June 24-25, 2012
Jun 24 01:52 Exposing the I voted twice novement Jun 24 09:40 Ritchie, Swanson won't enforce Constitution Jun 24 13:45 Franken, Klobuchar vote for higher electricity prices Jun 24 17:27 Trust Eric Holder? I think not Jun 25 01:09 FT pre-spinning PPACA ruling Jun 25 03:11 Environmentalists' petitions more spin than fact Jun 25 12:59 Democrats' judicial activism arguments pure spin Jun 25 15:57 I told you so
Prior Months: Jan Feb Mar Apr May
Prior Years: 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011
Exposing the I voted twice novement
After the public employees unions' thuggish behavior in Wisconsin, nobody in their right mind is willing to give union thugs the benefit of the doubt. That's why people won't give this thug the benefit of the doubt:
MILWAUKEE - In March, Dan Shansky left Wisconsin for California to take a job with a union there, but that didn't stop him from casting a ballot in the June 5th recall election. The community organizer, who lists the Milwaukee-based Community Action Now as a recent employer, was heavily involved over the past year and a half in the protest and recall movement in Wisconsin. Shansky's Facebook comments announcing his new job and the move to California in March were greeted with congratulations by various liberal organizers employed by many of Wisconsin's most high profile left-wing groups.
Wisconsin state law requires that before a person cast their ballot in a Wisconsin election they be a resident of the state. Specifically, residence is defined as the place 'where the person's habitation is fixed, without any present intent to move, and to which, when absent, the person intends to return.' [Wis. Stat. 6.10(1)]
Shansky's move to California in March, nearly two months before the election, and acceptance of a job out there would almost certainly mean that he does not qualify as a Wisconsin elector and should not have cast a ballot. He no longer lives in the state and he does not appear [to] regard his move as a mere temporary absence from Wisconsin.
Winning elections is important to being in union leadership. Apparently, the ends justify the means.
I've never heard of a state statute that allows a person to vote after they've moved to another state. I don't doubt that some states look the other way on that. (Minnesota, with Ritchie as SOS, leaps to mind.)
The reality is that voter fraud exists. That's why we need photo ID, a secretary of state that keeps updating the SVRS in timely fashion and doesn't look the other way when it fits his ideology.
Tags: Unions , Voter Fraud , Wisconsin Recall Election , California , Democrats
Posted Sunday, June 24, 2012 1:52 AM
Comment 1 by Chad Q at 24-Jun-12 08:46 AM
Oh come on Gary, this is just one isolated case of a vindictive union thug voting where he shouldn't have voted. Why do we need to spend billions of dollars trying to fix something that doesn't need fixing when we could be spending that money on more social engineering and mass transit projects that will benefit the collective?
Funny how liberals say there isn't voter fraud and then they post on their social networking sites that they commited voter fraud.
Comment 2 by J. Ewing at 24-Jun-12 09:11 AM
I still say they ought to PROVE there is no voter fraud, which they can't without voter ID. But then of course there are the outright proven cases like this one, or the felony convictions in Minnesota, that they have to deny exist, too. Not a big problem for liberals, of course.
Comment 3 by walter hanson at 24-Jun-12 12:46 PM
J:
Gary left out an interesting detail from this story. The man bragged about how he was able to do it because the state of Wisconsin was stopped from implementing voter id.
Racine, WI had lots of fraud going on.
And it's kind of hard to have fraud proven when a prosecutor doesn't think it's his or her job to go after these real criminals.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
Ritchie, Swanson won't enforce Constitution
When I first read this article , I thought I was seeing things. Unfortunately, I hadn't. Here's what I'm talking about:
But the state has no obligation to verify eligibility before counting votes, nor would doing so be practical, countered Assistant Attorney General Nathan Hartshorn, representing Secretary of State Mark Ritchie and Attorney General Lori Swanson.
That's an odd interpretation of Article VII of Minnesota's Constitution :
ARTICLE VII
ELECTIVE FRANCHISE
Section 1. ELIGIBILITY; PLACE OF VOTING; INELIGIBLE PERSONS. Every person 18 years of age or more who has been a citizen of the United States for three months and who has resided in the precinct for 30 days next preceding an election shall be entitled to vote in that precinct. The place of voting by one otherwise qualified who has changed his residence within 30 days preceding the election shall be prescribed by law. The following persons shall not be entitled or permitted to vote at any election in this state: A person not meeting the above requirements; a person who has been convicted of treason or felony, unless restored to civil rights; a person under guardianship, or a person who is insane or not mentally competent.
