The Supreme Court's punt on Prop 8
The
US Supreme Court issued a mealy mouth ruling today on California's
Constitutional Amendment that defines marriage as the union of one man
and one woman. Californians voted twice to protect traditional
marriage. First on Mar 7, 2000 and then again on Nov. 4, 2008 with
Proposition 8 which after its passage became a part of the California
Constitution - § 7.5 to Article I. When it was
challenged in the courts by gay activists, a gay federal judge ruled it
unconstitutional. In other words, this jurist opined that the
California Constitution was itself unconstitutional.
Then
both Gov. Brown and his sidekick the lefty Attorney General Kamala
Harris refused to appeal the ruling. Without an appeal the ruling stands.
Notwithstanding that both state officials had sworn oaths to uphold
the constitutions, both of California and that of the United
States.They didn't.Of course, in a normal red state, they would be
impeached or recalled.
In California, the media here hailed them as "brave" and "heroes" for defying the majority will of some 6.500.000 Californians. How is trashing the constitution and substituting your own personal beliefs while running to the aid of a powerful special interest group now heroic? After the governor failed to appeal, the sponsors of Prop. 8 stepped in. This is reasonable as many citizen-sponsored initiatives attack a government law or policy. If there was to be a lower court ruling against each of the new initiatives, citizen initiatives would never get appealed if all the government had to do was to sit it out.
The California Supreme Court ruled in 2011 that initiative sponsors could represent their initiatives in court. This ruling gave them standing. This is why the case was able to go to the California Supreme Court.
In
today's ruling the Supreme Court said that states have the right to
make their own rules about gay marriage. But apparently, they're not
entitled to make their own rules about "standing." And so the Supremes ruled that they couldn't hear the case as the appellants lacked "standing."
This type of technical kick back to the lower court is bogus. This
ruling proved fatal to the proponents of Prop. 8 and to the 6,500,000
Californian's who voted for it.
A
simple slight of hand and the Constitution disappears - not with a
bang but with a whimper. It showed an enormous lack of courage to so
trivially treat one of the most important social issues of our time. Can
a free people make their own laws or shall a single judge or a court
of appeals overrule 6,500,000 voters on a technicality? Justice
Roberts, who also contorted the law for Obamacare, has now outdone that first act.
How Will America Hold Together?
By A.D. 200, the Roman Republic was a distant memory. Few citizens of the global Roman Empire even knew of their illustrious ancestors like Scipio or Cicero. Millions no longer spoke Latin. Italian emperors were a rarity. There were no national elections.Yet Rome endured as a global power for three more centuries. What held it together?
A stubborn common popular culture and the prosperity of Mediterranean-wide standardization kept things going. The Egyptian, the Numidian, the Iberian and the Greek assumed that everything from Roman clay lamps and glass to good roads and plentiful grain were available to millions throughout the Mediterranean.
As long as the sea was free of pirates, thieves cleared from the roads, and merchants allowed to profit, few cared whether the lawless Caracalla or the unhinged Elagabalus was emperor in distant Rome.
Something likewise both depressing and encouraging is happening to the United States. Few Americans seem to worry that our present leaders have lied to or misled the Congress and the American people without consequences.
Most young people cannot distinguish the First Amendment from the Fourth Amendment -- and do not worry that they cannot. Washington, Jefferson and Lincoln are mere names of grammar schools but otherwise unidentifiable to most.
Separatism is believed to bring dividends. Here in California, universities conduct separate graduation ceremonies predicated on race -- sometimes difficult given the increasingly mixed ancestry of Americans.
As in Rome, there is a vast disconnect between elites and the people. Almost half of America receives some sort of public assistance, and another half pays no federal income tax. About one-seventh of Americans are on food stamps.
Yet housing prices in elite enclaves -- Manhattan, Cambridge, Santa Monica, Palo Alto -- are soaring. The wealthy like to cocoon themselves in Roman-like villas, safe from the real-life ramifications of their own utopian ideology.
The government and the media do their best to spread the ideals of radical egalitarianism while avoiding offense to anyone. There is no official war on terror or against radical Islamism. Instead, in "overseas contingency operations" we fight "man-caused disasters" while at home dealing with "workplace violence."
In news stories that involve crimes with divisive racial themes, the media frequently paper over information about the perpetrators. But that noble restraint only seems to incite readers. In reckless fashion they often post the most inflammatory online comments about such liberal censorship. Officially, America celebrates diversity; privately, America is fragmenting into racial, political and ideological camps.
