07/28/16

The ‘Roads and Bridges’ Lie

By: Renee Nal | New Zeal

In order to restore the sovereignty of the states, Americans MUST demand that their state legislatures stop taking federal taxpayer dollars.

President Obama speaks about transportation infrastructure during a visit to the Tappan Zee Bridge

“From the beginning the constitutionality of appropriations for the construction of roads was warmly [adamantly] denied, and by none more steadily than by the successive presidents, Jefferson, Madison and Monroe. All of them refused to be convinced that the building of roads in different parts of the country was such a matter of ‘general welfare‘ as to justify the expenditure of the public moneys.” – American Political History, 1763-1876, Volume 1, By Alexander Johnston

During the financial crisis of 2008, Presidents George W. Bush and Barack Obama assured Americans that some banks were “too big to fail.” Hard earned tax payer dollars were immediately needed to be used to bail out banks and then, the auto industry.

President George Bush was famously quoted as saying,

“I had to abandon free market principles in order to save the free market system.” – George W. Bush

Read more here…

06/27/15

The US Supreme Court Has Gone Rogue

By Frank Salvato

Many on the Right side of the aisle are outraged. Gay marriage – a social issue at its core – has been validated by the US Supreme Court. The outrage is palpable. And while there is legitimacy to this outrage – especially with regard to the Court’s transgression of the 10th Amendment – the decision on gay marriage is a “bright shiny thing” that serves to quickly file us past an earlier decision that directly threatens the constitutional structure of our government: The Court’s ruling on King v. Burwell; the Obamacare subsidies.

No matter how you feel about the issue of gay marriage, the Court’s ruling on this social issue is an attack on the 10th Amendment, the rights of States to have authority over all things not enumerated in the US Constitution. But comparatively, the Court’s decision on Obergefell v. Hodges is a “mosquito bite” to yesterday’s “beheading” of our balance of powers at the federal level. We are being led away from what is tantamount to a “genocidal slaughter” of the Separation of Powers to gawk at a “highway accident.” With yesterday’s decision we are all – Liberal and Conservative, Republican, Democrat and Libertarian – losing our government to a transformative end stage; a commingling of constitutional branches and a centralized governmental authority in the federal government; something uniquely anathema to our basic governmental structure.

The Court’s King v. Burwell decision is so much more than its Obergefell v. Hodges decision because the former strikes at the root of how our government is supposed to work. By moving on from this constitutional crisis (and this is a true constitutional crisis) to outrage over a social issue when there are still remedies to be affected for said social issue, we are acquiescing to the Court’s decision on King v. Burwell – and the mortal damage it would establish to our system of government. No, with the Court’s King v. Burwell decision we should be fundamentally and exclusively outraged to the point of immediate action, arguing our points effectively and making a singular and cohesive stand for the Constitution.

There are those who argue that the Court’s attack on the 10th Amendment in Obergefell v. Hodges is equally as important as the Court’s direct assault on the Separation of Powers. I vehemently disagree and for good reason. The immediate danger to the Constitution and the survival of our nation – as we face forces that are achieving the fundamental transformation of our governmental structure – is the failure of the government structure itself, not the prior or resulting social issue movements. To make this argument is akin to believing that the crew of the Titanic should have started examining how to better construct a ship’s hull as the vessel was sinking instead of doing everything that they could to keep the ship afloat.

A simple solution to Obergefell v. Hodges is to remove government from the authoritative realm of marriage altogether. One way to achieve this is through the utilization of contracts for legal affairs between cohabitants, leaving the sanctity of the institution of marriage to the Churches where it belongs. Regarding the issue of taxation, where marriage is concerned, radically transforming our tax system from one based on income to one based on consumption makes the issue of “marriage” and personal taxation moot.

That social issue solution understood, we can see why King v. Burwell is so much more important. We live in a time when judicial precedent trumps constitutionality, and we are, in real time, witnessing an explosion of the very structure of our government. Precedent is being set – right before our eyes – that would allow the Judicial Branch to directly rewrite legislation via the issuing of judicial edicts from this point forward.

