan">Jessica Vaughan</a> of the <a href="http://www.cis.org/">Center for Immigration Studies</a> testified that there "has been a significant decline in enforcement activity, as measured by the number of removals." As <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/article/346043/cooking-books-deportation-stats">reported</a> <span class="author-article"><span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">by </span></span><a class="author-article" href="http://www.nationalreview.com/author/3850"><span class="author-article">Andrew Stiles</span></a> of <em>National Review</em>: </div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Removals generated by ICE’s Enforcement and Removals division, which is responsible for interior immigration enforcement, have decreased nearly 50 percent since June 2011. Vaughan says the administration has been inflating its deportation statistics by including a greater number of U.S. Border Patrol cases — illegal immigrants picked up at the border and subsequently referred to ICE — as part of its annual statistics. Border Patrol cases accounted for 56 percent of removals reported in fiscal year 2013, up from 33 percent in 2008. Typically, an individual apprehended at the southern border is simply returned to Mexico without being processed as a deportation by ICE.</span></blockquote>
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Later that month, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/02/us/for-chris-crane-a-quest-to-block-an-immigration-bill.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0">Crane told reporters</a> that “DHS and ICE are knowingly manipulating arrest and deportation data with the specific intent of misleading the American public with regard to the enforcement of illegal immigration in our country.” He actually claimed that “ICE arrest and deportation numbers have plummeted since <strong>2008</strong>" (emphasis added), which he called "clear evidence that interior enforcement has in large part been shut down over the last four years.” Not surprisingly, Mrs. Vaughan considers it “foolhardy for Congress to trust that this administration is actually going to implement any new enforcement plans” </div>
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Then there's the talking point about how <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rk4_Qy0Zt3I&feature=c4-overview&list=UU27-2t39uttF8XC-hrBr4Kw">the status quo is “de facto amnesty.”</a> (The solution: de <em>jure</em> amnesty!) Ann Coulter pretty well destroyed the potency of that sound bite with this: </div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">I gather Marco Rubio considers this his big showstopper, since he says it in every interview as if he’s announcing the Kochen-Specker theorem. But if we already have de facto amnesty, [then] why is this bill even necessary? Oh, that’s right! The Democrats need 30 million new voters.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">It’s curious that Democrats don’t hysterically demand amnesty for other lawbreakers, such as tax-cheats or polluters. Right now — hold on to your hat, Marco! — we have “de facto amnesty” for tax-cheats and polluters! (Also rapists and murderers and every other crime that doesn’t have 100 percent enforcement.)</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">And if we won’t grant amnesty to tax-cheats and polluters, [then] what about their children? Why punish the children? They did nothing wrong. Their parents <i>told them</i> they had lots of money for houses, clothes and college tuition. How can you put a tax lien on the homes of innocent children? Think of how BP executives’ children have suffered — the divorces, the deferred dreams, the broken families …</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">And by the way, polluters are also hard workers. They love their families and want the best for them, too. I bet illegal aliens who rape women and kill people in drunk-driving accidents love their families. Members of MS-13 work very hard at gang activities, such as, for example, when you cross them, they are very dogged about having you killed in a drive-by shooting. That shows a real stick-to-itiveness.</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">But weirdly, Democrats are obsessed with amnesty only for the lawbreakers that will get them 30 million new voters. (Violent felons come next.)</span></blockquote>
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I'm aware that the deportation process is very expensive. Deporting an illegal alien, though, costs a hell of a lot less than supporting them with the cradle-to-grave system of entitlements on which the left is so keen.</div>
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The immigration reform we need won't legalize the millions of Americans living in this country illegally; it's a reform in the federal government's approach to enforcement, both border enforcement and interior enforcement. Instead of passing a bill that spends a horrendous amount of money without solving the problem (BTW, what exactly is "conservative" about that?), the Congress should pass a law providing for a national, <strong>mandatory</strong> E-verify system and nullifying the DHS directives that instruct law enforcement officials <strong>not to enforce federal law</strong>. Granted, the constitutionality of legislation limiting the executive's prosecutorial discretion would be questionable at best, so the Congress would have to be careful about the wording of such a bill, but they've got really smart people to work on that. </div>
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Finally<span style="font-size: small;">, I'll briefly address this BS about how the Republican Party is doomed if they don't jump on the band wagon and embrace "comprehensive immigration reform". There are plenty of cogent rebuttals to this argument, available to anyone who wants to read/hear them, but let me end this passage where I began: <strong><a href="http://www.cis.org/sites/cis.org/files/articles/2010/republican-demise.pdf">Immigrants vote Democrat</a></strong>, not 100%, but a majority of them do. Considering that illegal immigrants aren't eligible to vote, exactly what is the harm for Republicans in making sure that they stay ineligible to vote? </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">I thought I had an answer to that question about a year ago. It dawned on me after a conversation with one of my friends (who happens to be the son of illegal immigrants): Illegal immigrants can't vote, but if their children are born here, then those children are U.S. citizens who can register to vote once they turn 18. Put yourself in the position of someone who was born here to parents who were in this country illegally. Regardless of your personal political ideology, are you likely to vote for any candidate affiliated with a party that has roundly castigated your parents and people like them and insisted that they be deported? </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">Then it occurred to me: Why would Republicans suddenly changing their tact on illegal immigration have any affect on that voter's choice at the ballot box? Do Republicans like <a href="http://www.graham.senate.gov/">Lindsey Graham</a> and <a href="http://www.flake.senate.gov/">Jeff Flake</a> think that the issue of illegal immigrants are going to forgive and forget just because a handful of Republicans supported legalizing their parents? </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">And, if you're worried about the Hispanic vote, Republicans, then you should be. Hispanics don't support your policies. <span style="font-size: small;"></span></span><a href="http://www.pewhispanic.org/files/2012/04/PHC-Hispanic-Identity.pdf">75% of Hispanics say they would rather have a bigger government providing more services than a smaller government with fewer services.</a> <span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span> <a href="http://latino.foxnews.com/latino/politics/2012/09/18/latinos-support-obamacare-over-romney-healthcare-proposal-poll-says/">62% support Obamacare</a>, and <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/11/majority-of-latinos-support-state-recognition-of-gay-marriage/" target="_blank">59% favor same-sex marriage</a>. According to <a href="http://www.people-press.org/2011/12/28/little-change-in-publics-response-to-capitalism-socialism/1/">a December 2011 survey</a> conducted by Princeton Data Source for the <a href="http://www.people-press.org/">Pew Research Center</a>, a majority of Hispanics have a negative view of capitalism, and 44% of Hispanics have a <strong>positive</strong> view of <strong>socialism</strong>. (By comparison, the survey found that only 40% of all American adults had a negative view of capitalism, compared to 50% who had a positive view, and only 31% had a positive view of socialism.) And, while <a href="http://www.gallup.com/poll/154838/pro-choice-americans-record-low.aspx">the percentage of Americans who identify as "pro-choice" dropped to a record low last year</a>, <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/blogs/politics/2012/11/latinos-endorse-legal-abortion/">2012 exit polls found that 2/3 of Latino voters are firmly pro-abortion</a>. </span></div>
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<span style="font-size: small;">So, Republican presidential hopefuls who are concerned about how to win over Hispanic voters are better served by taking advice from anti-amnesty candidates such as <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/%20291494/getting-know-susana-jay-nordlinger">Susana Martinez</a> and <a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/ted-cruz-40-percent-of-hispanic-texans-voted-for-my-border-security-first-platform/article/2532146">Ted Cruz</a>--or should I say <strong>Gov.</strong> <a href="http://www.governor.state.nm.us/">Susana Martinez</a> (R-state that's 46% Latino) and <strong>Sen.</strong> <a href="http://www.cruz.senate.gov/">Ted Cruz</a> (R-state that's 38% Latino)--than from faux-conservatives like <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/07/12/opinion/brooks-pass-the-bill.html?ref=davidbrooks">David Brooks</a> who live in an insulated bubble that shields them from life's cruel realities. Right-wing Genius out!</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-45847935102605994862013-07-10T19:43:00.000-07:002013-07-10T19:43:17.841-07:00Now, Now, Jay, You Don't Have to Be So Snippy About It<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<em>The Weekly Standard</em>'s <span class="uppercase1"><a href="http://www.weeklystandard.com/author/daniel-halper"><span style="text-transform: none;"><span style="color: #145da4;">Daniel Halper</span></span></a></span> <a href="http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/carney-report-read-federal-register-i-know-thatd-be-lot-ask_739208.html">blogged</a> the following today:
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">"The ability to postpone the deadline is clear," said Carney.</span><br />
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">"I invite you to read the Federal Register," he said. "I know that'd be a lot to ask."</span></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">"Yes," said Carney, smirking. "Exactly."</span></div>
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That was probably actually a more appropriate response than what Carney was thinking. I might have said something like, "Does it matter?" (Seriously, does anyone honestly believe at this point that Obama cares whether he has the legal/constitutional authority to do something? If he wants to do it, then he'll do it.)</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-57064524431634683102013-07-09T21:13:00.000-07:002013-07-10T12:15:45.940-07:00Adios, Mo' Fo.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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Yesterday, Gov. <a href="http://www.governor.state.tx.us/">Rick Perry</a> (R) confirmed what a lot of us who are attuned to the Texas political scene had been expecting: <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/texas-gov-perry-wont-seek-election-2014-181834401.html">he won't seek re-election next year</a>. </div>
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Perry, 63, has been governor of the Lone Star State since December 21, 2000, when he succeeded to the governorship upon the resignation of then-President-Elect George W. Bush. He had been elected lieutenant governor in 1998. To those outside the state, he may be best known for either his ill-fated presidential bid in the last election cycle or his cameo in the 2005 comedy <em><a href="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0331933/">Man of the House</a></em>. </div>
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His retirement is significant because it means that, among other things, next year's gubernatorial race will be the first one in Texas without a sitting governor since 1990 (which, coincidentally, was the last time Texans elected a Democratic governor). </div>
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Right now, the odds-on favorite to succeed Perry is <a href="http://www.gregabbott.com/">Greg Abbott</a>, who is currently serving his third term as state attorney general. Should he decide to run, his biggest obstacle(s) to victory would likely come in the primary. In a state where every statewide elected office is held by a Republican, Democrats are challenged by a paucity of viable candidates and a brand problem not unlike what the GOP is burdened with in some other states. </div>
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<a href="http://right-winggenius.blogspot.com/2011/07/okay-michele-you-have-my-blessing-but.html">I've never been a fan of Rick Perry</a>, even when he's right. He reminds me a lot of Bill Clinton: a good politician but not so good a leader. You can try and claim that Clinton was/is more erudite and well-spoken than the notoriously malapropism-prone Perry, but if I concede that point, then you must admit that the Gov has Slick Willie beat in the "honor & courage" category, having been an Eagle Scout and served in the U.S. Air Force. </div>
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A lot of pundits and political junkies now want to speculate on whether Perry will try and run for president again; I'm not the least bit interested. His official announcement that he wouldn't seek another term as governor piqued my interest because I'm looking forward to Texas finally getting a new chief executive. Expect us to pay special attention to this 2014 race, as it may well shape up to be one of the most exciting primaries in any gubernatorial or senatorial election this cycle.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-83137959171973959232013-06-26T21:15:00.001-07:002014-01-21T07:51:21.648-08:00A Good Day for Equal Justice Under Law<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwC_n7kOIdy89szPJwJVKtwAlPfo4A9GIDojAH7caRODChyphenhyphenJIencsFkI11JuGjkomAcal2_p6cEZGEbpeW5J1kq5zO00r0X5r5j9uEIi1visAQvvQuYrkG3hkKuywKqvKBNSb2Qtrx6t10/s1024/sSC130625wide_Roberts-1024x687.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgwC_n7kOIdy89szPJwJVKtwAlPfo4A9GIDojAH7caRODChyphenhyphenJIencsFkI11JuGjkomAcal2_p6cEZGEbpeW5J1kq5zO00r0X5r5j9uEIi1visAQvvQuYrkG3hkKuywKqvKBNSb2Qtrx6t10/s320/sSC130625wide_Roberts-1024x687.jpg" height="214" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 8.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">Chief Justice John G. Roberts delivers the opinion of the Court
in <em>Shelby County v. Holder</em>. (Art Lien)</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Yesterday, the
Supreme Court rendered an important, long-overdue and unfortunately necessary
decision that galled a lot of Americans who want to continue living in the
past. </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">In <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/12-96_6k47.pdf">Shelby County v. Holder</a></i>,</span> a
five-justice majority held that <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 is
unconstitutional. Here’s a brief background on the case:</span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="mso-tab-count: 1;"> </span>§ 5 of the Voting Rights Act
requires some States<span style="color: #333333;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">and</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN;"> <span lang="EN">localities</span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> to obtain federal
permission before enacting any law related to voting. § 4 of the Act sets forth
the formula for determining which jurisdictions are subject to that </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">preclearance
process</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">.
