Posts Tagged ‘SCOTUS’

Get the evil bastards!

August 31, 2009

Get general Motors for supplying the vehicles that are used by drunk drivers to kill and maim all across the land! While you are at it, get Ford Motor Company as well!

Alright, I twisted a few things. So be it. Beat me with a wet noodle so I can sue a pasta manufacturer into oblivion… When I first read about this I was reminded of a televised debate between Ari Armstrong and the hopeless hopolophobe and criminal Tom Mauser on PBS one evening. The essence is about being able to put the blame on one party, due to the sole actions of another person. I find that immoral to the extreme…

Tracking new cases: Suing gun makers

Sunday, August 30th, 2009 7:39 am | Lyle Denniston | Print This Post
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NOTE: From time to time, the blog will examine significant new cases as they are filed at the Supreme Court.  This post is one in that series.  Some of these cases very likely will appear later in the blog’s Petitions to Watch feature when the Court is ready to consider them.

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Seeking to revive a lawsuit against a gun manufacturer over a teenager’s accidental but fatal shooting of a friend, lawyers for the Illinois parents of the dead boy have asked the Supreme Court to strike down a four-year-old federal law that shields the industry from many — but not all — lawsuits.  The petition in Adames, et al. v. Beretta USA Corp., filed last Monday and docketed as 09-253, can be downloaded here.  That file includes the appendix.  For a link only to the Illinois Supreme Court decison rejecting the constitutional challenge, click here.

The 2005 law – titled the Protection of Lawful Commerce in Arms Act — was controversial when passed, and has been attacked repeatedly since then in court.  The challengers have argued variously that Congress either had no power to wipe out already-filed lawsuits against gun makers, or that it went too far in doing so. So far, the Supreme Court has not been willing to get into the controversy, and the first issue facing the new lawsuit is whether it is sufficiently different that it can not only draw the Justices’ interest, but also overcome likely resistance from the federal government.

Last March 19, the Court denied review in two cases challenging the Act — New York City, et al. v. Beretta (08-530) and Lawson, et al. v. Beretta (08-545).  The federal government joined in both of those cases to defend the law, and successfully urged the Court not to hear either one, arguing that neither one raised clearly the issues it sought to put forward.  In the new case, the Justice Department was not involved as it went through Illinois courts, but because a federal law could be at stake, it could do so in the Court.

The narrower issue in the Illinois case is whether the specific lawsuit by the dead boy’s parents fits within an exception in the 2005 law that permits some cases to go ahead.  The broader issue is whether Congress has intruded too deeply into the way states craft their own laws, barring those that test issues arising under state common law, allowing at least some that test a state statute.  The petition quotes at length from congressional floor debates, with lawmakers blasting juries and judges for fashioning “novel” ways to attack the gun industry while showing respect for laws that emerge from state legislatures.

The tragedy that led to the Adames lawsuit in Illinois occurred eight years ago, when 13-year-old Billy Swan aimed and fired a Beretta pistol at a friend who had come over to play, Joshua Adames, who also was 13. The gun belonged to Billy’s dad, a Cook County sheriff’s deputy. Billy had taken out the gun’s clip before aiming it, believing that would make it harmless. A bullet that had remained in the gun’s chamber killed Joshua.

Billy’s parents sued Beretta, among others, contending that the gun manufacturer failed to warn users of this kind of pistol that removal of the magazine did not make it safe.  Without a cheap device to prevent just such accidents, and without a specific warning about the hazard, the pistol was too dangerous, the lawsuit contended. (There were other claims, but that one is the center of the case now.)

While a lower state court allowed that claim to proceed, the Illinois Supreme Court blocked the lawsuit altogether.  It ruled that, because Billy had intentionally aimed the gun and pulled the trigger, the incident did not come within the exception Congress had made to the lawsuit ban.  But it also went further, and found that the law did not run afoul of the Constitution’s Tenth Amendment, and its protection of state laws, because it did not “commandeer” state officials or processes to carry out some federal order or duty.

