This letter was sent to Congressman Bill Young, Senators Lemieux and Bill Nelson, and President Barack Obama:
This letter is intended to be read to all members of Congress and the Senate; please feel free to distribute it to all of your colleagues as you see fit.
You know, Washington, DC is an insane town. It is probably the only place on earth, at the only time in history, where enough power to heal the whole world or destroy it has been wielded by human beings. Imperfect, greedy, conniving, power-hungry, ambitious, talented, rich, spiritually all over the spectrum from depraved to decent, God-made, Satan-seduced political creatures who represent both the best and the worst of the very nation that represents, in turn, the best and the worst of mankind.
It is not without good, good reason that God saw to it there be a Constitution instituted to govern this people... this cantankerous, beautiful, powerful, morally decayed but still sometimes faithful tribe of Forgetters that first came to the fore after the twin sons of Joseph sired the most numerous, the most powerful, and the most troublesome parts of the great nation once governed by the wisdom of the two best kings that ever ruled, and fallen into disgrace because the second of those two kings lost his way at the end.
Now it has become apparent that like Solomon, ruler of a justly founded world empire ages ago, the custodians of today's even more justly founded superpower -- more justly founded because it derives its power from the consent of the governed by way of the written word of law, rather than through autocratic whim -- are about to sabotage the very contract by which this nation was founded to lose this nation's birthright for pottage in the manner of Esau.
I bear witness to you who read this that if this republic's leaders so derange themselves from its founding principles, embodied in its foundational written words, that states are played against one another for advantage and the legislative process is short-circuited with bills being declared passed without completed votes, then we will have destroyed the Union of these states as surely as Solomon destroyed the unity of the Kingdom of Israel and Judah at the end by his addiction to strange gods.
Be not addicted to foreign gods, God declared over 3,400 years ago. Do not be like the nations who desire a king over them and who worship idols. I tell you the truth -- if this Congress and this President chase the strange gods of socialism and populist autocracy, and abandon the Constitution that created the greatest nation on earth for the sake of health care or any other cause, you will destroy this nation and you will grieve over what you have destroyed for eternity.
Showing posts with label congress. Show all posts
Showing posts with label congress. Show all posts
Friday, March 19, 2010
Wednesday, December 16, 2009
Climate Change and the EPA Power Grab
Although the House of Representatives has no power to ratify a potential climate change treaty signed by the President, it does have exclusive power to initiate revenue bills, and members of Congress will be charged with the duty to raise serious questions about the high costs of climate change "Cap'n Trade" legislation and treaties, as those costs will be borne by American taxpayers who elect the lawmakers of this Republic.
It is also the responsibility of both houses of Congress to define the limits of federal regulatory agencies, notably the Environmental Protection Agency, an unelected federal agency which has been preparing a power grab over the carbon dioxide issue for years, and has now declared CO2 to be a substance harmful to man. The EPA acted in spite of abundant scientific evidence that carbon dioxide is an indispensable nutrient for plants, which use it to make sugars naturally. CO2 also has a well-known "fertilizer effect" that is responsible for much of the agricultural success of the 20th and 21st centuries, which has staved off the starvation of billions of people in a burgeoning world.
It is also the responsibility of both houses of Congress to define the limits of federal regulatory agencies, notably the Environmental Protection Agency, an unelected federal agency which has been preparing a power grab over the carbon dioxide issue for years, and has now declared CO2 to be a substance harmful to man. The EPA acted in spite of abundant scientific evidence that carbon dioxide is an indispensable nutrient for plants, which use it to make sugars naturally. CO2 also has a well-known "fertilizer effect" that is responsible for much of the agricultural success of the 20th and 21st centuries, which has staved off the starvation of billions of people in a burgeoning world.
Since it is the intention of the EPA to reduce carbon dioxide emissions to the extent of significantly impacting the ratio of CO2 in the atmosphere, I submit that it is the EPA and like-minded simian bureaucrats that have become harmful to human life, and it should be proposed in Congress that this agency's funds and regulatory scope be sharply curtailed before its anti-life policies result in the mass starvation of both humans and animals in our ecosystem.