(Currently, </span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN;">that meant Virginia, South Carolina, Georgia, Alabama,
Mississippi, Louisiana, Texas, Arizona and Alaska and portions of New York,
North Carolina, Florida, Michigan, South Dakota and California.</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">) In 2010, Shelby
County, Alabama sued the Attorney General, seeking a declaratory judgment that
§§ 4(b) and 5 of the Voting Rights Act are facially unconstitutional, as well
as a permanent injunction against their enforcement. The District Court rejected
the county’s argument and upheld the Act. The Court of Appeals for the D. C.
Circuit affirmed the District Court’s judgment. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">The Court’s ruling today means that Section
4’s formula can no longer be used as a basis for subjecting jurisdictions to
preclearance under the Voting Rights Act. SCOTUSblog Editor <a href="http://www.scotusblog.com/author/amy-howe" style="color: #444444; text-decoration: none;">Amy Howe</a> <a href="http://www.scotusblog.com/2013/06/we-gave-you-a-chance-todays-shelby-county-decision-in-plain-english/">broke down the Court's ruling and its immediate implications</a> thusly: </span></div>
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<em>The Chief Justice delivered the opinion of the Court,
which was joined by Justices Scalia, Kennedy, Thomas, and Alito. The Court
began by acknowledging that when the Voting Rights Act was enacted, it
“employed extraordinary measures” – in the form of restrictions on the
independence of the covered states – to combat the “extraordinary problem” of
widespread voter discrimination. In 1966, the Court explained, these restrictions,
which were intended to be temporary, were justified, and the formula used to
determine who should be covered “made sense” then.<o:p></o:p></em></blockquote>
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<em>But today, fifty years later? Not so much. In the
Court’s eyes, “things have changed dramatically.” When judged by a variety of
measures – such as voter registration, voter turnout, and the number of African
Americans elected to office — conditions have improved significantly in the
states that are covered by the preclearance requirements. The Court agrees that
these changes “are in large part because of the Voting Rights Act”;
despite those improvements, the Court complains, the formula that determines
who must comply with the preclearance requirement is “based on decades-old
data” and practices – such as literacy tests – that were long ago abandoned.
Because it isn’t fair for Congress to “rely simply on the past” to single out a
few state and local governments for unequal treatment “based on 40-year-old
facts having no logical relationship to the present day,” the coverage formula
cannot stand.<o:p></o:p></em></blockquote>
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<em>The last section of the Court’s opinion is the
judicial version of throwing the Voting Rights Act ball back across First
Street N.E. to Congress. Emphasizing that invalidating a federal law is one of
its most serious responsibilities, and that it “do[es] not do so lightly,” the
Court makes clear that in its view, only Congress is to blame here. Four years
ago, it warned Congress that the constitutionality of the law was in doubt;
“Congress could have updated the coverage formula” then, but it failed to do
so. “Its failure to act,” the Court explains, “leaves us today with no choice
but to declare [the coverage formula] unconstitutional.”</em></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">What Howe is referring to in the last two
sentences of that excerpt is<span style="color: #333333;"> </span></span>the court's<span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN;"> 2009 decision</span> in <a href="http://www.bloomberglaw.com/public/document/Northwest_Austin_Mun_Utility_Dist_No_One_v_Holder_129_S_Ct_2504_1"><i><span style="color: #006699;">Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District No. 1
(NAMUDNO) v. Holder</span></i></a>, in which <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">a Texas utility
district <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">challenged the constitutionality
of the preclearance provisions of the Voting Rights Act. In that case, the
Court bypassed the constitutional question and ruled that </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">the statute allowed the utility district to seek bailout</span>
from the Act’s coverage. But the Court did something else, too: in an opinion delivered by Chief Justice Roberts and joined by all the associate justices except Justice Thomas, the Court acknowledged that it had already upheld the Act’s constitutionality
in prior decisions but noted, “Some of the conditions that we relied upon in
upholding this statutory scheme ... have unquestionably improved.” And, while
conceding that these “improvements are no doubt due in significant part to the
Voting Rights Act itself,” the Court admonished that “[p]ast success alone,
however, is not adequate justification to retain the preclearance requirements,”
adding, “It may be that these improvements are insufficient and that conditions
continue to warrant preclearance under the Act. But the Act imposes current
burdens and must be justified by current needs.”<o:p></o:p></span>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Rather
than heed the Court’s warnings and prod Congress to revise the formula in<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> § </span>4 (as he’s so fond of doing when it comes to other policy issues), President Obama was content to leave the Act as is and
let his Justice Department defend a constitutional challenge to a law the
Supreme Court had as much as told us was unconstitutional. Unsurprisingly, the
Respondent in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Shelby County</i> had a
difficult time explaining how the Act’s ridiculously outdated formula and
inequitable treatment of different states and localities was “</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">justified
by current needs,</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">”
and today, the Supreme Court officially recognized what Congress and the
President should have recognized years ago: § 4 of the Voting Rights Act
exceeds Congress’s constitutional authority</span><span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">.</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p></o:p></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></div>
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Section 1 of the Fifteenth Amendment to <a href="http://www.archives.gov/exhibits/charters/constitution.html">the U.S. Constitution</a> provides, "The right of citizens of the United States to vote shall not be denied or abridged by the United States or by any State on account of race, color, or previous condition of servitude," and <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Section 2<b> </b></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">grants Congress "the power to enforce this article by appropriate legislation." The central question underlying this and previous constitutional challenges to the Voting Rights Act was whether Sections 4 and 5 were still "appropriate" legislation, in light of their selective treatment of certain parts of the country based on data that no longer accurately reflects the current state of the union. To the extent that the members of Congress who voted to reauthorize the Act--and President Bush, who signed the reauthorization into law--back in 2006 considered the issue, their answer was "Yes, it is."</span></div>
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<span style="color: #463e3e; font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="color: black;"></span></span><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN;"></span><br />
Thank God for judicial review. (Well, thank the Marshall Court, but their decision in <em>Marbury v. Madison</em> was probably guided by divine providence anyway.) <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">As the Court ruled
yesterday, “The Fifteenth Amendment . . . is not designed to punish for the
past; its purpose is to ensure a better future.” The majority stopped short of drawing a bright line or laying out a clear standard for determining what constitutes "appropriate legislation" under Amendment XV</span>, but they rejected the notion that Congress is entitled to absolute deference on that subject (and for good reason). <br />
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During <a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/oral_arguments/argument_transcripts/12-96.pdf">oral arguments before the Court</a> in February, U.S. Solicitor General Donald
Verrilli insisted that the court shouldn't second-guess Congress's
determination that certain areas require special oversight to prevent
violations of the 15th Amendment's guarantee of voting rights. But why, if the basis of that determination is patently irrational? The formula for selecting jurisdictions covered by Section 5 was last updated <strong>based on
the 1972 election results</strong>. <strong>Congress had more than forty years</strong> to revise this formula based on more current data. Its failure to do so meant that certain states were left stigmatized as backwards regions of the country that couldn't be trusted to regulate their own elections without federal oversight, that stigma written into federal law and used as a pretext for subjecting these jurisdictions to onerous burdens and an indignity that most of the country doesn't have to suffer. Furthermore, why shouldn't the state and local governments who enacted changes to their voting laws be afforded the same deference as Congress? No one defending Section 4 could provide a satisfactory answer to that question, either. </div>
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<span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-size: small;">If you think like me, then you had two specific inquiries about the Court's decision in <em>Shelby County</em>: (1) How did Justices Ginsburg and Breyer, who dissented from the Court's decision yesterday, square their dissent with the Opinion of the Court in <em>Northwest Austin</em> that laid forth serious constitutional infirmities of the Voting Rights Act, in which they both joined? And, (2) What, if anything, did Justice Clarence Thomas, the only member of the Court to experience life as an African-American in the segregated South, have to say about all this? </span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-size: small;"></span></span> </div>
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<span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN;">I'll answer the second question first. As previously mentioned, Justice Thomas did not join the Opinion of the Court in <em>Northwest Austin</em>; he filed an opinion concurring in the judgment in part and dissenting in part. Basically, he wanted to decide the constitutional issue that the Court had avoided and strike down § 5 as unconstitutional. In explaining why § 5 exceeds Congress' power to enforce the Fifteenth Amendment, the Georgia native wrote, "The extensive pattern of discrimination that led the Court to previously uphold § 5 as enforcing the Fifteenth Amendment no longer exists." </span></div>
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Justice Thomas reiterated that statement in a opinion yesterday, in which he explained how the Court's own opinion "compellingly demonstrates that Congress has failed to justify ‘current burdens’ with a record demonstrating ‘current needs.’" </div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"></span> </div>
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As to my other query, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg filed an acrid dissent joined by Justices<span style="color: black; font-family: "Calibri","sans-serif"; font-size: 9pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-ascii-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family: "Century Schoolbook"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-hansi-theme-font: minor-latin;"> </span>Breyer<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">, </span>Sotomayor<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> and </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">Kagan</span>, <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">in which she said that</span></div>
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"the Court’s opinion can hardly be described as an exemplar of restrained and moderate decisionmaking. Quite the opposite. Hubris is a fit word for today’s demolition of the VRA."
