Ron Paul, Justin Amash and Paul Broun of GA are the only three who voted against HR347
HR347 which Passed Monday essentially makes into the law the ability of the Federal Government to prevent protests of any kind in the presence of the President, the VP and anyone them deem worthy of SS protection. Want to hold a protest rally against the POTUS, guess what, you can now be sent to jail for 10 years.
Have a nice day.
Cheers,
Mike
The Senate passed S. 1867 a $662 billion Pentagon funding bill Thursday night after fights among lawmakers over terrorism-related provisions. One such provision would authorize indefinite detention without trial and give preference to military detention of terror suspects instead of the civilian justice system. Senator Marco Rubio suggests that these provisions could only be used on suspects with direct connections with organizations like Al-Qaeda but we know how well the Federal Government is at bending definitions.
The Obama administration threatened to veto the legislation, arguing the executive branch should decide how to try terror detainees despite this, the liberal Michigan Democrat and Senate Armed Services Chairman Carl Levin, rejected call after call by senior Obama administration officials to overhaul how his defense bill handles the treatment of suspected terrorists. Both parties emerged disagreeing over whether the law allowed or disallowed indefinite detention of Americans. But after an outcry conveyed by both liberals and conservatives, lawmakers arrived at a compromise that essentially concluded the indefinite detention was allowed while saying current policy wouldn't change.
A few Republicans led by Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, have railed against provisions that Mr. Paul argued violated the Constitution, aligning himself with liberal Democrats.
This legislation is along the lines of the Patriot Act. Disguised as a simple funding measure, it's actions and amendments in my opinion will continue to hamper our rights and freedoms.
Cheers,
Mike
It appears all the debate on this issue has caused the State Central Committee to take notice. This won’t be as cut and dry as they thought it would be. Thanks in large part to those of us newly active we were able to make them realize many in the State are now paying attention to details, because details do matter.
If you have any questions about the proposed rules change please feel free to contact me. This new change could be huge, and it could make IL relevant again in Presidential Politics, and not just a state where candidates come to raise funds. The new rules will also allow the other candidates who don’t get all the press coverage and the MSM (Main Stream Media) seal of approval a chance to compete on the National Stage. The field is spread pretty thin and could get more so if Palin gets in. Ron Paul is running strong even though Rick Perry and Mitt Romney are still getting the majority of the MSM coverage. Many of us see Rick Perry for the fraud he is, and many have already pledged not to support Mitt in any capacity. Add to that the growing support Ron Paul is getting and the numbers of us who will not vote for any other then him in 2012 and we might for the first time since 1948 see a real brokered RNC Convention.
The new rules will allow for candidates who receive at least 10% of the vote to obtain a proportion of the delegates based on their total percentage in the primary unless 1 candidate gets 51% or higher. The new rules as amended will allow the Campaign to choose their delegates as usual and will avoid the hassle of signature collection and ballot challenges from other campaigns or even the democrat party. There are some very influential spokespeople on both sides of this issue. I for one support it, I think the proposed changes are a good idea. If you feel strongly about this I suggest you call the SCC members to share your opinion.
CD Committeeman Home Email
1. Steven Daglas (708) 943-1913 sdaglas@sbcglobal.net
2. Judy A. Diekelman (708) 877-6565 diekelmanj@aol.com
3. Angel Garcia (312) 375-0979 angeldgarcia@gmail.com
4.Vacnt
5. Angelo Skip Saviano (708) 453-7598 skip@skipsaviano.com
6. Chris Kachiroubas (630) 832-0778 katch99@msn.com
7. Carol Smith Donovan (312) 643-0730 carol.smith.donovan@gmail.com
8. Eugene R. Dawson (847) 381-8817 erdaw@comcast.net
9. John Dorgan (847) 698-0630 jmdgop@yahoo.com
10.Tolbert Chisum (847) 251-4967 tchisum@aol.com
11.Richard S. Williamson (847) 251-2927rwilliamson@salisburystrategies.com
12.Barbara J. Peterson (708) 946-2331 bjp2124@aol.com
13.Deb Detmers (618) 259-6374 ddetmers@charter.net
14.Roger C. Claar (630) 759-3232 bbmayor@aol.com
15.Jim Oberweis (630) 466-4886 joberweis@oberweis.net
16.Jerry Clarke (217) 649-7805 jerrytclarke@yahoo.com
17.Dave Syverson (815) 282-4200 sen1@aol.com
18.Judy Dudek (309) 647-7968 jdudek1955@sbcglobal.net
19.Michael S. Bigger (309) 695-6338 m.bigger@mchsi.com
20.Demetra K. DeMonte (309) 347-4397 demetrademonte@gmail.com
21.Bob Winchester (618) 285-3636 bobwinchester@hotmail.com
The complete text can viewed here.