Article VII, Sect. 1 specifically says that people who don't meet the Constitution's requirements "shall not be entitled or permitted to vote at any election in this state."
The Secretary of State is known as the chief election official in Minnesota just like the Attorney General is known as the chief law enforcement official in Minnesota. They, along with the state auditor, the governor and the leiutenant governor are the 5 "constitutional offices."
What Assistant Attorney General Hartshorn just said in U.S. District Court is that Minnesota's constitutional officers, specifically the Secretary of State and the Attorney General, aren't required to uphold Minnesota's Constitution.
That argument wouldn't work in a Minnesota court. If it wouldn't work in here, it certainly won't fly in any US appellate court with the exception of the Ninth Circuit.
Hartshorn isn't going beyond the bizarre statements in Mark Ritchie's memo in favor of dismissal motion :
In their responsive memorandum, Plaintiffs once again proceed from the premise that the Minnesota Constitution imposes an obligation on Defendants to 'confirm' or 'verify' voter eligibility before counting votes. This time, Plaintiffs repeatedly assert that that obligation is contained in the phrase 'any election' in Minn. Const. art. VII, § 1.
(See 2d. Pls. Mem. 3, 7, 13, 16, 17, 19.) As Plaintiffs concede, however, that section of the state constitution merely provides that a 'person not entitled to vote cannot vote in 'any election.'" (2d. Pls. Mem. 7 (emphasis added).) There is nothing in the words 'any election,' in art. VII, § 1, or elsewhere in Minnesota law that places upon Defendants an affirmative obligation to prevent such persons from committing felony voter fraud.
What Mr. Hartshorn is arguing is that the chief election official doesn't have a responsibility for upholding Minnesota's election laws. What he's arguing is that a) the Secretary of State's office is a ceremonial office devoid of official constitutional responsibilities and b) Minnesota's constitution doesn't require that the Constitution be upheld.
He's also arguing that the chief law enforcement officer in the state isn't responsible for enforcing the requirements codified into Minnesota's Constitution.
These are absurd arguments that attempt to shirk the Secretary of State's and the Attorney General's responsibilities. It's absurd to think that the Constitution requires something but Minnesota state statutes doesn't compel anyone to enforce those requirements.
Posted Sunday, June 24, 2012 9:40 AM
Comment 1 by walter hanson at 24-Jun-12 12:42 PM
Gary:
Just think how much they will want to defend the state constitution if the voters vote for voter id or marriage. I guess they will just pretend they weren't passed.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
Comment 2 by Dan McGrath at 25-Jun-12 12:07 PM
Notice how he left out the word "permitted" and offered up the phony red herring of "any election" as a substitute. "Shall not be entitled OR PERMITTED to vote at any election in this state." Words mean things.
Comment 3 by Gary Gross at 25-Jun-12 12:37 PM
Indeed they do, Dan. Indeed they do. And yes, I noticed that. I didn't write about that aspect of it because I don't want to write gargantuan 2,000 word posts because I'd lose the readers' attention.
If I wanted to, though, I could easily turn this post into 1,500 words without much extra effort.
Franken, Klobuchar vote for higher electricity prices
This past Wednesday, Sen. Franken, (D-MN) and Sen. Klobuchar, (D-MN), voted to raise Minnesotans' electricity bills . They did it by voting to extend the filibuster of a resolution that would've nullified the EPA's Utility MACT rules.
The Heritage Foundation's Foundry blog sounds an alarming note:
The EPA estimates the rule will cost $9.6 billion annually, to be paid by utilities and customers alike for new equipment, monitoring and reporting, loss of generating capacity, and higher electricity rates. Industry insiders consider the agency figures to be a lowball estimate.
That's just the tip of the regulatory iceberg. This important information shouldn't be overlooked:
Prima facie evidence of the non-credibility of EPA's co-benefits estimates exists in EPA's baseline estimates of risk in this RIA: deaths that were 'due to' ambient PM2.5 exposures exceeded 20% in areas of the US in 2005. These cobenefits assumptions also imply that over 40% of deaths were due to PM2.5 in parts of the US during the period 1979-1983 when PM2.5 concentrations were approximately double those for 2005. These surprisingly high assumptions about baseline risk, which in my opinion stretch the bounds of plausibility, are the result of a single assumption change in 2009 in EPA's RIAs to extrapolate risks below the ambient PM2.5 levels that have been studied, to as low as background (i.e., nearly zero).