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Respectfully, Madame Justice, striking down a blatantly unconstitutional law is not "hubris." "Hubris" is exhibited by those who believe that certain parts of the country should be treated differently than their co-equal sovereigns because of transgressions perpetrated years ago by people who are long dead. "Hubris" is thinking that the attorney general of the United States, whoever that happens to be at the time, is so enlightened that he/she should be given an effective veto power over laws that were duly enacted by state and local governments, even if that AG happens to be a corrupt hack and perjurer with an obvious chip on his shoulder. Hubris is a fit word for the insolence of those who reauthorized the Voting Rights Act, outdated criteria and all, for another <strong>25 years</strong> back in <strong>2006</strong> without amending it to reflect recent changes and trends. "Hubris" is dismissing the serious issues with the Act's constitutionality explicitly raised in an opinion <strong>you joined</strong> as mere "dictum", which you did in your dissenting opinion yesterday.</div>
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<span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">If I sound especially passionate about this, then it's because I am. It's not just because I live in Texas, one of the states required to get approval from the federal government to before making any changes to its voting laws or procedures, "even for something as seemingly innocuous as moving a polling place across the street." as Amy Howe put it. Anyone who believes in states' rights (or, for that matter, who respects the Tenth Amendment) should find a law that <span style="font-family: Arial;">requires state and local governments<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> to obtain federal approval before enacting policies to address local issues revolting. </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Chief Justice Roberts quite rightly called this requirement “a drastic departure from basic principles of federalism” and the untenable application of it to only select jurisdictions “an equally dramatic departure from the principle that all States enjoy equal sovereignty.” </span></span></span></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"></span></span></span><br /></div>
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<span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">I know that the term "states' rights" has a negative</span> connotation in some pockets of the country (and some people's minds), but the principle that all U.S. states are equal sovereigns and that their governments should have as expansive a police power to regulate matters within their jurisdictions as the people of those states empower them to, unencumbered by an oppressive federal government that is not and cannot be as attuned to local concerns as the elected policymakers in those states are, was written into our Constitution--and recognized by the Supreme Court since the first time it addressed the issue--for a reason. If the framers of the Constitution had wanted the Department of Justice to have oversight over state and local voting regulations, then they could have included a provision stating as much, and if the drafters of the Fifteenth Amendment had intended for Congress to have unquestionable discretion to determine what legislation was an "appropriate" means of enforcing the Fifteenth Amendment, then they could have made that amendment more specific. But they didn't. </span></div>
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It seems discordant that self-styled "progressives" were upset with the Court's decision in <em>Shelby County</em>. President Barack Obama and his <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">attorney general </span><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/26/us/politics/on-voting-case-reaction-from-deeply-disappointed-to-its-about-time.html">both said</a> they were "deeply disappointed" by
the ruling. (The
president even took care to remind us that "voting discrimination has been
historically prevalent" in the places affected by Section 4, which evidently means
it's okay for the federal government to perpetually treat those states as
bastions of racism and ignore both the progress they've made and any real,
actual attempts at voter discrimination in other parts of the country in the
last 41 years.) Rev. Jesse Jackson called it “the most devastating blow to civil rights since” <em><a href="http://www.oyez.org/cases/1851-1900/1895/1895_210">Plessy v. Ferguson</a></em> and complained that it “seeks to destroy the infrastructure of ... inclusion and expansion.” The <em>New York Times</em> Editorial Board <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/26/opinion/an-assault-on-the-voting-rights-act.html?ref=opinion&_r=0">wailed</a> that the Court had "eviscerated enforcement of the Voting Rights Act, in which Congress kept the promise of a vote for every citizen."
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These people should take a look at what is inscribed aboved the pillars on the front of the Supreme Court Building the next time they have occasion to visit it (or just look at a picture of it). As Jonathan Tobin <a href="http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2013/06/25/left-lives-in-the-past-on-voting-rights/">wrote</a> for <em>Commentary</em>: </div>
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The reality of 2013 is that even the left is hard pressed to find anyplace in the country where anyone who is legally entitled to vote and wants to exercise their franchise is being prevented from doing so. Stating that is not to deny that racism still exists in some quarters of American society anymore than any other species of hatred. Nor does it imply that our electoral system is perfect or incapable of betterment. But to leave in place a legal formula that treated some states differently than others solely because of history is not only absurd, it is unconstitutional discrimination. In a country where, as it was argued before the court, Mississippi may have a more healthy voting rights environment in some respects than Massachusetts, preserving the battle lines of the fight against Jim Crow is not only meaningless, it actually hampers efforts to combat illegal practices.</blockquote>
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But the main interest of those dedicated to preserving the status quo wasn’t in preventing states from denying a right to vote that is not in question. It was in holding onto their capacity to use federal law to prevent some states from passing voter ID laws that have been wrongly branded as a form of discrimination or voter suppression. The vast majority of Americans—including the members of those groups that civil rights advocates claim will be injured by voter ID laws—think these measures are merely a matter of common sense to ensure the integrity of the election system. But by disingenuously waving the bloody shirt of Jim Crow, the left has sought to brand race-neutral laws like voter ID a form of racism.</blockquote>
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Instead of continuing to live in the past and basing their opinions on specters of a bygone era (kind of like the racists whose actions arguably necessitated the Voting Rights Act in the first place), those who claim to support the Voting Rights Act should celebrate its effects and acknowledge that the preclearance requirement of Section 5 is no longer necessary in many of the regions to which it has been applied. If the members of Congress who voted to reauthorize the Act in 2006 and are still serving believe the legislation is necessary and good policy, then they ought to craft a new formula based on current data and practices to determine which areas of the country, if any, need the federal oversight authorized by Section 5. </div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Should the Congress endeavor to take up such legislation, however, there must be a vigorous debate over whether any law that is selectively applied only to some states and localities, based on constantly changing statistics that will require frequent re-examination, is wise policy. The anachronistic character of these provisions in the Voting Rights Act and the problem of leaving the Act as is was summed up splendidly in the following paragraph of the Court's opinion yesterday: </span></o:p></span> </div>
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In
1965, the States could be divided into two groups: those with a recent history
of voting tests and low voter registration and turnout, and those without those
characteristics. Congress based its coverage formula on that distinction. Today
the Nation is no longer divided along those lines, yet the Voting Rights Act
continues to treat it as if it were.</blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p>It is a disturbing display of dissonance that those who wanted the Court to let Section 4 stand express concern for making sure that all Americans are treated equally under the law, when Section 4 itself stood in affront to that concept. </o:p></span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-8340045579751044832013-06-19T16:19:00.000-07:002013-06-19T16:19:43.791-07:00Paul Begala Makes the Case for Senator Gomez<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">If you were to rank all of God’s creatures from the least
loathsome to the most, then the <span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><a href="http://www.cnn.com/POLITICS/begala.commentary/archive">Paul Begala</a>s of the World would belong somewhere between serpents and pedophiles.
(That would also be a fitting place for the </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Democratic strategist and CNN political contributor</span><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"> to spend eternity.) </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><o:p></o:p></span></span> </div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold;"><o:p> </o:p></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">But,
on Saturday, Mr. Begala actually made a positive contribution to society. He
gave Massachusetts voters a concise list of reasons (the most compelling I’ve
seen) to vote for </span><span style="color: #404040; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><a href="http://www.gomezforma.com/">Gabriel Gomez</a></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"> in the upcoming special election to the U.S. Senate
seat formerly occupied by John Kerry (D). Get a load of this:</span> </div>
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: justify;">
<em>In the Senate, Democrat Ed Markey will fight alongside
Massachusetts' rising star, Elizabeth Warren; Gomez would cancel her vote.
Markey will support President Obama; Gomez will oppose him. Markey will stand
for progressive change: an increase in the minimum wage, universal
prekindergarten, tax fairness, rebuilding our roads and bridges and more. Gomez
will empower obstructionist Republicans like GOP leader Mitch McConnell and the
tea party extremists.</em></blockquote>
</span></span><div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">Sounds good to me. Remember, in the left-wing, business-as-usual lingo of
Beltway insiders that Begala speaks fluently, members of Congress who fight for liberty and against big government oppression are "tea party
extremists," Republicans who zealously represent their constituents' interests and try to stop bad policies from being enacted are
"obstructionist," and "tax fairness" means "giving
huge tax breaks to the president's cronies and shifting the tax burden even
further onto the people who actually work for a living so that the millions of
Americans who pay little or nothing in federal taxes can continue to live off
the labors of others." </span></span></span></div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span></span></span> </div>
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<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span lang="EN" style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">When the appropriate translation is made, Begala's pitch is also an uncharacteristically honest bit of rhetoric from him, proving my point that, on the rare occasions when Democrats tell the truth, they end up making some very persuasive<span style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-weight: bold; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>arguments</span> for voters to vote Republican. </span></span></span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-43329612520419135002013-06-18T21:49:00.001-07:002013-06-19T11:02:57.852-07:00Once Again, Paul Ryan Speaks My Mind<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIEOKnXS6weg7H6d-uXg1_ZZnLW9Uenq_uxYR5zWtP6tIQMba3Lt1Lem2qE38SZmIhE9DgB2XFvcF6weqSOwJlBCLuWJ7N3jEMA1GQpLjjIgbVRDP7ACOYVrO9zHf6l2kdbofXUkIqdxWS/s1600/paul-ryan.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgIEOKnXS6weg7H6d-uXg1_ZZnLW9Uenq_uxYR5zWtP6tIQMba3Lt1Lem2qE38SZmIhE9DgB2XFvcF6weqSOwJlBCLuWJ7N3jEMA1GQpLjjIgbVRDP7ACOYVrO9zHf6l2kdbofXUkIqdxWS/s320/paul-ryan.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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(Photo: <em>The Christian Post</em>/Napp Nazworth)</div>
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This is one of the problems with blogging as a hobby, as opposed to a full-time gig. I don't publish my thoughts as soon as I have them. </div>
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Once again, Rep. <a href="http://paulryan.house.gov/">Paul Ryan</a> (R-WI) demonstrates why his visage belongs on the banner atop this blog (and <a href="http://www.right-winggenius.com/">our parent web site</a>). <a href="http://www.christianpost.com/news/recent-scandals-are-big-government-in-practice-paul-ryan-says-98033/#dfzcAjGkPZ2vWH9E.99">From the<em> Christian Post</em></a>:</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">With references to some of the recent government scandals, such as the </span><a href="http://www.christianpost.com/news/pro-life-groups-say-irs-targeted-them-too-96177/" target="_blank"><span style="font-size: x-small;">Internal Revenue Service's harassment of pro-life groups</span></a><span style="font-size: x-small;">, Ryan said at the Faith & Freedom Coalition's "Road to Majority 2013" conference, "big government is bad enough in theory, look what we see in practice."</span></blockquote>
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Ryan's words were an abbreviated version of <a href="http://youtu.be/aSR-vJHSQjM">the sentiment he expressed last month</a> on <em>Fox News Sunday</em>, when he said of President Obama's agenda., "Now, we're seeing big government in practice. Now, we're seeing the arrogance. We're seeing the cronyism in practice in this second term, and that is even uglier than big government in theory."<br /><br />He added that he and former Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney "had a challenge in the campaign against empty rhetoric," but "now the country is seeing what this kind of big unlimited government does in practice," which "is not a pretty picture." </div>