While both these decisions are important, one cements the destruction of our governmental model, while the other is a social issue battle that the Progressives will use to keep the citizenry away from being cohesive on the latter. Should we fail to see this true constitutional crisis then we will witness, in the immediate, the end of our constitutional form of government.

One battle is so much more important than the other. If we cannot see that then we are not worthy of the freedom we pretend to enjoy. Truthfully, I am stunned this has to be explained.

Frank Salvato is the Executive Director of BasicsProject.org a grassroots, non-partisan, research and education initiative focusing on Constitutional Literacy, and internal and external threats facing Western Civilization. His writing has been recognized by the US House International Relations Committee and the Japan Center for Conflict Prevention. His opinion and analysis have been published by The American Enterprise Institute, The Washington Times, The Jewish World Review, Accuracy in Media, Human Events, Townhall.com and are syndicated nationally. Mr. Salvato has appeared on The O’Reilly Factor on FOX News Channel, and is the author of six books examining Islamofascism and Progressivism, including “Understanding the Threat of Radical Islam”. Mr. Salvato’s personal writing can be found at FrankJSalvato.com.

06/26/15

The End Of Constitutional Government

By: Terresa Monroe-Hamilton

It’s been an historic week and although I am not surprised by the Supreme Court decisions, they saddened me beyond belief. I have sadly come to the conclusion that many of my colleagues are correct… our Constitutional form of government is now dead and Obama’s transformative ‘change’ is all but complete.

Things are now snowballing and it is more than most Americans can take or bear. From gay marriage and the ensuing infringement on free speech and our religious rights, to enforced Obamacare, to forced wealth redistibution in our neighborhoods, to the EPA run amok… our freedoms are being absolutely nullified. States are now saying they won’t comply with the EPA on coal and who can blame them? Americans will get very dangerous when they are hungry and cold. And then there is the Iran deadline, which is this weekend. Instead of holding their feet to fire, we are actually giving Iran nuclear reactors while they shout, “Death to America!” in their parliament. Insanity is the norm now. Then there is the increased Islamic State threat on our southern border and the attacks on our power grid coming down the pike. It’s surreal and all instigated, manipulated and planned for by our government – the ultimate enemy from within.

Adding to the tyrannical frenzy of the aftermath of the mass shooting in South Carolina, evidently America is cool with censoring her own history, but wants to hang on to the likes of Nazi Germany and bloody communist regimes. Satanism is still in vogue it would seem as well… but if you are a lover of the Confederate flag, well, you should be summarily burned at the stake. Let’s not leave out Stalin or concentration camps as making the ‘cool’ list either. And it goes without saying that Che Guevara is tres chic. Prohibition of thought and our history is all the rage now. No doubt next on the censorship bandwagon… burning books and thought police. Oh, wait…

The flaming lynch mob mentality of Progressives is burning through businesses across the former land of the free. They are feeling immense pressure to conform and be politically correct. None of them seem to have a spine. This is insane. Not only are they banning all Confederate flags and calling for Civil War statues to be taken down (which is erasing American history), they are getting rid of General Lee, an orange Dodge Charger from “The Dukes of Hazzard.” Walmart and Amazon have stopped selling anything having to do with the Confederate flag, but Walmart is still selling Che Guevara shirts, as well as Castro memorabilia and Iranian flags. Apple just removed Civil War Games from their App Store. South Carolina, Louisiana, Alabama and Kentucky are all removing Confederate flags as well. It’s an all you can eat buffet of political correctness feeding a ‘get em!’ move by Progressives. Now, they want to ban Gone With The Wind. We have literally plummeted down the rabbit hole and are sipping tea with the Mad Hatter. The Constitution is now being replaced with censorship and regulation – it’s incomprehensible.