Tuesday, July 7, 2009
The so-called "coup" in Honduras... ISN'T!
For over a week now the news media in the United States has been portraying the interim presidency of Roberto Micheletti, appointed by the Congress of Honduras to replace impeached and ousted President Manuel "Mel" Zelaya, as the leadership of a "coup." This is ever since the Honduran armed forces, acting on a warrant issued by the Supreme Court, and supported by Congress, arrested Mel Zelaya and sent him into exile on a Venezuelan airplane.
At this point you should be asking yourself, since when does a coup take place in the process of serving a warrant issued and authorized by a court of law, with the backing of the legislature? Have you ever heard of a coup d'etat that was authorized by a court order? And, why did Mel leave on a Venezuelan plane? Why not an American plane, or a Mexican plane, or a Salvadorean plane? I had to dig a little deeper to discover the truth about this, something the US news media is increasingly loathe to do when it conflicts with their leftist interests.
First I found this leftist writer, a member of the Washington Post group, named Alvaro Vargas Llosa, writing that Zelaya is to blame for this coup against him! Very interesting to see a leftist writer say that about this situation since Zelaya is a leftist himself, in fact, is a disciple of Hugo Chavez and tried to align Honduras completely within the orbit of Chavez's regime in Venezuela. Llosa writes,
"A member of the rancid oligarchy he now decries, Zelaya took office in 2006 as the leader of one of the two center-right parties that have dominated Honduran politics for decades. His general platform, his support for the Central American Free Trade Agreement with the United States and his alliances with business organizations gave no inkling of the fact that halfway into his term he would become a political cross-dresser.
"Suddenly, in 2007, he declared himself a socialist and began to establish close ties with Venezuela. In December of that year, he incorporated Honduras into Petrocaribe, a mechanism set up by Hugo Chávez for lavishing oil subsidies on Latin American and Caribbean countries in exchange for political subservience. Then his government joined the Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America and the Caribbean (ALBA), Venezuela's answer to the proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas, ostensibly a commercial alliance but in practice a political conspiracy that seeks to expand populist dictatorship to the rest of Latin America."
Up until this point, other than completely betraying his political party's platform, Zelaya had not broken any laws to my knowledge. That was also to change, as Llosa continues,
"Last year, following the script originally laid out by Chávez in Venezuela and adopted by Evo Morales in Bolivia and Rafael Correa in Ecuador, Zelaya announced that he would hold a referendum to set up a constituent assembly that would change the constitution that barred him from reelection. In the next few months, every legal body in Honduras -- the electoral tribunal, the Supreme Court, the attorney general, the human rights ombudsman -- declared the referendum unconstitutional. According to the Honduran constitution (articles 5, 373 and 374), presidential term limits cannot be changed under any circumstance; only Congress can modify the constitution; and political institutions are not subject to referendums. Honduras's Congress, Zelaya's own Liberal Party and a majority of Hondurans (in various polls) expressed their horror at the prospect of having Zelaya perpetuate himself and bring Honduras into the Chávez fold. In defiance of court orders, Zelaya persisted. Surrounded by a friendly mob, he broke into the military installations where the ballots were kept and ordered them distributed. The courts declared that Zelaya had placed himself outside the law, and Congress began an impeachment procedure." -- http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/01/AR2009070103210.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
I'll let Oliver North pick up the thread here, after all it's only fair for these informational sources to be politically balanced. He writes,
"Late last year, as the Honduran economy tanked and unemployment grew to nearly 28 percent, Zelaya forced Elvin Santos, the country's elected vice president, to resign and began holding conversations with Chavez and Ortega on how to hold on to power. In lengthy Chavez-like populist speeches, he denounced the U.S. and wealthy landowners and linked himself with leftists in the Honduran labor movement. On March 23, he issued an executive decree directing a national referendum on a Venezuela-style constituent assembly to rewrite the country's constitution in time for presidential and legislative elections in November. The Obama-Clinton State Department was mute about all of this.
