But the most important battles are still to come Gun Owners of America E-Mail Alert 8001 Forbes Place, Suite 102, Springfield, VA 22151 Phone: 703-321-8585 / FAX: 703-321-8408 http://www.gunowners.org Wednesday, April 8, 2009 Thank you for your activism last week on the budget resolution, especially given the short notice. (Please realize that GOA has no control over when votes are scheduled, so sometimes we have to alert you with little time before the vote takes place!) While the budget resolution for fiscal year 2010 has now passed the Senate and the House in different forms, we were able to secure some significant victories in the Senate. First, with 64 favorable votes, the Senate passed an amendment by Sen. Roger Wicker (R-MS) to force the federally subsidized Amtrak to allow passengers to carry firearms in checked bags. In addition, the Senate adopted an amendment offered by Senator James DeMint (R-SC) to prohibit any system of nationalized health care which would prevent Americans from being able to select their doctors and insurance companies. This amendment could make it more difficult to institute either socialized medicine or a Massachusetts-style insurance that requires everyone to purchase [government approved?] insurance. This is good news for gun owners. A "mandated" insurance system could not only cost you up to $1,000 month, but could also result in your most sensitive personal information being placed in a medical database -- information that could easily be used to put more names on the gun prohibition list (NICS). The budget resolution now goes to conference committee, where anti-gunners are expected to strip out both of our pro-gun amendments. But these amendments did pin senators down on important issues early in the budget war, which was an important strategic objective. It is unclear when the conference report on the budget resolution will be sent back to the Senate and the House. One possibility is that the resolution will be held in conference until September. The Democrat leadership has ominously threatened to produce a bill that would require mandatory health insurance. They are not talking about this openly, but as a recent editorial in The Washington Post confessed: "Though only some of the players [on Capitol Hill] will say so now, the [health care] plan will ultimately include a mandate requiring everyone to have insurance." (April 6, 2009) You see, the power players on Capitol Hill are not admitting this openly because the American people oppose it. But if they set in motion a process to help sneak such a "mandate" into law, then gun owners will only have a few weeks to stop it in September. This is why we need to keep the pressure on liberty-leaning Senators during the ensuing months. Please stay tuned. **************************** Olofson Update David Olofson continues to languish in prison for a malfunctioning rifle. GOA attorneys made oral arguments before the federal appeals court in Chicago on January 23. They pointed out that the government withheld from the jury that the Supreme Court itself, along with a government training manual, has made it clear that a gun functioning like Olofson's was not a machine gun but simply a malfunctioning gun. If this decision is not overturned, any owner of a semi-automatic firearm could find himself sitting in jail next to David Olofson. Generous individuals have made monthly commitments of $10 a month (or more). This has enabled Candy Olofson to take care of their three kids and keep her job as a nurse without having to get a second job. The Olofson Relief Fund has been making the monthly payments of approximately $1300 combined for the family car and mortgage. Understandably, some have had to stop making their monthly contributions. Can you step up to the plate and take their place? If so, please go to http://gunowners.org/olofson.htm and use your favorite credit card to make an automatic monthly donation of $10 (or more). If you can't commit to a monthly charge, that same page accepts one-time donations... every little bit helps. ****************************
Archive for April, 2009
Some Victories Last Week During The First Budget Skirmish
April 9, 2009DOW HOSTING STATEWIDE AQUATIC NUISANCE SPECIES TRAININGS AND WORKSHOPS
April 9, 2009DENVER, Colo.–The Colorado Division of Wildlife today announced it will host a variety of Aquatic Nuisance Species trainings and workshops throughout Colorado in April and May. The courses are designed to provide the required certification and training for anyone conducting ANS monitoring and sampling, or providing watercraft inspections and decontamination services in Colorado.
“We want to make sure that everyone sampling for aquatic nuisance species or conducting boat inspections is following standardized procedures,” said Elizabeth Brown, Division of Wildlife invasive species coordinator. “It is our priority to ensure our partners have the best information and tools to protect our waters from zebra and quagga mussels, and other aquatic nuisance species.”