Taken to the Supreme Court by some of the same lawyers who pursued one of the earlier challenges, the Adames petition puts its primary stress on the Tenth Amendment issue. That Amendment, leaving states free to create their own laws when the powers have not been assigned to Congress, bars Congress from dictating to states “which branch of state government may authorize  liability against a particular industry so long as the federal enactment does not ‘commandeer’ state officials,” the petition argues.

The Illinois court, like the Second Circuit Court (in one of last Term’s cases), deferred to Congress “when it determined which branch of state government it would recognize as the authoritative expositor of state law, as well as limiting the scope of the Tenth Amendment to its anti-commandeering principle,” the filing contends.  That “cannot be reconciled with our system of federalism,” it says.

On what kinds of lawsuits are affected by the 2005 law, the petition argues that the reach of that law “is an issue of pressing national importance that courts nationwide are continually struggling with and which requires this Court’s definitive construction.”

The Beretta company’s response to the appeal is now due by Sept. 28, unless the time to file is extended.

SOURCE

Incorporation: Beast or Blessing?

August 25, 2009

Incorporation used in this context will apply to legal terminology.

First, I suppose that I will need to go pee in the various swelled headed Lawyers morning bowl of oatmeal. I believe that you simply do not have to be a Lawyer in order to understand the difference between what is right and wrong. Moral, or immoral. Lawyers write really neat briefs and such. However, as I pointed out to a Jury once. They are disconnected all to often with reality.

Now, on to the point that I intend to make. The Supreme Court, and in all the downstream Courts there is a hierarchy. The Supreme Court of the United States is above, or has authority over the Courts of Appeals, which have authority over United State District Courts, which can over rule State Courts, and so on down the line. My terminology may be a bit off here, but, after all I’m not in the business of Law. I am a retired Paramedic, and the son of a dead Marine. So, if any corrections are needed as to the chain of command I will accept them.

The point here is that within the legal community there are big dogs, and then there are bigger dogs, and so on. I was taught that Law operates in the same manner. As in, there is the highest Law in the land the United States Constitution, including the Bill of Rights. All this is pretty logical so far. There is indeed a clear cut chain of command. Not to tough for a kid that attended High Schools in Southern California to understand. Or anywhere else as far as that goes.

However, it seems that some people just can’t figure out that simple principle. Those people are called Lawyers, or at least that is how it appears. No, not all Lawyers. Some actually can think like normal people do. Others though, simply can’t understand normal thinking as an old Scot saying goes…

So now, as a result of illogical and quite possibly immoral action we the American people are about to be Lorded over yet again by a bunch of blithering nincompoops that probably should be tarred and feathered! Oh, I forgot, that they had that made “illegal” so that they can’t be held accountable…

Read on folks, and warm up some tar as you send you children off to the barn for Great grandma’s old feather bed.

A federal appeals court on September 24 will hear a high-profile gun rights case that’s a leading candidate to end up before the U.S. Supreme Court.

The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals is likely to decide whether the Second Amendment’s guarantee of a right to “keep and bear arms” restricts only the federal government — the current state of affairs — or whether it can be used to strike down intrusive state and local laws too.

A three-judge panel ruled that the Second Amendment does apply to the states. But now a larger Ninth Circuit panel will rehear the case, a procedure reserved only for issues of exceptional importance, which means the earlier decision could be upheld or overruled.

Two other circuits have said the Second Amendment does not apply to the states, a legal term known as “incorporation.” If the Ninth Circuit’s en banc panel continues to disagree with its peers, the Supreme Court almost certainly would step in.

The Ninth Circuit case involves Russell and Sallie Nordyke, who run a gun show business that would like to rent Alameda County’s fairgrounds (the county includes Oakland and is across the bay from San Francisco). After being blocked, they sued. The author of the ordinance in question, then-county supervisor Mary King, actually claimed such shows are nothing but “a place for people to display guns for worship as deities for the collectors who treat them as icons of patriotism.”

The hearing is set for 10 a.m. PT in the federal courthouse at 95 Seventh Street in San Francisco.

A few other items:

California Update: I wrote an article three months ago about a lawsuit filed by the Second Amendment Foundation and the Calguns Foundation saying routine denials of concealed carry permits violate the Second Amendment’s right to bear arms. Oral arguments on a preliminary motion in that case are scheduled for the same day — September 24 — at 2 p.m. in Sacramento.