So why is the United States not experiencing something like the rioting in Turkey or Brazil, or the murder of thousands in Mexico? How are we able to avoid the bloody chaos in Syria, the harsh dictatorships of Russia and China, the implosion of Egypt or the economic hopelessness now endemic in Southern Europe?
About half of America and many of its institutions operate as they always have. Cal-Tech and MIT are still serious. Neither interjects race, class and gender studies into its engineering or physics curricula. Most in the IRS, unlike some of their bosses, are not corrupt. For the well driller, the power plant operator and the wheat farmer, the lies in Washington are still mostly an abstraction.
Get up at 5:30 a.m. and you'll see that most of the nation's urban freeways are jammed with hard-working commuters. Every day they go to work, support their families, pay their taxes and avoid arrest -- so that millions of others do not have to do the same. The U.S. military still more closely resembles our heroes from World War II than the culture of the Kardashians.
Like diverse imperial Roman citizens, we are united in some fashion by shared popular tastes and mass consumerism. The cell phones and cars of the poor offer more computing power and better transportation than the aristocracy enjoyed just 20 years ago.
Youth of all races and backgrounds in lockstep fiddle with their cell phones as they walk about. Jeans are an unspoken American uniform -- both for the Wall Street grandees and the homeless on the sidewalks. Left, right, liberal, conservative, professor and ditch digger have similar-looking Facebook accounts.
If Rome quieted the people with public spectacles and cheap grain from the provinces, so too Americans of all classes keep glued to favorite video games and reality-TV shows. Fast food is both cheap and tasty. All that for now is preferable to rioting and revolt.
Like Rome, America apparently can coast for a long time on the fumes of its wonderful political heritage and economic dynamism -- even if both are little understood or appreciated by most who still benefit from them.
http://townhall.com/columnists/victordavishanson/2013/06/27/how-will-america-hold-together-n1628162/page/full
Republican Party Won't Survive Amnesty Bill and Neither will America
The Republican Party
won't survive the passing of the Democrat's illegal immigration amnesty
bill. This shouldn't be too complex for the D.C. geniuses: if you
betray your party's base to pander to the opposition's base, they win, you lose.
If you screw the white working class to pander to the Hispanic vote, whites will stay home.
If you destroy your base's trust in government, by passing yet another 2000 page bill no one has read, Republicans will stay home. Republicans are too busy working and raising a family to waste their time voting for a bunch of cynical, lying politicians.
President Bush let down his base by spending money like a drunken sailor. They stayed home.
Obama lost Democrat voters in 2012, but he won anyway because an estimated 6 million white voters stayed home compared to 2008. Who were these election drop-outs? Rural, working class Republicans. What issues did these voters care about? They are deficit hawks, and want to see government spending come under control - not a swelling of the welfare state to support illegals. They hate illegal immigration. They want good education and a solvent Medicare system. They want to feel listened to by their own party. And they will not vote for a party that betrays them, no matter how awful the other side is.
The Democrats want "comprehensive" immigration reform because it legalizes eleven (or is it twenty?) millionillegals, brings in their families and on top of that, doubles the number of legal immigrants. Plus the CBO says 75% of illegal immigration would continue. This will create a record number of foreign-born legals and illegals, mostly Spanish-speaking, mostly third world, mostly a net drain on taxpayers. We are talking about an estimated 56 million people within a decade. According to the Center for Immigration studies, "There has never been a period in American history when the foreign-born share grew this fast."
The immigration bill will permanently wipe away America as we know it. Democrats believe this will mean a permanent voting majority for their big government welfare state. They are right. We will become Republicans' worst nightmare: a nanny state with a permanent Democrat majority who feel entitled to live on taxpaying families.
Hopes for a good economic future for America's blacks and working class will be sunk, as they are forced to compete for low wage jobs. Hopes for constitutionally limited government will be sunk, as we get an unassimilated influx of third world people who do not understand our republic and the principals for which it stands.
Republican politicians, we are told, think the amnesty bill will be good for them personally. They have business and agribusiness lobbyists who profit from illegals and new immigrants' low wages and no benefits. The Republican leadership is willing to sell out America to fatten their own political coffers - and they think they can survive the voters' wrath?
The cost of illegal immigration to the taxpayers of Los Angeles County alone is $1 billion a year. For the country's taxpayers, it is already well over $100 billion a year. Most of the expense to support illegals is at the state and local government. We hear about the taxes paid by illegals, but that covers 5% of the local and state government spending on them, and only 30% of federal outlays.
Even low-skill, low-wage legal immigrants are a burden on their fellow citizens. According to the Heritage Foundation:
For the 11 million illegals who are about to be given amnesty, it is far, far worse:
We are looking at crushing tax burden for Americans.