State and federal agencies, counties, municipalities, private entities, water managers, conservation groups and boating and angling groups are invited to attend.
All courses are free-of-charge but early registration is required.
ANS Annual Workshops
ANS Workshops provide detailed information on a variety of ANS including zebra/quagga mussels, aquatic weeds and pathogens. The workshops, co-sponsored by the Colorado Weed Management Association, are open to anyone including fisheries biologists, weed managers, watershed groups and reservoir managers. Workshops begin at 9 a.m. and adjourn at 4:30 p.m.
April 28, Grand Junction ANS Workshop, Mesa County Fairgrounds in Grand Junction
May 5, Denver ANS Workshop, Jefferson County Fairgrounds in Golden
State ANS Sampling and Monitoring Training School
This training is required for anyone conducting ANS sampling or monitoring, including zebra and quagga mussels, in Colorado. A permit is required to conduct ANS sampling in Colorado and permits will be awarded following completion of the training. Participants must attend all three days.
April 15-17
Day 1: Boulder Library and Boulder Creek (10 a.m. — 4 p.m.)
Day 2: Chatfield State Park in Littleton (8:30 a.m. — 4:30 p.m.)
Day 3: Federal Center in Lakewood (8:30 a.m.– 4:30 p.m.)
Watercraft Inspection and Decontamination State Certification Course (Stage II)
This certification course is required for anyone conducting watercraft inspections and decontaminations in Colorado. Anyone who has received training in the past must also attend one two-day course to be a “state certified” agent. Continuing education is required due to new regulations and changes in protocols from last year. Participants must attend both days to receive their certification. The tentative schedule for day one begins at 9 a.m. and concludes at 4 p.m. Day two begins at 9 a.m. and concludes at 2 p.m.
April 9-10, Northeast Colorado Training, Larimer County Visitors Center (located just north of Carter Lake)
April 13-14, Denver Metro Training, Jefferson County Fairgrounds, Golden
April 29-30, Grand Junction Training, Mesa County Fairgrounds, Grand Junction
May 6-7, Blue Mesa Training, Blue Mesa Reservoir
May 12-13, Grand County Training, USFS Facility “The Village” in between Granby and Grand Lake
For more information, contact Elizabeth Brown at elizabeth.brown@state.co.us, or call (303)291-7362
To register for trainings, contact Suzan Schafer at suzan.schafer@state.co.us, or call (303)291-7355.
For more information about Division of Wildlife go to: http://wildlife.state.co.us.
Someone forgot to tell killers that murder is against the law
April 8, 2009More good writing from an Examiner author!
Credit all of the state legislatures around the country that made it a crime to murder people. This has been the situation in this country even before we were a country, so the laws against murder are not new, and could not possibly have been overlooked by killers, no matter who they are.
Read About It: The Examiner
Support for Gun Control Laws at All Time Lows
April 8, 2009Well imagine that? Why could this be? Perhaps because even many democrats don’t trust the imposter in chief and his administration?
In Gallup polling conducted prior to last week’s gun massacre at an immigrant center in Binghamton, N.Y., only 29% of Americans said the possession of handguns by private citizens should be banned in the United States. While similar to the 30% recorded in 2007, the latest reading is the smallest percentage favoring a handgun ban since Gallup first polled on this nearly 50 years ago.
Read About It: Gallup Poll
If He Can Make It Here, He Could Make It Anywhere!
April 8, 2009Okay folks, I don’t know how on earth this slipped past me, but better late then never I suppose, and yes, the NRA should have proof read this before posting it. SOURCE
| Friday, April 03, 2009 |
| For those of you who don’t closely follow local politics in Manhattan, Richard Aborn, former president of then-Handgun Control, Inc. (now Brady Center) is running for Manhattan DA, and he has secured some endorsements for his race based in large part on his support for gun control.
