Monthly Archives: October 2009

The U.S. Constitution Does “NOT” Authorize Congress To Force Americans To Buy Health Insurance

Action Item, Contact Your State Senators & Representatives, Contact Your US Senators & Congresswoman, Corruption, Educational Material, Honoring Their Sacrifice, US Congress Legislation October 26, 2009 Comments: 2

Being under the weather and feeling the pressure of supplying new material here at ConstitutionallySpeaking along with the pressure I am now feeling of getting everything on my Christmas list completed as I am also a quilter & seamstress, it helps when an article such as this comes along. Thanks to Publius Huldah of Canada Free Press  for all your hard work and due diligence in compiling this for us.

I now CHALLENGE ALL my readers to copy and send this to ALL your US Senators & Reps in DC as well as your state Senators & Reps.

Constitution‘General Welfare’ Clause: Defending The Constitution From It’s Domestic Enemies.

By Publius Huldah  Friday, October 23, 2009

CNSNews.com recently posted an article, “Hoyer Says Constitution’s ‘General Welfare’ Clause Empowers Congress to Order Americans to Buy Health Insurance”.  In the article, Steny Hoyer(Democrat House Majority Leader) said Congress has “broad authority” to force Americans to purchase health insurance, so long as it was trying to promote “the general welfare”.

Oh my!  Does Steny Hoyer not know that his view was thoroughly examined and soundly rejected by our Founders?

The Truth is that Congress is NOT authorized to pass laws just because a majority in Congress say the laws promote the “general welfare”!  As shown below, James Madison, Father of The Constitution, and Alexander Hamilton, author of most of The Federalist Papers, expressly said The Constitution does not give a general grant of legislative authority to Congress! Rather, ours is a Constitution of enumerated powers  only. If a power isn’t specifically granted to Congress in The Constitution, Congress doesn’t have the power. It really is that easy – and our beloved Madison and Hamilton prove it.

1. Let us look at the so-called “general welfare” clause:  Article I, Sec.8, clause 1, U.S. Constitution, says:

The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States…

Immediately thereafter, follows an enumeration of some 15 specific powers which are delegated to Congress. If you will spend 20 minutes carefully reading through the entire Constitution and highlighting the powers delegated to Congress, you will find (depending upon how you count) that only some 21 specific powers were delegated to Congress. This is what is meant when it is said that ours is a Constitution of enumerated powers!

2. But Steny Hoyer and his gang of statists claim that the “general welfare” clause is a blank check which gives them power to pass any law they want which they say promotes the “general welfare”. Further, they claim the power to FORCE their view of such on us.

3. Let us analyze this. Since words change meaning throughout time [200 years ago, “nice” meant “precise”], we must learn what the word, “welfare”, meant when the Constitution was ratified. “Welfare”, as used in Art. 1, Sec. 8, clause 1, meant:

Exemption from any unusual evil or calamity; the enjoyment of peace and prosperity, or the ordinary blessings of society and civil govern-ment (Webster’s American Dictionary of the English Language, 1828).

But The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language (1969), gave a new meaning: “Public relief—on welfare.  Dependent on public relief”. Do you see how our Constitution is perverted when 20th century meanings are substituted for original meanings?  Or when the words of The Constitution are treated as if they have no meaning at all except that which the statists assign to them?

4. Both Madison and Hamilton squarely addressed and expressly rejected the notion that the “general welfare” clause constitutes a general grant of power to Congress. In Federalist No. 41  (last 4 paras), Madison denounced as an “absurd” “misconstruction” the notion that

…the power “to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts, and excises, to pay the debts, and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States,” amounts to an unlimited commission to exercise every power which may be alleged to be necessary for the common defense or general welfare….

In refuting this “misconstruction”, Madison pointed out that the first paragraph of Art. I, Sec. 8 employs “general terms” which are “immediately” followed by the “enumeration of particular powers” which “explain and qualify”, by a “recital of particulars”, the general terms. Madison also said:

…Nothing is more natural nor common than first to use a general phrase, and then to explain and qualify it by a recital of particulars. But the idea of an enumeration of particulars which neither explain nor qualify the general meaning, and can have no other effect than to confound and mislead, is an absurdity…

Madison was emphatic: He said it was “error” to focus on the “general expressions” and disregard “the specifications which ascertain and limit their import”; and to argue that the general expression provides “an unlimited power” to provide for “the common defense and general welfare”, is “an absurdity”.

In Federalist No. 83  (7th para), Hamilton said:

…The plan of the [constitutional] convention declares that the power of Congress…shall extend to certain enumerated cases. This specification of particulars evidently excludes all pretension to a general legislative authority, because an affirmative grant of special powers would be absurd, as well as useless, if a general authority was intended… [italics added]

5. And what else did Madison and Hamilton say about the “enumerated” powers of the federal government?  In Federalist No. 45  (9th para), Madison said:

The powers delegated by the proposed Constitution to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite.  The former will be exercised principally on external objects, as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce; with which last the power of taxation will, for the most part, be connected.  The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people…[emphasis added]

Madison said it again in Federalist No. 39  (3rd para from end):

…the proposed government cannot be deemed a national one; since its jurisdiction extends to certain enumerated objects only, and leaves to the several States a residuary and inviolable sovereignity over all other objects….” [emphasis added]

In Federalist No. 14  (8th para), Madison said:

… the general [federal] government is not to be charged with the whole power of making and administering laws. Its jurisdiction is limited to certain enumerated objects...[emphasis added]

In Federalist No. 27  (last para), Hamilton said:

…It merits particular attention in this place, that the laws of the Confederacy [the federal government], as to the ENUMERATED and LEGITIMATE objects of its jurisdiction, will become the SUPREME LAW of the land…Thus the legislatures, courts, and magistrates, of the respective members, will be incorporated into the operations of the national government AS FAR AS ITS JUST AND CONSTITUTIONAL AUTHORITY EXTENDS…[caps in original]

6. Now, let’s look at the 10th Amendment:

The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.

Now, we can understand the true meaning of the “general welfare” clause: OUR FOUNDERS UNDERSTOOD that the “general Welfare”, i.e., the enjoyment of peace and prosperity, and the enjoyment of the ordinary blessings of society and civil government, was possible only with a civil government which was strictly limited and restricted in what it was given power to do!

7. So!  How did we get to the point where the federal government claims the power to regulate every aspect of our lives, including forcing us to buy health insurance? Consider Prohibition:  During 1919, everyone understood that the Constitution did not give Congress authority to simply “pass a law” banning alcoholic beverages!  So the Constitution was amended to prohibit alcoholic beverages, and to authorize Congress to make laws to enforce the prohibition (18th Amdt.).

But with Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR), the federal government abandoned our Constitution:  FDR proposed “New Deal” schemes; Congress passed them. At first, the Supreme Court opined (generally 5 to 4) that “New Deal” programs were unconstitutional as outside the powers granted to Congress. But when FDR threatened to “pack the court” by adding judges who would do his bidding, one judge flipped to the liberal side, and the Court started approving New Deal programs (generally 5 to 4).

Since then, law schools don’t teach the Constitution. Instead, they teach Supreme Court opinions which purport to explain why Congress has the power to regulate anything it pleases. The law schools thus produced generations of constitutionally illiterate lawyers and judges who have been wrongly taught that the “general welfare” clause, along with the “interstate commerce” and the “necessary and proper” clauses, permit Congress to do whatever it wants!

Roger Pilon  of the Cato Institute nailed it in his recent post on Politico.com:

Is it unconstitutional for Congress to mandate that individuals buy health insurance or be taxed if they don’t? Absolutely—if we lived under the Constitution. But we don’t. Today we live under something called “constitutional law”—an accumulation of 220 years of Supreme Court opinions—and that “law” reflects the Constitution only occasionally.

Now you see how the statists justify the totalitarian dictatorship they are attempting to foist upon the American People.  The statists and the brainwashed products of our law schools go by U.S. Supreme Court opinions which reject Our Constitution!(But Publius Huldah goes by The Constitution as explained by The Federalist Papers).

8. But is the Supreme Court the ultimate authority on the meaning of our Constitution? NO!  Hamilton said the people are “the natural guardians of the Constitution”, and he called upon us to become “enlightened enough to distinguish between a legal exercise and an illegal usurpation of authority.” (Federalist No.16,  next to last para). Madison (or Hamilton) said that breaches of our Constitution can be corrected by “..the people themselves, who, as the grantors of the commission [The Constitution], can alone declare its true meaning, and enforce its observance” (Federalist No. 49,  3rd Para).

Folks! Your duty is clear:  Study The Declaration of Independence, The Constitution, and The Federalist Papers. Live up to the expectations of Hamilton and Madison; and throw off the chains which the usurpers are forging for you and Our Posterity.

My reply to Senator Johnson. I am still waiting for one from a similar letter sent a few weeks ago now that also pointed out the Federalist Papers, the Framers & early SCOTUS decisions.

Dear Senator Johnson,

I am still waiting for that reply to my previous constitutional questions sent to you regarding all the unconstitutional legislation that you and those on the left in Congress are trying to shove down our throats.

And while I do respect the office you serve, I can not and will not support your actions since getting re-elected and the following is why.

Please dear Sir, take some time to reflect on your position as a “PUBLIC SERVANT” to those whom you represent and the limitations of your office. You are treading on treacherous ground and ‘We the People’ are tired of you turning your back on us.

The “Congressional” Natural Born Citizen Part II: Shocked, Outraged or Ambivalent?

Corruption, Educational Material, Media Blackout, US Congress Legislation October 26, 2009 Comments: 8

What would your reaction be if you heard that Congress was set in 2007 to bestow ‘natural born’ citizenship on ALL anchor babies through their Immigration Reform legislation. (110th Congress) S. 1348

Shocked? Outraged? Ambivalent?

What if you heard that Congress was moving to change Immigration & Naturalization laws so the every child born overseas to 1 citizen parent & 1 foreign parent would forever be deemed a ‘natural born’ citizen. (101st Congress) H.R. 1380, (99th Congress) H.R. 2535,

Shocked? Outraged? Ambivalent?

What if Congress had a bill waiting to come out of committee in February of 2008 that would change the citizenship laws of all children born to US parents serving in the military abroad(off US & US Territory soil) so that those children would now become natural born citizen at birth, but instead of following through with it, Congress sets the bill aside and passes a public resolution that holds one former military personnel’s citizenship in higher regard than all the others that are currently serving as if this person had some supremacy over the others. S. 2678

Shocked, Outraged? Ambivalent?