"Unfortunately for Zelaya's aspirations, the Honduran Constitution requires that amendments be passed by a two-thirds vote of the country's unicameral Congress during two consecutive sessions. By late May, the Honduran Congress, the Honduran Supreme Court, the commissioner for human rights, and the Honduran electoral tribunal all had overwhelmingly declared the referendum unconstitutional. Zelaya ignored the people's representatives, had ballots printed in Venezuela, and announced that the vote would take place June 28. Again, the O-Team was silent.
"In keeping with the rule of law, Honduran Attorney General Luis Alberto Rubi took the case to court. The Honduran Supreme Court ruled the referendum to be illegal and ordered the ballots to be confiscated. Late on June 23, Zelaya countermanded the court order and directed the army to distribute the ballots. Gen. Romeo Vasquez, the chief of staff of the Honduran military, sought legal opinions and decided not to distribute them. The following day, Zelaya accepted the resignation of the minister of defense, Edmundo Orellana, and fired Vasquez.
"The Honduran Supreme Court unanimously ruled the Vasquez firing illegal and reinstated him June 25. That prompted Zelaya and a group of supporters to seize the ballots and issue another executive decree, which directed government officials to set up 15,000 polling stations at schools and community buildings across the country. In response to a request from Attorney General Rubi, the Honduran Congress -- controlled by Zelaya's own Liberal Party -- opened an investigation into the president's mental stability and fitness to govern. Zelaya replied with a two-hour broadcast harangue, in which he claimed: 'Congress cannot investigate me, much less remove me or stage a technical coup against me, because I am honest. I'm a free president, and nobody scares me.'" -- http://townhall.com/columnists/OliverNorth/2009/07/04/wrong_again
Up to this point, you gotta ask yourself, what would the United States Congress... one that isn't bamboozled by a populist and numbed to sleep by infotainment about the death of a famous singer... have done about a man engaged in such naked grabs for power? I can tell you what they did to Presidents Andrew Johnson and Richard Nixon, and neither one of those Presidents ever went a tenth as far over the wall as Zelaya did in Honduras. You would think the ouster of such a tyrant in embryo, such a power hungry man doing his best imitation of an early Hitler or an early (fictional) Palpatine, would be welcomed by, at least, the Western world of constitutional democratic republics, limited monarchies, and the like. Even if some of those governments inclined toward liberalism, you would think that a constitutionally governed free nation like Honduras would be allowed to take care of its own internal wannabe Saddam Hussein without a chorus of objections from the entire world, after having seen recently what a Saddam Hussein did to the people in his own country.
Nothing could be further from the truth. One of the biggest culprits being the news media, in the worst hoax involving a Latin American government since the Hearst-led yellow journalism that started the Spanish-American War of 1898, headlines in every American newspaper have been blaring "COUP IN HONDURAS" with details in the articles emphasizing sympathetically how Zelaya was pulled out of his house in a gun battle and ushered onto a plane in his pajamas and told not to come back. Subsequent coverage has emphasized violent treatment of riotous protesters at the airport awaiting Zelaya's return. But not a whole lot gets reported about the very long, two year train of growing abuses of power that sickened every other branch of the Honduran government and most of the people to the point where the country's Supreme Court finally launched a legal proceeding to get rid of the scoundrel. I'm sure the military was all too happy to lead the assault, since Zelaya had also abused his authority trying to rearrange its hierarchy, too. But none of that seems to be reaching the halls of power in the rest of the world.
From the news I've been able to hear, the United Nations General Assembly, the European Union, the Organization of American States, and the United States have all condemned the impeachment and removal of Manuel Zelaya, and yes, they all call it a "coup" despite the non-factual, banal, and ridiculous application of the term. Honduras for its part has withdrawn from the OAS for the following reasons:
"'Insulza did not come here to negotiate; he came here to impose,' José Danilo Izaguirre, the Supreme Court spokesman stated.
"Honduras withdrew its membership from the OAS, after a visit by Insulza, the General Secretary, of the OAS, for proposing 'undignified and unilateral resolutions' in their case, demanding that Honduras give up its fight for independence by reinstating ex-President Manuel Zelaya.