The House will be debating this shortly.
The bullet points from the 74 page bill are below.
The deal puts in spending caps like the bill the Republicans passed last week. The caps are worth about $917 billion in cuts over 10 years. Those caps rise from $1.043 trillion in fiscal 2012 to $1.234 trillion in fiscal 2021 they are split between defense and non defense pending.
Leaders in each party and each chamber would appoint three members to a 12-person "Super Committee" that would be tasked with finding $1.2 trillion or more in cuts. The committee would report by Nov. 23, and the bill provides for expedited floor procedures for voting. If they fail to report a bill by November 23 they would lose the special privileges.
If Congress doesn’t act on the "Super Committee" recommendation or if the new law doesn’t meet the reduction goals the difference between $1.2 trillion and whatever is enacted would go into effect. They claim the reductions would be divided equally between defense and non-defense.
The most important issue with the deal is that the debt ceiling will be raised between $2.1 trillion and $2.4 trillion. Obama will get $400 Billion dollars immediately and then he must jump through hoops to get an additional chunk of $500 Billion dollars. Another $1.2 trillion hike can occur when the president requests it but that figure would rise to $1.5 trillion if a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution has been sent to the states for ratification.
I personally do not support anything that allows for the Debt Ceiling to rise again but all early indications are that this bill will likely get approved despite heavy opposition. Ron Paul and a few others have already pledged to vote no. Please continue to contact your Representatives in Congress if you want this measure to fail.
Cheers,
Mike
Most of the information being given by the MSM isn't worth spit. Do these people actually believe that we will have a financial catastrophe if the debt ceiling isn't raised? Do they really believe our military won't be paid or that Seniors won't get their checks from Social Security? The U.S. has been in default for some time. Default means you can't pay the expenses with your current income. Borrowing more so you can continue to pay doesn't change that, it only prolongs the inevitable. Loans to cover expenses makes sense when it's justified by your projected future revenues being great enough to make up for up for it, but how long can you get by with nothing but more loans?
Some think an increase in revenue (Raised Taxes on the rich) is the anwser. but this doesn't work either. Taxes can't be raised high enough to cover the shortfall without also hitting the middle and lower income bracket with huge tax increses. The MSM would have us believe it's only the Republicans who are being stuborn on this issue but the democrats are being just as stuborn by not actually participating. President Obama has still not actually provided an actual plan. His Press Secrestary admitted this saying to do so would be too politcally charged. Really? Does anyone have any idea where this strategy comes from? Some would so the Frankfurt School of political theory others would say it's simply a way to deflect blame. Regardless the strategy is working exactly the way it seems it was intended.
Just tonight, John Boehner got many of the republicans to cave on their principles by allowing for a rise in the debt ceiling, even though the Senate would likely table this legislation. This is a sign the GOP will now go along with whatever Harry Reids sends them. If so, Obama will get his comprimise and the ablitity to spend another Trillion Dollars now, so we can work on a Trillion Dollars in future cuts over a period of years. Does this make any sense? At least I can be proud that my Congressman
Timothy V. Johnson IL-15 voted No and stuck to his guns.
Thank you Congressman Johnson and thank you to the twenty one other brave republicans who continue to fight. The list below are the Republicans who voted NO along side two of the Presidential Candidates Ron Paul and Michelle Bachman.
Ron Paul (Texas)
Michele Bachmann (Minn.)
Justin Amash (Mich.)
Chip Cravaack (Minn.)
Jason Chaffetz (Utah)
Scott Desjarlais (Tenn.)
Tom Graves (Ga.)
Tim Huelskamp (Kans.)
Steve King (Iowa)
Tim Johnson (Ill.)
Tom McClintock (Calif.)
Mick Mulvaney (S.C.)
Connie Mack (Fla.)
Jim Jordan (Ohio)
Tim Scott (S.C.)
Paul Broun (Ga.)