What if there was evidence of a bill introduced to Congress in 2004 to specifically change the definition of ‘natural born citizen’ from what the Framers meant it to be at the time of the adoption of the Constitution. S. 2128

Shocked? Outraged? Ambivalent?

What would your reaction be if you heard that there have been numerous attempts to remove the words ‘natural born citizen’ from Article II of the constitution in regards to Presidential qualifications so that ALL anchor babies could someday become President, regardless if their parents are still here illegally? (93rd Congress)HJ Res 325, HJ Res 880, HJ Res 890, HJ Res 896, HJ Res 993, HJ Res 1051, (94th Congress) HJ Res 33, HJ Res 86 (95th Congress) HJ Res 38 (106th Congress) HJ Res 88 (108th Congress) HJ Res 59, HJ Res 67, HJ Res 104 (109th Congress) HJ Res 2,HJ Res 15, HJ Res 42 

Shocked? Outraged? Ambivalent?

And what if ALL these prior efforts were retroactive to ALL children born, that are alive today in the US and abroad.

Shocked? Outraged? Ambivalent?

Of all these permanently recorded Congressional proposals, the ones that give us more in-depth testimony/summary are H.R. 1380, H.J. Res. 88, S. 2128, S. 1348 & S. 2678.

H.R. 1380 was a bill to amend the Immigration & Nationality Act to grant US national & ‘natural born’ citizen status to certain persons born outside the United States. Alexander’s bill would have granted a child born with dual nationality ‘natural born’ citizenship status and it also addressed the issue of children born to US military personnel overseas. Summing up the bill, Alexander said: 

“My bill would also insert the term ‘natural born’ into section 301 of the Immigration & Nationality Act of 1952, thus clearing up any question as to whether a child born abroad as an American citizen qualifies under the Constitution to run for President when he or she grows up.” 

Kennedy’s aka ‘Fast Eddie’s’ bill, S. 1348, went a bit further and it was quite clever of him to slip those 2 little yet powerful words ‘natural born’ into the bill. Reading the summary was quite laughable. This is where Kennedy tries to claim that children(anchor babies) born to nonimmigrant illegal aliens are ‘natural born’, however he does not stop there, he goes on to call adopted children of nonimmigrant illegal aliens as natural born once the aliens acquired the new Z-visa that would have been created by the immigration reform act. 

In 2000, Rep. Barney, I can’t “Frank”ly understand why Ma. keeps reelecting him, introduced H.J. Res. 88, an amendment to the Constitution of the United States to make eligible for Office of the President a person who has been a citizen for twenty years. This is the 1st bill introduced where we have extensive testimony on the subject of ‘natural born citizen’ before the Subcommittee of the Constitution because Barney does [n]ot favor putting obstacles on the ability of the people to choose who they wish] to elect. 

Mr. Candy who is chairing the subcommittee opens by stating: 

“The natural-born citizen qualification continues to provide to the political system of the United States a certain level of protection against the influence of foreign nations. In addition to this safeguard, the requirement also secures the ability of the President to make decisions involving domestic and foreign policy that are in the best interests of the United States without an inherent emotional or familial attachment to another nation.” 

And Mr. Candy is quite right. The qualification was put in place specifically for national security & sovereignty reasons. It was put in place to protect the citizens of the newly formed Republic from ever becoming ‘subjects’ to foreign sovereigns or an all powerful central Monarchy. Mr. Candy has done his homework and thus is the reason I believe that this never made it out of committee. However, let’s review a bit more testimony. 

We shall start with the testimony from an immigrant, Balint Vazsonyi, of the Center for American Founding who immigrated in 1959. 

“The Constitution, which created a country unlike any other, also brought forth a Nation populated by people who are unlike any other. It is as if an umbrella had been erected over this country inviting all the people of the world to come here and become something else than they were in the moment of arrival…Indeed, Americans are different. I noticed this soon after I had arrived in this country 41 years ago. I daresay, I have spent a great deal of my life trying to understand, first of all, in what way Americans are different and why, but the fact remains that they are…So when the framers of the Constitution made this provision, perhaps they were already aware of the fact, as indeed perhaps instinctively or through inspiration they were aware of so many other things, that already then Americans were different because they did something nobody else had done before them…One of the best examples of that is precisely Congressman Frank’s resolution. It is unthinkable, ladies and gentlemen, that a legislator in another land would actually spend time proposing that some foreigner could become the first citizen of that land. So, Congressman Frank, you are as good an example as I have met to show that Americans pour their hearts out and want to share everything, even the Presidency…I would say respectfully that describing this provision of the Constitution, as I said, and I will say once again, one of the solitary miracles of human history, as victimizing immigrants or being unjust—to be able to run for President is not a right. It is very important not to confuse the system of government with rights. Where would such a right come from? It is a well-thought-out provision of our Constitution.” 

Continuing on about foreign influences & national security, Vazsonyi states: 

“I am here to tell you, after 41 years of making the most strenuous efforts of becoming American, not just legally but in every sense of the word, and having spent 40 of those 41 years living with a native-born American, that I still have not been able to even approach the temperament, the natural tolerance, the unfailing good will toward the world that Americans are famous for…Foreigners come here and have to learn it. It is a miracle that within one generation they can do so. I think it would be expecting something even more than the impossible that they can do it within the same lifetime, and that they can forget everything they had grown up with…The question of foreign influence has already been discussed. I would just like to add that having grown up in Hungary, I would find it very difficult to make decisions—not so much affecting Hungarians, but those toward whom Hungarians hold an animus. What if somebody of a certain birth would have to just express an opinion about immigration quotas from a country with which the native land had been at odds? This is just a tiny example. Of course, the matter of being Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces is much more important…To say that the world is a more peaceful place today is a very temporary condition. It can turn into something else tomorrow or the day after. The constitutional provisions are not there to serve this week or next week. They have served this country for over 200 years, and I hope and we all hope that they will continue to do so…So I would like to conclude with a general comment on constitutional amendments. I believe they are rarely necessary, hardly ever justified, and perhaps entirely untimely right now, when Americans seem to be considering even the very nature of this country, whether it is a Republic or a democracy. Therefore, with due respect to the proposal, I would like to cast a vote for rejecting it.” 

In the Vazsonyi’s written testimony turned over to the committee, Vazsonyi further address the importance of the ‘natural born’ qualification in regards to foreign influences and national security: 

“It is well known that the Founding Fathers were mindful in the extreme of foreign influences, and the dangers therefrom to the Republic. While experience has shown that a native-born Chief Executive is not necessarily immune to foreign influence, the odds are certainly more favorable if the president is an American plain and simple, who has never been, and is not at the time of taking office, anything else…Article II of the U.S. Constitution requires the President to ”take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed.” Mr. Chairman, it is an incontrovertible fact that the inhabitants of most countries are not only unfamiliar with what we call the Rule of Law, but find the concept virtually incomprehensible. Again, it is a miracle that so many immigrants are able to operate within the American system of laws, contracts, and agreements on a handshake…Equally of concern is the new appetite for, and silent acceptance of, dual citizenship. It would be naive at best to believe that neither has any bearing on what used to be unconditional loyalty and commitment to America…Those who favor the proposed amendment will no doubt point to exceptional persons of their acquaintance who, in their view, would fulfill any and all expectations with regard to the office of president, though being of foreign birth. Yet the laws of this country never have been written with the exceptions in mind. Among other things, the Framers of the Constitution distinguished themselves by writing few laws, and employing language at once broad and concise, so as to be applicable to all circumstances at all times.” 

Another to testify and submit written testimony was Forrest McDonald, historian and professor of history at the U of Alabama. McDonald starts out by agreeing with Chairman Candy then goes on to cite supreme Court Justice Joseph Story in his testimony: 

“Debates about electing the President raged until early September, less than 2 weeks before the Convention adjourned. Then Pierce Butler, an Irish-born delegate, came up with a cumbersome plan that overcame the objections to all earlier proposals. This was the electoral college system. The system was so diffuse that it would be virtually impossible, given the primitive communications then available, for foreign agents to corrupt it. But for good measure Butler’s proposal included the restrictive language, ”no person except a natural-born citizen…To appreciate the significance of the Constitution’s restriction of presidential eligibility to natural born citizens, it is useful to place the requirement in historical perspective. Americans of the founding generation were extremely distrustful of executive authority because experience with colonial governors had convinced them that executive power was inherently inimical to liberty, because they felt betrayed by George III, and because they considered a strong executive to be incompatible with the republicanism they embraced when they declared their independence in 1776. As a consequence, their revolutionary state constitutions provided minimal executive branches, and the first national constitution, the Articles of Confederation, established no executive arm…By the time the Constitutional Convention met in Philadelphia in 1787, difficulties undergone during and after the war for independence had convinced most public spirited men that an energetic national executive was necessary, but they approached the problem cautiously, and at least a third of the delegates to the Convention favored a plural executive in the interest of safety. The others endorsed a single executive, not least because all understood that George Washington, whom everybody trusted, would be the first occupant of the office…But Washington could not serve forever, and the delegates groped almost desperately to devise a suitable way of choosing his successors. The search took up more of the debates than any other subject the Convention faced. Most delegates favored having Congress elect the president, but that would make the executive department dependent upon the legislative unless the president were ineligible for reelection, but ineligibility would necessitate a dangerously long term—six or seven years being the common suggestion. The greatest fear was of corrupt influences upon the election, particularly from abroad…That language was adopted without a single dissenting voice, nor did anyone speak in its support. Its meaning and rationale went without saying. As Joseph Storey later explained in his famous commentaries, the phraseology ”cuts off all chances for ambitious foreigners who might otherwise be intriguing for the office and interposes a barrier against . . . corrupt interferences of foreign governments…Now, the question before the subcommittee is not the original purpose of the clause, but whether it has outlived its usefulness. The circumstances that prevailed at the time of the founding have changed. Yet it seems to me on balance that conditions in the foreseeable future warrant a continuation of the caution shown by the framers…Take the matter of the possible corruption in the electoral process. The system is still structurally diffuse, but in practice it might as well be centralized, given modern techniques of communication and the instant portability of money, the most potent corrupting influence. Presidential candidates spend scores of millions of dollars. Just consider the prospective influence of a few billion dollars, a sum well within the means of a number of countries, any one of which, while unwilling to risk such a sum on a natural-born American, might be eager to support a candidate who had been born and raised in their country…The original Constitution contemplated a relatively weak Presidency, but the office has become the most powerful in the world, and safeguards surrounding it are therefore more indispensable than ever. The one area of Presidential authority that is virtually unchecked and uncheckable is the President’s power as Commander in Chief…Let us consider a few scenarios, starting with an extreme example. The espionage agencies of some countries have occasionally employed agents under deep cover who might not be activated for decades. It is not difficult to imagine such an agent being elected to an office of trust, but a Senator is 1 of 100, and a Representative is 1 of 435. What check is there on a President who is 1 of 1, except for the constitutional restriction?… In the role of Commander in Chief, it is not enough to be above reproach. One must be above the suspicion of reproach…In conclusion let me say that on this as on other constitutional questions, we are best guided by the wisdom and prudence of the Founding Fathers. The amendment process is not to be taken lightly, nor should it be used for political or electioneering purposes. The structure created by the Constitution has stood the test of time and continues to stand as the truest foundation for our freedom.” 