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Before I had heard/seen Ryan's remarks, I told someone that one reason the left-wing media was so desperate to downplay/bury the IRS scandal was that it manifestly exposed a critical flaw in their ideology's policy agenda. The malfeasance at the IRS (and the incompetence in other parts of the government that allowed this malfeasance to continue, unabated, for two straight years) was not an anomaly. Rather, it was an example of something <strong>that is inevitable when government grows as big as the federal government has gotten</strong>. There's no such thing as big government without a trace of incompetence or corruption.</div>
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It's good when someone with Paul Ryan's stature says what needs to be said, and it's even better when people listen. Whenever I feel I have an important contribution to make on topic of public interest, I try to find the time to churn out a blog post or YouTube upload. If someone has a similar thought, then I would hope he/she expresses it, especially if that person happens to be articulate and easy on the eyes and has a large audience.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-71917745779765182842013-06-13T14:51:00.000-07:002013-06-13T14:52:05.513-07:00Bring Back Judging!<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I love </span><a href="http://www.adamcarolla.com/"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Adam Carolla</span></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">. Between him and Greg Gutfeld, FOX News
has almost cornered the market on sapient social commentary. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br /></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Last night on <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/on-air/oreilly/index.html">The O’Reilly Factor</a></i>, Bill O’Reilly invited Carolla to "talk directly to"
Orlando Shaw, a deadbeat father of 22. Here's the segment:</span></div>
<script src="http://player.ooyala.com/player.js?deepLinkEmbedCode=VwcGJkYzoKpLFI8bTk9jAiXtIiAXIqmW&width=613&embedCode=VwcGJkYzoKpLFI8bTk9jAiXtIiAXIqmW&video_pcode=k4Nmw6Cri746xA2OsoSlngyrIudg&height=344"></script>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I quite agree, except it wasn’t just <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">some</b> idiot; there were a lot of idiots—and even some smarter but
nonetheless misguided fools—who convinced the lot of us that it was wrong to
"judge" people. </span></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Yes, Jesus did say, "Judge not, that ye be not judged," but I don’t read this as an admonition not to judge others; it's an admonition against hypocrisy. There
are many circumstances under which it’s entirely appropriate for human beings
to sit in judgment of others. How else could we have trial by jury? </span></div>
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<o:p><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></o:p></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">I also think Carolla was
too kind about the use of<span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a</span> Denver boot as a chastity belt. If it were up to me,
then I’d see that Mr. Shaw undergo an orchiectomy. I would much rather my tax
dollars pay for that than to take care of his indigent brood. (I’d pay for the
costs of the operation, but if Orlando wants to anesthetized, then he’ll have
to pay for that himself.) Then I'd put him in a work camp so he could begin to pay off his debt. If at some point he is able to secure gainful employment, then he might be released from his forced servitude, and we could simply garnish his wages. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Carolla is right that "we need to bring back judging." Every time in my life that I've heard someone say, "Don't you judge me," or "How dare you judge me!" or something similar, it was said by someone who clearly didn't want to take responsibility for his/her actions. If we refuse to judge those who are in the wrong, then they either won't realize the error of their ways or they will, but they'll have no impetus to change. </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span> </div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">But, remember the words of Jesus. Worry about the mote in your own eye before you go around concerning yourself with the motes in others' eyes. And, to all the Orlando Shaws out there, as my mother would say, "If you can't feed 'em, then don't breed 'em!"</span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-835878714354514422013-05-27T21:40:00.000-07:002013-06-13T14:53:19.212-07:00The Middle-Class Kentucky Derby<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgre6mS7vTG9851lAySjhvTJjKtjmmQ3tBhVg2e991qAjEh3BxU9-YUAF6YCv6-oR_A8IPM7rfEfBk233k-oX9MZkctQlQH0OnaViG5H_fxiAwwokZIqrYzhiLIfLJrOp_m2V8qwkg30Qw/s1600/W0zWD_St_58.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="182" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgre6mS7vTG9851lAySjhvTJjKtjmmQ3tBhVg2e991qAjEh3BxU9-YUAF6YCv6-oR_A8IPM7rfEfBk233k-oX9MZkctQlQH0OnaViG5H_fxiAwwokZIqrYzhiLIfLJrOp_m2V8qwkg30Qw/s320/W0zWD_St_58.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<strong>The place to be on Memorial Day weekend <strong><span style="color: #111111; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span></strong>in </strong><strong>Fort<br />Worth<span style="color: black; font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"> </span>is The Colonial.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(<em>Star-Telegram</em>/Paul Moseley)</strong></div>
<span style="color: #111111; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 9pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span><br />
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Normally, the marquee sporting event in the month of May, at
least for high-society types, is the Kentucky Derby. The Bluegrass State’s
upper class traditionally flocks to Churchill Downs</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> on the first
Saturday in May<span style="color: #333333;">, and you can count on every
network’s early-Saturday-morning sort-of-news program—be it <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Today</i>, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">FOX & Friends</i> or <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Good
Morning America—</i>to send at least one of their reporters out to Louisville
to educate their viewers about the right bourbon to buy. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Here in the Metroplex, however,
our social/sporting event of the month takes place toward the end. It doesn’t
involve horses or a bed of roses, and it lasts a hell or a lot longer. But it’s
a magnificent spectacle, and I like it. </span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Since 1946, the pros have come to Fort Worth's <a href="http://www.crowneplazainvitational.com/">Colonial Golf Club</a> for one of the PGA's five annaul "invitational" tournaments. For decades, it was known simply as the Colonial National Invitational Tournament. Now it's <a href="http://www.star-telegram.com/2013/05/26/4885525/crowne-plaza-at-colonial-sunday.html">the "Crown Plaza Invitational,"</a> but not even crass corporate sponsorship can mar this major event, rich as it is in history and tradition. It's our Kentucky Derby, but with less pretense and more walking.</span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Forget</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> <span style="color: #333333;">the</span> mint julep. The traditional beverage here is
the frozen margarita.<span style="color: #333333;"> And, you likely won’t find
women sporting ridiculously gaudy hats, but you will get an idea of what the
appropriate attire is for those who want to spend the day outside in the hot,
humid climate without looking like a slob. </span></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p> </o:p></span></div>
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<span style="color: #333333; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">There’s no "</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">Millionaire's Row<span style="color: #333333;">"
here, either (unless you count the houses on Country Club Circle); celebrities who show
up, and there are a few, are forced to watch alongside the common folk. (Yes, "</span>VIP
guests" get special treatment, such as access to the 19th Hole Lounge,<span style="color: #333333;"> but if you want to see the pros golf up close and in
person, then you'll have to find a spot outside the ropes just like any other
spectator</span>.<span style="color: #333333;">) </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="color: #333333;"></span></span><br />
Businesses with high-end products/services to hock have recognized that the Colonial presents a fantastic marketing opportunity. In recent years, they've taken to setting up tents at the tournament with chairs, refreshments and air conditioning to lure in their target demographic. Call it a sales pitch, but it's the most pleasant and comfortable sales pitch I've ever experienced. <br />
<br />
Local charities and other causes--everything from high school booster clubs to Harris Methodist to the Girl Scouts--man the concession stands. Patrons, including yours truly, are more willing to pay the egregiously marked-up fare if the profits go to a good cause. <br />
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="color: #333333;">This year, the attendees were disappointed that local favorites <span class="tourLeaderboardPlayerName"><a href="http://www.pgatour.com/players/player.34046.jordan-spieth.html/scorecards/r021/sp_">Jordan Spieth</a> and <span class="tourLeaderboardPlayerName"><a href="http://www.pgatour.com/players/player.23353.j-j-henry.html/scorecards/r021/he_">J.J. Henry</a> didn't do better,</span></span> but <a href="http://www.pgatour.com/daily-wrapup/2013/05/26/crowne-plaza-final-round.html">Boo Weekley's victory</a> was by no means unwelcome. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="color: #333333;"></span></span><br />
That's all well and good, you may think, but what does any of this have to do with <strong>Memorial Day</strong>? Is the purpose of this day not to honor those who have made the ultimate sacrifice in service to our country? Well, as it so happens, the Colonial offers free admission to military personnel and their families through Carswell AFB, so there!<br />
</div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="color: #333333;">If you live in or near the Metroplex and have never been to the Crowne Plaza Invitational at the Colonial, then you absolutely must go, whether or not you can get in for free. </span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="color: #333333;"></span></span> </div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="color: #333333;">Finally, because it is Memorial Day, <span style="color: #737373; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/05887155438794858776"><span style="color: #145da4;">Right-wing_Genius</span></a></span> would like you to watch <a href="http://t.co/UgKaSyHFNu">this video</a> (if you haven't already), featuring his grandmother and one of my very dear friends. Thank you to all who have served our country at home and abroad. </span></span></div>
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sportsfanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17429888760983690959noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-33816103549263548292013-05-24T15:17:00.001-07:002013-08-15T16:00:47.662-07:00The GOP Won’t “Overplay its Hand” on the Obama IRS scandal...Because it Can't<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">It’s only been a couple weeks since </span>news<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> broke that the IRS
unconstitutionally targeted conservative groups/organizations for additional
scrutiny and harassment in the run-up to the 2012 election, and already,
President Obama’s most ardent apologists are acknowledging the severity of this
problem, calling the White House out on its arrogant mendacity and joining
Republicans in their efforts to uncover the truth and bring all culpable
parties to justice. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<o:p><span style="font-family: Century;"> </span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Yeah, right. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<o:p><span style="font-family: Century;"> </span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Actually, many on the Left have been trying to shift the
focus from what is clearly a serious scandal involving unconstitutional acts by
the government to...the GOP. But how? Republicans, whose role in this sordid
affair (if any) is limited to that of victims, are rightly incensed by what in
all likelihood was a calculated political efforts to boost the electoral
prospects of the president and other Democrats by hamstringing conservative
groups and individuals. </span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<o:p><span style="font-family: Century;"> </span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Well, as gifted as the Left is at creating alternate realities<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: small;">,</span> even they can’t inculpate the GOP in this mess,
it’s pushing a different narrative: <em>Republicans are eagerly ginning up con</em><span class="provider"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><em>troversy and trying to capitalize on these so-called "scandals", but they're so blinded by their utter contempt and disdain for the president that they're already <span class="provider"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">overreaching and blowing these things way out of proportion, oblivious to the pitfalls of ganging up on a president who's still a lot more popular than they are</span></span>.</em> </span></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<o:p><span style="font-family: Century;"> </span></o:p></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/reporters/bio/2"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Charlie Cook</span></a>, an idiot, has been pushing this narrative with the utmost
vigor in<cite> </cite><span class="provider"><i>National Journal.</i></span> Last week, he <a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/columns/cook-report/republicans-should-go-easy-on-obama-at-least-in-public-20130516">wrote</a> that “</span>Republicans Should Go Easy on Obama.<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">”<span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> (I tried to find where Cook had written the
same or something similar about Democrats and President Bush, but I could find
no such case.) On Tuesday, he claimed that Republicans are </span></span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">so </span><span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">blinded by their “</span></span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">hatred</span> of <span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Obama</span></span><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">” that</span></span> “they can’t see how little impact the 'scandals' have had on
public opinion.” (<span class="watch-page-link"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Yes, he actually put "scandals" in quotation marks.)</span></span><strong> <o:p></o:p></strong></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Century;"> </span></o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
“The simple