In a brief filed on Monday, Sacramento (one of the counties sued) says it wants more time to question the gun owners who filed the case to verify that they’re in a position to sue. “Defendants seek to depose the individual plaintiffs on these issues to determine the basis of their alleged ‘undisputed facts,’ what process each plaintiff has engaged in to the end of obtaining a carry concealed permit in Sacramento County,” it says.

Some Guns Are More Equal Than Others: Nobody has been hurt by the protesters who have legally carried guns to events where the president has been speaking, and I know of no evidence that they were even close enough to see the man.

Nevertheless, Eleanor Holmes Norton, the District of Columbia’s non-voting Democratic rep in the U.S. House of Representatives, wants mandatory “gun-free zones around the president, his cabinet and other top federal officials,” according to a report by the local Fox affiliate. Similarly, the Brady Campaign told CBS News that guns have no place at such an event.

It’s Official: Congratulations to the Calguns Foundation for being awarded non-profit status by the IRS. Gene Hoffman, chairman of the Calguns Foundation, told me on Monday evening that the group is now officially a 501(c)(3) non-profit; previously, the non-profit status had been pending.

Montana Update: You may remember that a Montana state law seeks to challenge the federal government on the manufacture and sale of guns made entirely within the state. It takes effect on October 1. As soon that happens, according to Montana Shooting Sports Association president Gary Marbut, gun-rights types will have a lawsuit ready to file to prevent federal prosecution of local would-be gunsmiths.

“We have some strong arguments to make, including some that have never been argued before about the (U.S. Constitution’s) Commerce Clause and the Tenth Amendment, as far as I know,” Marbut told me on Monday.

Paging The Ninth Circuit: I just noticed yet another case in which a judge has declined to extend the Second Amendment to state or local laws. The case is called Slough v. Telb and arose out of a gun seizure in Ohio.

U.S. District Judge David Katz ruled on August 14: “The United States Supreme Court has never held that the Second Amendment is enforceable against the states by incorporation into the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment. Courts in other circuits have held that Second Amendment rights are not enforceable against the states under (civil rights laws). As the weight of authority holds that the individual right to bear arms may not be enforceable against the states, the constitutional right to do so is anything but clearly established.”


Declan McCullagh is a correspondent for CBSNews.com. He can be reached at declan@cbsnews.com. You can bookmark the Taking Liberties site here, or subscribe to the RSS feed.

And here it comes…

August 24, 2009

There are many ways to undermine Liberty. Make gun control into a “health” issue is one. More on that at a later date… Then, as if that isn’t outrageous enough. The anti liberty and freedom crowd are making traditional human things into First Amendment arguments. That’s right, hunting and fishing are on the table for the Black Crow Cowards. As a First Amendment issue no less...

Full Story

What next? Will WordPress become a Tenth Amendment issue because some bloggers here post things that some people take offense too?

Rosen: Sotomayor won’t disappoint liberals

July 23, 2009

The soon to be anointed Justice Sotomeyor performed pretty much as I expected her to during the Senate conformation hearings. She doesn’t really frighten me so much as the next appointee sticks into a job for life. After all, replacing a sexist constitution hating member of the Supreme Court with another will not make all that much difference. The next one though? The impostor in chief just might get a Second Amendment ruling of the people kind… In any case Mike Rosen summed up the hearings pretty well. Read on;

Predictably, the confirmation hearings for Sonia Sotomayor were mostly for show.

The senators played their roles, just as Sotomayor played hers. Democrats sang her praises and lobbed her softballs. Republicans homed in on her controversial decisions, which she deftly parried with contradictory assertions, evasions, rationalizations, circumlocutions and lateral arabesques.

When pressed to explain how she might rule on future cases, she liberally invoked the “Ginsburg rule,” institutionalized in 1993 when Ruth Bader Ginsburg refused to answer hypothetical questions during her confirmation hearing. (How do they get away with that? If you were interviewing someone for a job, wouldn’t you want to know how they’d deal with future contingencies?)