RIAs are not subject to peer review by EPA's Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee (CASAC) or to a public comment period.
Nothing says untrustworthy louder than rules that aren't "subject to peer review" or that ignores public comments before implementing the rule.
That means Sen. Franken and Sen. Klobuchar based their votes, which will increase Minnesotans' electric bills, on fiction and ideology. Some coal-fired power plants in the southeast will be forced to shut down entirely, hitting that region especially hard in terms of unemployment.
A strong case can be made that Sen. Franken and Sen. Klobuchar, along with others voting to maintain the filibuster, voted for higher unemployment and lower family incomes by voting to continue this filibuster.
What sick person would make that vote while the economy is struggling and families are hurting?
Tags: Senate , Amy Klobuchar , Al Franken , Utility MACT , EPA , Unemployment , RIA , Regulations , Democrats , Elections
Posted Sunday, June 24, 2012 1:45 PM
No comments.
Trust Eric Holder? I think not
This weekend, Democrats have visited the TV talk shows explaining that Eric Holder is the victim of Republicans' vindictive political fishing expedition. That's insulting for a multitude of reasons.
The morning of the vote, President Obama asserted executive privilege, which temporarily prevented the House Government Oversight and Reform Committee from seeing the documents. Most serious legal scholars expect the courts to laugh at President Obama's claims of executive privilege.
Before we take that step, though, it's time to remember Holder's past indiscretions. The most recent indiscretion was his dropping charges against the New Black Panther Party thugs that threatened white voters outside a Philadelphia polling station:
Bartle Bull described himself as a " John Kennedy Democrat " during his interview with Bill O'Reilly. Here's what he told O'Reilly:
O'REILLY: And that's interesting, because you are leading the charge here against these Black Panthers. Now what did you see yourself on election day? What did you see?
BULL: I saw two armed uniformed threatening men blocking the door to a polling place, screaming rudeness at voters.
O'REILLY: What was their intent?
BULL: I can't answer for what was between their ears.
O'REILLY: Well, what were they screaming, though?
BULL: I heard, well, one of them, for example, screamed, 'Now you will see what it is like to be ruled by the black man, cracker.'
O'REILLY: Okay, did they have their Black Panther regalia on?
BULL: They wore jack boots, black boots, black combat boots, black paramilitary uniforms, black berets.
O'REILLY: All right, so they were intimidating as this young man who photographed them said. You concur with that assessment?
BULL: Oh, absolutely.
Despite the eyewitness testimony of a civil rights movement legend and videotape of the Panthers' thuggery, Eric Holder dropped the case against the New Black Panthers Party.
That alone is justification for doubting Holder. Unfortunately, that isn't the only reason not to trust Holder :
This is the same man who was a driving force behind President Clinton's pardons of members of the notorious Puerto Rican terrorist group, the Armed Forces for National Liberation (FALN).
This shows what type of terrorists FALN was:
After members of the FALN were arrested, they threatened Judge Thomas McMillen's life during their Chicago trial. Carmen Valentine told the judge, 'You are lucky that we cannot take you right now,' and called the judge a terrorist. Dylcia Pagan warned the courtroom: 'All of you, I would advise you to watch your backs.' And Ida Rodriguez told the judge, 'You say we have no remorse. You're right. Your jails and your long sentences will not frighten us.' These terrorists convinced McMillen that they would continue being terrorists 'as long as you live. If there was a death penalty, I'd impose the penalty on you without hesitation.'
What type of law enforcement official would tell the president that these terrorists deserve a pardon? Answer: an Eric Holder type of 'law enforcement official'. That's before considering the fact that Mr. Holder played a vital role in the Marc Rich pardon :
Mr. Holder had more than a half-dozen contacts with Mr. Rich's lawyers over 15 months, including phone calls, e-mail and memorandums that helped keep alive Mr. Rich's prospects for a legal resolution to his case. And Mr. Holder's final opinion on the matter, a recommendation to the White House on the eve of the pardon that he was 'neutral, leaning toward' favorable, helped ensure that Mr. Clinton signed the pardon despite objections from other senior staff members, participants said.
It's interesting that the man that Democrats are telling us to trust today is the person who told the Justice Department to drop a case they'd already won a conviction on.
The person Democrats are telling us to trust today is the man who said the FALN terrorists should be pardoned. The person that the Democrats are portraying as an honest man is the person who refused to stop the pardon of a fugitive from justice.