fact is that although the Republican sharks are circling,” <a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/columns/off-to-the-races/republicans-hatred-of-obama-blinds-them-to-public-disinterest-in-scandals-20130520">Cook<strong> </strong><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">wrote</span></a>, “there isn’t a
trace of blood in the water.” He based this on an out-of-context quote from
former House Speaker Newt Gingrich and the results of two polls (one of which was
an outlier that pegged Obama’s job-approval rating at 53%, five percentage
points higher than <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/president_obama_job_approval-1044.html">the current RCP average</a>, and the other being Gallup, which as
<span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">we know nailed
President Romney’s margin of victory in the 2012 election). <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="watch-page-link"><span lang="EN" style="color: #666666; font-size: 8.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN;"><o:p><span style="font-size: small;">
</span></o:p></span></span><br />
<span class="watch-page-link"><span lang="EN" style="color: #666666; font-size: 8.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN;"><span style="font-size: small;"><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
<span class="provider"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">Cook recites these
polls in <a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/columns/cook-report/no-wonder-republican-criticism-of-obama-isn-t-working-20130523">his latest article</a>, in which he likens the bipartisan investigation into
to the impeachment of Pres. Bill Clinton that proved to hurt Republicans more
than the president:</span></span> “The current situation is reminding many
folks of the impeachment controversy in 1998” he says, raising the question of
how many “folks” Cook talks to who don’t think exactly like him. “Blinded by
their hatred for President Clinton, Republicans made irrational decisions then,
and they are making the same mistakes today.”</div>
</span><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt;">
</div>
</span></span><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Another</span><cite><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"> </span></cite><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><span class="provider"><i>National Journal</i><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">
contributor</span></span><span class="watch-page-link"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">,</span></span><i><span lang="EN"> </span></i><span class="fn">Ron
Fournier</span><cite><span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi;"> </span></cite>(who
is not an idiot but is pretty obtuse) y<span class="watch-page-link">esterday</span><span class="provider"><span lang="EN" style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> </span><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><a href="http://news.yahoo.com/rnc-chairman-shows-obama-scandals-backfire-gop-113803916.html">accused</a> <span class="yshortcuts" id="lw_1369329313797_4"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">RNC Chairman Reince Priebus</span></span></span></span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> of “</span></span>demonizing,
politicizing and overreaching just enough to jeopardize his cause.<span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">” This is the same </span></span></span><span style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 8.5pt;"><a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/authors/ron_fournier/"><span style="color: #145da4;">Ron Fournier</span></a></span><span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> who earlier this week <a href="http://www.nationaljournal.com/politics/why-you-can-t-trust-the-white-house-even-if-nobody-s-lying-20130521">expressly stated</a> that the White House</span></span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> “has demonstrated an inability
and/or unwillingness to tell the full truth about the IRS scandal and a spate
of other controversies.” Either Fournier is suffering from some kind of bipolar
disorder or he believes that the Obama White House’s serial dishonesty is just
as consistent with innocence as culpability.</span><span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="font-family: Century;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></span></span><br />
<span style="font-family: Century;"></span> </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: small;"><span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Stuart
Rothenberg, who is usually more astute, couldn’t resist the same faulty comparison
Cook made. In <a href="http://blogs.rollcall.com/rothenblog/will-republicans-screw-up-again-some-are-already-overreaching/">a blog post entitled, “</a></span></span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif";"><a href="http://blogs.rollcall.com/rothenblog/will-republicans-screw-up-again-some-are-already-overreaching/">Will Republicans Screw Up Again? Some Are Already
Overreaching,</a></span></span><span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><a href="http://blogs.rollcall.com/rothenblog/will-republicans-screw-up-again-some-are-already-overreaching/">”</a>
Rothenberg mused: </span></span></span><span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Republicans failed to
capitalize on President Bill Clinton’s inappropriate conduct by over-playing
their hand and pushing impeachment. Not only did they fail to drive him from
office, the GOP ended up losing a handful of House seats in the 1998 midterms
instead of adding seats as initially expected.</span></blockquote>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">Republicans allowed
themselves to look as if they were primarily interested in scoring political
points and overturning the results of the 1996 election, even if it meant
paralyzing the government.<o:p></o:p>
</span></blockquote>
</div>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">That same danger
exists once again for the GOP.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
</blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">With fundraising
playing such a huge part in our politics, some conservative groups will be
tempted to use the trifecta of controversies to play to their bases to boost
anger and fundraising.<o:p></o:p></span></blockquote>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">This,
in turn, will make the issues appear more and more partisan, giving the
president the same opportunity that Clinton used when he sought to rise above
“politics” and called for members of both parties to address public policy
challenges.<o:p></o:p></span></blockquote>
<span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;">He
then undermined his own argument by describing some of the </span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">differences
between 1998 and 2013 that make any comparisons of the two situations sound
ridiculous.<span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"> </span><span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"></span></span><o:p></o:p></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"><o:p> </o:p></span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">I’ll spare you excerpts from the ramblings of ditsy hacks like </span><a href="http://www.salon.com/2013/05/20/beltway_scandal_machine_breaks_knows_nothing_about_america/">Joan Walsh</a>, <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2013/05/21/hatred-of-obama-could-lead-to-gop-overreach/" rel="author external" title="Visit Greg Sargent’s website"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Greg Sargent</span></a>
and <a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/2013/05/23/just_say_no_special_prosecutor_308289.html">Michael Tomasky</a>; let it suffice to say that they've been even more
defensive in their commentary on these affairs. <o:p></o:p></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 10.5pt;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"> </span></o:p></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">The logical rebuttal to these warnings of Republican “overreach”
is simple. Republicans won’t overreach on—and won’t overblow—these scandals, esp.
the IRS scandal, because they can’t. Yes, you could conceivably say something
that exaggerates the magnitude of any one particular scandal (though I’ve yet
to hear any such thing from a Republican to date), but the cumulation of these
things—from the abject incompetence of the ill-conceived (and even more poorly
executed) "</span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Fast & Furious" operation to</span><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 10.5pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">administration’s
repeated prevarication about Benghazi to the possible unconstitutionality of
the Justice Dept. preying on reporters and</span><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 10.5pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">the definite
unconstitutionality of the IRS’s treatment of conservatives—is far greater than
any scandal or combination of scandals involving a U.S. president and his
administration. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 10.5pt;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"> </span></o:p></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">Sure, other presidents have done terrible and </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">inexcusable</span><span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">things.
Andrew Jackson forced thousands of Cherokee (including my great-great-great-great
grandparents) to take leave of their homes in the southeastern U.S. and trudge
miles westward in a journey that killed thousands of them and injured countless
others. L.B.J. and his administration repeatedly misled Americans about the
Vietnam war and continued to send American soldiers, many of whom were drafted,
to die and/or suffer serious bodily harm in the jungles of southeast Asia after
it became clear they were fighting a losing battle. Richard Nixon...well, we
know what he did. And, don’t get me started on F.D.R. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"> </span></o:p></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">Whether or not these or other nefarious deeds by part presidents
fit the definition of “scandal” is a discussion for another time. I’m not
saying the pain and suffering caused by the Obama Administration’s actions is
worse than the Trail of Tears, but unlike Obama, Jackson had the legal
authority to do what he did. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"> </span></o:p></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">In addition to the unconstitutionality of the IRS’s actions, there’s
another compelling reason why the gravity of that particular scandal can’t be
overstated. As I explained in <a href="http://youtu.be/PmeiUGQfz5M">a YouTube video</a> yesterday, the effects of the IRS’s
misdeeds were, among other things, to unfairly hamstring conservative efforts
in the 2012 campaign. Libertarian/Republican candidates and causes were
deprived of much-needed capital during a critical election cycle. Who knows how
many races would have turned out differently had the playing field been level? </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 10pt;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"> </span></o:p></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;">I don’t mean to invite people to reconsider what has already come
to pass, and I certainly don’t want to dwell on what might have been. This much
is undeniable, however: as long as even one politician elected in a close race
in 2012, the outcome of which might have been different had the IRS not engaged
in these unconstitutional practices, is still in office, we are still living
with the consequences of what the IRS did, and that means this scandal still
has legs. In that sense, nobody is<span class="provider"><span style="mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> “overreaching”</span></span></span><span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10pt;"> just by
pulling out all the stops to make sure that the truth will come out and all
complicit parties will be exposed and brought to justice. <o:p></o:p></span></div>
</div>
Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-82877275414213668952013-05-22T14:51:00.001-07:002013-08-15T16:00:47.678-07:00The Obama-Nixon Comparison Is Indeed Appropriate<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<a href="http://www.realclearpolitics.com/authors/steve_chapman/" id="author_link"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Steve Chapman</span></a><span style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 8.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">, </span></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span class="st1">the <em>Chicago Tribune</em> columnist and editorial writer whose semiweekly
musings range</span> from the sentient to the delusional, has convinced
me that the comparison of Obama to the late President Nixon is not only justified
but apt. How? Well, take a look at this from his latest column: </span><o:p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"> </span></o:p></div>
<div style="background: white; line-height: 13.8pt;">
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">In recent days, those people have
triumphantly likened Barack Obama to Richard Nixon, particularly on the misuse
of the Internal Revenue Service for political advantage. In 1974, the House
Judiciary Committee voted to impeach Nixon because, among other reasons, he
tried to cause "income tax audits or other income tax investigations to be
initiated or conducted in a discriminatory manner."<o:p></o:p></span>
</blockquote>
</div>
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: x-small;">
</span><br />
<div style="background: white; line-height: 13.8pt;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">This, of course, is exactly what the IRS now admits doing when it singled out
conservative groups for special scrutiny. The Treasury Department's Inspector
General found, "The IRS used inappropriate criteria that identified for
review Tea Party and other organizations applying for tax-exempt status based
upon their names or policy positions."<o:p></o:p>
</span></div>
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: x-small;">
</span><br />
<span style="font-size: x-small;"></span><br />
<div style="background: white; line-height: 13.8pt;">
<span style="font-size: x-small;">The misconduct happened under the
current president. Therefore, Obama = Nixon.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
</div>
</div>
<span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;">
</span><br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-size: small;">Makes sense to me, except for that "Obama = Nixon” part. The two presidents
may be guilty of similar acts, but they’re not the same man. (<a href="https://twitter.com/rightwinggenius/status/336986686351343618">I recently tweeted my displeasure at the profligate comparisons of Obama to Nixon</a>; people
shouldn’t speak so ill of the dead.) <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></o:p></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Chapman then explains that he was just setting up a straw man. Equating
the two “is like concluding that babies are like poisonous snakes because some
of them have rattles." Nice one, Steve, and were that hackneyed quip the worst
part of your column, I wouldn’t have been moved to write this post, but then