Alas, in politics, this is the way the game is played. Nominees hold their cards close to the vest. Candor takes a back seat to tap dancing, carefully crafted ambiguity, and declarations of motherhood and apple pie. Even Justices Samuel Alito and John Roberts pulled their punches as nominees. The last Supreme Court candidate to say what he really believed — and eloquently, at that — was Robert Bork. He wasn’t confirmed.

As was expected, conservatives were unsatisfied with many of Sotomayor’s answers. But the mixed reviews on the left were more interesting. Pragmatists within the liberal establishment, rooting for Sotomayor, took her coy answers at face value and declared her to be respectably moderate. E.J. Dionne asserted that “she is the most conservative choice that President Obama could have made.” NPR’s oh-so-liberal judicial “reporter” Nina Totenberg hilariously opined on the “Charlie Rose” show that Sotomayor may be even more conservative on some issues than Justice Anthony Scalia!

Maureen Dowd lamented Sotomayor’s retreat from her earlier preening about the superiority of “a wise Latina woman” but explained why it was necessary. “As any clever job applicant knows,” admitted Dowd, “you must obscure as well as reveal, so she sidestepped the dreaded empathy questions — even though that’s why the president wants her.”

On the far left, political pragmatism gave way to doctrinaire ideological grandstanding. This was their moment to proudly proclaim their judicio-political creed. Dahlia Lithwick told MSNBC she was upset that Sotomayor and the Democrats “bought into [Chief Justice Roberts‘] notion that judges call balls and strikes” rather than ruling on their personal opinions.

Rabbi Michael Lerner, chair of the Network of Spiritual Progressives — and a socialist, one-world, Kumbaya utopian of the first order — urged Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee to “make statements that explain why a liberal or progressive worldview is precisely what is needed on the Supreme Court.” If they had any backbone, Lerner said, they should declare: “We intend to vote for you, Judge Sotomayor. But we hope that you overcome this notion that you’ve been putting forward that your task on the Supreme Court is simply to enforce the law . . . we hopePresident Obama picked someone who was not just a passive ratifier of precedent, but a creative thinker who could look at the needs of American society today and help shape laws that fit these new realities.”

Lerner then rejected the “false notion that law is somehow impartial” and condemned the “rich white men” who made those laws and the “corporate power” they serve. Whew, what a mouthful!

Liberals needn’t worry. Sotomayor will be reliably “progressive,” if not the left-wing revolutionary Lerner hoped for. To believe otherwise, you’d have to imagine that theObama team got suckered by a closet conservative. No way. Only Republican presidents make mistakes like that. We’ll see soon enough when she takes her seat and starts casting votes and writing opinions. I’m betting Sotomayor will beRuth Bader Ginsburg with a Latino flavor.

Mike Rosen’s radio show airs weekdays from 9 a.m. to noon on 850-KOA.

SOURCE

Time to put the heat on your Senators as Sotomayor hearings begin.‏

July 13, 2009
Should We be Surprised by Sotomayor's Radical Views?
-- Time to put the heat on your Senators as hearings begin

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

"I will be talking [to Judge Sotomayor] about the question of 
foreign law and the question of [her] commitment to the Second 
Amendment, the right to keep and bear arms....  President Obama, who 
nominated Judge Sotomayor, has a rather limited view of what the Second 
Amendment guarantees." -- Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL), June 2009

Monday, July 13, 2009

Today, the U.S. Senate commences hearings on Justice Sonia Sotomayor, 
who was nominated by President Obama to replace the retiring Judge 
David Souter on the U.S. Supreme Court.

In many ways, Sotomayor's views are out-of-step with our American 
heritage and with the views of Americans in general.  For example, 
Sotomayor believes that our fundamental law is constantly evolving and 
that rights are constantly changing with the times.

But should we be surprised?  The President who nominated her holds some 
of the most radical views ever held by a resident of the White House.  
His take on the Constitution -- and the Second Amendment in particular 
-- has stationed him to the far left on the political spectrum.

Consider just a small snapshot of his record over the years:

* As President, Obama has nationalized much of the car and banking 
industry and is now looking to do the same with health care.  Even the 
Marxist President of Venezuela, Hugo Chavez, joked on live television 
last month that he and Fidel Castro need to be careful or else "we 
are going to end up to [Obama's] right."