At least one good thing came out of the Supreme Court this week. During the Great Depression, the government decided that prices paid to farmers were too low and undertook to correct the problem by limiting their output. It was a fascist move then and is still one now. It is sheer theft. Marvin and Laura Horne decided not to play that game and took their beef all the way to the Supreme Court – raisin hell, so-to-speak. And they won on Monday! The feds claimed they owed $700,000 because they would not surrender 47% of their crop for over a decade to the government with no compensation. Not even the left-leaning Supremes could let that one slide.

Raisin farmer Marvin Horne stands in a field of grapevines planted next to his home in
Kerman, Calif. Horne was accused of violating a 1937 federal rule that regulates raisin prices
by setting aside a percentage of crop to avoid a glut. (Gary Kazanjian, AP)

The Raisin Administrative Committee, which operates under the supervision of the USDA, sells or gives away the raisins it takes, with the proceeds going to cover its operating costs, storage fees and promotional efforts abroad. If any money is left, the farmers get some of it. If not, they receive nada. Looks like the Road to Serfdom has been detoured on this issue, at least for now. The unconstitutional theft being imposed on farmers such as the Hornes is no more. But at least these raisin farmers can get back to raising their crops and taking care of business – liberal fascism has moved on to the next hot topic.

Then there was the ultimate betrayal by Justice Roberts and the ruling in favor of Obamacare this week. The ruling stomped all over state’s rights and bent over backwards to reinterpret the Obamacare statute in favor of federal exchanges. “The somersaults of statutory interpretation they [the Justices of the Supreme Court] have performed …will be cited by litigants endlessly, to the confusion of honest jurisprudence,” concludes Justice Antonin Scalia in his dissent, joined by Justices Clarence Thomas and Sam Alito. “And the cases will publish forever the discouraging truth that the Supreme Court of the United States favors some laws over others, and is prepared to do whatever it takes to uphold and assist its favorites.”

“So it rewrites the law to make tax credits available everywhere,” he dissents. “We should start calling this law SCOTUScare.” The Court’s interpretation is “absurd,” Justice Scalia opined. And right he is. Scalia is a brilliant legal mind and he is horrified by the Leftist turn of the court. This must tear his soul apart. This was simply a political power play and one has to wonder, as I have before, if Chief Roberts has skeletons in his closet that are being used to sway his opinion.

This partisan ruling will have wide-ranging, catastrophic ramifications for America. The majority opinion states that “The combination of no tax credits and an ineffective coverage requirement could well push a State’s individual insurance market into a death spiral.” And it inevitably will. Which in turn, will usher in single-payer healthcare. It’s coming.

“It is implausible that Congress meant the Act to operate in this manner,” Justice John Roberts writes for the majority. Really? Because it looks entirely plausible to me. In fact, choreographed.

Justice Scalia notes that these Justices are “presuppos[ing] the availability of tax credits on both federal and state Exchanges.” In layman terms, that means that federal tax credits that have already been given to millions of people must continue. Along with the tax credits will come higher premiums, crappier healthcare, death panels, higher deductibles and part-time employment as the national norm.

This is tyranny and what you are seeing here is the dissolution of the three branches of constitutional government we are based upon. We now have one executive behemoth branch that is drunk with power and careening out of control, right on schedule.

Ted Cruz’s statement on the Supreme Court’s ruling:

“Today’s decision in King v. Burwell is judicial activism, plain and simple. For the second time in just a few years, a handful of unelected judges has rewritten the text of Obamacare in order to impose this failed law on millions of Americans. The first time, the Court ignored federal law and magically transformed a statutory ‘penalty’ into a ‘tax.’ Today, these robed Houdinis transmogrified a ‘federal exchange’ into an exchange ‘established by the State.’

“As Justice Scalia rightfully put it, ‘Words no longer have meaning if an Exchange that is not established by a State is ‘established by the State.” He also said, ‘We should start calling this law SCOTUSCare’ – I agree.

“If this were a bankruptcy case, or any other case of ordinary statutory interpretation, the result would have been 9-0, with the Court unanimously reversing the Obama administration’s illegal actions. But instead, politics intervened.