Tom Latham (Iowa)
Jeff Duncan (S.C.)
Trey Gowdy (S.C.)
Steve Southerland (Fla.)
Joe Walsh (Ill.)
Joe Wilson (S.C.)
Half of these folks are freshman!!!
Just moments ago the Senate did in fact reject the measure 59-41. I guess we'll see where it goes from here.
Cheers,
Mike
It has come to my attention that the use of this letter (From my previous post on 7-20) might not be having the effect I planned. I hoped that using material from a left leaning source would help show the commonality between our points of view. As I wrote this I assumed that most readers would understand the natural aversion to changing the Constitution that any Constitutionalists would have. I understood that many of the economists who wrote this letter lean to the left, I figured it would show both sides of the argument which agree, but what I failed to calculate was the mass support such an amendment would have. If your reading my blog you probably lean to the right and should realize I do as well. I'd like to believe you don't support a balanced budget amendment just because some leftist economists disagree with the idea. I don't make a habit of supporting something just because the left is against it. There are many reasons why I hold the view I do, some of the reasons coincide with the views of these economists and some do not.
I personally believe in a free market economic system which takes controls away the Federal Government. This means in my personal view anything that puts more control on the economy is a bad idea. Murry Rothbard once wrote, "balancing the budget by increasing taxes is like curing influenza by shooting the patient." A balanced budget amendment would allow the Federal Government to use tax hikes to do just that. He also agreed with one of my earlier points. He believed a major flaw was treating "the budget" as a constitutional entity which would increase the tendency of the government to spend money on off book items that don't get included in official expenses. There are all kinds of games that can be played depending on how such an amendment is written. Do we really want to take the chance right now with the current climate? My last aversion but certainly not least in my mind is the fact that spending is our problem.
WE DON'T NEED A CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT TO CUT SPENDING!
Why people can't understand this is beyond me.
Cheers,
What will they think of next? Every time John Boehner starts to reassure me he comes up with another idea that makes me cringe. Boehner supports a plan conceived by Mitch McConnell and Harry Reid. The legislation to lift the debt ceiling would be accompanied by the creation of a 12-member panel made up of 12 lawmakers, six from each chamber and six from each party. Such a committee, which some have called a “Super Congress” or a “super committee”, reportedly would have special powers which currently are unconstitutional. In the plan the debt ceiling would be raised by one trillion dollars for a period coupled with an equal dollar figure of cuts over a ten year period. A second increase in the debt ceiling would be tied to the creation of this Super Congress that would be required to find a minimum amount of spending cuts.
The debt ceiling date is August 2 if Congress does not approve additional borrowing. Republicans have insisted the White House agree to deep spending cuts for long-term deficit reduction before they approve any increase in America's debt burden. Republican leaders would like to show progress before Monday and before 4pm ET on Sunday when the financial market trading begins in Asia.
The Balanced Budget amendment was bad enough, now they want to create another unconstitutional congressional body with unprecedented powers that go far beyond that are a regular member of Congress. Multiple news reports and people familiar with his plan say, House Speaker John Boehner has made this a central part of his last-minute proposal. What is John Boehner thinking, does this make any sense? I don't think so.
Cheers,
Mike
The idea of changing the Constitution to require a balanced budget seems like a good idea right? It appears to force lawmakers to live within their means. How could that be a bad thing? Well, how is it that most U.S. states now requires a balanced budget from the governor and/or the legislature, Yet still find themselves in various types of financial messes?
At the state and local level it creates an incentive to create all sort of off-budget enterprises like housing authorities and hospital authorities, to avoid the implications of the balanced-budget amendment. Also a balanced-budget amendment would mandate action to counter recessions and economic downturns not to mention tax revenue shortfalls and unemployment benefits. This would essentially hard wire Keynesian Economics into the United States Constitution.
Below is the contents of a letter written to our leaders in Washington in regards to the idea of balanced budget amendment. The letter is written by 6 past Nobel Prize Economists and Laura Tyson from the University of California, Berkeley.
We, the undersigned economists, urge the rejection of proposals to add a balanced-budget amendment to the U.S. Constitution. While the nation faces significant fiscal problems that need to be addressed through measures that start to take effect after the economy is strong enough to absorb them, writing a requirement into the Constitution that the budget be balanced each year would represent very unsound policy. Adding additional restrictions, as some balanced budget amendment proposals would do, such as an arbitrary cap on total federal expenditures, would make the balanced budget amendment even worse.