you say, "Maybe information will someday emerge to confirm the
conservative suspicion that Obama thuggishly subverted the IRS to win
re-election, but so far, it falls in the realm of make-believe." <o:p></o:p></span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="margin: 0in 0in 0pt; text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></o:p></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">I’d say it falls in the category of “undiscovered
evidence,” the kind that warrants a dedicated, persistent and earnest cong</span>r<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">essional investigation and the appointment of an independent counsel. Chapman
did at least review the history of how Nixon used tax agents as political operatives, but then he went
way out on a limb with his assertion that, in "the case of Obama, there is no
evidence that he or his Treasury Secretary was aware of the mistreatment of
conservative groups -- much less that either of them requested it." </span></span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="color: black; font-family: "Georgia","serif"; font-size: 8.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></div>
<div style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Well, here's what we do know: </span><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/12/irs-knew-tea-party-targeted-in-2011/#ixzz2U2mnaqMQ"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">According to</span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><em> </em>The Associated Press</span></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><em>:</em></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span><br />
<blockquote>
<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Many conservative groups complained during the 2012 election that they were being harassed by the IRS. They accused the agency of frustrating their attempts to become tax exempt by sending them lengthy, intrusive questionnaires.</span></em><br />
<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></em><br />
<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The forms, which the groups have made available, sought information about group members' political activities, including details of their postings on social networking websites and about family members.</span></em><br />
<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></em><br />
<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">In some cases, the IRS acknowledged, agents inappropriately asked for lists of donors.</span></em><br />
<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span></em><br />
<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">There has been a surge of politically active groups claiming tax-exempt status in recent elections -- conservative and liberal. Among the highest profile are Republican Karl Rove's group Crossroads GPS and the liberal Moveon.org.</span></em><br />
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<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">These groups claim tax-exempt status under section 501 (c) (4) of the federal tax code, which is for social welfare groups. Unlike other charitable groups, these organizations are allowed to participate in political activities, but their primary activity must be social welfare.</span></em><br />
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<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">That determination is up to the IRS.</span></em><br />
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<em><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The number of groups filing for this tax-exempt status more than doubled from 2010 to 2012, to more than 3,400. To handle the influx, the IRS centralized its review of these applications in an office in Cincinnati.</span></em></blockquote>
<a href="http://news.yahoo.com/ap-exclusive-irs-knew-tea-party-targeted-2011-190852283.html"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The IRS agents in Cincinnati reportedly came up with a list of things to look for in an application, including the words "tea party" and "patriot."</span></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> </span><a href="http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/05/19/IRS-scandal-widens-Agency-appeared-to-misuse-audit-power-against-conservatives-groups"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Donors to conservative groups and Republican candidates were harassed, audited and elderly.</span></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> (Their age is not the IRS's fault, but it is a common trait I've noticed among the conservative/Republican victims of the Obama Administration's witch hunt.) </span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"></span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Lois Lerner, who runs the IRS division that oversees tax-exempt organizations, knew about the targeting of Tea Party groups as early as June 29, 2011, according to the Inspector General's draft report released last week. <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/12/irs-knew-tea-party-targeted-in-2011/#ixzz2U2n7QejH">On Aug. 4, 2011, staffers in the IRS's Rulings & Agreements office "held a meeting with chief counsel so that everyone would have the latest information on the issue."</a> This raises the question of whether then-IRS Commissioner Douglas Shulman perjured himself at a <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">hearing before <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">the
House Ways and Means </span><span class="middlecopy"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">Subcommittee on Oversight on March 22, 2012, when <a href="http://waysandmeans.house.gov/UploadedFiles/FINALwaysANDmeansCommissioner21March2012.pdf">he testified</a>, <span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">"There's
absolutely no targeting." (This was in response to Rep. Charles Boustany's question, "Can you give us assurances that the IRS is not targeting particular groups based on political leanings?") Yesterday, <a href="http://www.finance.senate.gov/hearings/hearing/?id=9b0a1cc8-5056-a032-5219-3e11fc44d504">Shulman testified before the Senate Finance Committee</a> that he learned “sometime in the spring of 2012″ that “there was a list that was being used” to identify political groups for further review and that the term “tea party” was on the list. That may have also been a lie, but assuming for the moment it was true, Shulman did not immediately (or even shortly thereafter) notify the subcommittee of this. Rather, he left a false impression with Congress and the public until this month, when he finally corrected the record. However, if "everyone" means "<strong>everyone</strong>," then it means that Shulman was clued into the targeting well before he testified to the contrary. Not surprisingly, <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/22/top-irs-official-refuses-to-testify-at-hearing-invokes-5th-amendment/">Lerner invoked her Fifth Amendment right not to incriminate herself today</a> in a hearing before the House Committee on Oversight. </span></span></span></span></span></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">As for whether the president and his Treasury Secretary personally knew about this misconduct, here's some "evidence" for Steve Chapman.<span lang="EN" style="color: black; font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; mso-ansi-language: EN; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span> </span><a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/301041-carney-white-house-irs-strategized-how-to-tell-public-about-story#ixzz2U33hIQ30"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">The White House coordinated with the Treasury Department over "how </span></a><a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/301041-carney-white-house-irs-strategized-how-to-tell-public-about-story#ixzz2U33hIQ30"><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">the IRS would disclose its targeting of conservative groups."</span></a><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"> And, <a href="http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2013/05/21/senate-lawmakers-grill-irs-officials-over-tea-party-targeting/#ixzz2U2lCyAll">the White House was caught in another lie on Monday</a>,
when Jay Carney acknowledged that, contrary to <a href="http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2013/05/13/press-gaggle-press-secretary-jay-carney-en-route-new-york-ny-5132013">what he had previously told the press corps</a>, Senior legal Counsel Kathryn Ruemmler was told on April 24 about the IRS audit that showed tax officials unfairly
targeted Tea Party groups and that she then told White House Chief of Staff Denis McDonough "and other senior officials" about the investigation.</span><br />
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;">So, Steve is wrong about there being "no evidence" that the Secretary of the Treasury knew about the mistreatment of conservative groups, but the rest of that sentence is correct--if by "evidence" he actually means <strong>direct</strong> evidence <strong>that has come out</strong>. Circumstantial evidence of the president's culpability in this affair is mounting every day. Let's not forget that it took a considerable while after the Watergate burglary in June 1972 for evidence of Nixon's personal involvement in the cover-up to surface. The fallout from this particular scandal is still in its larval stage. If there's any talk on this subject that falls "in the realm of make-believe," then it's coming from those who are scoffing at and deriding the notion that President Obama's hands are clean in all this. Stay tuned. </span></div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-25646467218817685642013-04-17T11:22:00.000-07:002013-04-17T11:23:01.430-07:00Farewell, Iron Lady<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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cortege passes along Fleet Street towards St. Paul's Cathedral for the funeral of former<br />Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher (inset). (Composite Photo)</span></span></div>
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Earlier today, thousands of Margaret Thatcher's relatives, friends and countrymen(and women) gathered at St. Paul's Cathedral in London for the former prime minister's funeral. While much of the media coverage and commentary has focused on ancillary matters--yes, <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/apr/17/amanda-thatcher-funeral">her nineteen-year-old granddaughter was beautiful and eloquent</a>, and yes, <a href="http://news.yahoo.com/thatchers-body-lies-chapel-funeral-debate-rages-174159201.html">President Obama did not attend</a>, nor did he send Vice-President Biden (thank God) or another cabinet-level member of his administration--I thought it would be appropriate to pay tribute to the woman herself. As much has been said about the Iron Lady, one can't overdo honoring the life and legacy of a figure as great as the Rt Hon. Baroness Thatcher.</div>
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First, a brief primer: Margaret Thatcher was born Margaret Hilda<strong> </strong>Roberts on 13 October 1925 in <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/apr/05/margaret-thatcher-grantham-reappraisal" title="Lincolnshire">Lincolnshire</a>. She was elected to Parliament in 1959 and became leader of the Conservative Party in 1975 and Prime Minister in 1979. Now for the interesting stuff. </div>
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Thatcher's route to Parliament was not only unusual but extraordinary. She earned a degree in chemistry from Oxford and worked as a research scientist--you may have heard about <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2013/04/08/margaret-thatcher-helped-invent-ice-cream-as-we-know-it/">her role in the creation of soft-serve</a> ice cream--before marrying, studying law and eventually becoming a barrister. She made three unsuccessful runs for Parliament before being elected from Finchley (a now-abolished constituency in what was then the County of Middlesex), which she represented until her retirement in 1992. </div>
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Years ago I was pleased to make the acquaintance of Jill Knight, Baroness of Collingtree, who served with Thatcher in the House of Commons for 30 years. She recalled how, during the '70s, there was a great schism between Mrs. Thatcher and Ted Heath, whom she succeeded as leader of the Conservative Party. While Heath was Prime Minister, from 1970 to '74, Thatcher served as Secretary of State for Education & Science. The two did not see eye-to-eye on many issues, and a rift soon developed between them (not unlike the erstwhile division across the pond between the Goldwater conservatives and Rockefeller Republicans in the GOP). After being swept out of power in the 1974 elections, the Conservatives replaced Heath with the younger, more libertarian-minded Thatcher. </div>
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To understand the significance of Thatcher becoming leader of the Conservative Party, you need to be familiar with British postwar political history. (No, don't stop reading!) While World War II invigorated a depressed American economy and arguably left the United States as the world's lone superpower, it devastated Great Britain. This loss of capital was compounded by a sharp decline in the birth rate caused by the deaths of many British men during World War I. Out of this emerged a "collectivist consensus" that transcended political parties: a generous, broad-based welfare state was needed to alleviate the widespread hardship caused by the War and support those who (suuposedly) had no other means of support. Often referred to as "Butskellism" (after Lord <strong>But</strong>ler, a Conservative who served as Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1951 to 1955, and MP Hugh Gait<strong>skell</strong>, Leader of the Labour Party from 1955 to 1963), this consensus gave rise to policies that effectively transformed the U.K. into a social democracy and that were perpetuated by seven prime ministers, including Heath, until by the late 1970s the stagnant British economy was plagued by excessive taxation, routine strikes, high inflation, mounting deficits and a government that seemed both hyperactive and incompetent. </div>
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So when the Conservatives replaced Sir Edward with a true conservative who appropriately denounced many of these policies as socialism akin to the policies imposed on many eastern European peoples. After regaining power in 1979, the Conservatives, led by Thatcher, set about scaling back the welfare state, reducing taxes, deregulating key industries, privatizing government entities and limiting the power of trade unions. Though much of the rabble who had become accustomed to suckling at the government teat pitched many a fit, a majority of the electorate supported Thatcher's agenda and kept her in power for nearly twelve consecutive years, the longest uninterrupted prime ministry since the Earl of Liverpool. </div>