* As a U.S. Senator, Obama was ranked by the National Journal in 2007 
as the most liberal legislator in that chamber.  Realize that such a 
ranking put Obama to the left of 99 other Senators -- including an 
open, self-avowed socialist, Senator Bernie Sanders (I-VT).

* Like many socialists, Obama has supported some of the most extreme 
positions on gun control:  supporting a ban on handguns, opposing the 
repeal of the draconian DC gun ban, opposing the right of self-defense 
for residents in the Chicago suburbs, and much more.

Obama's brand of far-left politics sees the Constitution as moldable as 
a ball of wax.  In a 2001 interview, he criticized earlier Supreme 
Courts for "never ventur[ing] into the issues of redistribution of 
wealth....  It didn't break free from the essential constraints that 
were placed by the Founding Fathers in the Constitution."

Sotomayor appears to have the same view of our highest document, as she 
stated in 1996 that law is not "static and predictable," but 
"constantly overhaul[ed] and adapt[ed] [by lawyers and courts] to 
the realities of ever-changing social, industrial and political 
conditions."

ACTION:  Please urge your two Senators to vote AGAINST the Sotomayor 
nomination.  Tell them to cast a pro-gun vote on EVERY vote related to 
Judge Sonia Sotomayor (whether it's a vote on sustaining a filibuster 
or a vote on final passage).

Please use the Gun Owners Legislative Action Center at
http://www.gunowners.org/activism.htm to send your legislators the 
pre-written e-mail message below.

----- Pre-written letter -----

Dear Senator:

Judge Sonia Sotomayor's views are out-of-step with our American 
heritage and with the views of Americans in general.  Not surprisingly, 
the Rasmussen polling firm reported on July 1 that more Americans 
oppose her nomination than support her.

Sotomayor believes that our fundamental law is constantly evolving and 
that rights are constantly changing with the times.  But a majority of 
Americans disagree.  Multiple polls have found that almost 
three-fourths of all Americans believe that the Second Amendment of the 
U.S. Constitution protects the rights of "individuals" to own 
guns.  Not so for Judge Sotomayor:

* She ruled in United States v. Sanchez-Villar (2004) that "the 
right to possess a gun is clearly not a fundamental right."

* And earlier this year, Sotomayor was part of a three-judge panel 
which ruled in Maloney v. Cuomo that the Second Amendment does not 
apply to the states.  This makes her more liberal than the Ninth 
Circuit, which stated in the Nordyke case in April that the Second 
Amendment does apply to the states.

Please cast a pro-gun vote on EVERY vote related to Judge Sonia 
Sotomayor (whether it's a vote on sustaining a filibuster or a vote on 
final passage).

I would like to hear back from you on this.  Although rest assured, Gun 
Owners of America will keep me up to date on any further developments.

Sincerely,
---

Politics, and blindfolds, as in Lady Justice

May 7, 2009

The impostor in chief is about to have the opportunity to not only make history yet again but to put his stamp on generations to come. How so? With at minimum one appointment to the Supreme Court.

Justice is supposed to be blind, not filled with emotion. Not issuing rulings based upon personal desires, but upon law. This is most important when one is a Justice on a Supreme Court, be that of an individual state or the United States Supreme Court. The rulings that are made in those places have an effect all the way down to the individual citizen. They determine how one lives, or dies too as far as that goes.

All too often high courts thwart the intentions of the people that had laws passed in order to achieve their own (the courts) personal agenda. Be that a State Supreme Court or the U.S. Supreme Court. Of note, or example, would be the Colorado Supreme Court trashing the Tabor Amendment, and the U.S. Supreme Court by endorsing ex post facto law that also takes away unalienable rights for less than felony indiscretions. Or mysandry based regulation or law founded within the realm of political correctness.

Part of the duty of those courts is the protection of minority groups, be those racial, political or based upon gender. We have all but put away the arguments based upon racial superiority in America, at least within the legal concept. Racism does still exist in America, as well as everywhere else in the world but we are making headway on that front where as in many other parts of the world it is lip service at best. On the other two fronts we have not really changed much at all. We have simply exchanged one evil for the extreme opposite. That, is where things become incredibly difficult when choosing a Supreme Court Justice.