1. A balanced budget amendment would mandate perverse actions in the face of recessions. In economic downturns, tax revenues fall and some outlays, such as unemployment benefits, rise. These so-called built-in stabilizers increase the deficit but limit declines of after-tax income and purchasing power. To keep the budget balanced every year would aggravate recessions.
2. Unlike many state constitutions, which permit borrowing to finance capital expenditures, the federal budget makes no distinction between capital investments and current outlays. Private businesses and households borrow all the time to finance capital spending. A balanced budget amendment would prevent federal borrowing to finance expenditures for
infrastructure, education, research and development, environmental protection, and other investment vital to the nation's future well being.
3. A balanced budget amendment would invite Congress to enact unfunded mandates,
requiring states, localities, and private businesses to do what it cannot finance itself. It also invites dubious accounting maneuvers (such as selling more public lands and other assets and counting the proceeds as deficit-reducing revenues), and other budgetary gimmicks. Disputes on the meaning of budget balance would likely end up in the courts, resulting in judge-made economic policy. So would disputes about how to balance an unbalanced budget when Congress lacks the votes to inflict painful cuts.
4. Balanced budget amendment proposals typically contain escape hatches, but in peacetime they require super-majorities of each House to adopt an unbalanced budget or to raise the debt limit. These provisions are recipes for gridlock.
5. An overall spending cap, which is part of some proposed amendments, would further limit Congress’s ability to fight recessions through either the built-in automatic stabilizers or deliberate changes in fiscal policy. Even during expansions, a binding spending cap could harm economic growth because increases in high-return investments — even those fully paid for with additional revenue — would be deemed unconstitutional if not offset by other spending reductions. A binding spending cap also would mean that emergency spending (for example on natural disasters) would necessitate reductions elsewhere, leading to
increased volatility in the funding for non-emergency programs.
6. A Constitutional amendment is not needed to balance the budget. The budget not only attained balance, but actually recorded surpluses and reduced debt, for four consecutive years after Congress enacted budget plans in the 1990s that reduced spending growth and raised revenues. This was done under the existing Constitution, and it can be done again. No other major nation hobbles its economy with a balanced-budget mandate. There is no need to put the nation in an economic straitjacket. Let the President and Congress make fiscal policies in response to national needs and priorities as the authors of our Constitution wisely provided.
7. It is dangerous to try to balance the budget too quickly in today’s economy. The large spending cuts and/or tax increases that would be needed to do so would greatly damage an already-weak recovery.
You can see the complete letter here.
Update 7-25-2011
It has come to my attention that the use of this letter (From my previous post on 7-20) might not be having the effect I planned. I hoped that using material from a left leaning source would help show the commonality between our points of view. As I wrote this I assumed that most readers would understand the natural aversion to changing the Constitution that any Constitutionalists would have. I understood that many of the economists who wrote this letter lean to the left, I figured it would show both sides of the argument which agree, but what I failed to calculate was the mass support such an amendment would have. If your reading my blog you probably lean to the right and should realize I do as well. I'd like to believe you don't support a balanced budget amendment just because some leftist economists disagree with the idea. I don't make a habit of supporting something just because the left is against it. There are many reasons why I hold the view I do, some of the reasons coincide with the views of these economists and some do not.
I personally believe in a free market economic system which takes controls away the Federal Government. This means in my personal view anything that puts more control on the economy is a bad idea. Murry Rothbard once wrote, "balancing the budget by increasing taxes is like curing influenza by shooting the patient." A balanced budget amendment would allow the Federal Government to use tax hikes to do just that. He also agreed with one of my earlier points. He believed a major flaw was treating "the budget" as a constitutional entity which would increase the tendency of the government to spend money on off book items that don't get included in official expenses. There are all kinds of games that can be played depending on how such an amendment is written. Do we really want to take the chance right now with the current climate? My last aversion but certainly not least in my mind is the fact that spending is our problem.
WE DON'T NEED A CONSTITUTIONAL AMENDMENT TO CUT SPENDING!
Why people can't understand this is beyond me.