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All good things must come to an end, though, and in 1990, facing a growing rebellion from within her own party, the Iron Lady resigned. Of all the explanations floated for her sudden decline in popularity and eventual downfall, one particular policy deserves special attention. Thatcher had long advocated replacing the rates system (under which local government services were funded by ad valorem taxes) with a poll tax. In 1987, she got her wish, and the rates were replaced with the Community Charge, which assessed a single flat-rate per-capita tax on every adult. The policy was very unpopular, particularly with large families, and Thatcher's successor, John Major, made good on his promise to abolish it shortly after taking office as prime minister. </div>
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Thankfully for the U.K., much of her legacy was more durable, and the country has remained an economic power on the world stage to this day. Not all Britons are grateful for the many ways in which she saved them from another devastating (and likely irreversible) collapse. For all the talk about the stereotypical "ugly American", our brothers and sisters in Mother England have shown over the past week that Respect for the recently departed is not a custom they wish to observe. Labour MP <a href="http://www.johnhealeymp.co.uk/">John Healey</a>, the Henry Waxman of South Yorkshire, actually called Thatcher's legacy "too bitter to warrant this claim to national mourning." </div>
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"Churchill . . . unified the country, while Margaret Thatcher divided it," he <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/apr/10/thatcher-boycott-ex-labour-minister">told</a> the <em>Guardian</em>.</div>
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One of Healey's colleagues, Respect MP <a href="http://www.georgegalloway.com/">George Galloway</a>, similarly praised one of the country's most revered leaders while maligning Thatcher. </div>
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"We'd be conducting this conversation in German if it was not for Mr. Churchill," <a href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2013/apr/15/thatcher-funeral-galloway-wicked-woman?INTCMP=ILCNETTXT3487">he spewed</a> on BBC2's<em> Daily Politics</em>. "He saved the very existence of this country, while Mrs. Thatcher did her best to destroy what was good about this country and did destroy more than a third of our manufacturing capacity, reducing us to the state we're in now." </div>
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Of course, the Baroness Thatcher was one of those leaders so confident in her principles that she was never phased or deterred by the petulant (and, in Mr. Galloway's case, historically inaccurate) jeers of her detractors. In fact, she relished confronting them; just watch some old clips of her taking questions (a term that apparently has quite a broad definition when it comes to the British Parliamentary tradition of the Prime Minister's "Question Time") from the opposition during her tenure as Prime Minister. </div>
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She confronted challenges, both at home and from abroad, with a courage and boldness unlike any British PM since Churchill. To be sure, Tony Blair displayed a confidence in his own policy agenda and was steadfast in his support for the War on Terror, including Operation Iraqi Freedom, amid vocal opposition from the British people, but his affable demeanor and disarming mien didn't convey quite the same resolve (or instill fear in his enemies) like the Iron Lady's steely disposition and forthright rhetoric. ("You turn if you want to. The lady's not for turning."<a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Margaret_Thatcher#cite_note-nft-85"></a>) While a lot of us had high hopes for David Cameron, he has yet to emulate the qualities that made Margaret Thatcher such an effective and successful leader.<br />
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Not all hope is lost, though, and as the United Kingdom--and the party of Disraeli and Churchill--bids farewell to another of its finest leaders, let us not just remember her many achievements but also take note of her philosophy and contemplate how it might be applied to solve our present-day problems.</div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-82743740195282091322013-03-23T16:12:00.000-07:002013-03-25T16:15:35.093-07:00Republicans and Democrats Working Together...To Screw Over Taxpayers<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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It's no secret that <a href="http://right-winggenius.blogspot.com/2011/09/going-postal.html">the U.S. Postal Service is having problems</a>. <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/ftpdocs/120xx/doc12039/HistoricalTables[1].xls">It's run a deficit every year since FY2007</a>, largely because of the extremely generous pensions and other benefits it's obligated to pay former employees. Last month, the USPS <a href="http://about.usps.com/news/national-releases/2013/pr13_019.htm">announced</a> that, beginning in August, Saturday delivery service would be discontinued as a cost-cutting measure...sort of. The USPS will still deliver packages, mail-order medicines, Priority Mail and Express Mail six days a week, and all forms of mail will continue to be delivered to Post Office boxes on Saturdays. <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/U.S._Postal_Service#cite_note-USPS_No_Saturday-34"></a>Still, this is supposed to save the Post Office $2 billion a year. </div>
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Except now it won't. On Wednesday, the U.S. Senate approved a bill that <span style="font-family: "Arial","sans-serif"; font-size: 10.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-fareast-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-fareast-language: EN-US;">included a provision that prevents the USPS from
reducing delivery service. <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/21/us-usa-postal-delivery-idUSBRE92K0OL20130321">The Hou</a></span><a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/21/us-usa-postal-delivery-idUSBRE92K0OL20130321">se of Representatives followed suit on Thursday.</a> Both measures passed with bipartisan support. </div>
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If President Obama signs the legislation into law, then it will be back to the drawing board for whoever is tasked with trying to make the USPS financially sound. In the meantime, I suggest they adopt a new logo: </div>
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(It has nothing to do with the Republican Party. If that's what you thought, then look up "white elephant".) </div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-8042543340422444892013-01-09T19:56:00.000-08:002013-08-15T16:00:47.674-07:00Richard Nixon at 100<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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My apologies to our readers for not posting anything in a while. For the past couple of weeks, I’ve
been spending between 90 and 95% of my waking hours either studying for the bar
exam or searching for a full-time job in the Obama economy. <a href="http://www.blogger.com/profile/17429888760983690959">sportsfan</a> is
recovering from watching his beloved Fighting Irish <a href="http://scores.espn.go.com/ncf/recap?gameId=330070333">get their asses handed to them in the BCS Championship</a>, and the rest of our contributors have various
excuses (some very compelling) for not wasting their time on blogging. </div>
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Still, I couldn't let such a significant occasion pass without acknowledging the man who would have been 100 years old today. </div>
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Perhaps no U.S. president has had a more mixed record than Richard Milhous Nixon. His achievements included re-opening relations with China, France and Egypt, ending U.S. involvement in Vietnam (and the draft), and lowering the federal voting age to 18. But then there were the scandals. Oh, the scandals. </div>
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Nixon fit the classic definition of a Greek tragic hero: a great man with a tragic character flaw that brought about his downfall. In his case, it was paranoia. That paranoia drove him to plant listening devices around the White House during his presidency and five members of his re-election campaign to break into the DNC headquarters at the Watergate complex on an apparently ham-handed investigatory mission. What the White House <a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/white_house/jan-june97/watergate_6-17.html">originally dismissed as a "third-rate burglary"</a> ultimately led to an unprecedented (and, to date, unrepeated) event: our president's term cut short, not by death, but by his own resignation.<br />
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The Watergate scandal alone would have been enough to indelibly tarnish Nixon's legacy, but his administration also suffered the taint of corruption from the activities of his vice president, Spiro Agnew, who turned out to have been on the take since his days as Baltimore County Executive. in October of 1973, less than a year prior to Nixon's departure, <a href="http://www.leagle.com/PrintDocument.aspx">Agnew pled <em>nolo contendere</em> (no contest) to a charge of federal income tax evasion</a> and resigned his office.<br />
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Even as scandal brought down his second-in-command and other scandals threatened to prematurely end his presidency, Nixon never let up in his efforts to further American interests abroad. After making good on his promise to withdraw all U.S. troops from Vietnam, he met repeatedly with then-Soviet premier Leonid Brezhnev, their last meeting taking place while former White House counsel and unabashed weasel John Dean was spinning tales as fast as he could to the Watergate Committee in a desperate attempt to save his own skin. Negotiations between the two leaders (known as the Strategic Arms Limitation Talks, or SALT) led to the signing of <a href="http://www.state.gov/t/avc/trty/101888.htm">the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty</a> in 1972. <br />
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Per Nixon's directive, the U.S. provided vital support to Israel during the Yom Kippur War in 1973. <a href="http://thenewnixon.org/2009/06/05/cairo/">He visited Cairo in June of 1974</a> and agreed to provide Egypt with nuclear technology. Not long after that, the House Judiciary Committee approved three articles of impeachment related to the Watergate cover-up. Before the House of Representatives could vote to impeach him, Nixon released transcripts of tape recordings that implicated him in the cover-up and announced his resignation. <br />
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Even after leaving office, he remained an authoritative voice on international affairs. <a href="http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,980651,00.html">President Clinton</a><a href="http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,980651,00.html"> even reportedly sought his advice</a><span style="color: black;">, and the<em> New York Times</em> (which seemed to never have a kind word for Nixon when he was alive) <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/books/98/06/14/specials/nixon-peace.html">acknowledged</a>, "The former President was always strongest writing about foreign policy</span>." He continued to visit foreign countries and meet with world leaders, and he wrote prolifically. (His memoir <em>RN</em> was okay, but if you really want to get a handle on the man's world view and/or mental processes, then <em>Six Crises</em> and <em>The Real War</em> are both worth a read,<span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin; mso-no-proof: yes;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and</span> I've read good things about <em>Beyond Peace</em>.) <br />
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I can remember learning of his death in 1994. I
was in first grade; as I left school, I stood under the flagpole gazing at Old
Glory. It's my earliest memory of seeing a flag flown at half-mast. </div>
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<span style="font-family: Arial; font-size: small;">One day not
long after that, while rooting through my parents’ closet looking for a box of
monies (you know, like every kid does at one point or another), I found a
shoebox full of political memorabilia. My father and grandmother had collected
it over the years. There were buttons from every presidential campaign from
1900 to 1972, many of them bearing Nixon’s name. It turns out the '68
campaign was the first one my father had been involved in. He told me how he
and his best friend David would stand out in front of my
grandmother’s house, near the road, with a big NIXON sign, and passing
motorists would honk or smile or shout at them (Every once in a while, someone would stick his
head out the window and shout, “Vote for George!”—i.e., George Wallace, the
Alabama governor and defender of segregation who ran for president in '68 on a
states’ rights platform.) Nixon, of course, won the 1968 election but narrowly lost Texas.<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"> </span>We still have the issue of the <em>Star-Telegram</em> from the morning after Election Day with
the headline “NIXON IS ELECTED PRESIDENT.” </span></div>
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Dad wasn't the only active Nixon supporter in my lineage. Years before my folks ever met, my other grandmother served as precinct chair for Nixon's re-election campaign in 1972. Like many Nixon supporters, she was bemused by the scandals that unfolded so soon after an incredible victory she and thousands of others had worked fervently to ensure.</div>
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"All I got out of it was a red face and a letter from John Wayne," she later told me. (The Duke had supported Nixon in all three of his<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>presidential bids and apparently sent letters to those who worked on the campaign, thanking them for their work.) </div>
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As a child, I idolized Nixon. Not because of my family, but because of what I learned about the man through my own research.<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"> </span>Certainly, Nixon did a lot of things to warrant admiration, even by those who never knew him personally. His ascendancy to the vice-presidency was one of the fastest in U.S. history; after returning home from World War II, during which he had served in the Navy, Nixon was elected to Congress in 1946. While his role in the Alger Hiss investigation arguably stood out as the most salient highlight of his time in the House of Representatives, he also helped write <a href="http://vi.uh.edu/pages/buzzmat/tafthartley.html">the Taft-Hartley Act</a> (a.k.a. The Labor Management Relations Act of 1947), which passed over President Truman's veto. During his second term in the House, he was elected to the U.S. Senate. His support for civil rights and opposition to price controls, illegal immigration and public power, along with his erudite speeches warning of the threat of "global Communism" endeared him to many conservatives, and in 1952, the Republican National Convention nominated the 39-year-old freshman senator to run for vice president on the ticket with Dwight D. Eisenhower. Eisenhower and Nixon won in a landslide--twice--even carrying several states in the "solid South" (including Texas, Tennessee, Florida and Virginia).
