Interesting Items Alex Gimarc [email protected] Monday Feb. 28, 2011 Howdy all, a few Interesting Items for your information. Enjoy – In this issue: 1. Wisconsin 2. Shutdown 3. Libya 4. Mental 5. DOMA 6. Cissna 1. Wisconsin. The battle of Wisconsin continued last week and the unions were not doing well, as their public behavior and actions became increasingly violent and ugly. Protestors occupying the Capitol have managed to thoroughly trash the inside of it. WI democrats on the lam in Illinois have been chased and hounded by TEA Party members who have attempted to interview them. Videos of these elected cowards have been posted to You Tube for all to see. Over the weekend, there were reports that their Magical Mystery Tour was being funded by the public employee unions that they are defending by their absence. The WI House passed out the non-spending portions of the union legislation. One of the things we have seen in the past with violent protests by public employee unions is that unionized local law enforcement refuses to step in and control union violence. This has also started happening in WI, with physical assaults by union protestors on reporters and anti-union people being ignored. All of this leads to the obvious question of why do we need unionize police when they look the other way when their buds in other unions misbehave? Expect layoffs to begin this week in WI, as their state budget crunch comes to a head. It does not appear that WI Governor Scott Walker is going to cave in on this. And it is all coming soon to a state near you. 2. Shutdown. Interesting observation on government shutdowns from last week, where the two existing government shutdowns are being orchestrated by democrat members of the Wisconsin and Indiana legislatures who fled from legislation they disagreed with. Polling in both states is running nearly 70% against the absent democrats. Yet out of DC we are getting the Kabuki dance between democrats and Republicans over an expected federal government shutdown. As of this writing, it appears that the House majority is going to start passing a series of continuing resolutions on the budget with a chunk taking out of spending each time one passes. The first one up to bat is a two-week CR with a $4 billion cut. While this is not squat in light of an expected $1.7 trillion spending deficit this year, it is a step in the right direction. But if they do this every two weeks until next January, they will end up cutting some serious money and most importantly, force democrats in the senate and Obama himself to continually remind voters of their intransigence regarding responsible spending. Keep putting the pressure on congress to cut the budget; cut it now; and keep on cutting it. We must also put pressure on them to change House rules so that ALL appropriations for ObamaCare are stopped immediately. 3. Libya. The anti-Khadafy revolt really picked up steam last week, with open warfare in the streets. Unlike Egypt, this one appears to be breaking down along tribal lines. Khadafy’s tribe was low on the food chain until he took control decades ago and they do not want to go quietly into that good night. It appears that the military has deserted him and he has invited mercenaries into Libya to do the dirty work for him. There are reports that most of the killing is being done by the mercenaries and directed against former military members who walked away. Khadafy also sits on several tons of mustard gas and uranium yellowcake. As of this weekend, there was also news of several Iranian bases in Libya, which may explain the pair of Iranian gunboats through the Suez Canal into the med. Needless to say, all westerners in Libya are getting out as quick as they can. Most Europeans were taken out via military ship. The Hillary Department of State chartered a smallish ferry that sat in port of several days due to high seas. The aircraft carrier battle groups in the region were not used nor were they moved into the Med to assist. All in all, this is the most feckless, limp-wristed reaction by Americans to festivities in the Middle East in decades. Finally, the festivities in Libya also spiked world oil futures well over $100/bbl, bringing pressure on the WH to take the lid off domestic oil and natural gas production, something Obama himself refused to do late last week. The Middle East is changing and all we are doing is watching. 4. Mental. A Clinton-appointed Federal District Judge, Gladys Kessler upheld ObamaCare last week. Her logic found that the Commerce Clause now covers everything, and that making a choice whether to do something or not is an action, albeit a mental action. And since congress can regulate commerce, choosing not to participate in that commerce, for whatever reason, is also commerce that can be regulated by congress. This is the most tortured logic possible by a leftist, and if left in place, there is nothing that congress cannot make legislation about. Essentially, there is no limit to the powers of congress under Judge Kessler’s view of the world. This is yet another example of why we must never elect democrats, as they install these black-robed fools onto the federal bench for a lifetime to make it up as they go. Read more about the opinion including a link to the actual court order from How Air on Thursday: http://hotair.com/archives/2011/02/23/obamacare-ruling-more-commerce-clause-idiocy/ 5. DOMA. The Obama WH tried to deflect attention from the public relations debacle in Wisconsin last week by suddenly deciding that section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act is unconstitutional and that he has ordered the (In)Justice Dept. not to defend it in court any more. To the social conservatives, this is the functional equivalent to shouting “Squirrel!” to a dog and watching it run off after the squirrel (from a running joke in the movie “Up.”). To me, it looks like an attempt to shift attention from the public employee unions to social issues. It didn’t work, as Obama was roundly blasted by both sides of the political divide for this decision. One of the primary jobs of the president it to faithfully execute all laws passed by congress, regardless of whether he agrees with those laws or not. Should a conservative president decide not to enforce laws pertaining to abortion, what do you expect the leftists in congress to do? Right: they would be drawing up impeachment paperwork immediately, as refusal to execute your sworn duty is indeed an impeachable offense. Now, I do have a little bit of sympathy with this decision, as it unintentionally aims squarely at the power of the federal courts. In Marbury, Justice Marshall and the SCOTUS grabbed for themselves the exclusive power to decide what was constitutional and what was not. Yet according to the founders, that power resides in each and every citizen and not exclusively in the courts. It is long past time to move that power out of the federal courts and back to the citizenry. Perhaps this action is the best thing that Obama has ever done, for if successful, it will redefine the relationship between the federal courts and the elected branches of government. I do not think this is the intended outcome for either Obama or the left, as it will absolutely be used by elected people on the right in years to come as a way to respond to outrageous SCOTUS decisions. In terms of doing his sworn duty, this Obama feint more than anything else shows us what a petty, sniveling wannabee little tyrant he is. And it will not be forgotten. Perhaps it is time for his democrat enablers in congress to pay him a little visit and remind him what his job is and what they will do to him if he does not faithfully execute his sworn duty. 6. Cissna. An Alaskan State Legislator was returning from Seattle last week following treatment for breast cancer. At SeaTac airport, she went through the new screening machine where an object in the breast area showed up. This led to a TSA demand to grope the prosthetic. Representative Cissna (D, Anchorage) refused and was refused entry to her flight. She took a ferry to Juneau where she was hailed as a hero by politicians on both sides of the political aisle. The event triggered a letter from Lisa Murkowski (R, AK Native Corporations) to the TSA demanding what their policy was on inspecting breast cancer survivors. Note that there are a lot of people out there with prosthetics. Does the soon to be unionized TSA intend to grope all of them? Is this not profiling? Is this not discrimination against the disabled? And if we can profile the disabled and those with prosthetics, why can we not profile young Muslim men who pose the largest threat to our public safety? Inquiring minds want to know. More later - - AG "If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen." - Samuel Adams, speech at the Philadelphia State House, August 1, 1776. Note: Interesting Items can be found at the following locations: Our Home Page http://interestingitems.org/ Archives can be found at http://home.gci.net/~agimarc The Alaska Standard http://thealaskastandard.com/ MatSu Valley News http://www.matsuvalleynews.com Subscriber and supporter Elbert Collins at http://thatselbert.wordpress.com/ Rod Martin's The Vanguard site is also a long-time supporter of this column: http://www.thevanguard.org/ -- To join RichsRants, send email to: [email protected] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/richsrants?hl=en