So why is the Republican leadership going along? Do their voters want higher taxes, a bankrupt safety net, a bigger government? Amnesty and an explosion of legal immigration betray every promise made during the election, and every interest of the majority of Republican voters.
Read our lips: we do not want amnesty.
If you screw the white working class to pander to the Hispanic vote, whites will stay home.
If you destroy your base's trust in government, by passing yet another 2000 page bill no one has read, Republicans will stay home. Republicans are too busy working and raising a family to waste their time voting for a bunch of cynical, lying politicians.
President Bush let down his base by spending money like a drunken sailor. They stayed home.
Obama lost Democrat voters in 2012, but he won anyway because an estimated 6 million white voters stayed home compared to 2008. Who were these election drop-outs? Rural, working class Republicans. What issues did these voters care about? They are deficit hawks, and want to see government spending come under control - not a swelling of the welfare state to support illegals. They hate illegal immigration. They want good education and a solvent Medicare system. They want to feel listened to by their own party. And they will not vote for a party that betrays them, no matter how awful the other side is.
The Democrats want "comprehensive" immigration reform because it legalizes eleven (or is it twenty?) millionillegals, brings in their families and on top of that, doubles the number of legal immigrants. Plus the CBO says 75% of illegal immigration would continue. This will create a record number of foreign-born legals and illegals, mostly Spanish-speaking, mostly third world, mostly a net drain on taxpayers. We are talking about an estimated 56 million people within a decade. According to the Center for Immigration studies, "There has never been a period in American history when the foreign-born share grew this fast."
The immigration bill will permanently wipe away America as we know it. Democrats believe this will mean a permanent voting majority for their big government welfare state. They are right. We will become Republicans' worst nightmare: a nanny state with a permanent Democrat majority who feel entitled to live on taxpaying families.
Hopes for a good economic future for America's blacks and working class will be sunk, as they are forced to compete for low wage jobs. Hopes for constitutionally limited government will be sunk, as we get an unassimilated influx of third world people who do not understand our republic and the principals for which it stands.
Republican politicians, we are told, think the amnesty bill will be good for them personally. They have business and agribusiness lobbyists who profit from illegals and new immigrants' low wages and no benefits. The Republican leadership is willing to sell out America to fatten their own political coffers - and they think they can survive the voters' wrath?
The cost of illegal immigration to the taxpayers of Los Angeles County alone is $1 billion a year. For the country's taxpayers, it is already well over $100 billion a year. Most of the expense to support illegals is at the state and local government. We hear about the taxes paid by illegals, but that covers 5% of the local and state government spending on them, and only 30% of federal outlays.
Even low-skill, low-wage legal immigrants are a burden on their fellow citizens. According to the Heritage Foundation:
In 2010, in the U.S. population as a whole, households headed by persons without a high school degree, on average, received $46,582 in government benefits while paying only $11,469 in taxes. ...Lawful immigrants receive significantly more welfare... than U.S.-born households...with the same education level.
For the 11 million illegals who are about to be given amnesty, it is far, far worse:
Amnesty would provide unlawful households with access to over 80 means-tested welfare programs, Obamacare, Social Security, and Medicare. ... The typical unlawful immigrant is 34 years old...If amnesty is enacted, the average adult unlawful immigrant would receive $592,000 more in government benefits over the course of his remaining lifetime than he would pay in taxes.
Over a lifetime, the former unlawful immigrants together would receive $9.4 trillion in government benefits and services and pay $3.1 trillion in taxes. They would generate a lifetime fiscal deficit (total benefits minus total taxes) of $6.3 trillion. (All figures are in constant 2010 dollars.) This ... understates real future costs because it undercounts the number of unlawful immigrants and dependents ... and underestimates significantly the future growth in welfare and medical benefits.
We are looking at crushing tax burden for Americans.
So why is the Republican leadership going along? Do their voters want higher taxes, a bankrupt safety net, a bigger government? Amnesty and an explosion of legal immigration betray every promise made during the election, and every interest of the majority of Republican voters.
Read our lips: we do not want amnesty.
Deportation Suggests Ominous Shift in Family Policies
Panelists warn about restrictions on home schooling
The Family Research Council hosted the discussion titled, “Should the State Raise Your Kids,” featuring Michael Donnelly, director of international affairs at the Home School Legal Defense Association, and Daniel Blomberg, legal counsel for the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty.
The case raising the question is that of the German Romeike family, which sought asylum in 2008, claiming that the German government’s refusal to let them home school their children was tantamount to persecution. The Obama administration dismissed the family’s plea for asylum in the United States.