“For nakedly political reasons, the Supreme Court willfully ignored the words that Congress wrote, and instead read into the law their preferred policy outcome. These judges have joined with President Obama in harming millions of Americans. Unelected judges have once again become legislators, and bad ones at that. They are lawless, and they hide their prevarication in legalese. Our government was designed to be one of laws, not of men, and this transparent distortion is disgraceful.

“At the same time, crocodile tears are flooding our nation’s capital today over the Supreme Court’s decision to illegally rewrite Obamacare, which has been a disaster since its inception. But one day of faux outrage from the Washington Cartel won’t fool the millions of courageous conservatives across our country. They know the Republican leadership in Washington is quietly celebrating the Court’s decision. If they believe this issue is now settled so they don’t have to address it, they are sorely mistaken.

“Every GOP candidate for the Republican nomination should know that this decision makes the 2016 election a referendum on the full repeal of Obamacare.

“I have made repeal of this disastrous law a top priority since the first day I arrived in the Senate and have made its repeal central to my campaign. Any candidate not willing to do the same—and campaign on it every day—should step aside.

“The Court adopted the IRS’s blatantly unlawful reading of the statute to make subsidies available to individuals on federal exchanges, when Congress expressly provided the opposite.

“After today’s ruling, Obamacare will now be responsible for imposing illegal taxes on more than 11 million individuals and for burdening hundreds of thousands of businesses with illegal penalties on their workers, killing jobs, and further slowing economic growth. President Obama’s health care law remains deeply unpopular and is harming countless Americans by increasing costs and worsening the quality of care.

“I remain fully committed to the repeal of Obamacare—every single word of it. And, in 2017, we will do exactly that.”

This is why I support Ted Cruz – he stands for something and isn’t afraid to walk the walk. And the Left fears and hates him for it.

Next, in Texas Department of Housing and Community Affairs v. The Inclusive Communities Project, Inc., the Supreme Court found in favor of Obama’s wealth redistribution in communities. Now, the government can decide who lives where and they can literally bribe community leaders into doing ‘gentrified’ slum housing just about anywhere. This will socially and demographically engineer America. It will force people to live among criminals and others they are trying to stay away from. It will cause crime to skyrocket and property values to plummet. The regulatory groundwork is now laid for substantial redistribution of tax dollars. Gradually cities will effectively swallow up their surrounding municipalities, with merged school districts and forced redistribution of public spending working together to kill the appeal of the suburbs. This is Agenda 21 and it is now nationally sanctioned. This is also aimed at manipulating the voter demographic to ensure a Marxist will stay in power indefinitely.

But, I saved the worst for last… in another 5-4 ruling, the Supreme Court legalized gay marriage nationally, following on the heels of Mexico doing the same thing last week. Funny, I don’t remember marriage of any sort being mentioned in the Constitution or as being seen as ‘a right.’ This decision will literally touch every aspect of our lives. It’s not just the act of non-traditional marriage; it’s all that it entails.

The Left will use this ruling to try and destroy religious freedom of all forms of worship, except for Islam. It won’t just be the refusal by Christian pastors and priests to consecrate homosexual unions… it will go far beyond that. If you go to a church that preaches biblical principles and traditional marriage, that could cost you your job. Children in all schools will be subjected to gender theories and all forms of sexual preferences – everything from homosexuality, to pedophilia, to polygamy, to incest, to bestiality and on it goes. This is what the liberal Progressives want – the destruction of all morality, faith and the family unit. It is the very bedrock of communism come to life in America. This ruling on gay marriage was the equivalent of a legalistic Pandora’s Box. It’s already occurring in the military – ministers are being court-martialed or rotated out because of their Christian faith. And of course, you are seeing it playing out with wedding chapels, bakeries, florists and photographers.

It will also be used as a weapon to silence free speech. It’s already happening. Witness the editorial board of PennLive/The Patriot-News in Harrisburg, PA who is taking a hardcore stance against those who disagree with the Supreme Court ruling to legalize gay marriage:

As a result of Friday’s ruling, PennLive/The Patriot-News will no longer accept, nor will it print, op-Eds and letters to the editor in opposition to same-sex marriage.