With all due respect, these aren't the actions of a trustworthy public servant. They're the actions of an ideologue who puts a higher priority on setting thugs free than on preventing violent thugs from seeing the light of day.
Trust Eric Holder? Not even if my life depended on it.
Tags: Operation Fast and Furious , Executive Privilege , President Obama , Eric Holder , Marc Rich , Fugitive , FALN , Terrorists , Bill Clinton , Pardons , TV Talk Shows , Spin , Democrats , Brian Terry , Law Enforcement
Posted Sunday, June 24, 2012 5:29 PM
No comments.
FT pre-spinning PPACA ruling
The first thing I thought about this FT article is that it must've been written by this administration. Here's what tipped me off that this was a spin job, not serious journalism:
When John Roberts was being confirmed as chief justice of the Supreme Court in 2005, he famously said that the nine judges on the highest US court should be like baseball umpires, whose job it is 'to call balls and strikes and not [to] pitch or bat'.
But almost seven years later, Mr Roberts has presided over a bench that has issued an increasing number of 5-4 decisions, a trend that has fuelled Americans' suspicions that the court is becoming ever-more political and that has exacerbated the decline in its public standing.
Those perceptions could be heightened this week, when the Supreme Court issues its much-anticipated ruling on whether President Barack Obama's 2010 healthcare reforms were constitutional.
The American people hate the PPACA. That's why they want it repealed. The numbers haven't moved more than a point or two since the bill's signing.
If SCOTUS rules that the entire bill is unconstitutional, the first thing you'll hear from families and businesses alike will be a huge sigh of relief. The next sound you'll hear will be loud applause because one of the most ill-advised pieces of legislation in history will be dispatched into oblivion.
The only people doing the handwringing thing will come be the professional worriers of the political class. The other 60% of people willl rejoice that the bill is dead.
This sounds like BS from the political class, too:
At the heart of the healthcare case is how the justices view the commerce clause, one of the most widely debated parts of the constitution, and one that has only grown more contentious as the public has become more concerned about the scope of federal government.
At the heart of this case is whether the federal government is able to tell people that choosing to not get involved in commerce is an act of commerce. It isn't.
Also at the heart of this case is whether there is a limit on the Commerce Clause. If there isn't, then Katie bar the door. The floodgates will open. Bad legislation will be justified by citing the Commerce Clause.
If it's ruled that there isn't a limit on the Commerce Clause, the TEA Party uprising of 2010 will seem mild compared with what will happen. Years ago, George Will wrote "When the American people want something badly enough and scream loudly enough long enough, sooner or later, the leaders will follow." Amen to that, Brother Will.
As with Bush v Gore and Citizens United, the healthcare ruling could have a substantial impact on the direction of a US election. To strike down the law would give Republicans a legal victory to tout as they persist in criticising the Obama administration's 'overreach'.
But it could also infuriate and energise the liberal Democratic base that has become increasingly disillusioned with President Barack Obama during the last three and a half years, and which might not otherwise vote in large numbers again this year.
Support for overturning the PPACA hovers in the mid-50's percentage-wise. That's all Republicans and a majority of independents. If Wisconsin taught us anything, and it did, it's that pro-growth conservatives do well when the Democrats' base is energized.
I remember hearing Juan Williams talking on Special Report when the first protests started in Wisconsin. He talked about the enthusiasm gap had finally disappeared. He talked about how this should worry Scott Walker.
Juan Williams was right. The enthusiasm gap had disappeared. With that gap gone, though, a new gap was created. That new gap might be called the disgusting behavior gap. When Katherine Windels allegedly sent Sen. Scott Fitzgerald a death threat , people recoiled with disgust.
The bottom line is that independents recoil with disgust when progressives show their true nature.
Conservatives have nothing to fear if SCOTUS overturns the PPACA. Rather, they'll have plenty to cheer about if it's overturned.
Tags: President Obama , Commerce Clause , PPACA , SCOTUS , Media Bias , John Roberts , Bush v. Gore , Citizens United v. FEC , Repeal , Independents , GOP , Democrats
Posted Monday, June 25, 2012 1:09 AM
Comment 1 by walter hanson at 25-Jun-12 03:52 PM
Gary:
The only reason why they are 5-4 decisions is that there are four judges who want to bat or act like kings or queen. If they exercised the real job of just balls and strikes most of them will be 9-0.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
Environmentalists' petitions more spin than fact
Like a Lori Swanson or Mike Hatch press conference announcing their next big lawsuit, the environmentalists' petitions delivered to Gov. Dayton are about PR, not substance.