Americans should ask themselves if they believe the state should be allowed to encroach on parents’ rights to make health related and education decisions for their children, Donnelly said.
“Those are the kinds of decisions parents should be able to make and the government should be protecting that not trying to encroach on it further,” Donnelly said.
Uwe and Hannelore Romeike began home schooling their children in 2006 because they felt the public school curriculum did not adhere to their Christian beliefs. As a result, the government heavily fined the family and once seized the children and forced them to attend school.
Germany prohibits home school education unless a parent’s job requires frequent moves or the child has disabilities, said Blomberg. The law orders all school age students to attend a public or state-run school.
An immigration judge granted the family asylum in 2010 because he said the Romeikes had a justified fear of religious persecution if they returned to Germany.
The Board of Immigration Appeals overturned the first ruling in 2012 arguing that Germany was prosecuting the family for “breaking a neutral law applied to everybody” not persecuting them for their religion, according to Donnelly.
Donnelly presented a video featuring the Romeike family talking about their fears of returning to Germany.
“They would try to ruin our family,” Uwe Romeike said. “For the German government it’s important to have first right on education of children because they want to impose their worldview, rather than have parents forming their children according to their worldview, which might be different.”
The Romeikes appealed their case in April to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals but the board’s decision was upheld.
Donnelly said the Romeikes deserve asylum, citing a clause in the Immigration and Nationality Act (INA) protecting them as a “recognized social group persecuted” because of “their religion.”
“Germany is actively seeking to prevent the Romeikes and others like them from exercising their fundamental right to live their faith,” Blomberg said. “That’s precisely why this nation has an asylum law in the first place so that we can serve as a refuge for those who’ve been denied their most fundamental human rights.”
The Romeikes are currently appealing the 6th Circuit and asking that the entire court hear their case, not just the three-panel judge that heard their case on April 23. If the court denies the appeal, the family will go to the Supreme Court, said Donnelly.
http://freebeacon.com/deportation-suggests-ominous-shift-in-family-policies/
Obama
Administration Exempts American Indians from Obamacare Mandate - See
more at:
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/obama-administration-exempts-american-indians-obamacare-mandate#sthash.GbdNcgoe.dpuf
Obama Administration Exempts American Indians from Obamacare Mandate
Obama administration on Wednesday broadened an exemption for American Indians from the new health care law's requirement that virtually every U.S. resident has health insurance starting next year.
New rules clarify that people who are eligible to receive medical care through the federal Indian Health Service will be exempt from the requirement to have health insurance or face fines from the Internal Revenue Service. The Indian Health Service, a division of U.S. Health and Human Services, oversees a network of clinics that are required through treaty obligations to serve all patients of Indian ancestry, even if they cannot document their federal tribal status.
"Today, we continue to fulfill our responsibility to consult and work with tribal communities," Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius said in a statement.
Last month, The Associated Press reported that the Affordable Care Act exempted only American Indians and Alaska Natives who can document their membership in one of about 560 tribes recognized by the U.S. Bureau of Indian Affairs. Yet more than 100 tribes nationwide are recognized only by states and not the federal government.
That meant thousands of people who consider themselves Native Americans would have to buy their own health insurance policies or pay a $695 fine to the Internal Revenue Service unless they could prove they were eligible to claim an exemption under the Affordable Care Act. The health care law mandates that all Americans carry insurance, with just a few exemptions.
Caitrin McCarron, manager of congressional relations at the National Indian Health Board, said tribal advocates are pleased that the administration added an exemption for Native Americans who are eligible for services through an Indian health care provider. But the board is still pushing for Congress to change that section of the federal law.
"We are really pleased that HHS decided to move forward with this exemption," McCarron said. "However, we still believe that this was a stop-gap measure. Because it's not a legislative fix and it's the secretary's exemption waiver, a future secretary could reverse the policy."
While the exemption provides Native Americans who aren't part of a federally recognized tribe with some financial relief, other discrepancies remain. Jay Stiener, an analyst with the National Council of Urban Indian Health in Washington, D.C., said some Native Americans could be on the hook for co-pays, deductibles and other cost-sharing requirements.
Also, he said members of federally recognized tribes are eligible to enroll throughout the year but not others.
The 2010 Census found that nearly one-third of the 6.2 million people who self-identify as American Indian or Alaska Native lack health insurance and that 28 percent live in poverty.
In California alone, about 21,000 people who currently receive free health care through Indian clinics are not recognized as Native American by the federal government and would have to pay the penalty, according to the nonprofit California Rural Indian Health Board.
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/obama-administration-exempts-american-indians-obamacare-mandate#sthash.GbdNcgoe.dpuf
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