Former New York City Police Department and current Los Angeles police commissioner Bill Bratton blessed Aborn’s race, noting their working relationship on, among other items, the Brady bill. Bratton also cited Aborn’s work with Mayor Bloomberg on “meaningful gun control and regulation.” Aborn was also endorsed by NY Assemblyman Danny O’Donnell, brother of the well-known, shrill, anti-gun crusader, Rosie O’Donnell. Danny O’Donnell cited the following in issuing his endorsement:
Someone needs to educate Assemblyman O’Donnell that “protecting civil liberties” while whittling away the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding Americans are mutually exclusive. And finally, from Aborn’s own campaign site, he lists these bona fides: GUN CONTROL LEADER
Enough said. |
From the Left: More Lousy Obama Nominees
April 5, 2009And there are still those that think the impostor in chief isn’t all about destroying America? Read on…
According to Harold Koh, Obama’s nominee for the State Department’s legal adviser and considered a possible future Obama Supreme Court pick, Shariah law (i.e., Islamic law) may properly be used to determine certain court cases. That’s just one of Koh’s off-the-wall positions. A former dean of Yale Law School, Koh is a proponent of what’s called a “transnational legal process,” which equates our constitutional process with laws instituted in other nations. That’s akin to accepting the currency of Zimbabwe (where a loaf of bread can cost billions) at a 1-to-1 ratio for our dollar — discounting the administration’s best efforts to match Zimbabwean hyperinflation. Koh believes that it’s “appropriate for the Supreme Court to construe our Constitution in the light of foreign and international law” in its decisions, regardless of the will of American voters. Think same-sex marriage, affirmative action and detainment of terrorists.
Koh has also claimed that together North Korea, Saddam-era Iraq and the United States compose an “axis of disobedience” because each “flagrantly” has disobeyed international law. But as far as disregarding the law himself, in 1994 he said, “I’d rather have [former Supreme Court Justice Harry] Blackmun, who uses the wrong reasoning in Roe [v. Wade] to get the right results, and let other people figure out the right reasoning.” In light of his obvious hostility to America and its Constitution, how can Koh take the oath to support and defend them?
In other nomination news, yet another Obama pick fessed up and paid back taxes this week — and it’s not an April Fool’s joke. Health and Human Services nominee Kathleen Sebelius, who replaced tax cheat Tom Daschle, amended three years’ worth of returns and paid nearly $8,000 to the IRS for “unintentional errors.” Asked for his thoughts, Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus said, “I think she should be confirmed.”
Department of Military Correctness: Murtha’s Award
April 5, 2009In yet another mind-boggling illustration that much of the upper echelon of American leadership, even some military leadership, is totally detached from reality, the United States Navy has given Rep. “Fightin'” John Murtha (D-PA) its Distinguished Public Service Award, the highest public service recognition given to a non-employee by the Department of the Navy. This would be the same John Murtha who, in May 2006, slandered U.S. Marines by accusing them of war crimes, saying they were nothing but “cold-blooded killers” who “murdered innocent civilians.”
The Navy’s perverse citation says that Murtha “ensured” that the America’s sailors and Marines “were provided the resources necessary to effectively conduct the global war on terrorism.” Words fail us in trying to describe the juxtaposition of Murtha’s award with his actions in the real world.
Needless to say, there are plenty of folks who are displeased with the Navy’s actions. The director of the Vets For Freedom Educational Institute, Gabe Ledeen, who is also a Marine veteran of Operation Iraqi Freedom, has posted a “Don’t Honor John Murtha” petition online, rightly saying that Murtha is unworthy of such an award. The petition calls on Murtha to “apologize for slandering the Marines … and for undermining the efforts of those servicemen and women who fought in Iraq,” pointing out that Murtha “has routinely and deliberately undermined the United States military, slandered servicemen serving in combat, and caused irreparable damage to our international reputation.” If Murtha doesn’t apologize, the award should be rescinded. Perhaps those in the Navy responsible for this decision should also apologize for giving a lying, treasonous coward one of its highest awards.
Hope ‘n’ Change: The (Toxic) Elephant in the Room
April 5, 2009What follows is an article that points out the utter failure by the current administration to understand fundamental principles of economics, and just about every other aspect of governing.