This article exposes the lie that there was a great groundswell of opposition against PolyMet and similar mining operations.
Former state legislator Frank Moe captured a lot of media attention when he staged a 350-mile sled dog run from Ely to the North Shore, through Duluth and down to the State Capitol in St. Paul.
The purpose: To deliver, on March 8, a reported 12,500 to 13,000 signed petitions to Gov. Mark Dayton to try to block any copper/nickel/precious metals mining in Northeastern Minnesota.
That was the environmentalists' first major mistake:
MiningMinnesota, an advocacy group for nonferrous mining in the region, at first had some difficulty getting copies of the petitions. But when it filed a Freedom of Information Act request with the governor's attorney, the petitions submitted to the Department of Natural Resources commissioner were made available immediately.
The results of their research are especially damaging to the environmentalists' credibility. Here's why:
70 percent of the signatures are from the seven-county metropolitan area (4,498 or 45 percent) and out of state (2,612 or 25 percent) combined. That differs considerably from what Steve Morse, executive director of the Minnesota Environmental Patnership, said at the March 8 rally at the State Capitol regarding the 'petitions of 12,500 Minnesotans from northern Minnesota primarily.'
It's worth noting that there weren't 12,500 signatures. Next, it's worth noting that, of the 10,000 approximate signatures, roughly one-fourth of them were from people who don't live in Minnesota. Finally, there's this:
Of the 1,805 from Northeast Minnesota, the vast majority of them are from places outside the Iron Range, with the most from Duluth and the North Shore.
That's possibly the biggest secret that the environmentalists didn't want people to know. Most Minnesotans think that the people living within 75 miles of Duluth had the same beliefs. They don't.
The Arrowhead is filled with treehuggers that hate mining. They've undercut the miners every step of the way while telling them they're an important part of the DFL coalition. These statistics tell the world that the Iron Range isn't environmentalist-friendly:
The core Iron Range had few signatures. Here are those unofficial numbers as counted: Virginia, 9 (including former City Councilor Rob Raplinger); Chisholm, 6; Soudan, 6; Bovey, 4; Hibbing, 5; Tower, 6; Buhl, 1; Makinen, 2.
That's stunning. Approximately 9,750 people signed the petition. Fewer than 40 of those signatures came from the Iron Range. That's just barely .4% of the signatures obtained.
As bad as those statistics are for the environmentalists, this statistic annihilates their credibility:
'The total number of hardrock mines permitted (on United States Forest Service lands) since 1990 is 2,658; no sites have been placed on the CERCLA Comprehensive Environmental Response, Compensation, and Liability Act (commonly known as Superfund) list ' Department of Agriculture Secretary Thomas Vilsack wrote in a letter to a U.S. senator on July 20, 2011.
For all of the environmentalists' accusations of mining destroying the countryside, official statistics from Washington, DC, say that "no sites have been placed on the [superfund list]" since 1990. That's over 20 years of consistent compliance with America's superfund laws. (I'm betting that the odds of that information making it into Conservation Minnesota's or MEP's fundraising appeals isn't 1%.)
Finally, let's demolish the environmentalists' myths with this information:
Ongaro also said Moe, who operates a sled dog business, was 'not even close' in citing the number of jobs in the region dependent on 'clean water.' He put the tourism jobs number in the region at 30,000.
'The total tourism-related private sector employment number for March 2012 in Cook, Lake and St. Louis counties combined is 15,153. Yes, half of the claimed 30,000. If you take out Duluth, that number drops to 9,113,' Ongaro said, referring to state Department of Employment and Economic Development statistics.
The environmentalists' arguments aren't about preserving the environment. It's about imposing the environmentalists' will on people. The tourism 'industry' is a myth. It won't trigger a dynamic economy. It hasn't kept the North Shore's or the Iron Range's economy humming. It never will.
That's 3 strikes (and then some) against the environmentalists' credibility.
Tags: Environmentalists , Frank Moe , Conservation Minnesota , MEP , MCEA , Petitions , Superfund , Tom Vilsack , Tourism , Duluth , Iron Range , North Shore , DFL , Frank Ongaro , Mining , DEED , Jobs
Posted Monday, June 25, 2012 3:11 AM
Comment 1 by walter hanson at 25-Jun-12 03:56 PM
Wow they lied! What a shocking development!!