Cheers,
Mike
It's been reported recently that the 14th Amendment could be used by the Obama administration to ignore the debt ceiling. It seems leftists are interested in the U.S. Constitution again, all of sudden. This after they smeared the Republicans for their new rules requiring a description of Constitutional authority on new legislation. The only problem is that as usual they have an incorrect view of what the measure actually means. Not only is their argument messed up but significant case law in regards to the matter is no longer clear, once again thanks to judicial activism. To make matters worse the misunderstanding of the 14th amendment is not only by Democrats but Iowa Sen. Charles Grassley has stated that he would relent if the Constitution was found to abrogate the concept.
In 1966 The Supreme Court case Katzenbach v. Morgan said that the section 5 of the 14th Amendment gave Congress the power to decide on how to implement the powers. but then in 1997 The court said no. Thirty-one years after Katzenbach, the Supreme Court revisited the "ratchet" interpretation, in the case of City of Boerne v. Flores. The Boerne Court stated, "This is not a necessary interpretation, however, or even the best one." This is way so many people tend to have the opinion that the U.S. Constitution is living and breathing, because the Supreme Court can change it's opinion so easily over time.
Will the Obama administration try to use the 14th Amendment? Nothing has stopped him so far from acting like a King, why does anyone think the Constitution will?
Cheers,
Mike
A protest permit is permission granted by the state for a demonstration to be held in a particular venue at a particular time. Failing to obtain a permit may lead to charges of parading without a permit.
1931 the Supreme Court developed a doctrine (Near vs Minnesota) that says that “there is a heavy presumption against” the Constitutional validity of prior restraint. This means that governments have to prove the validity of prior restraint in each instance; its validity can never be assumed. Several Constitutional scholars have agreed that requiring permit engage in protest is a classic type of prior restraint, and permit systems assume the validity of prior restraint: instead of governments always having to prove prior restraint is essential, protesters are burdened with proving unconstitutionality.
Then in 1939 the Supreme Court finally declared (Hague vs. Committee For Industrial Organization) that the use of streets and sidewalks for political assembly and speech was constitutionally protected. And when it made this declaration it immediately qualified it. Public speech and assembly, the Court declared, has always to be “exercised in subordination to the general comfort and convenience, and in consonance with peace and good order” since then, the courts have found “general comfort and convenience, peace and good order” to encompass everything from minimizing the opportunity for violence to not disrupting Saturday afternoon shoppers. Still, courts have strongly encouraged the development of permit processes, regardless of the decision which found the permit a form of “prior restrain” on political speech.
The Court’s contradiction between its promotion of permit systems and its prior restraint doctrine is unnerving to say the least. The 1941 ruling (Cox v. New Hampshire) said that public political speech could not be licensed but parades could. Then in 1953 The Vinson Court decided that stationary protests could also be regulated, since unlike parades, they tended to “monopolize” space making it unavailable. In 14 years time the Supreme court ruled on free speech that Americans enjoyed for 163 years without the need of court involvement, then backpedaled so far as to contradict itself and remove the right almost completely, unless they grant you a permission slip.
The protest permit system now is the primary means of assuring peace and good order, by regulating free speech.
Prior restraint as a form of government censorship would have disgusted the designers of the Bill of Rights.
Did Martin Luther King Jr. Get a permit?
Did Gandhi get a permit?
Here is a short list of 56 early Americans who also chose not to get a permit for their initial protest.
John Hancock
Josiah Bartlett
William Whipple
Matthew Thornton
Samuel Adams
John Adams
Robert Treat Paine
Elbridge Gerry
Stephen Hopkins
William Ellery
Roger Sherman
Samuel Huntington
William Williams
Oliver Wolcott
William Floyd
Philip Livingston
Francis Lewis
Lewis Morris
Richard Stockton
John Witherspoon
Francis Hopkinson
John Hart
Abraham Clark
Robert Morris
Benjamin Rush
Benjamin Franklin
John Morton
George Clymer
James Smith
George Taylor
James Wilson
George Ross
George Read
Caesar Rodney
Thomas McKean
Samuel Chase
William Paca
Thomas Stone
Charles Carroll of Carrollton
George Wythe
Richard Henry Lee
Thomas Jefferson
Benjamin Harrison
Thomas Nelson, Jr.
Francis Lightfoot Lee
Carter Braxton
William Hooper
Joseph Hewes
John Penn
Edward Rutledge
Thomas Heyward, Jr.
Thomas Lynch, Jr.
Arthur Middleton
Button Gwinnett
Lyman Hall
George Walton
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