What follows is from yesterdays Patriot Post about this subject. You read, and decide if someone should be appointed, for life, to a position of near unbridled authority based upon the contents of their crotch, personal penchants, and ability to go with the flow. Or, upon personal integrity, honor, and sense of duty.

“[J]udges, therefore, should be always men of learning and experience in the laws, of exemplary morals, great patience, calmness, coolness, and attention. Their minds should not be distracted with jarring interests; they should not be dependent upon any man, or body of men.” –Johns Adams

Rule of men: “Now, the process of selecting someone to replace Justice (David) Souter is among my most serious responsibilities as president, so I will seek somebody with a sharp and independent mind and a record of excellence and integrity. I will seek someone who understands that justice isn’t about some abstract legal theory or footnote in a casebook; it is also about how our laws affect the daily realities of people’s lives, whether they can make a living and care for their families, whether they feel safe in their homes and welcome in their own nation. I view that quality of empathy, of understanding and identifying with people’s hopes and struggles, as an essential ingredient for arriving at just decisions and outcomes.” –President Barack Obama

From the gun grabbers: “[T]he Supreme Court has ruled in a direction that gives more opportunity for people to have guns. We never denied that right. We don’t want to take their guns away. We want them registered … and we have to rid the debate of the misconceptions that people have about what gun safety means.” –Nancy Pelosi

Non Compos Mentis: “Welcome to Cinco de Cuatro — Cinco de Mayo at the White House.” –Barack Obama (click here for video)

Quite taken with himself: “Everywhere I go, crowds spontaneously assemble. They start to cheer, whether I go to a play on Broadway or I’m going home to Wilmington, Delaware. I walk on the train. People stand up and clap.” –Vice President Joe Biden

Tacky: “If we had pursued what President Nixon declared in 1970 as the war on cancer, we would have cured many strains. I think Jack Kemp would be alive today. And that research has saved or prolonged many lives, including mine.” –Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA), who fits in just fine with his new party **”Specter’s use of Kemp’s death is not only tasteless but nonsensical. If Republicans killed Kemp by blocking cancer research, how is it that the research they blocked prolonged Specter’s life?” –James Taranto

“That President Obama has made ’empathy’ with certain groups one of his criteria for choosing a Supreme Court nominee is a dangerous sign of how much further the Supreme Court may be pushed away from the rule of law and toward even more arbitrary judicial edicts to advance the agenda of the left and set it in legal concrete, immune from the democratic process. Would you want to go into court to appear before a judge with ’empathy’ for groups A, B and C, if you were a member of groups X, Y or Z? Nothing could be further from the rule of law.” –Hoover Institution economist Thomas Sowell

“Mr. Obama will make Supreme Court history, all right. He will become the first president in American history to make lawlessness an explicit standard for Supreme Court justices. … He has boldly proclaimed that he intends to make sure his nominees to the Supreme Court don’t harbor any crusty fealty to the written Constitution, or the millenniums of Western law that undergird its principles, or to the timeless truths that underlie our Declaration of Independence.” –Judicial Confirmation Network counsel Wendy E. Long

“There is a reason that Lady Justice wears a blindfold. Justice is supposed to be blind to the race, gender, finances, politics — and every other ’empathy’-eliciting — characteristic of those who seek it in good faith.” –columnist Carol Platt Liebau

“It is dangerous in this day and age to use the word ‘fascism’ lightly. Liberals sling around the term ‘fascism’ without regard to its meaning — for the Left, ‘fascism’ applies to everything from religious social perspectives to conservative tax cut prescriptions. But economic fascism has a precise, defined meaning. And Barack Obama’s economic policy fulfills that meaning in every conceivable way.” –radio talk-show host Jerry Doyle

“Liberals do not win elections for Republicans. Conservatives win elections. Whenever conservatives try to placate liberals and show how sensitive and caring and in touch with the feelings and concerns of the other party they are, they lose. But when Republicans stand on principles and demonstrate conviction and give evidence that their ideas work, they win.” –columnist Cal Thomas

“The killer virus for Republicans hasn’t been intolerance inside the party for moderates. What cost Republicans control of the White House and Congress was alleged conservatives behaving too much like Democrats, especially on spending.” –columnist Brendan Miniter

All quotes by former Congressman Jack Kemp (1935-2009)

“As the GOP stumbles around Washington trying to be the party of Herbert Hoover, it’s sad to see so many Republicans drifting so far and so fast from the Reagan model that helped pave the way for the great, non-inflationary economic and jobs expansion of the past 25 years.”