Too bad the real media doesn't care about that.
Walter Hanson
Minneapolis, MN
Response 1.1 by Gary Gross at 25-Jun-12 04:10 PM
Shame on you, Walter, for calling the Red Star & their ilk "the real media." That type of thinking won't be tolerated here anymore. Blogs and journalists like Michelle Malkin, James O'Keefe & the late Andrew Breitbart are "the real media."
I've broken more than a half dozen stories in the past 8 months that the supposedly "real media" refused to cover. These were LFR or Examiner exclusives.
Comment 2 by eric z at 25-Jun-12 04:45 PM
Walter, Gary - which of you lives next door to a mine?
Response 2.1 by Gary Gross at 25-Jun-12 07:17 PM
Eric, Why don't you trust verified facts? Tom Vilsack made the statement that no superfund sites have been found despite the monitoring. That means you either think you know better than the experts or your ideology won't let you admit to the truth.
Democrats' judicial activism arguments pure spin
With SCOTUS apparently heading towards striking down at least part of the PPACA, Democrats have already been testing trial balloon defenses. One of their arguments will be that the Roberts Court is an activist court, the type of thing conservatives railed against for years.
I won't say that you should ignore the Left's arguments. I'm recommending that you smash their arguments and ridicule them for making intellectually flimsy arguments.
The Left's intellectual laziness started with their getting their way in the Wickard v. Filburn ruling. Wickard v. Filburn is constitutionally tortured:
A farmer, Roscoe Filburn, was growing wheat for on-farm consumption. The U.S. government had established limits on wheat production based on acreage owned by a farmer, in order to drive up wheat prices during the Great Depression, and Filburn was growing more than the limits permitted. Filburn was ordered to destroy his crops and pay a fine, even though he was producing the excess wheat for his own use and had no intention of selling it.
The Supreme Court interpreted the United States Constitution's Commerce Clause under Article 1 Section 8, which permits the United States Congress "To regulate Commerce with foreign Nations, and among the several States, and with the Indian Tribes". The Court decided that Filburn's wheat growing activities reduced the amount of wheat he would buy for chicken feed on the open market, and because wheat was traded nationally, Filburn's production of more wheat than he was allotted was affecting interstate commerce. Thus, Filburn's production could be regulated by the federal government.
That opened the floodgates for SCOTUS to rapidly and incorrectly expand the federal government's authority beyond its constitutional boundaries.
The Commerce Clause was codified into the Constitution to give the federal government the authority to prevent interstate trade wars. PERIOD. It wasn't intended to give Congress a quasi-constitutional rationalization for doing whatever it wanted.
The Commerce Clause is now used by progressives in both parties to justify rationalize major expansions of federal authority. The Founding Fathers envisioned a federal government with enumerated responsibilities and the authority to do what only the federal government needed to do.
That's why they put the Ninth and Tenth amendments in the Bill of Rights.
What the Left is disparaging as judicial activism is nothing more than the SCOTUS using the Constitution as the basis for their ruling. That isn't what past courts have done but it's the right way for determining whether legislation is constitutional.
That said, if that's what's happening, it'd mark a major shift in how cases are ruled on. Some might rightly argue that it's a revolutionary shift in how the courts rule on things.
During Chief Justice John Roberts' confirmation hearings, Sen. Dick Durbin asked him what assurances Durbin could get that a Chief Justice Roberts would "side with the little guy" in his rulings. Roberts' reply certainly left them apoplectic.
Roberts replied that the senators could rest assured that "every time that the Constitution is on the little guy's side," he'd rule for the little guy.
Democrats didn't like that reply but it's a reply that the vast majority of Americans would wholeheartedly agree with.
While it'd be foolish to argue that basing opinions on precedents isn't worthwhile, it isn't foolish to argue that badly thought through precedents are worthless.
Nobody questions the fact that Rudy Giuliani is pro-choice. Still, he's argued that Roe v. Wade isn't SCOTUS's best work from a constitutional. Rudy's argued that the US Constitution doesn't give the federal government the authority to rule on what he sees as a states' rights issue.
To be fair, Democrats are struggling to cope with what's possibly a brave new world for them. They've relied on SCOTUS to give them their biggest political victories.
Hypothetically speaking, telling Democrats that they'll have to earn their legislative victories through the legislative branch in cooperation with the executive branch is a shock to the Democrats' nervous system.