"Honduran officials agreed it would be best to have 6 months of sanctions while elections are held, than to lose their independence." -- hondurasnews.com
So where does it go from here? At this point, the reactions in the West and in the United States government in particular have only degraded continuously as such luminaries as Secy. of State Hillary Clinton continue to shame themselves parroting the Chavista-OAS party line on Honduras:
"U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated taht the United States will support an international mediation effort to restore democratic order in Honduras.
"Hillary Clinton says she told President Jose Manuel Zelaya the U.S. supports a restoration of democratic order.
"Zelaya will participate in the talks, which Costa Rican President Oscar Arias will mediate.
"The provisional president of Honduras, Roberto Micheletti, also has signaled his willingness to participate, Clinton said.
"'We call upon all parties to refrain from acts of violence and to seek a peaceful, constitutional and lasting solution to serious divisions in Honduras through dialogue,' Clinton said. “We hope this process can begin as soon as possible."
I'm sorry Mrs. Clinton, but Honduras already HAD a constitutional solution to this "serious division" and it was the IMPEACHMENT AND REMOVAL OF MANUEL ZELAYA FROM POWER. NO other solution by any morally consistent, legal standard should apply!!
At this point you should be asking yourself, since when does a coup take place in the process of serving a warrant issued and authorized by a court of law, with the backing of the legislature? Have you ever heard of a coup d'etat that was authorized by a court order? And, why did Mel leave on a Venezuelan plane? Why not an American plane, or a Mexican plane, or a Salvadorean plane? I had to dig a little deeper to discover the truth about this, something the US news media is increasingly loathe to do when it conflicts with their leftist interests.
First I found this leftist writer, a member of the Washington Post group, named Alvaro Vargas Llosa, writing that Zelaya is to blame for this coup against him! Very interesting to see a leftist writer say that about this situation since Zelaya is a leftist himself, in fact, is a disciple of Hugo Chavez and tried to align Honduras completely within the orbit of Chavez's regime in Venezuela. Llosa writes,
"A member of the rancid oligarchy he now decries, Zelaya took office in 2006 as the leader of one of the two center-right parties that have dominated Honduran politics for decades. His general platform, his support for the Central American Free Trade Agreement with the United States and his alliances with business organizations gave no inkling of the fact that halfway into his term he would become a political cross-dresser.
"Suddenly, in 2007, he declared himself a socialist and began to establish close ties with Venezuela. In December of that year, he incorporated Honduras into Petrocaribe, a mechanism set up by Hugo Chávez for lavishing oil subsidies on Latin American and Caribbean countries in exchange for political subservience. Then his government joined the Bolivarian Alternative for Latin America and the Caribbean (ALBA), Venezuela's answer to the proposed Free Trade Area of the Americas, ostensibly a commercial alliance but in practice a political conspiracy that seeks to expand populist dictatorship to the rest of Latin America."
Up until this point, other than completely betraying his political party's platform, Zelaya had not broken any laws to my knowledge. That was also to change, as Llosa continues,
"Last year, following the script originally laid out by Chávez in Venezuela and adopted by Evo Morales in Bolivia and Rafael Correa in Ecuador, Zelaya announced that he would hold a referendum to set up a constituent assembly that would change the constitution that barred him from reelection. In the next few months, every legal body in Honduras -- the electoral tribunal, the Supreme Court, the attorney general, the human rights ombudsman -- declared the referendum unconstitutional. According to the Honduran constitution (articles 5, 373 and 374), presidential term limits cannot be changed under any circumstance; only Congress can modify the constitution; and political institutions are not subject to referendums. Honduras's Congress, Zelaya's own Liberal Party and a majority of Hondurans (in various polls) expressed their horror at the prospect of having Zelaya perpetuate himself and bring Honduras into the Chávez fold. In defiance of court orders, Zelaya persisted. Surrounded by a friendly mob, he broke into the military installations where the ballots were kept and ordered them distributed. The courts declared that Zelaya had placed himself outside the law, and Congress began an impeachment procedure." -- http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/07/01/AR2009070103210.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
I'll let Oliver North pick up the thread here, after all it's only fair for these informational sources to be politically balanced. He writes,
"Late last year, as the Honduran economy tanked and unemployment grew to nearly 28 percent, Zelaya forced Elvin Santos, the country's elected vice president, to resign and began holding conversations with Chavez and Ortega on how to hold on to power. In lengthy Chavez-like populist speeches, he denounced the U.S. and wealthy landowners and linked himself with leftists in the Honduran labor movement. On March 23, he issued an executive decree directing a national referendum on a Venezuela-style constituent assembly to rewrite the country's constitution in time for presidential and legislative elections in November. The Obama-Clinton State Department was mute about all of this.