“Democrats are quick to draw parallels with the stock-market crash of 1929. The irony is that it’s mostly the Democrats who want to repeat the mistakes that turned the Crash of ’29 into the Great Depression.”

“The first order of business must be debunking the Democrats’ notion that higher taxes will lead to a more prosperous America.”

“When you tax something you get less of it, and when you reward something you get more of it.”

“Our friends in the other party say the economy is moving forward, and it is. But it is moving like a ship dragging an anchor, the anchor of high taxes, excessive regulation and big government.”

Will the man that refuses to show his real birth certificate choose wisely, or rather based upon political correctness and expediency? Only time will tell.

Buttered popcorn and Budweiser beer

December 3, 2008

The Supremo’s have decided to take a look at Obama, and his constitutional qualifications as regards becoming the President of the United States. Given the courts propensity to buck real issues I have serious doubts that the Black Crows will do anything substantial.

Yes, on occasion they do actually accomplish something. However, it is most often a half baked attempt. That goes double if it truly is a constitutional issue. The recent D.C. gun control case is a perfect example. It only applies to D.C. while still leaving the door wide open for further oppression by those that know how to take care of all of us better then we ourselves do.

For my part I think that I will sit with a bowl of buttered popcorn and a Budweiser while I watch the show.

Second Amendment, I was correct it seems!

June 26, 2008

This has been a hot button issue for years. Yet, after the last two rulings that came down from the Supreme Court I had serious doubts that they would get this one on the correct side of the fence.

Face it, if you read the Federalist and Anti-Federalist papers, there was no doubt. If you read Blackstone their was no doubt. If you studied “The Rights of Englishmen.”  It became blatantly obvious that some things, like the ability to defend oneself effectively, and your neighbor, was not only a God given right, but a duty.

I am reading the full decision and have not yet determined the scope of this ruling.

http://www.scotusblog.com/wp/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/07-290.pdf

One would hope that this ruling will, in fact, and practice, strike down the draconian laws that deprive people in places like Chicago, New York City and elsewhereThe free fire zones that are so abundant across our nation have only resulted in innocent men, women, and children being slaughtered by people that are anything but innocent.

The Second Amendment is there as an individual right. It is not a privilege that is granted by any authority.

The “Supremes” again, and no, not the singing group

June 25, 2008

Today as I was driving the “Fruitliner” down I-225 there was breaking news … The Supreme Court had rendered yet another bizarre decision. That being, that the death penalty was both “cruel and unusual” punishment for child rapists.

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/26/washington/26scotuscnd.html?em&ex=1214625600&en=c70d615789f2e6fc&ei=5087%0A

Is it cruel? Certainly it is, almost as cruel as the crime. Is it unusual? Yes, and that needs changing in a big way.What really bothers me though, is that these “Justice’s” overturned the will of a jury, duly selected from the perpetrators peers. There was no indication of racial prejudice, or prosecutorial misconduct. It was the will of the people that this person had so violated acceptable norms set by the community where the act had been committed, that death was appropriate as societal retribution.

I spent more then twenty years working the streets as a Paramedic. I saw things that most people can only guess at. People are always asking, what was the most terrible thing that you ever saw? Guess what, it was child rape victims. Those kids lives were wrecked, forever, period. I went on calls involving three of them again years later, as suicides. As far as I am concerned, the rapist killed those kids. Others that do live? I have never seen one that was fully healed. Drugs, alcohol, and the absolute lack of an ability to have a fulfilling sex life themselves, or an ability to trust others are the norm. Worse yet, sometimes they became sexual abusers themselves.

The death penalty is appropriate for certain crimes …

I’m too angry to keep typing, more later …