Of course the committee heard from 2 other witnesses for the progressive view; one for adoptive parents of foreign children and the other a civil rights activist for immigrants. You are welcome to read their bloviating testimony online as it is not relevant to defining ‘natural born’. 

After H.J. Res. 88 failed to make it out of committee, Sen. Nickles (OK) along with Landrieu (LA) and Inhofe (OK) brought forward S. 2128 in 2004, a bill to define the term ‘natural born Citizen’ as used in the Constitution of the United States to establish eligibility for the Office of President. 

Sen. Nickles, in his speech when introducing the S. 2128, announced that: 

“There is obviously a need for clarification. In the absence of a judicial interpretation, Congress can express a legislative interpretation of Constitutional terms. We should not wait for an election to be challenged and the courts to decide what ‘natural born’ means. 

And then concludes by stating: 

“This bill ensures that children born abroad to or adopted by American parents have claim to the full meaning of the American dream…they can also have the freedom to choose to run for president.” 

I was taken aback by Nickles proclamation that Congress had never defined ‘natural born citizen’. Had he just gone to the congressional records from 1866, when the 14th Amendment was drafted and subsequently ratified, he would have found this from Rep. John A. Bingham:

“I find no fault with the introductory clause [S 61 Bill], which is simply declaratory of what is written in the Constitution, that every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen”

And yet again repeating myself, we know that the term ‘natural born citizen’ exists exclusively in one place in the Constitution itself. Article II, Section I, Clause V:

“No Person except a natural born Citizen, or a Citizen of the United States, at the time of the Adoption of this Constitution, shall be eligible to the Office of President; neither shall any Person be eligible to that Office who shall not have attained to the Age of thirty five Years, and been fourteen Years a Resident within the United States.”

Sen. Inhofe made note of the repealed Immigration & Naturalization Act of 1790 as some sort of fact that Congress had defined what ‘natural born’ meant, as if it has always pertained to naturalized citizens or citizens by statute, and uses the argument that in the absence of any judicial interpretation, Congress, per the 1790 Act, has the authority to make such interpretation. And let it be noted, Inhofe per his speech, is the grandfather of an internationally adopted child, thus did not have pure intentions when signing onto this bill. 

There was no objection, the bill was recorded and met the same demise of all previous other attempts to alter presidential qualifications. 

All these attempts, all these secret bills quietly kept out of earshot of the public at large, are verified proof that Congress has for decades been trying to usurp the original intent of the founding fathers of this great nation further risking our sovereignty & national security. An agenda that Washington warned about in his farewell address:

If, in the opinion of the people, the distribution or modification of the constitutional powers be in any particular wrong, let it be corrected by an amendment in the way which the Constitution designates. But let there be no change by usurpation; for though this, in one instance, may be the instrument of good, it is the customary weapon by which free governments are destroyed. The precedent must always greatly overbalance in permanent evil any partial or transient benefit, which the use can at any time yield…

As avenues to foreign influence in innumerable ways, such attachments are particularly alarming to the truly enlightened and independent patriot. How many opportunities do they afford to tamper with domestic factions, to practice the arts of seduction, to mislead public opinion, to influence or awe the public councils. Such an attachment of a small or weak towards a great and powerful nation dooms the former to be the satellite of the latter.

Against the insidious wiles of foreign influence (I conjure you to believe me, fellow-citizens) the jealousy of a free people ought to be constantly awake, since history and experience prove that foreign influence is one of the most baneful foes of republican government...

Real patriots who may resist the intrigues of the favorite are liable to become suspected and odious, while its tools and dupes usurp the applause and confidence of the people, to surrender their interests…

Part I: The “Congressional” Natural Born Citizen Part I : A ‘Tribe’-ute to DC Liberal Activism

Part III: the conclusion. I purposely held back the review & summary of S. 2678 as it pertains directly to S. Res. 511 and including it here would spill the beans so to speak. But rest assured, it will be published no later than Thursday evening.

Linda A. Melin, Citizen Researcher

http://www.constitutionallyspeaking.wordpress.com

Copyright 2009

The “Congressional” Natural Born Citizen Part III: McCain & S. Res. 511 Were Meant To Sanitize Obama’s Ineligibility to Be President [correction/important addition in blue]

Corruption, Educational Material, Media Blackout, Media Propaganda, Media Propaganda Exposed, US Congress Legislation, Youth Educational Material October 26, 2009 Comments: 16

Leo, this ones for you. “Thank You” for your dedication that lit a fire underneath me while educating me at the same time.

With persistence & perseverance, a researcher will inevitably come across the “ONE” document that brings full circle his/her research to a specific conclusion. Sometimes the conclusion backs the researcher’s theory and sometimes it does not.

I give you my final research to judge for yourself. Parts I & II with all the Congressional actions to eliminate ‘natural born’ from Article II, Sec I Clause V of the Cosntitution from 1973 forward can be found here.

Gasoline & Fire Do Not Mix

This is not a new concept in DC, yet it would seem these days that it has become the norm. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t as in the case of S. 2678, a bill [To clarify the law and ensure that children born to United States citizens while serving overseas in the military are eligible to become president].

The bill was sponsored by Sen. McCaskill (MO) and introduced in the Senate on February 28, 2008. After having been read twice, the bill was then referred the Judiciary committee. On February 29thSen. Obama (IL) signed on as a co-sponsor and then on March 3rdSen. Menendez (NJ) & Sen. Clinton (NY) were added as co-sponsors to the bill. By March 4thSen. McCaskill & team had recruited a Republican, Sen. Coburn (OK) to join the ticket to usurp the constitution.  

Now, this particular bill was also 2 fold, its 1st point was to declare all children born to military ‘natural born’ citizens. The 2nd mission of the bill was to expand on the defininition of ‘natural born’ by including the following which is what jumped right out at me:

“Congress finds and declares that the term ‘natural born Citizen’ in article II, section 1, clause 5 of the Constitution of the United States shall include: ‘Any person born to any citizen of the United States while serving in the active or reserve components of the United States Armed Forces’.”(emphasis added)

So if we take McCaskill’s words ‘shall include’ and the singular use of ‘citizen’  we can conclude that Congress was aware of the Congressional history of the term ‘natural born’ and was looking for an out for McCain. But Obama, seizing his opportunity to ride the wave, rushed right over to McCaskill’s office and requested to be assigned as a co-sponsor of the legislation the very next day. Or was McCaskill the ‘fall gal’ all along? Did Obama & the Democratic elite know ahead of time of Obama’s ineligibility problem and used McCaskill or did she sign on to the corruption of her own volition? This we may never know.

Beginning sometime in 2007, the blogosphere was a buzz with a former Washington Post article from 1998  titled “McCain’s Panama Problem’ that had resurfaced and the search into the Panama Canal history took off at rocket speed. Questions regarding McCain’s eligibility continued to plague McCain & the RNC. The public announcement of S. 2678 on February 28, 2008 was like pouring gasoline onto an already burning fire.

A quick search of Internet archives shows that the issue was quite a ‘hot’ topic  however I was not paying too much attention to it at the time which I will forever regret. But someone else was paying very close attention. A certain someone, who has remained very close to Obama since his years at Harvard, was quietly working the backrooms of college campuses for the Obama campaign.

Obama’s “Tribe”

On January 16, 2007, Lynn Sweet of the Sun Times breaks with the scoop  that [L]aurence Tribe, one of the nation’s leading constitutional scholars, calls Obama “one the two most talented students I’ve had in 37 years in teaching…When I look at my kids and grandkids and ask what makes me hopeful about the future-one thing is Barack Obama.]

Now, while this is not a full out in the open endorsement, it does give the initial opening for a future endorsement which seems to come in June of 2007  when Tribe appears in a campaign TV ad  for Obama, that kicked off in Iowa. Also in June, Tribe gives an interview to The Harvard Crimson  in which he states that although [h]e would back Hillary if she won the Democratic Party’s nomination, he has always championed Obama’s cause.]

On September 17, 2007 the Chicago Tribune publishes  an extensive list of Obama’s Policy team and listed under domestic policy is ‘Laurence Tribe (Harvard Law Professor). Then on November 19, 2007 MSNBC reports  that the first Obama campaign mailing had been sent out to NH voters and inside the mailer is a quote from Tribe. In addition to the endorsement in the campaign mailers, Tribe spent quite a bit of time that November touring New Hampshire campaigning for Obama.

Moving on into December of 2007, Tribe’s former endorsement is officially listed at Obama’s my.barackobama.com  by Eddie Lee, Obama Staff.

For some readers, this is where you may want to switch from coffee to a stiffer drink.

The “Fix” Is In

On January 31, 2008 Professor Tribe gives a persuasive talk  with the main argument on electability. In his talk, Tribe openly states that

he [c]onsidered it highly probable the John McCain will be the Republican candidate] and also that [h]e is convinced that Hillary is unelectable]. Tribe finishes his persuasive by talking about the importance of voting in the primaries, the importance that a candidate not win by a small margin and how there was no room for complacency.]

This pretty much wraps it up for me as to why Obama signed onto S. 2678 so quickly and why the wheels shifted so swiftly from S. 2678 to S. Res. 511. With Tribe already on Obama’s policy team, you can bank on the fact that discussions were already had that S. 2678 would have to be resubmitted as an amendment to the constitution, however there was a much swifter and less ovbious way to proceed that would sanitize Obama’s eligibility problem through McCain. With the help of the 2 most prominent/influential constitutional lawyers known to the DC circuit, they would use a non-binding, but publically accepted backdoor method called a Resolution.