"Unfortunately for Zelaya's aspirations, the Honduran Constitution requires that amendments be passed by a two-thirds vote of the country's unicameral Congress during two consecutive sessions. By late May, the Honduran Congress, the Honduran Supreme Court, the commissioner for human rights, and the Honduran electoral tribunal all had overwhelmingly declared the referendum unconstitutional. Zelaya ignored the people's representatives, had ballots printed in Venezuela, and announced that the vote would take place June 28. Again, the O-Team was silent.
"In keeping with the rule of law, Honduran Attorney General Luis Alberto Rubi took the case to court. The Honduran Supreme Court ruled the referendum to be illegal and ordered the ballots to be confiscated. Late on June 23, Zelaya countermanded the court order and directed the army to distribute the ballots. Gen. Romeo Vasquez, the chief of staff of the Honduran military, sought legal opinions and decided not to distribute them. The following day, Zelaya accepted the resignation of the minister of defense, Edmundo Orellana, and fired Vasquez.
"The Honduran Supreme Court unanimously ruled the Vasquez firing illegal and reinstated him June 25. That prompted Zelaya and a group of supporters to seize the ballots and issue another executive decree, which directed government officials to set up 15,000 polling stations at schools and community buildings across the country. In response to a request from Attorney General Rubi, the Honduran Congress -- controlled by Zelaya's own Liberal Party -- opened an investigation into the president's mental stability and fitness to govern. Zelaya replied with a two-hour broadcast harangue, in which he claimed: 'Congress cannot investigate me, much less remove me or stage a technical coup against me, because I am honest. I'm a free president, and nobody scares me.'" -- http://townhall.com/columnists/OliverNorth/2009/07/04/wrong_again
Up to this point, you gotta ask yourself, what would the United States Congress... one that isn't bamboozled by a populist and numbed to sleep by infotainment about the death of a famous singer... have done about a man engaged in such naked grabs for power? I can tell you what they did to Presidents Andrew Johnson and Richard Nixon, and neither one of those Presidents ever went a tenth as far over the wall as Zelaya did in Honduras. You would think the ouster of such a tyrant in embryo, such a power hungry man doing his best imitation of an early Hitler or an early (fictional) Palpatine, would be welcomed by, at least, the Western world of constitutional democratic republics, limited monarchies, and the like. Even if some of those governments inclined toward liberalism, you would think that a constitutionally governed free nation like Honduras would be allowed to take care of its own internal wannabe Saddam Hussein without a chorus of objections from the entire world, after having seen recently what a Saddam Hussein did to the people in his own country.
Nothing could be further from the truth. One of the biggest culprits being the news media, in the worst hoax involving a Latin American government since the Hearst-led yellow journalism that started the Spanish-American War of 1898, headlines in every American newspaper have been blaring "COUP IN HONDURAS" with details in the articles emphasizing sympathetically how Zelaya was pulled out of his house in a gun battle and ushered onto a plane in his pajamas and told not to come back. Subsequent coverage has emphasized violent treatment of riotous protesters at the airport awaiting Zelaya's return. But not a whole lot gets reported about the very long, two year train of growing abuses of power that sickened every other branch of the Honduran government and most of the people to the point where the country's Supreme Court finally launched a legal proceeding to get rid of the scoundrel. I'm sure the military was all too happy to lead the assault, since Zelaya had also abused his authority trying to rearrange its hierarchy, too. But none of that seems to be reaching the halls of power in the rest of the world.