The nation’s Kommissar of Economic Cheerleading, a.k.a. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, unveiled his plan to save our ailing economy this week — the so-called Public-Private Investment Program (PPIP). The announcement was punctuated by a much-ballyhooed 500-point surge in the Dow, an indication that the market, at least, likes PPIP. But why wouldn’t it? Investors tend to appreciate “free” money.
At its core, PPIP provides investors with mega-leveraged government financing. Patterned roughly after the Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC) thrift bailout plan of the late ’80s, PPIP is composed of two parts: The first part addresses “legacy” loans; the second, “legacy” securities. “Legacy,” incidentally, is the new kinder-gentler buzzword for “toxic,” as in “toxic assets,” the former nom du jour for radioactive financial instruments like subprime mortgages and mortgage-derived securities.
PPIP offers private investors enormous amounts of cheap, taxpayer-backed financing for every dollar they put up of their own money. Under the program, government lends up to 85 percent of investor funding, with the Treasury “investing” one dollar of taxpayer money for each private capital dollar to cover the remaining 15 percent.
From an investor’s standpoint, of course, there’s no personal downside. Investors leverage government money at a 6-to-1 ratio and the lion’s share of any losses generated are absorbed by taxpayers. Thus, if a borrower defaults on his mortgage, the government would only be able to seize the real estate — private investors walk away relatively unhurt.
Independent of taxpayer liability, however, the program is not without risk. As indicated by Vincent Reinhart, American Enterprise Institute resident scholar and director of the Monetary Affairs Division of the Federal Reserve, PPIP assumes that “assets are troubled because their true values are obscured by irrational self-doubt and market illiquidity, and not by fundamental problems in the prospects of repayment. It also assumes that the solution to problems created by excessive leverage is for government to encourage more leverage.”
Apart from PPIP, our strategic issue, the elephant in the room, is one of accountability. Helped by a willing media, the central focus has been shifting from Congress and the Executive branches to business. Still, for all the finger pointing at banks and insurers, and for all post-hoc economic crater repairing, we hope those as yet unenlightened Americans who have been blinded by the Obama media will soon learn the origins of this mess: government.
The AIG Saga Continues
April 5, 2009The Senate this week significantly slowed the progress of a punitive 90 percent tax on bonuses for executives of companies receiving federal bailout money. Reflecting the cooling position of the White House, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) announced that the upper chamber would first debate a bill for national service followed by the 2010 budget. Last week, Reid planned to bring the bill to the floor right after it passed the House 328-93. So, what changed Harry’s mind?
President Obama’s recent statement that “We cannot govern out of anger” played a part, though this was also a significant change from what he had said just a few days prior. Obama first said he would “pursue every legal avenue to block these bonuses.” Therein lies the problem. This tax may actually be unconstitutional, and if the White House is not going to support it, then the Senate is likely to retreat.
The Constitution specifically outlaws bills of attainder, measures that impose punishments on a select group through legislation without trial. The tax currently being proposed is a direct result of the revelation that American International Group, the poster child of the recent federal bailout craze, was about to pay $165 million in bonuses to its top executives. Congress was outraged that AIG would have the nerve to make such a move, particularly after the federal government bought an 80 percent stake in the foundering company for the bargain price of $170 billion. Claiming that their punitive tax is not a bill of attainder is a bit disingenuous. However, the statements of politicians alone cannot be counted on to hold up in court. After all, politicians will say anything. Therefore, the burden of proof in the constitutionality of the tax lies in its impetus. Is it meant to punish greedy AIG execs, or is it meant to protect the massive, and unsolicited, support of the taxpayers?
On the other hand, the issue may just fizzle out. New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo successfully persuaded at least 15 AIG bonus recipients to return up to $50 million in bonus money. He hopes to recover up to $80 million in total — the other $85 million was given to employees outside the U.S. and is therefore, as even he admits, out of his jurisdiction. Cuomo’s efforts may thus save the constitutional law professor in chief from getting into a protracted argument over constitutional issues. After all, the president needs to preserve his diminishing political capital for another day.