Already laying out the background on Laurence Tribe, we must now look at Theodore Olson. Olson was born in Chicago; however he grew up in the same liberal stomping grounds of the San Francisco valley as Tribe. He received his law degree at Berkley in 1958 & is a member of The Federalist Society. While serving under Reagan & Bush Jr., Olson championed conservative & constitutional causes, though his actions out of public office lean more to the liberal progressive causes. After retiring from Solicitor General in 2004, Olson returned to Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher at their DC office. Olson had previously worked for Gibson Dunn in Los Angeles (beginning in 1965) as an associate where he eventually made partner. Soon after the 2008 elections, Olson jumps the conservative ship & joins David Boies, (lead council for Gore in Bush v. Gore & an invited guest to Olson’s nuptials to Booth in Napa Valley, Ca in 2006) in Boies’s lawsuit to overturn Prop 8 in California.

Thus the question begs to be answered, why would a member of the Federalist Society, co-write an analysis that is in complete conflict to what the Federalist Society’s review of natural born citizen is? Is his membership for decoration purposes only? Maybe, however I believe Olson finally released his inner ‘liberal civil rights activist’ that has been pent up for decades.

Note must also be taken that Olson’s wife, Lady Booth is very active in the liberal activist realm & was a staunch supporter of Obama during the 2008 campaign. Thanks to commenter ‘royll’ for bringing this to my attention.

The Two Views Become One

As I stated earlier, the change from S. 2678 to S. Res. 511, a resolution [R]ecognizing that John Sidney McCain, III, is a natural born citizen] moved curiously swiftly.

I will also not go into all the ‘whereas’, as I have already covered this. You can read them here, along with my commentary. What I will do is pick a couple of them apart that pertain to Olson & Tribe’s analysis, as well as the testimony/analysis of Olson & Tribe. I will also place special emphasis on Tribe who is on record as officially endorsing Obama as well as a current member of Obama’s domestic policy team well before S. Res. 511 was introduced. I do believe Olson’s part, for the most part, was pure decoration for the benefit of the GOP to get them to go along with the scheme. I’ll let you judge for yourself by reading this article from the ‘World Socialist Website’. There could be no better cover-up, than to put a so called conservative constitutional lawyer who is loathed by the liberal left, but also happens to be a closet liberal civil rights activist in bed with a progressive one.

First let’s begin with the written analysis/testimony that was permanently recorded in the congressional record on April 30, 2008 but was officially sent to the Senate on April 8ththrough the law firm of Gibson, Dunn & Crutcher LLP.

The analysis which begins by citing that the Constitution does not define ‘natural born’ citizen & that Congress has never given a definituion either can be argued against. Some argue otherwise, however the best place to find the definition would be in the 39th Congress records of 1866 when the 14th Amendment was being drafted. They then go on to cite Marsh v. Chambers, 463 U.S. 783, 790-91 which is a 1983 Supreme Court case on freedom of religious speech. While this had me baffled for a day or so, it suddenly hit me. Maybe they were not using the deciding opinion of the case. Maybe they went to the dissenting opinion. BINGO! Justice Brennan dissenting wrote:

“Finally, and most importantly, the argument tendered by the court is misguided because the Constitution is not a static document whose every meaning on every detail is fixed for all time by the life experience of the Framers. We have recognized in a variety of constitutional contexts that the practices that were in place at the time any particular guarantee was enacted in to the Constitution do not necessarily fix forever the meaning of that guarantee…”

So basically what they did was take Brennan’s dissenting opinion and use it as precedent to usurp our guarantee, our national security protection under the Rule of Law that the person attaining to the highest office of land, the Commander of our military forces would have no foreign influences or intrigues. But let us not stop there with this opinion, Brennan goes on to write:

“Our primary task must be to translate “the majestic generalities of the Bill of Rights, conceived as part of the pattern of liberal government in the eighteenth century…”

And there we have it, that big ‘it’s my constitutional right to be president some day’ analogy thrown right in our faces. Framers be damned!

So now that we have an initial grasp of the view of the Constitution these two men hold, let’s look further into their true interpretation of who they believed the Framers to be. You know, those men who were our founding fathers and who also fought a bloody war. A war to end America’s ties to an all powerful Monarchy and put in the hands of the people, the power to govern themselves by drafting a Constitution & establishing a Republic.

Next, Tribe & Olson brings up the subject of common law at the time of the founding and also reference Wong Kim Ark, 169 U.S. 649, 655 (1898). If this surprises you, then you have not been paying attention because it is the premise to all their legal analysis. Tribe has written, lectured extensively, as well as teaches in depth Blackstone’s English Common Law as the guide to interpreting our Constitution. In the analysis sent to the Senate Judiciary, they write:

“These sources ALL confirm that the phrase ‘natural born’ includes both birth abroad to parents who were citizens, and birth within the nation’s territory and allegiance.” (emphasis added)

Oh, really?

Tribe & Olson go on to mis-cite the specific part of Wong Kim Ark they are relying on for their conclusion, and they also do not cite the case Minor v. Happersett (1874) 21 Wall. 162, 166-168 which we know for a fact, from extensive research done by Leo Donofrio & team, was the guiding case for the Wong Kim Ark decision.

“In Wong Kim Ark, the court thoroughly discussed “natural born citizen”.  And in doing so, Justice Gray quoted directly from the holding in a prior Supreme Court case, Minor v. Happersett.  The following passage is a quote from Minor as quoted by Justice Gray in Wong Kim Ark:

 ‘At common law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country, of parents who were its citizens, became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners. Some authorities go further, and include as citizens children born within the jurisdiction, without reference to the citizenship of their parents. As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first. For the purposes of this case, it is not necessary to solve these doubts.It is sufficient, for everything we have now to consider, that all children, born of citizen parents within the jurisdiction, are themselves citizens.’ Minor v. Happersett (1874) 21 Wall. 162, 166-168.” (Emphasis added)

Look at that, you have Justice Gray citing the court in Minor who are themselves citing the “Laws of Nations” definition (they didn’t directly cite that treatise but the definition used is taken therefrom) of  natural born citizen = person born in US to “citizen parents” = nbc .

In Minor,they clearly established who was a “natural born citizen” beyond any doubt, a definition that does not include Obama.  As to persons born in the US to foreign parents they said, as directly quoted in Wong Kim Ark by Justice Gray, “As to this class there have been doubts, but never as to the first.“

Now, why, would the Supreme Court be relying on the Law of Nations if in fact, as Tribe & Olson claim, the Framers relied on English common law. The same law that kept them oppressed while under the rule of the English Monarchy. The fact is they didn’t. In the 1st commentaries on the Constitution written by Supreme Court Justice Wilson (who was appointed by George Washington, was a signer of the Declaration of Independence and was as member of the Continental Congress), Wilson specifically refers to the law of nations as the guiding force behind our Constitution and it interpretation.

“The law of nature, when applied to states and political societies, receives a new name, that of the law of nations. This law, important in all states, is of peculiar importance in free ones. The States of America are certainly entitled to this dignified appellation…But if the knowledge of the law of nations is greatly useful to those who appoint, it surely must be highly necessary to those who are appointed…As Puffendorff thought that the law of nature and the law of nations were precisely the same, he has not, in his book on these subjects treated of the law of nations separately; but has every where joined it with the law of nature, properly called so…the law of nature is applied to individuals; the law of nations is applied to states.”

Clear, concise & truthfully spoken. This is also one of the most inspirational commentaries on our Constitutional law & patriotism I have read. If you have not read James Wilson, Of the Law of Nations, Lectures on Law (1791) as of yet, I encourage you to do so.

So, putting Wilson’s ‘Lectures on Law’ to task, we can say with confidence that Tribe is completely misguided and flat out wrong when he claimed:

“British statutes in force when the Constitution was drafted, which undoubtedly informed the Framers’ understanding of the Natural Born Citizen Clause. Those statutes provided, for example, that children born abroad to parents who were ‘natural born Subjects’ were also ‘natural-born Subjects…to all Intents, Constructions and Purposes whatsoever…The Framers substituted the word ‘citizen for ‘subject’ to reflect the shift from a monarchy to democracy…”(emphasis added)

For supposed constitutional scholars, Tribe & Olson really miss the mark on this one. They also make reference that we are a democracy which is just an out right lie. The Framers wrote a Constitution for a Republic with citizens as sovereigns who are superior to the government institution itself, not Subjects to some Democracy who are ruled by a central government put in place by mob rule and where individual rights are only those given to you by the government. Democracies rarely last, they either give cause for revolution or they ascend to a Monarchy or Dictatorship.

Hitting More Pay Dirt 

In a recent Illinois Public Law & Legal Theory  written by Professor Lawrence B Solum  of the U of IL, College of Law, Chicago, Solum further explains why the English common law definition of ‘natural born subject was not the definition adopted by the Framers for the Sovereign citizens of the United States of America.

[Blackstone Commentaries (1765): When I say, that an alien is one who is born out of the king’s dominions, or allegiance, this also must be understood with some restrictions. The common law indeed stood absolutely so; with only a very few exceptions: so that a particular act of parliament became necessary after the restoration, for the naturalization of children of his majesty’s English subjects, born in foreign countries during the late troubles. And this maxim of the law proceeded upon a general principle, that every man owes natural allegiance where he is born, and cannot owe two such allegiances, or serve two masters, at once. Yet the children of the king’s ambassadors born abroad were always held to be natural subjects: for as the father, though in a foreign country, owes not even a local allegiance to the prince to whom he is sent; so, with regard to the son also, he was held (by a kind of postliminium) to be born under the king of England’s allegiance, represented by his father, the ambassador.

To encourage also foreign commerce, it was enacted by statute 25 Edw. III. st. 2. that all children born abroad, provided both their parents were at the time of the birth in allegiance to the king, and the mother had passed the seas by her husband’s consent, might inherit as if born in England: and accordingly it hath been so adjudged in behalf of merchants. But by several more modern statutes these restrictions are still farther taken off: so that all children, born out of the king’s ligeance, whose fathers were natural-born subjects, are now natural-born subjects themselves, to all intents and purposes, without any exception;…]

[F.E. Edwards, Natural Born British Subjects at Common Law, 14 Journal of the Society of Comparative Legislation 314 (1914): The pro- position that British Protectorates, and consequently any less interest of the Crown, should be excluded from our definition of the King’s protection, is supported by Sir William Anson, who declares that birth within such a region is not sufficient to found a claim for British natural-born status. The real test of whether a given territory is part of the British Dominions is that it must have passed openly, completely, and unequivocally into the possession of the Crown.]

[Solum: If the American conception of “natural born citizen” were equivalent to the English notion of a “natural born subject,” then it could be argued that only persons born on American soil to American parents would have qualified. This might lead to the conclusion that McCain would not be a constitutional natural-born citizen, because the Panama Canal Zone was not the sovereign territory of the United States, but was instead merely subject to its administrative control.