From the news I've been able to hear, the United Nations General Assembly, the European Union, the Organization of American States, and the United States have all condemned the impeachment and removal of Manuel Zelaya, and yes, they all call it a "coup" despite the non-factual, banal, and ridiculous application of the term. Honduras for its part has withdrawn from the OAS for the following reasons:
"'Insulza did not come here to negotiate; he came here to impose,' José Danilo Izaguirre, the Supreme Court spokesman stated.
"Honduras withdrew its membership from the OAS, after a visit by Insulza, the General Secretary, of the OAS, for proposing 'undignified and unilateral resolutions' in their case, demanding that Honduras give up its fight for independence by reinstating ex-President Manuel Zelaya.
"Honduran officials agreed it would be best to have 6 months of sanctions while elections are held, than to lose their independence." -- hondurasnews.com
So where does it go from here? At this point, the reactions in the West and in the United States government in particular have only degraded continuously as such luminaries as Secy. of State Hillary Clinton continue to shame themselves parroting the Chavista-OAS party line on Honduras:
"U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton stated taht the United States will support an international mediation effort to restore democratic order in Honduras.
"Hillary Clinton says she told President Jose Manuel Zelaya the U.S. supports a restoration of democratic order.
"Zelaya will participate in the talks, which Costa Rican President Oscar Arias will mediate.
"The provisional president of Honduras, Roberto Micheletti, also has signaled his willingness to participate, Clinton said.
"'We call upon all parties to refrain from acts of violence and to seek a peaceful, constitutional and lasting solution to serious divisions in Honduras through dialogue,' Clinton said. “We hope this process can begin as soon as possible."
I'm sorry Mrs. Clinton, but Honduras already HAD a constitutional solution to this "serious division" and it was the IMPEACHMENT AND REMOVAL OF MANUEL ZELAYA FROM POWER. NO other solution by any morally consistent, legal standard should apply!!
Sunday, November 4, 2007
A Simpler Solution to the Energy Crunch
First, Double Nickels.
We need to institute what was done by Congress under President Nixon: impose a national speed limit that maximizes highway mileage, which is 55 miles per hour. This measure, when it was adopted the first time, not only cut consumption of gasoline and diesel fuel by several percentage points, adding 2 to 3 miles per gallon to the nation's average highway fuel economy, but also saved thousands of lives per year by reducing highway traffic accidents, and the best part of it was that no one hadto retool car manufacturing, revamp gasoline formulations, spend money on alternative energy schemes, some of which remain dubious in cost recovery, or impose punitive taxation to limit consumption at the pump to achieve the same benefits. Even a 1 or 2 percent reduction of gasoline consumption would add many thousands of barrels of fuel a day, in effect, to the nation's fuel supply.
Second, Sixty-Eight/Seventy-Five.
We need to pass a law requiring business establishments and government offices nationwide to set their heating thermostats no higher than 68 degrees Fahrenheit during colder weather, and air conditioning no lower than 75 degrees for summer weather. This should include EVERY business, no exceptions. In addition to this, advertising should be funded strongly encouraging private homeowners and renters to conserve energy by setting their thermostats to the same limits, 68 degrees maximum for heat, 75 degrees minimum for air conditioning. Besides conserving energy this would also encourage healthier living, because heat that is set too high fosters the multiplication of viruses and bacteria indoors, and A/C set too low tends to encourage the spread of mold and mildew, as well as impacting the immune system through excessive exposure to chill in the warm season. These factors are probably responsible for literally millions of respiratory illnesses every year that take enormous amounts of man-hours out of the economy and seriously impact our already beleaguered health care system.Let's do this now, since they would be easy to implement (compared to other measures) and with oil prices nearing $100 a barrel, both measures would be very timely and would put downward pressure on the price spiral that has been taking place.
We need to institute what was done by Congress under President Nixon: impose a national speed limit that maximizes highway mileage, which is 55 miles per hour. This measure, when it was adopted the first time, not only cut consumption of gasoline and diesel fuel by several percentage points, adding 2 to 3 miles per gallon to the nation's average highway fuel economy, but also saved thousands of lives per year by reducing highway traffic accidents, and the best part of it was that no one hadto retool car manufacturing, revamp gasoline formulations, spend money on alternative energy schemes, some of which remain dubious in cost recovery, or impose punitive taxation to limit consumption at the pump to achieve the same benefits. Even a 1 or 2 percent reduction of gasoline consumption would add many thousands of barrels of fuel a day, in effect, to the nation's fuel supply.