One area in which Obama is considering spending some political capital is his idea to regulate pay for all executives, regardless of prior federal involvement. If he wants “Atlas Shrugged” to further come to life, that’s one way to do it. Companies that cannot determine the salaries of their own management will take their business overseas, and executives who don’t get paid what they are worth could go the way of Rand’s protagonist, John Galt. Government has no business making decisions regarding pay in the private sector, any more than it does in making decisions on prices — an unconstitutional folly perpetrated before.
An interesting addendum: AIG is suing the IRS to recover $306 million in taxes, interest, penalties and court costs. AIG maintains that the IRS inaccurately determined the company improperly claimed $62 million in tax credits and that the agency also billed AIG for taxes it claims the company should have paid. Many see the lawsuit as the high point of gall, but the fact is, if the company did indeed overpay its taxes or was improperly charged by the IRS, it has a duty to rectify the situation for its shareholders, who are now predominantly American taxpayers.
States Rebellion Pending
April 5, 2009This article from the Patriot Post (see sidebar) points out what many blogs have been posting about for months.
States Rebellion Pending
By Walter E. Williams
Our Colonial ancestors petitioned and pleaded with King George III to get his boot off their necks. He ignored their pleas, and in 1776, they rightfully declared unilateral independence and went to war. Today it’s the same story except Congress is the one usurping the rights of the people and the states, making King George’s actions look mild in comparison. Our constitutional ignorance — perhaps contempt, coupled with the fact that we’ve become a nation of wimps, sissies and supplicants — has made us easy prey for Washington’s tyrannical forces. But that might be changing a bit. There are rumblings of a long overdue re-emergence of Americans’ characteristic spirit of rebellion.
Eight state legislatures have introduced resolutions declaring state sovereignty under the Ninth and 10th amendments to the U.S. Constitution; they include Arizona, Hawaii, Montana, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington. There’s speculation that they will be joined by Alaska, Alabama, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Nevada, Maine and Pennsylvania.
You might ask, “Isn’t the 10th Amendment that no-good states’ rights amendment that Dixie governors, such as George Wallace and Orval Faubus, used to thwart school desegregation and black civil rights?” That’s the kind of constitutional disrespect and ignorance that big-government proponents, whether they’re liberals or conservatives, want you to have. The reason is that they want Washington to have total control over our lives. The Founders tried to limit that power with the 10th Amendment, which reads: “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.”
New Hampshire’s 10th Amendment resolution typifies others and, in part, reads: “That the several States composing the United States of America, are not united on the principle of unlimited submission to their General (federal) Government; but that, by a compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a General Government for special purposes, delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government; and that whensoever the General Government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force.” Put simply, these 10th Amendment resolutions insist that the states and their people are the masters and that Congress and the White House are the servants. Put yet another way, Washington is a creature of the states, not the other way around.
Congress and the White House will laugh off these state resolutions. State legislatures must take measures that put some teeth into their 10th Amendment resolutions. Congress will simply threaten a state, for example, with a cutoff of highway construction funds if it doesn’t obey a congressional mandate, such as those that require seat belt laws or that lower the legal blood-alcohol level to .08 for drivers. States might take a lead explored by Colorado.
In 1994, the Colorado Legislature passed a 10th Amendment resolution and later introduced a bill titled “State Sovereignty Act.” Had the State Sovereignty Act passed both houses of the legislature, it would have required all people liable for any federal tax that’s a component of the highway users fund, such as a gasoline tax, to remit those taxes directly to the Colorado Department of Revenue. The money would have been deposited in an escrow account called the “Federal Tax Fund” and remitted monthly to the IRS, along with a list of payees and respective amounts paid. If Congress imposed sanctions on Colorado for failure to obey an unconstitutional mandate and penalized the state by withholding funds due, say $5 million for highway construction, the State Sovereignty Act would have prohibited the state treasurer from remitting any funds in the escrow account to the IRS. Instead, Colorado would have imposed a $5 million surcharge on the Federal Tax Fund account to continue the highway construction.
The eight state legislatures that have enacted 10th Amendment resolutions deserve our praise, but their next step is to give them teeth.
Conservative Libertarian Outpost 