The language of the Constitution recognizes a distinction between the terms “citizen” and “subject.”For example, in Article III Section 2, which confers “judicial power” on the federal courts, “citizens” of the several states are differentiated from “citizens” or “subjects” of foreign states—corresponding to the distinction between diversity and alienage jurisdiction. In the framing era, these two terms reflected two distinct theories of the relationship between individual members of a political community and the state.

In feudal or monarchical constitutional theory, individuals were the subjects of a monarch or sovereign, but the republican constitutional theory of the revolutionary and post revolutionary period conceived of the individual as a citizen and assigned sovereignty to the people.

The distinction between citizens and subjects is reflected in Chief Justice John Jay’s opinion in Chisholm v. Georgia, the first great constitutional case decided after the ratification of the Constitution of 1789:

[T]he sovereignty of the nation is in the people of the nation, and the residuary sovereignty of each State in the people of each State…

[A]t the Revolution, the sovereignty devolved on the people; and they are truly the sovereigns of the country, but they are sovereigns without subjects…]

As you can see, in England there are two very distinct meanings of  ‘natural born’ subject. In one hand there is the broader view & in the other there is the view of the laws of nations. What the liberal progressive constitutionalists use is the broader view and thus disregard the fact that at some point, even England used the law of nations. The Framers also knew of Englands use of the law of nations and were very aware of its importance when establishing a new nation. It has also been proven that the Law of Nations was in the hands of the Framers at the time of the drafting of the Declaration of Independence.

Thus, wrapping up on British Justice Blackstone, I refer you to another writing of his that pertains to what was on the minds of our founding fathers when they declared independence from the king:

“The king is not only incapable of doing wrong, but even of thinking wrong: in him there is no folly or weakness.”

To believe that the Framers held onto this logic and thus held onto the common law definition of subjects for the newly emancipated citizens, would be to believe there was never a bloody revolution to escape it. The truth is Blackstone was a Kings Knight. He loved his dear England and was faithful to the end and to the Monarchy who he adored just as much. Blackstone was also noted for contradicting himself, which I believe is the reason for such confusion in interpreting his commentaries.

Moving on to the real truth of which law guided the Framers, we turn to another early Supreme Court Justice, Joseph Story, who was also the main founder of Harvard law School. Story gives a very distinct conclusion to the Law of Nation & the law of nature as the guiding force behind the Framers definition of ‘natural born’ citizen when he wrote this of the qualifications for President in one of his early commentaries.

Volume 3, Section 73: § 1473. It is indispensable, too, that the president should be a natural born citizen of the United States; or a citizen at the adoption of the constitution, and for fourteen years before his election. This permission of a naturalized citizen to become president is an exception from the great fundamental policy of all governments, to exclude foreign influence from their executive councils and duties. It was doubtless introduced (for it has now become by lapse of time merely nominal, and will soon become wholly extinct) out of respect to those distinguished revolutionary patriots, who were born in a foreign land, and yet had entitled themselves to high honors in their adopted country. A positive exclusion of them from the office would have been unjust to their merits, and painful to their sensibilities. But the general propriety of the exclusion of foreigners, in common cases, will scarcely be doubted by any sound statesman. It cuts off all chances for ambitious foreigners, who might otherwise be intriguing for the office; and interposes a barrier against those corrupt interferences of foreign governments in executive elections, which have inflicted the most serious evils upon the elective monarchies of Europe. Germany, Poland, and even the pontificate of Rome, are sad, but instructive examples of the enduring mischiefs arising from this source. (emphasis mine)

Story specifically calls the founding fathers ‘naturalized’ citizens, and rightly so.

Tribe & Olson’s analysis is all over the place. They bring in the repealed Naturalization Act of 1790 and in light of Wilson’s 1st ‘Commentary on the Constitution’; we can put to rest the reason as to why that Act was repealed. Congress was not invested with the powers of declaring anyone a ‘natural born’ citizen. The only powers regarding citizenship they had were those of naturalizing alien immigrants. A ‘natural born’ citizen is clearly defined in the laws of nations as well as the Congressional records of 1866.

“Vattel in Bk 1 Sec 212, states the following: § 212. Citizens and natives: The natives, or natural-born citizens, are those born in the country, of parents who are citizens. As the society cannot exist and perpetuate itself otherwise than by the children of the citizens, those children naturally follow the condition of their fathers, and succeed to all their rights. The society is supposed to desire this, in consequence of what it owes to its own preservation; and it is presumed, as matter of course, that each citizen, on entering into society, reserves to his children the right of becoming members of it. The country of the fathers is therefore that of the children; and these become true citizens merely by their tacit consent. We shall soon see whether, on their coming to the years of discretion, they may renounce their right, and what they owe to the society in which they were born. I say, that, in order to be of the country, it is necessary that a person be born of a father who is a citizen; for, if he is born there of a foreigner, it will be only the place of his birth, and not his country.” 

“Rep. Bingham commenting on Section 1992 said it means “every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen.” (Cong. Globe, 39th, 1st Sess., 1291 (1866))”(emphasis added) 

Tribe & Olson also refer to several statutes pertaining to citizenship, however, the Constitution trumps statutes, thus using them to define ‘natural born’ citizen is grossly incompetent in light of all the historical and legal references that date back to the revolution. Leo Donofrio gives an excellent run down  of how McCain is a citizen by statute and according the most current version of the US Foreign Affairs Manual, it has yet to be determined whether children born abroad are eligible for President.

7 FAM 1131.6-2 Eligibility for Presidency
(TL:CON-68; 04-01-1998)
a. It has never been determined definitively by a court whether a person who acquired U.S. citizenship by birth abroad to U.S. citizens is a natural born citizen within the meaning of Article II of the Constitution and, therefore, eligible for the Presidency.

In one of Leo’s latest articles  on McCain he wrote:

“According to the birth certificate  and COLB  of John McCain, McCain was born in Colon Hospital, city of Colon, Panama.  While the BC states at the top that it is from the “Canal Zone”, the document also states that McCain was born in Colon Hospital, city of Colon.  The city of Colon and the hospital were not in the Canal Zone.

The common story you hear is that McCain was born in the Canal Zone, but these documents posted online do not testify to that.  Furthermore, there is no official document that has ever surfaced which states that McCain was born in the Canal Zone.

There is a birth announcement in the Panama American newspaper  which states that McCain was born in the “submarine base hospital”.  I don’t know what the submarine base hospital is.”  

Permit me to dispel  that Panama newspaper birth bit, Leo. It would seem that there is NO record of John McCain in the August 1936 birth registry of the Canal Zone.

panama records of birth for Coco Solo

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Nope, no index record there, but I’ll bet you can find it in the August birth registry of the Republic of Panama since McCain was actually born off base in Colon Hospital, Colon, Panama. The media propaganda machine also covered for McCain by claiming that it was a clerical mistake that McCain is not listed in the August 1936 Canal Zone index registry. And as if that wasn’t enough, they tried to claim a different doctor than the one that signed the birth certificate, actually delivered McCain. Thanks to the lame stream propaganda media who stepped right up and said the visible, certified official records are wrong, the general public was kept in the dark as to the truth.

This also goes to show that it doesn’t matter how decorated you are and how many years your family has served honorably, eventually those who spend too much time in politics will fall to the intrigue and corruption of power.

So what does this all have to do with Obama?

Olson & Tribe conclude their analysis by reiterating their delusional rhetoric and false reporting of Kansas & Arizona as just territories. Kansas & Arizona were Sovereign Territories that had been operating under the complete law of the U. S. Constitution and jurisdiction of the United States and thus their citizens were under complete jurisdiction of the Constitution of the United States and were considered for all legal and political purposes to be the same as that of statehood citizens.

“Historical practice confirms that birth on soil that is under the sovereignty of the United States, but not within a State, satisfies the Natural Born Citizen Clause. For example, Vice President Charles Curtis was born in the territory of Kansas on January 25, 1860–one year before Kansas became a State. Because the Twelfth Amendment requires that Vice Presidents possess the same qualifications as Presidents, the service of Vice President Curtis verifies that the phrase “natural born Citizen” includes birth outside of any State but within U.S. territory. Similarly, Senator Barry Goldwater was born in Arizona before its statehood, yet attained the Republican Party’s presidential nomination in 1964. And Senator Barack Obama was born in Hawaii on August 4, 1961–not long after its admission to the Union on August 21, 1959. We find it inconceivable that Senator Obama would have been ineligible for the Presidency had he been born two years earlier.”

Olson & Tribe consistently refer back to the 14th Amendment & its interpretation that a citizen born to an immigrant is none the less a citizen and therefore under English common law, the founders considered them to be same as a ‘natural born’ citizen in all sense of the words. They did this purposely to confuse the issue knowing that Congress never really reads anything, anyways. However, I think I can confidently claim that I, along with the help of some great patriots out there, have blown that smoke filled theory right back where it came from…right up the ‘you know what’ of the liberal progressive ideologues who believe we are Subjects to some all powerful central government.

We are NOT Subjects, Nothing could be further from the TRUTH and the TRUTH ALWAYS PREVAILS!

Thus it was not surprising to find this recent review  of Laurence Tribe’s most current thesis ’The Invisible Constitution’

“Tribe’s legal philosophy is antithecal to the original intent of the Constitution’s Framers and is insufficient as a legitimate theory of Constitutional Law. At its foundation, Tribe’s ideology is secular, Marxist, socialist legal philosophy.”

Then put Theodore Olson next to Tribe in a Senate Judiciary hearing and what you have is the ultimate ‘white-wash’ of political corruption.

Therefore, with all the above evidence, I conclusively report that:

‘Whereas there is no evidence of the intention of the Framers or ANY Congress to limit the constitutional rights of children born to Americans serving in the military nor to prevent those children from serving their country’s President; (emphasis added)

Sorry, busted.

Whereas previous presidential candidates were born outside the United States of America and were understood to be eligible to be President;

Again, busted.

Whereas John Sidney McCain, III, was born to American citizens on an American military base in the Panama Canal Zone in 1936:

Also BUSTED by McCain’s own original vital records and the index birth records kept by the Canal Zone.

Was it a coincidence that Obama quickly signed onto S. 2678? I think NOT!

Was it also a coincidence that Tribe gave that political persuasive talk on Jan. 31, 2008? I think NOT!

And it certainly was no coincidence that Tribe was selected to co-write the analysis that would sanitize McCain & Obama’s ineligibility. After all, persuasive speeches seem to be his forte’. You had just better make sure you are wearing pretty high boots if you ever attend one.