Hopefully, SCOTUS' ruling on the PPACA will usher in a new era of relying on the Constitution for their rulings rather than the justices substituting their policy beliefs for the elected branches of government's policies.
Tags: Wickard v. Filburn , Commerce Clause , Judicial Activism , Roe v. Wade , Precedents , Constitution , Ninth Amendment , Enumerated Powers , Tenth Amendment , State Sovereignty , John Roberts , SCOTUS
Posted Monday, June 25, 2012 1:01 PM
Comment 1 by eric z at 25-Jun-12 04:43 PM
Never mind "activists." Bootlicking Gore v. Bush fabricators is who they are.
Response 1.1 by Gary Gross at 25-Jun-12 07:22 PM
The "bootlicking Bush v. Gore fabricators" weren't the people that made this ruling. FWIW, though, the Supreme Court got Bush v. Gore right. The Florida Supreme Court tried to changing the law after the election. That's illegal, which is why the US Supreme Court voided Florida's first ruling. When it was returned to Florida, the Florida Supreme Court acted like the US Supreme Court hadn't acted.
Because the Florida Supreme Court tried ignoring the laws passed by the Florida legislature & signed into law by Florida's governor, the US Supreme Court stepped in & said that the Florida Supreme Court couldn't ignore the laws passed by Florida's legislature.
I told you so
I told you so. I said it was just a matter of time before liberals started writing articles about the 'activist' SCOTUS. Ezra Klein's post proved me right:
Over the past two years, the Republican Party has slowly been building a permission structure for the five Republicans on the Supreme Court to feel comfortable doing something nobody thought they could do: Violate the existing understanding of the Commerce Clause and, in perhaps the most significant moment of judicial activism since the New Deal, overturn either all or part of the Affordable Care Act.
The first step was, perhaps, the hardest: The Republican Party had to take an official and unanimous stand against the wisdom and constitutionality of the individual mandate. Typically, it's not that difficult for the opposition party to oppose the least popular element in the majority party's largest initiative. But the individual mandate was a policy idea Republicans had thought of in the late-1980s and supported for two decades. They had, in effect, to convince every Republican to say that the policy they had been supporting was an unconstitutional assault on liberty.
Klein's writing that 'Republican justices' are violating "the existing understanding of the Commerce Clause" is judicial activism doesn't mean they're being activists. That's a warped twist on words.
If the individual mandate is ruled unconstitutional, the 5 justices will have only ruled that the Ninth and Tenth amendments must be taken seriously. They will have ruled that the Commerce Clause isn't meant to give Congress and the president the authority to strip states and individuals of the rights the Founding Fathers originally gave them.
The Supreme Court's Wickard v. Filburn ruling was as misguided as was their Roe v. Wade ruling.
Striking down precedents that violate the Constitution is a virtuous thing. They enable the courts to restore the Constitution to its proper place of authority.
The proper definition of judicial activism is when the courts put in place their policy preferences even if it volates the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.
Wickard v. Filburn was clever lawyering but the justices could've said that they appreciated the clever lawyering without ruling for the clever lawyer's client. Wickard v. Filburn opened the floodgates that helped Congress take rights away from states and individuals.
If it's examined closely, Wickard v. Filburn is a ruling that says the federal government has the right to tell businesses that they have to conduct business according to the federal government's preferences.
That ruling didn't have anything to do with interstate commerce. It had everything to do with the federal government passing a law to artificially creating commerce. As is usually the case, the federal government's attempt to bully businesses into doing what they want hurt farmers without helping the economy.
It's government of, by and for the control freaks in government.
Hopefully, the Supreme Court will rid us of 75 years of bad precedents when it hands down its ruling this Thursday.
Tags: Wickard v. Filburn , Commerce Clause , Judicial Activism , Roe v. Wade , SCOTUS , Media Bias , Progressives , Precedent , Constitution , Ninth Amendment , Tenth Amendment , Bill of Rights
Posted Monday, June 25, 2012 3:57 PM
Comment 1 by eric z at 25-Jun-12 04:41 PM
No cause to criticize. None whatsoever. Corporations really are humans, Clarence Thomas really is a Supreme Court Justice. All's fine.
Response 1.1 by Gary Gross at 25-Jun-12 07:23 PM
Why should a group of people not have the right to speak collectively? Isn't that what unions do? I don't hear you complaining that unions have too many First Amendment rights. Why is that, Eric?