And that will happen as well on the airwaves and on the Internet. Blogs, such as mine, who support traditional marriage will be censored, fined or banned. Prison is also a possibility.

As my friend, Bookworm Room, so astutely put it, we have an incredibly dangerous clash of constitutional rights looming and I wouldn’t place odds on our side winning at this point. Businesses and schools will get slammed and litigated to death over this.

Justice Antonin Scalia nailed it:

The opinion is couched in a style that is as pretentious as its content is egotistic. It is one thing for separate concurring or dissenting opinions to contain extravagances, even silly extravagances, of thought and expression; it is something else for the official opinion of the Court to do so. Of course the opinion’s showy profundities are often profoundly incoherent. “The nature of marriage is that, through its enduring bond, two persons together can find other freedoms, such as expression, intimacy, and spirituality.”23 (Really? Who ever thought that intimacy and spirituality [whatever that means] were freedoms? …

And just as Bookie quoted it, I will quote my friend James Simpson on gay marriage – because it goes to the heart of the matter:

The Left uses “rights” agendas to wrap itself in the mantle of righteousness and seize the moral high ground, tactically putting us on the defense in the process. But they couldn’t care less about the actual issue except in its ability to facilitate their path to power.

The agenda is never the agenda for the Left. And this is especially true for gay marriage. Homosexual marriage is a Trojan horse tactic. The true agenda is to establish the primacy of homosexual rights over the First Amendment’s guarantee of the free exercise of religion. Our nation was founded on this principle, and the gay marriage movement seeks to destroy it.

Consider that Annise Parker, the lesbian mayor of Houston, Texas, demanded to review pastors’ church sermons before public outrage forced her to back off. We have already seen how small businesses have been singled out and attacked for refusing to provide certain services to gays.

What is less known is that these gay couples are frequently part of the movement. They deliberately seek out businesses known for their Christian owners. They deliberately demand a service they know in advance will be refused. When the inevitable happens they use it as pretext to destroy the business and savage its owners. Doesn’t it amaze you how quickly legal groups immediately materialize to assist in the attack? The fact that they got unexpected push back through a spontaneous crowd sourcing campaign to support one pizza shop will not dissuade them from future efforts. If gay marriage is adopted, their current bullying behavior will look like child’s play compared to what’s coming.

This is a highly organized, nationwide campaign of vilification against Christians. But even Christians are not the ultimate target. If the First Amendment can be challenged this way; if a certain group’s “rights” can trump the U.S. Constitution, and if the Supreme Court can actually issue an edict making it so, then the entire Constitution has become meaningless. This is the Left’s true agenda and it always has been. This is the Cultural Marxists’ endgame. The issue is not the issue. The issue for them has always been destroying our country to impose socialism — with them in charge, of course. In order to do that they have to strip America of its culture, its traditions, and most importantly, the most important law of the land, the U.S. Constitution.

Persecution and tyranny are upon us. Now is the time for Christians and Constitutionalists to come together and make a stand. We are being persecuted and forced to go against all we believe in. I for one will stand and I will definitely not comply. Neither will the Black Robe Regiment. This will reverberate across all of our society, our laws and our lives. Soon, Americans will find that standing on their Christian beliefs will cost them their jobs, their families and maybe their lives. Marxism has swept global leadership and they are in the process of bringing their boots down on our necks. If the government enforces this blatant violation of free speech and religion here in the US, they will have to take us to jail. Americans will not comply.

I agree with Justice Scalia that this ruling is a threat to democracy and to the Republic itself. This decision effectively puts the State (the federal government) above the individual and this was never what our founding fathers intended. In fact, they warned us against this. The Supreme Court has turned activist, legislating from the bench, instead of being supreme judges of the land as they were so assigned. As JoshuaPundit puts it, what principles do you stand for? Just what are you willing to compromise on? It’s time to take a stand and choose a side. It was a nice Constitutional Republic while it lasted… now it’s time to reboot and fight. I hear a third party calling.