And as if all this is not enough to prove that our government and our election process is totally corrupt to the core, Roger Calero, a green card holding alien from Nicaragua  and member of the Socialist Workers Party (communist party) was on the Presidential ballots in 5 states where he received 7,209 votes. He originally was on the ballot in 12, however was removed from 7 and replaced by another SWP member James Harris who received 2,424 votes. The states that allowed Calero, a Nicaraguan National, to remain on the ballot despite complaints to the Secretary of State in those states prior to the election were: CT, DE, MN, NJ, NY & VT.

There are 535 members of Congress who know the truth. Will they step up to the Constitution and hold themselves accountable by returning the election to the people so that we may have a legitimate presidential election in which we have eligible candidates to vote for?

I’m not holding my breath for that to happen because I do not think there is a true Patriotic spine in the lot.

 What I will do is make a guarantee to keep researching and expose every speck of corruption I dig up.

God Bless America and God Bless Our Brave Service men & women who serve honorably and are NOT afraid to uphold their oath of office and defend this great nation from enemies foreign & DOMESTIC.

Linda A. Melin, Citizen Researcher

http://www.constitutionallyspeaking.wordpress.com

Copyright 2009

McCain’s Law : Updated

Corruption, Educational Material, US Congress Legislation October 26, 2009 1 Comment

“When applying the law the role of judges is not to impose their own view as to best policy choices for society but to faithfully and accurately determine the policy choices already made by the people and embodied in the law.” 

John Sidney McCain III

 

Mario Apuzzo puts out a rather compelling argument that according to Vattel, McCain could be classified as a ‘natural born’ citizen. Let’s take a look…

Under Sec. 217 of The Law of Nations transcribed by Vattel is reference to children born out of country but in the armies of the state. Apuzzo gives much weight to the phrase “reputed born”. What does this mean in legal terminology? I do not know, I am not a lawyer, and Apuzzo gives no definition of it (of which there are several for it at the time of the adoption of the constitution) in his article that he uses as the basis for his claim.

What I do know is that in the current FAM (foreign affairs manual), it clearly states that all children born in the Canal Zone, as well as the Republic of Panama are citizens by statute, Act of August 4, 1937, Sec. 1, 50 Stat. 558, codified at INA: 

TITLE 8 > CHAPTER 12 > SUBCHAPTER III > Part I > § 1403

§ 1403. Persons born in the Canal Zone or Republic of Panama on or after February 26, 1904

303(a) Any person born in the Canal Zone on or after February 26, 1904, and whether before or after the effective date of this chapter, whose father or mother or both at the time of the birth of such person was or is a citizen of the United States, is declared to be a citizen of the United States.

303(b) Any person born in the Republic of Panama on or after February 26, 1904, and whether before or after the effective date of this chapter, whose father or mother or both at the time of the birth of such person was or is a citizen of the United States employed by the Government of the United States or by the Panama Railroad Company, or its successor in title, is declared to be a citizen of the United States.

We also know for fact that McCain’s birth certificate was filed with the Panama Railroad Company. If the natural born citizen were to apply, McCain’s birth would have been directly recorded with the permanent resident state of his parents at the time he was born.

As McCain said, judges have to faithfully apply the law that is already in place. Policies and personal choices are not to be legislated from the bench, therefore my conclusion of McCain’s ineligibility to be President stands as reported.

Well documented in Part II of my series ‘The Congressional Natural Born Citizen”, McCain had known of this problem decades before the 2008 election. There were numerous attempts to amend Article II as well as change the INA codified laws. They ALL failed and for good reason. Those in Congress, who held the gavel at the time, knew of the potential threat to our national security if the qualifications for President & Commander in Chief were open to those with dual citizenship.

As much as I sympathize with those who admire McCain for his service to our country (I am one of them), that admiration CAN NOT usurp the law. By trying to do so puts those people in the same corrupt circle of thinkers who pick & choose law at will for their personal benefit.

McCain has brought dishonor to himself by his own volition. It was his choice not ours and he will have to live with it every day for the rest of his life. He will also have to live with the irreparable harm that resulted from his willingness to skirt the law for personal political power which is in complete conflict of the opening quote of this article.

Leo weighs in regarding a request I had made to him regarding this issue. This response pertains to the UIPA requests that have been sent to Hawaii and Hawaii’s  responses thus far:

[ed. … I will post a report next week which makes the truth clear and which establishes that an AG Opinion was rendered and is now being kept secret by the AG – and his office has personally informed me that they are invoking attorney client privilege thereto. The general public is now being guided away from paying attention to that AG opinion because the opinion must be disclosed by law. And if they can make the public lose focus then they might be able to keep the report hidden. If the public makes enough noise and does not lose focus on the AG report, then it is VERY hard for the AG to not cough it up. So, if you all want to see the AG opinion then don’t fall for the Seussian hooplah telling you that it does not exist. It does exist.]

Good For Me But “NOT” For Thee?

In The News October 25, 2009

This speaks volumes as to Obama’s intentions for the so called ‘national emergency’.

Via AP & FOX via FirstThings formerly GatewayPundit:

 
by Jim Hoft

Waiting in line for health care.

Some of the 1,200 people who braved rain and 39 degree (3 degrees Celcius) temperatures queue to receive a free H1N1 flu vaccine at Richard J. Daley College in Chicago October 24, 2009. (Reuters)

Barack Obama declared the swine flu outbreak a national emergency today. Over 1,000 people have died from the swine flu in the US this year.
The AP reported:

President Barack Obama declared the swine flu outbreak a national emergency, giving his health chief the power to let hospitals move emergency rooms offsite to speed treatment and protect noninfected patients.

The declaration, signed Friday night and announced Saturday, comes with the disease more prevalent than ever in the country and production delays undercutting the government’s initial, optimistic estimates that as many as 120 million doses of the vaccine could be available by mid-October.

Health authorities say more than 1,000 people in the United States, including almost 100 children, have died from the strain of flu known as H1N1, and 46 states have widespread flu activity. So far only 11 million doses have gone out to health departments, doctor’s offices and other providers, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention officials.

But, despite the national emergency, Barack and Michelle have decided not to inoculate their two girls against the H1N1 virus.

BTW..I seem to have contracted some sort of bug, thus the delay in publishing my next “Tribe” report. Please be patient, it WILL be out this week.

The “Congressional” Natural Born Citizen Part I : A ‘Tribe’-ute to DC Liberal Activism

Corruption, Educational Material, Media Blackout, US Congress Legislation October 25, 2009 Comments: 5

This will be a multi-part series that focuses on Congresses knowledge of the meaning of ‘natural born citizen’ and how they have purposely side stepped the constitution & the intent of the founding fathers regarding US citizenship by using ‘baby steps’ to achieve their ultimate goal:

“An Amendment to the Constitution to make eligible for the office of President any person who has been a US citizen for (X) amount of years”

I use (X) because there are several versions, all with differing views as to the number of years the citizen must be a continual resident prior to running for office.

‘Hope-n-Change’ Floats 

“The written Constitution ‘floats’ in a vast and deep – and, crucially, invisible – ocean of ideas, propositions, recovered memories, and imagined experiences…The Invisible Constitution is not simply a mask for imposing a particular ideology on the Constitution, which is what people sometimes think.”…”What I am hoping is that people will come to see that we’re all engaged in the same game and that the political reality of the Constitution, which is not confined to the written text, is an equal-opportunity reality.”

Laurence H. Tribe (The Invisible Constitution) 2008

This folks is the view of every liberal progressive ideologue on capital hill today.

Laurence Tribe’s roots to the progressive movement span decades. Tribe graduated from Harvard Law in 1966, immediately clerked for Trobiner in the Ca Supreme Court for a year, then moved to DC where he clerked for Stewart for a year. Not having any real world experience, Tribe then joins Harvard as an assistant professor in 1968 and after 4 years, he received his tenure from Harvard in 1972.

Sounding familiar? Let’s continue on…

Laurence Tribe is the co-founder of the liberal activist “American Constitution Society”, a law and policy organization formed to breed and pit young activist lawyers, like himself, against originalism and constitutional jurisprudence. Tribe is considered as a demigod at Harvard and the cast of characters surrounding him over the years sounds like a who’s who of liberal activism progressive style. We have Aharon Barach, chief justice of Israel who believes in letting unrepentant genocidal terrorists roam free; Doris Kearn Goodwin, liberal revisionist historian; Akhil Amar, liberal law professor at Yale; Nina Totenberg, liberal legal correspondent for NPR. Most notably in Tribe’s cast of contributing characters, we find none other than Cass Sunstein, Dianne Feinstein (D-Ca) & Barack Obama. The one I shall take note of today is Barack Obama.

While studying at Harvard, Obama became a research assistant to Tribe on his book – “Abortion: The Clash of Absolutes” (1990) and in turn, during Obama’s candidacy, Tribe did a political commercial congratulating Obama and publically supporting the Obama campaign.

During the campaign last year, Ellis Washington wrote this of Tribe:

‘Tribes judicial philosophy would be right up there with the most radical leftists of the Supreme Court, like Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, John Paul Stevens, Earl Warren, Harry Blackmun, William Brennan, Thurgood Marshall and many other enemies of the original intent of the framers.”

Tribe’s Congress

Tribe wrote his initial commentary on the Constitution in 1978 call “American Constitutional Law”. With this initial commentary, Tribe ascended to the throne and since has been the liberal’s commandant in their efforts to over throw capitalism and our Republic’s Judeo Christian heritage through backdoor congressional activist legislation.

In 1987, Michael Greve of the ‘Reason Magazine’ wrote a review of Scalia’s book, A Matter of Interpretation. Scalia’s book expounds on the ‘textualist’ theory and his qualities as a judicial ‘statesman’. Neither of which is Tribe.

Greve writes that Tribe is [n]otorious for urging judges to go boldly where none have gone before and that [T]ribe’s pretenses are a thin cover for their effort to mobilize the Constitution for left-liberal causes.

Enter Liberal Left Election Activism Through Legislation

Of Tribe’s most notable influences on congressional committee hearings are those during the Nixon & Clinton impeachment hearings, The Gore/Bush election & most currently the judiciary committee hearings on S. Res. 511:

Recognizing that John Sidney McCain, III, is a natural born citizen.

There are many more areas where tribe’s activist views have been sought to pass radical legislation, however, for the purposes of this series, we shall stick to the topic at hand.

I can not say with certainty when it all began; but the legislative moves to forever redefine/remove the term ‘natural born citizen’ as it exists in the founding documents of the United States of America, have been going on far longer than I had thought.