Second, Sixty-Eight/Seventy-Five.
We need to pass a law requiring business establishments and government offices nationwide to set their heating thermostats no higher than 68 degrees Fahrenheit during colder weather, and air conditioning no lower than 75 degrees for summer weather. This should include EVERY business, no exceptions. In addition to this, advertising should be funded strongly encouraging private homeowners and renters to conserve energy by setting their thermostats to the same limits, 68 degrees maximum for heat, 75 degrees minimum for air conditioning. Besides conserving energy this would also encourage healthier living, because heat that is set too high fosters the multiplication of viruses and bacteria indoors, and A/C set too low tends to encourage the spread of mold and mildew, as well as impacting the immune system through excessive exposure to chill in the warm season. These factors are probably responsible for literally millions of respiratory illnesses every year that take enormous amounts of man-hours out of the economy and seriously impact our already beleaguered health care system.Let's do this now, since they would be easy to implement (compared to other measures) and with oil prices nearing $100 a barrel, both measures would be very timely and would put downward pressure on the price spiral that has been taking place.
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
Aliens don't get to have America's rights? And we fight for what, exactly...?
Senator Mel Martinez (R, Florida) wrote to me, in part:
"The strength of America depends on the preservation of our values. Terrorists who are detained in this war, and subsequently prosecuted, should be afforded an appropriate legal process; however, these detainees simply cannot and should not be afforded the same rights and process that our citizens enjoy in our courts."
I asked him in reply, "So you're saying aliens should not have the same rights as Americans? OK. What exactly are we fighting for in the Middle East then?"
"The strength of America depends on the preservation of our values. Terrorists who are detained in this war, and subsequently prosecuted, should be afforded an appropriate legal process; however, these detainees simply cannot and should not be afforded the same rights and process that our citizens enjoy in our courts."
I asked him in reply, "So you're saying aliens should not have the same rights as Americans? OK. What exactly are we fighting for in the Middle East then?"
Saturday, September 29, 2007
I sent the following email to Senator Mel Martinez (R, FL) and appended a copy to Senator Bill Nelson (D, FL) after reading that a cloture bill failed to revoke the suspension of habeas corpus for detainees. This is the text of the email:
I don't know by what rationale the GOP justifies the suspension of habeas corpus for detainees, maybe you could explain that to me? Last I checked the US Constitution, habeas corpus is not to be suspended except in cases of insurrection or invasion. I don't see an insurrection or an invasion. Just as a comparison, the Lincoln suspension of habeas corpus took place in the Civil War which was an insurrection. It's the only other time I'm aware of that this basic right in the body of the Constitution itself was ever suspended. I'm looking around and I don't see Confederate troops flooding the streets in gray or shelling Tampa.
If I or anyone I know is ever affected by this, I can promise a class action civil rights lawsuit for the highest sum of money I can convince a lawyer to sue for, and I will name everyone who votes to continue habeas corpus suspension, next time it comes up, as a respondent to that civil rights lawsuit. Just so we're all clear on what I think about this issue.
I don't know by what rationale the GOP justifies the suspension of habeas corpus for detainees, maybe you could explain that to me? Last I checked the US Constitution, habeas corpus is not to be suspended except in cases of insurrection or invasion. I don't see an insurrection or an invasion. Just as a comparison, the Lincoln suspension of habeas corpus took place in the Civil War which was an insurrection. It's the only other time I'm aware of that this basic right in the body of the Constitution itself was ever suspended. I'm looking around and I don't see Confederate troops flooding the streets in gray or shelling Tampa.
If I or anyone I know is ever affected by this, I can promise a class action civil rights lawsuit for the highest sum of money I can convince a lawyer to sue for, and I will name everyone who votes to continue habeas corpus suspension, next time it comes up, as a respondent to that civil rights lawsuit. Just so we're all clear on what I think about this issue.
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