05/30/15

Emergence of a National Police Force

By: Andrew Kopas – Guest Columnist
Stand Up America

With the recent shooting in Ferguson and deaths in New York City and Baltimore of residents there involved in criminal activity at the time of their arrests, there is an outcry from the likes of civil rights activist Al Sharpton and others for nullification of state’s rights and the takeover of local and state police forces nationwide by the Federal Government, specifically by the Executive Branch.

BESTPIX BALTIMORE, MD - APRIL 27: Demonstrators climb on a destroyed Baltimore Police car in the street near the corner of Pennsylvania and North avenues during violent protests following the funeral of Freddie Gray April 27, 2015 in Baltimore, Maryland. Gray, 25, who was arrested for possessing a switch blade knife April 12 outside the Gilmor Homes housing project on Baltimore's west side. According to his attorney, Gray died a week later in the hospital from a severe spinal cord injury he received while in police custody. (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images) *** BESTPIX ***

BESTPIX BALTIMORE, MD – APRIL 27 (Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

In all of this, keep in mind that Obama has very successfully used “straw man” arguments to advance his objectives. In this particular case, the “straw man” argument being put forward is that all law enforcement agencies across America are inherently racist and that only his takeover of them will fix these racist organizations.

He has essentially painted a bull’s eye on the backs of our local and state law enforcement personnel and endorsed instead the criminal element in America that has responded by assassination style shootings of law enforcement personnel in NYC and most recently in Mississippi as well.

The nationalization of our local and state police forces is indeed a very bad idea and should be adamantly opposed by both the states and the general populace for several reasons.

First and foremost, it would bring ALL organized armed personnel, namely the American Military, Homeland Security, and all local and state police under the direct control of one man, namely Obama and any future Presidents of the United States.

That would in turn allow for tremendous abuses of that power that we have already seen in this Administration, such as use of the IRS and DHS against what he perceives to be his domestic enemies, namely anyone who opposes him and his policies.

Remember the National Police Force Obama Promised in 2008?

Secondly, if he decided to fully seize power and set aside the limitations of the Office of President imposed on him by the Constitution of the United States, which he has already done in a number of particulars such as with illegal immigration, failure to enforce DOMA, bypassing Congress unilaterally in matters of treaty negotiations, etc., there would be no armed force except the American people directly to stop him.

But without organization and leadership, the probability of that successfully happening on a national scale is remote.

In fact, he could use all of the organized armed forces at his disposal, including local and state police who would be under his direct control, to put down any such opposition that the people might undertake.

As reported in The Daily Bell on December 7, 2011, as early as 2009 Obama advocated “a civilian police force to match the size and power of our armed forces.” One has to ask the question “Why” such national control is required vs. local law enforcement properly trained and equipped to deal with any domestic terrorist threats?

His expansion of the Homeland Security Department has followed that pronouncement, as has his use of the NSA to go far beyond its mandate and monitor the communications of every man, woman and child in America.

And the fact that he is actively promoting and funding illegal immigration on a massive scale in America today without screening for terrorists crossing our borders begs the question of if he indeed wants to see an increase in domestic terrorist attacks like we have seen in many places across the USA such as at Ft. Hood, Oklahoma, Boston and most recently in Garland, Texas with the expressed purpose of forcing the need for such a national police force under his direct control to put down such attacks?

Obama has gone on record on more than one occasion to praise the Chinese Communist form of government and other authoritarian regimes that are essentially dictatorships based on central government control over all aspects of their citizens’ lives including how many children they can have, how they worship, how they communicate with each other over the Internet, and even how they assemble.

Do we want a man with the belief that an authoritarian form of government is preferable to a democratically elected government with clear separation of powers between the Executive, Legislative and Judicial branches as set for in our Constitution to have the kind of unlimited power that nationalization of our local and state law enforcement agencies would give him?

God forbid!