Not only have they moved to redefine/remove it from the Constitution, they have actively been bestowing ‘natural born’ citizenship status on individual citizens for decades through ‘private’ laws. 

A search of Thomas.gov revealed that since 1973. Congress has bestowed ‘natural born’ citizenship 13 times through this ‘private law’ practice. I was only able to retrieve the basics, as I assume, the fact that they are ‘private law’ bills, the contents are sealed, and therefore not available to the public. This is as specific as they get, no congressional committee minutes are available through Thomas.gov:

Title: A bill for the relief of Phillip Harper. Became Private Law No. 98-39 (1983) 

In 1987, a bill was introduced which was entitled, ‘The overseas American Children’s Human Right’s Act of 1987’. The summary concludes that children born outside of the US to mixed parents (one being an alien) shall be a U.S. citizen at birth and then goes on to grant US national and natural born citizen status to any person born, whether in or out of wedlock, to a US citizen parent outside the United States.

This bill as far as I can tell never made it out of committee. A similar bill appeared in 1989 that met the same demise.

Were these bills a precursor for the currently behind closed committee door activism in Congress? Were they Congresses initial ‘baby steps’ towards the ultimate destruction of the ‘natural born’ citizen?

From 1973 – current, attempts have been made to remove ‘natural born’ from Article II of the Constitution. Additional attempts have also been made to formally define/change the meaning of ‘natural born’, therefore opening the door for any and all citizens to be able to run for President, regardless of their type of citizenship.

Committee minutes from the earlier days are nil, thus lending me to believe no merit was given to the early attempts. However, the sponsor of the earliest 6 amendments from 1973-77 was Rep. Jonathan B. Bingham (NY). Jonathan Bingham was a Connecticut Bingham and I do not know at this time if there is a direct relation to Rep. John A Bingham who was one of the founders of the 14th Amendment that left this famous quote which is recorded in congressional records for all time:

Rep. Bingham commenting on Section 1992 said it means “every human being born within the jurisdiction of the United States of parents not owing allegiance to any foreign sovereignty is, in the language of your Constitution itself, a natural born citizen.” (Cong. Globe, 39th, 1st Sess., 1291 (1866))

Coincidence? I think not. To believe that a representative with the same family surname, a surname of a long historical list of politicians dating back to the revolution, was not aware or had studied the congressional records during the drafting of the 14th Amendment would be naïve.

These early attempts, that are still available to be retrieved online at Thomas.gov, also coincide with the appearance of Laurence Tribe onto the scene that had this to say about natural born citizen:

“The Framers substituted the word ‘citizen’ for ‘subject’ to reflect the shift from a monarchy to democracy”

Well, had the Framers actually adopted a Constitution for a Democracy instead of a Constitutional Republic, Tribe may have been right. This is also just one tiny example of his influence on Congress over the past several decades of Constitutional abuse.

From 1973 – current, there have been 15 silent secret attempts to remove the words ‘natural born’ from the Constitution and replace them with just citizen. It is the ideology of the leftist-liberals that the words ‘natural born’ are discriminatory and therefore keep naturalized citizens and those born with dual citizenship from their imaginary right to be president.

Part II to come: Breaking down of the most current secret legislation proposed from 2000-08.

Part III will focus specifically on S. Res. 511 and Tribe’s extensive influence in Congresses cover-up of ineligible presidential candidates that continues to this day.

Linda A. Melin, Citizen Researcher

http://www.constitutionallyspeaking.wordpress.com

Copyright 2009

Hannity Probes Not Constitutionally Qualified Jindal about Presidential Run

Educational Material October 24, 2009

Hannity is still pushing the liberal’s global agenda by calling on ‘NOT” constitutionally qualified Jindal to run for President in 2012.

Jindal may have been born on US soil, however, niether of Jindal’s parents were citizens when he was born.

Being ‘natural born’ is only one requirement for president and NOT all natural born citizens may run, so get over any feelings of being president as some sort of right. One can be 32 and natural born, however that person is not qualified to run for president. One can be 35, a natural born, but not lived in the country for the 14 years prior to the election thus making that person ‘NOT’ qualified. Making sure the Commander in Chief of our Armed Forces is ‘natural born’, born on US soil to parents(both) who are US citizens, is a national security measure written into the Constitution and adopted by ALL states to guard against foreign influence & intrigue that we are now seeing with Obama.

Jindal was raised on US soil by parents who practiced & taught Jindal the influences of their home country of India. You can NOT disolve those influences in ones own lifetime & the founding fathers knew it.

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Forcing Our Youth Into Servitude

US Congress Legislation October 22, 2009

Rule for Radicals, in which Obama & his cronies know word for word, cover to cover, states very clearly that the way to radical change is through the youth, so what better way could there be for them to implement their plan than to ‘require’ servitude for student loans.

via HotAir via American Issues Project:

With all of the attention paid to the health-care overhaul plans of the Obama administration and the cap-and-trade bill coming next from Congress, political observers can be excused if they believe that all of the government interventions and takeovers have been addressed.  However, statism rarely sleeps, and in this case the statists have become adept at multitasking.  The House has already passed a bill that will nationalize the student loan industry, and the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions now has it under consideration.

This bill proposes two major interventions from the federal government.   The first is rather straightforward: it proposes to loan money directly to students and eliminate private-sector lending.  Section 201’s summary makes this quite succinct:

(Sec. 201) Prohibits any new loans from being made or insured under the part B Federal Family Education Loan (FFEL) program after June 2010.

Decades ago, the federal government decided to encourage students to attend colleges and universities by subsidizing and guaranteeing loans for tuition and other expenses.  That encouraged banks to lend to what normally would be a high-risk constitiuency — teenagers without jobs.  That allowed many more students to access higher education, and lenders had little risk in the transaction – and for a while, everyone was happy.

However, that large increase in demand created pressure on prices, too.  As more students flooded into colleges and universities, tuitions increased as supply strained to meet the demand.  The size of loans had to get larger, which meant more risk transferred to the federal government as it continued to encourage lenders by making the programs nearly fail-safe.  The scope of lending also increased under federal pressure and incentives, so that more loans failed and Washington spent more on its guarantees.

If this sounds like a familiar pattern, well, it should.  The same mechanisms that inflated the housing bubble were in play in the student loan market. (snip)

That plan has one very large problem, as Rep. John Kline (R-MN) explained to me in an interview this week.  The private-sector lenders actually have the money to lend.  The government, on the other hand, had to borrow $1.4 trillion in order to fund itself in FY2009, and the deficit projection for FY2010 is another $1.4 trillion.  Even if one was inclined to believe that the government could run a loan program better than the private-sector lenders – which, given the debacles of the TARP program, among others, is highly suspect – the money just doesn’t exist. (snip)

continue reading here             read HR 3221 here

The True Keepers Of The “Flame of Liberty”

Educational Material, Honoring Their Sacrifice, Honoring Their Service October 22, 2009

H/T Ed Morrisy via HotAir: Cheney’s speech is as good as it is long. He blasts Obama’s “dithering” on the war in Afghanistan and his abrupt betrayals of allies in eastern Europe:

As prepared for delivery
October 21, 2009

Thank you all very much. It’s a pleasure to be here, and especially to receive the Keeper of the Flame Award in the company of so many good friends.

I’m told that among those you’ve recognized before me was my friend Don Rumsfeld. I don’t mind that a bit. It fits something of a pattern. In a career that includes being chief of staff, congressman, and secretary of defense, I haven’t had much that Don didn’t get first. But truth be told, any award once conferred on Donald Rumsfeld carries extra luster, and I am very proud to see my name added to such a distinguished list.

To Frank Gaffney and all the supporters of Center for Security Policy, I thank you for this honor. And I thank you for the great energy and high intelligence you bring to as vital a cause as there is – the advance of freedom and the uncompromising defense of the United States.

Most anyone who is given responsibility in matters of national security quickly comes to appreciate the commitments and structures put in place by others who came before. You deploy a military force that was planned and funded by your predecessors. You inherit relationships with partners and obligations to allies that were first undertaken years and even generations earlier. With the authority you hold for a little while, you have great freedom of action. And whatever course you follow, the essential thing is always to keep commitments, and to leave no doubts about the credibility of your country’s word.

So among my other concerns about the drift of events under the present administration, I consider the abandonment of missile defense in Eastern Europe to be a strategic blunder and a breach of good faith.

It is certainly not a model of diplomacy when the leaders of Poland and the Czech Republic are informed of such a decision at the last minute in midnight phone calls. It took a long time and lot of political courage in those countries to arrange for our interceptor system in Poland and the radar system in the Czech Republic. Our Polish and Czech friends are entitled to wonder how strategic plans and promises years in the making could be dissolved, just like that – with apparently little, if any, consultation. Seventy years to the day after the Soviets invaded Poland, it was an odd way to mark the occasion.

You hardly have to go back to 1939 to understand why these countries desire – and thought they had – a close and trusting relationship with the United States. Only last year, the Russian Army moved into Georgia, under the orders of a man who regards the collapse of the Soviet Union as the greatest geopolitical disaster of the 20th century. Anybody who has spent much time in that part of the world knows what Vladimir Putin is up to. And those who try placating him, by conceding ground and accommodating his wishes, will get nothing in return but more trouble.

What did the Obama Administration get from Russia for its abandonment of Poland and the Czech Republic, and for its famous “Reset” button? Another deeply flawed election and continued Russian opposition to sanctioning Iran for its pursuit of nuclear weapons.

In the short of it, President Obama’s cancellation of America’s agreements with the Polish and Czech governments was a serious blow to the hopes and aspirations of millions of Europeans. For twenty years, these peoples have done nothing but strive to move closer to us, and to gain the opportunities and security that America offered. These are faithful friends and NATO allies, and they deserve better. The impact of making two NATO allies walk the plank won’t be felt only in Europe. Our friends throughout the world are watching and wondering whether America will abandon them as well.

Big events turn on the credibility of the United States – doing what we said we would do, and always defending our fundamental security interests. In that category belong the ongoing missions in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the need to counter the nuclear ambitions of the current regime in Iran. Candidate Obama declared last year that he would be willing to sit down with Iran’s leader without preconditions. As President, he has committed America to an Iran strategy that seems to treat engagement as an objective rather than a tactic. Time and time again, he has outstretched his hand to the Islamic Republic’s authoritarian leaders, and all the while Iran has continued to provide lethal support to extremists and terrorists who are killing American soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan. The Islamic Republic continues to provide support to extremists in Syria, Lebanon, and the Palestinian territories. Meanwhile, the regime continues to spin centrifuges and test missiles. And these are just the activities we know about.