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<span style="font-size: 11.5pt;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"></span></o:p></span> </div>
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<o:p>As vice president, Nixon honed his already keen foreign policy credentials, touring dozens of countries and chairing National Security Council meetings in the president's absence. On a trip to Moscow in 1959, he challenged Khrushchev during their infamous "kitchen debate," bluntly telling the Communist leader, "You don't know everything." </o:p></div>
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<span style="font-size: 11.5pt;"><o:p><span style="font-family: Times New Roman; font-size: small;"></span></o:p></span> </div>
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<o:p>Nixon held the distinction of losing the closest presidential election in U.S. history and winning a presidential election by the biggest landslide in U.S. history. His successful 1968 campaign, waged eight years after a devastatingly close loss to JFK and six years after losing his bid for governor of California, remains one of the great political comebacks of all time. He's the only person to be twice elected vice president <strong>and</strong> twice elected president of the United States. </o:p></div>
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My appreciation of his work wasn't ideological, either. Domestically,
Nixon could not be called a conservative, not in any sense of the word. He
expanded the size of the federal government, signing into law legislation that
created, <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">inter alia</i>, the <a href="http://www.epa.gov/">EPA</a>, <a href="http://www.eeoc.gov/">EEOC</a>,
<a href="http://www.osha.gov/">OSHA</a>, <a href="http://www.cbo.gov/">CBO</a> and <a href="http://www.freddiemac.com/">FHLMC</a> (better known as "Freddie Mac"). As
part of his "New Federalism" agenda, he proposed a new welfare program that would have
guaranteed a minimum payment to all needy American households, regardless of work ethic.<span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"> </span><span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 8.5pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;">He
also</span> put
in place wage and price controls and took the U.S. off the gold standard. He
cut some taxes but raised others, including the capital-gains rate. His administration
commenced affirmative action, though arguably at a time when institutional
racism was far more widespread in the U.S. than it is today. The federal revenue-sharing program, under which the federal government shares its tax revnues with local governments, also began under Nixon, so every time you see/hear some worthless politician wailing about how spending cuts will mean fewer teachers/police officers/firemen, they're probably lying, but their mendacity is facilitated by one of President Nixon's policies. <br />
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His policy mistakes aside, Nixon was a brilliant and hardworking man who made some bad choices. Nothing he is known to have done, however, is/was bad enough to justify ignoring all of his good deeds <em>in damnatio
memoriae</em>. Count me as<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>a fan who believes his accomplishments were far greater than his transgressions.<br />
<span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span><br />
<span style="font-family: "Century","serif"; font-size: 12pt; mso-ansi-language: EN-US; mso-bidi-font-family: "Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt; mso-bidi-language: AR-SA; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-bidi; mso-fareast-font-family: Calibri; mso-fareast-language: EN-US; mso-fareast-theme-font: minor-latin;"></span>To some, Nixon will always
be a villain, but he was certainly a hell of a lot better president than the one we have
now. </div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-2035362674646718327.post-54381628357423298022012-12-17T15:51:00.000-08:002012-12-26T16:48:53.858-08:00Hang in there, Tony.<div dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;" trbidi="on">
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<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjruqHDLhhDCwgQSzkWXcdO-B68fPh-rK_LEvh1sBDKFUE8BOrG-2r-1ssUy7H-oEZDm0z6x5qV9oxAwqSetqs-cRNrOhc2NQGiH9axBeY3AaI2ycC4h2v9QJiXQgbb0U4SS70FDS_PzXvu/s1600/OB-UX347_1010ke_G_20121010090212.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="213" nea="true" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjruqHDLhhDCwgQSzkWXcdO-B68fPh-rK_LEvh1sBDKFUE8BOrG-2r-1ssUy7H-oEZDm0z6x5qV9oxAwqSetqs-cRNrOhc2NQGiH9axBeY3AaI2ycC4h2v9QJiXQgbb0U4SS70FDS_PzXvu/s320/OB-UX347_1010ke_G_20121010090212.jpg" width="320" /></a></div>
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<span style="font-size: x-small;">Associate Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, during a Supreme Court<br />group portrait in Washington on October 8, 2010. (Associated Press)</span></div>
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Of all the concerns about what four more years of President Obama will mean for the United States, perhaps the single most disturbing prospect is an opportunity to shift the balance of the Supreme Court. </div>
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Despite this president's consternation, the judiciary is a coequal branch of government, and it has long provided a crucial check on overreach by the other two branches, especially the current executive. Among the current Court's unanimous rebukes of the Obama administration's positions are its decisions in: </div>
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<li><div style="text-align: justify;">
<em><a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/11pdf/10-1259.pdf">United States v. Jones</a></em>, where it held, contrary to the administration's argument, that <a href="http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2012-01-23/politics/35440467_1_gps-device-surveillance-privacy">the attachment of a GPS (Global–Positioning–System) tracking device to a suspected drug dealter's vehicle, and the use of that device to monitor the vehicle's movements on public streets, was a "search" within the meaning of the Fourth Amendment</a>; </div>
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<em><a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/11pdf/10-553.pdf">Hosanna-Tabor Evangelical Lutheran Church & School v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission</a></em>, where it held, contrary to the administration's argument, that <a href="http://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/hosanna-tabor-evangelical-lutheran-church-and-school-v-eeoc/">the</a><a href="http://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/hosanna-tabor-evangelical-lutheran-church-and-school-v-eeoc/"> Establishment and Free Exercise Clauses of the First Amendment barred employment discrimination suits brought on behalf of ministers against their churches</a>; and </div>
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<em><a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/11-597_i426.pdf">Arkansas Game & Fish Comm</a></em><span style="font-family: Times New Roman,Italic;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><em><a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/11-597_i426.pdf">issio</a></em></span></span><em><a href="http://www.supremecourt.gov/opinions/12pdf/11-597_i426.pdf">n v. United States</a></em>, where it held, contrary to the administration's argument, that <a href="http://search.yahoo.com/r/_ylt=A0oG7qA37sRQlQUA9wIPxQt.;_ylu=X3oDMTBscWN2ZnBjBHNlYwNzYwRjb2xvA2FjMgR2dGlkAw--/SIG=13m0q11gp/EXP=1355112119/**http%3a//www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/12/04/supreme-court-says-government-can-be-liable-for-floods/">government-induced flooding that is temporary in duration gains no automatic exemption from Takings Clause inspection</a>. </div>
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The administration has enjoyed some victories before the high court, to be sure, most notably in <em><a href="http://www.scotusblog.com/case-files/cases/national-federation-of-independent-business-v-sebelius/">National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius</a></em>, where a five-justice majority upheld the constitutionality of the president's signature health care reform law, with one exception: seven of the nine justices agreed that the federal government couldn't threaten States with the loss of theirexisting Medicaid funding if they decline to comply with the law's Medicaid expansion. Justice Anthony Kennedy, who many expected to be the "swing" vote that would decide the case, instead sided with Justices Scalia, Thomas and Alito in <a href="http://supreme.justia.com/cases/federal/us/567/11-393/dissent5.html">a scathing dissent</a> from the core ruling. </div>
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The cases in which Justice Kennedy finds himself in the minority are becoming more and more infrequent. Last term, <a href="http://sblog.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/06/SB_frequency_OT11_final.pdf">he voted in the majority 93% of the time</a>, more often than any other justice. Of the 42 cases in which the justices split, Kennedy voted with the majority in all but five--again, more often than any other justice. </div>
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Because of his pivotal role in so many decisions, the thought of a Democratic president--especially one as hyper-partisan as Obama--appointing Kennedy's succesor is troubling to say the least. Judicial appointments are arguably one of the president's most significant powers; he can stock another branch of government with whomever he wants, restrained only by the advice and consent of the U.S. Senate. President Obama has already made two Supreme Court appointments, but Justices Sotomayor and Kagan replaced like-minded liberals, so there was no significant change in the ideological composition of the Court. In this respect, their appointments weren't a loss for conservatives so much as a missed opportunity. The same could be said if Obama gets to appoint a successor to Justice Ginsburg or Justice Breyer. </div>
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If one of the Court's more conservative members should die or retire, however, then this president will have an opportunity to shift the ideological balance of the high court, possibly for decades to come. There's little danger of Chief Justice Roberts or Justices Alito and Thomas stepping down anytime soon, and Antonin Scalia is unlikely to leave with a Democrat in the White House. That leaves Justice Anthony Kennedy, notorious for playing his cards close to the vest. </div>
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Although appointed by President Reagan, Kennedy has not been a reliably conservative vote on the Supreme Court. He disappointed the Right on cases involving eminent domain, states' rights, the death penalty and the right of enemy combatants to petition for a writ of habeas corpus. His voting record more closely aligns him with William H. Rehnquist than any of his other erstwhile colleagues. His opinions reflect a comprehensive approach to interpreting the Constitution, going so far as to draw on international law and recent changes in American law and traditions. </div>
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Ideologically, Kennedy is probably best described as a moderate conservative. Some have slapped him with the "libertarian" label. Here's <a href="http://www.cato-at-liberty.org/justice-kennedys-mysterious-philosophy/">something by David Boaz</a>, the executive vice president of the Cato Institute:</div>
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<span style="font-family: Century;"><span style="font-family: Times New Roman;"><blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Justice Kennedy seems to be very concerned with liberty. He often sides with conservatives on economic issues (which are actually never mentioned by <em>Time</em>) and campaign speech, and with liberals on civil liberties, gay rights, and school prayer. Pretty inconsistent, huh?</span></blockquote>
<blockquote class="tr_bq" style="text-align: justify;">
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">Or then again, maybe Justice Kennedy has a basically libertarian view of the world and the Constitution. The word “libertarian” never appears in the article. Perhaps it should.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif;"><br /><span style="font-size: x-small;"></span></span><span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">And it’s not like the idea of Justice Kennedy’s libertarianism is a deep, dark secret. The writers might have consulted Helen Knowles’s book The Tie Goes to Freedom: Justice Anthony M. Kennedy on Liberty. Or Frank Colucci’s book Justice Kennedy’s Jurisprudence: The Full and Necessary Meaning of Liberty. Or Randy Barnett’s Cato Supreme Court Review article on the Texas case, “Justice Kennedy’s Libertarian Revolution.”</span></blockquote>
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<span style="font-family: Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: x-small;">I’m not saying that Justice Kennedy is a down-the-line, Nozick-reading, Cato Institute libertarian. He did join the Court’s statist majority in the medical marijuana case <em>Raich v. Gonzales</em>. And he infuriated libertarians by joining the majority in striking down state term limits and upholding state eminent domain. But the books and article cited above, and the Institute for Justice’s 1997 rating of Supreme Court justices, do point to a strong libertarian streak in Kennedy’s jurisprudence. </span></div>
</blockquote>
</span></span>Kennedy's background certainly doesn't contradict this assessment. As a lawyer in California, he worked closely with then-Governor Ronald Reagan, including on Proposition 1, a proposed amendment to the state constitution that would have limited state taxing and spending powers. (Voters rejected it in 1973.) It was Reagan who recommended to then-President Ford that he appoint Kennedy to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit. </div>
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However he might be categorized, Kennedy has provided critical votes in decisions that struck down government overreach. Had someone in the mold of Sonia Sotomayor or Elena Kagan been on the Court in his stead, dozens of cases likely would have been decided differently. Our jurisprudence on many constitutional issues, involving everything from civil liberties to the commerce clause to substantive due process, would be very different. <br />
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It's possible that Kennedy a<span imes="imes" minor-latin="minor-latin" mso-ansi-language:en-us="mso-ansi-language:en-us" mso-bidi-language:ar-sa="mso-bidi-language:ar-sa" mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi="mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi" mso-fareast-font-family:calibri="mso-fareast-font-family:calibri" mso-fareast-language:en-us="mso-fareast-language:en-us" new="new" roman="roman" serif="serif" style="font-family: '; font-size: 12pt; mso-bidi-font-size: 11.0pt;">da</span>mantly wants a Republic<span style="font-family: Times New Roman;">an president to choose his successor and has no desire to give up his seat while Obama is president. It's also possible that he might do the Rehnquist thing and stay on until he's ten toes up.</span> Whatever the case, here’s hoping he sticks it out for at least four more years. </div>
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Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0