I have long been skeptical of engagement with the current regime in Tehran, but even Iran experts who previously advocated for engagement have changed their tune since the rigged elections this past June and the brutal suppression of Iran’s democratic protestors. The administration clearly missed an opportunity to stand with Iran’s democrats, whose popular protests represent the greatest challenge to the Islamic Republic since its founding in 1979. Instead, the President has been largely silent about the violent crackdown on Iran’s protestors, and has moved blindly forward to engage Iran’s authoritarian regime. Unless the Islamic Republic fears real consequences from the United States and the international community, it is hard to see how diplomacy will work.

Next door in Iraq, it is vitally important that President Obama, in his rush to withdraw troops, not undermine the progress we’ve made in recent years. Prime Minister Maliki met yesterday with President Obama, who began his press availability with an extended comment about Afghanistan. When he finally got around to talking about Iraq, he told the media that he reiterated to Maliki his intention to remove all U.S. troops from Iraq. Former President Bush’s bold decision to change strategy in Iraq and surge U.S. forces there set the stage for success in that country. Iraq has the potential to be a strong, democratic ally in the war on terrorism, and an example of economic and democratic reform in the heart of the Middle East. The Obama Administration has an obligation to protect this young democracy and build on the strategic success we have achieved in Iraq.

We should all be concerned as well with the direction of policy on Afghanistan. For quite a while, the cause of our military in that country went pretty much unquestioned, even on the left. The effort was routinely praised by way of contrast to Iraq, which many wrote off as a failure until the surge proved them wrong. Now suddenly – and despite our success in Iraq – we’re hearing a drumbeat of defeatism over Afghanistan. These criticisms carry the same air of hopelessness, they offer the same short-sighted arguments for walking away, and they should be summarily rejected for the same reasons of national security.

Having announced his Afghanistan strategy last March, President Obama now seems afraid to make a decision, and unable to provide his commander on the ground with the troops he needs to complete his mission.

President Obama has said he understands the stakes for America. When he announced his new strategy he couched the need to succeed in the starkest possible terms, saying, quote, “If the Afghan government falls to the Taliban – or allows al-Qaeda to go unchallenged – that country will again be a base for terrorists who want to kill as many of our people as they possibly can.” End quote.

Five months later, in August of this year, speaking at the VFW, the President made a promise to America’s armed forces. “I will give you a clear mission,” he said, “defined goals, and the equipment and support you need to get the job done. That’s my commitment to you.”

It’s time for President Obama to make good on his promise. The White House must stop dithering while America’s armed forces are in danger.

Make no mistake, signals of indecision out of Washington hurt our allies and embolden our adversaries. Waffling, while our troops on the ground face an emboldened enemy, endangers them and hurts our cause.

Recently, President Obama’s advisors have decided that it’s easier to blame the Bush Administration than support our troops. This weekend they leveled a charge that cannot go unanswered. The President’s chief of staff claimed that the Bush Administration hadn’t asked any tough questions about Afghanistan, and he complained that the Obama Administration had to start from scratch to put together a strategy.

In the fall of 2008, fully aware of the need to meet new challenges being posed by the Taliban, we dug into every aspect of Afghanistan policy, assembling a team that repeatedly went into the country, reviewing options and recommendations, and briefing President-elect Obama’s team. They asked us not to announce our findings publicly, and we agreed, giving them the benefit of our work and the benefit of the doubt. The new strategy they embraced in March, with a focus on counterinsurgency and an increase in the numbers of troops, bears a striking resemblance to the strategy we passed to them. They made a decision – a good one, I think – and sent a commander into the field to implement it.

Now they seem to be pulling back and blaming others for their failure to implement the strategy they embraced. It’s time for President Obama to do what it takes to win a war he has repeatedly and rightly called a war of necessity.

It’s worth recalling that we were engaged in Afghanistan in the 1980’s, supporting the Mujahadeen against the Soviets. That was a successful policy, but then we pretty much put Afghanistan out of our minds. While no one was watching, what followed was a civil war, the takeover by the Taliban, and the rise of bin Laden and al-Qaeda. All of that set in motion the events of 9/11. When we deployed forces eight years ago this month, it was to make sure Afghanistan would never again be a training ground for the killing of Americans. Saving untold thousands of lives is still the business at hand in this fight. And the success of our mission in Afghanistan is not only essential, it is entirely achievable with enough troops and enough political courage.

Then there’s the matter of how to handle the terrorists we capture in this ongoing war. Some of them know things that, if shared, can save a good many innocent lives. When we faced that problem in the days and years after 9/11, we made some basic decisions. We understood that organized terrorism is not just a law-enforcement issue, but a strategic threat to the United States.

At every turn, we understood as well that the safety of the country required collecting information known only to the worst of the terrorists. We had a lot of blind spots – and that’s an awful thing, especially in wartime. With many thousands of lives potentially in the balance, we didn’t think it made sense to let the terrorists answer questions in their own good time, if they answered them at all.

The intelligence professionals who got the answers we needed from terrorists had limited time, limited options, and careful legal guidance. They got the baddest actors we picked up to reveal things they really didn’t want to share. In the case of Khalid Sheik Muhammed, by the time it was over he was not was not only talking, he was practically conducting a seminar, complete with chalkboards and charts. It turned out he had a professorial side, and our guys didn’t mind at all if classes ran long. At some point, the mastermind of 9/11 became an expansive briefer on the operations and plans of al-Qaeda. It happened in the course of enhanced interrogations. All the evidence, and common sense as well, tells us why he started to talk.

The debate over intelligence gathering in the seven years after 9/11 involves much more than historical accuracy. What we’re really debating are the means and resolve to protect this country over the next few years, and long after that. Terrorists and their state sponsors must be held accountable, and America must remain on the offensive against them. We got it right after 9/11. And our government needs to keep getting it right, year after year, president after president, until the danger is finally overcome.

Our administration always faced its share of criticism, and from some quarters it was always intense. That was especially so in the later years of our term, when the dangers were as serious as ever, but the sense of general alarm after 9/11 was a fading memory. Part of our responsibility, as we saw it, was not to forget the terrible harm that had been done to America … and not to let 9/11 become the prelude to something much bigger and far worse.

Eight years into the effort, one thing we know is that the enemy has spent most of this time on the defensive – and every attempt to strike inside the United States has failed. So you would think that our successors would be going to the intelligence community saying, “How did you did you do it? What were the keys to preventing another attack over that period of time?”

Instead, they’ve chosen a different path entirely – giving in to the angry left, slandering people who did a hard job well, and demagoguing an issue more serious than any other they’ll face in these four years. No one knows just where that path will lead, but I can promise you this: There will always be plenty of us willing to stand up for the policies and the people that have kept this country safe.

On the political left, it will still be asserted that tough interrogations did no good, because this is an article of faith for them, and actual evidence is unwelcome and disregarded. President Obama himself has ruled these methods out, and when he last addressed the subject he filled the air with vague and useless platitudes. His preferred device is to suggest that we could have gotten the same information by other means. We’re invited to think so. But this ignores the hard, inconvenient truth that we did try other means and techniques to elicit information from Khalid Sheikh Muhammed and other al-Qaeda operatives, only turning to enhanced techniques when we failed to produce the actionable intelligence we knew they were withholding. In fact, our intelligence professionals, in urgent circumstances with the highest of stakes, obtained specific information, prevented specific attacks, and saved American lives.

In short, to call enhanced interrogation a program of torture is not only to disregard the program’s legal underpinnings and safeguards. Such accusations are a libel against dedicated professionals who acted honorably and well, in our country’s name and in our country’s cause. What’s more, to completely rule out enhanced interrogation in the future, in favor of half-measures, is unwise in the extreme. In the fight against terrorism, there is no middle ground, and half-measures keep you half exposed.

For all that we’ve lost in this conflict, the United States has never lost its moral bearings – and least of all can that be said of our armed forces and intelligence personnel. They have done right, they have made our country safer, and a lot of Americans are alive today because of them.

Last January 20th, our successors in office were given the highest honors that the voters of this country can give any two citizens. Along with that, George W. Bush and I handed the new president and vice president both a record of success in the war on terror, and the policies to continue that record and ultimately prevail. We had been the decision makers, but those seven years, four months, and nine days without another 9/11 or worse, were a combined achievement: a credit to all who serve in the defense of America, including some of the finest people I’ve ever met.

What the present administration does with those policies is their call to make, and will become a measure of their own record. But I will tell you straight that I am not encouraged when intelligence officers who acted in the service of this country find themselves hounded with a zeal that should be reserved for America’s enemies. And it certainly is not a good sign when the Justice Department is set on a political mission to discredit, disbar, or otherwise persecute the very people who helped protect our nation in the years after 9/11.

There are policy differences, and then there are affronts that have to be answered every time without equivocation, and this is one of them. We cannot protect this country by putting politics over security, and turning the guns on our own guys.

We cannot hope to win a war by talking down our country and those who do its hardest work – the men and women of our military and intelligence services. They are, after all, the true keepers of the flame.

Thank you very much.

The Democrats Public Option Deception

Contact Your US Senators & Congresswoman, Educational Material, In The News, Media Propaganda Exposed, US Congress Legislation October 21, 2009 1 Comment

BigGovernment.com by Morgen Richmond : Nothing we have uncovered previously is as comprehensive and breathtakingly direct as a new audio clip of Paul Krugman we discovered this week. Krugman is speaking on health care reform at Hunter College on July 16, 2008. It’s a long clip at ~5:00 (unedited), but if you want to know why liberals are continuing to fight tooth and nail for the public option, here it is in astonishing detail (click below to listen):

The Public Option Deception

Just a couple of quick points on this. Since I already knew about this hidden agenda, what I found most striking was Krugman’s admission that even without a public option the system would largely look like a single payer system. Based on the subsidies for lower wage earners, and the fact that everyone else is paying for these with taxes on top of their insurance premiums. (And with the bills being discussed in Congress, subsidies are provided up to 300-400% of the federal poverty level).

Also, I should point out that a “Rube Goldberg device”, which Krugman used as a metaphor, is a term for an over-engineered solution to a simple problem. In this case, designed to obscure the solution they are actually looking for, i.e. single payer.

However, the critical point in all of this is the sheer scope of this deception on the part of the Administration – and the media. Paul Krugman and Ezra Klein have been two of the most prominent media advocates for healthcare reform throughout the debate this year. With numerous appearances on television and their blogs at the New York Times and the Washington Post, respectively. And while they are both unabashedly partisan, this should not excuse them from direct and honest reporting.