Tag Archives: freedom

Contempt

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A Wall Street Journal piece centered on Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer’s (D, NY) supposed plan to bring President Joe Biden’s (D) and his Progressive-Democratic Party’s “Build Back Better Act” to a Senate floor vote in January, and therewith dare Senator Joe Manchin (D, VA) to vote against it, had the following highly instructive bit buried toward the end.

Congresswoman Pramila Jayapal (D, WA), Chairwoman of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, castigated Manchin over his decision regarding the Progressive-Democrats’ reconciliation bill:

We cannot hang the futures of millions of Americans on the words of one man who represents a state that has a tiny percentage of the country’s entire population.

Never mind that Senators and Representatives, at least nominally, work for their constituents and not for Party or the nation at large. Never mind, either, that pesky 10th Amendment, much less the 9th Amendment.

This is the utter contempt that Progressive-Democrats have for our Constitution and for the federal republican structure of our government that our Constitution creates.

This is the utter contempt that Progressive-Democrats have for us average Americans.

Everything from the center, and the center over everyone.

Seth Moulton’s Symbolism

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Congressman Seth Moulton (D, MA) had some thoughts on “saving Ukraine” in his Sunday WSJ op-ed. He began by announcing that our options are limited.

At this point, US options are limited. President Biden has already said he won’t send more troops.

Then he listed some things we could do, anyway, to show our support for Ukraine.

  • First, dramatically increase the speed of weapons procurement for Ukraine, and do so publicly. Washington must clearly articulate to the world how the weapons we provide will force Mr. Putin to incur substantial losses of Russian troops right away, not merely over time.
  • Second, organize effective sanctions. They must be targeted, powerful and widely agreed on in advance by NATO. … Mr Putin needs to know that he’ll have trouble buying a soda five minutes after he invades….
  • Third, clearly communicate the grave consequences of invading—not only to Mr. Putin, but to the Russian people.

All of those steps are necessary, but even in their aggregate, they’re insufficient. They’re especially so individually. We could—if the Progressive-Democratic Party, in control of Congress and the State and Defense Departments, were willing to stop slow-walking the supplies. But even if they were, it still would take weeks, at best, to get the weapons delivered in sufficient quantities, deployed, and the soldiers trained on them. Putin is ready to jump in days.

Effective sanctions? Certainly there is plenty of room to toughen them up, but consider: even if Putin were finding it hard to by a soda five minutes after invading—he’d still have Ukraine. There’s a real big so what factor in play here.

Clearly communicate the costs of invading…. On what basis does Moulton think either Putin or the Russian people would take anything Biden-Harris, or Blinken, or Austin—or Milley—have to say seriously? They’ve been weak and their words less than weak tea for the last eleven months.

No.

Also necessary is making concrete those suggestions. Biden-Harris must correct his assurance to Putin that he won’t resist Putin’s coming invasion of Ukraine (or of the Baltics, if Putin’s moves opposite Ukraine prove to be misdirection).

Biden-Harris must redeploy American troops (beginning from out of Germany, which disdains NATO, anyway, and so won’t miss them beyond the GIs’ spending on the German economy) into southern and northern Poland—opposite Ukraine and Kaliningrad—and into Lithuania.

Biden-Harris must move naval forces into US air strike range of Kaliningrad.

Biden-Harris must begin joint air training and CAP exercises with Ukrainian and Lithuanian air forces in those nations’ airspaces.

Absent these, the Progressive-Democrat’s suggestions are nothing but symbolism.

Insisting on your Rights is Uncooperative

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That’s the view of one lawyer.

It seems that the actor Alec Baldwin wanted a search warrant before he would turn over his cell phone to the Santa Fe Sheriff’s Department. Supposedly, Baldwin asked for one even before the sheriff asked for his cell in the apparent expectation that the sheriff would be asking.

Lawyer Christopher Melcher says that’s being uncooperative.

It is spin by Alec’s lawyer to say that he suggested the warrant. He refused to provide his phone without a warrant. That is not cooperation or a proactive suggestion.

What we think of Baldwin doesn’t matter. Nor does it matter whether he asked for the search warrant before or after the sheriff asked for his cell phone. Not only his right to have a search warrant implied by our Constitution. The government’s requirement to get one before any search is written in black letters in our Constitution:

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

What would be uncooperative would be the sheriff demanding Baldwin give up his cell phone without that warrant (which is different from the sheriff asking for it before getting the warrant in order to save some administrative hassle).

It’s attitudes like Melcher’s that give law enforcement and prosecutorial proceedings a bad name, whether or not Melcher is associated with either.

“Coy,” Is It?

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The Biden-Harris administration, in its argument for the government’s appeal in the 8th Circuit of a trial court’s rulings in Religious Sisters of Mercy v Azar and Catholic Benefits Association v Azar, steadfastly refused to say whether, in fact, these entities would be subject to government suit were those entities, in fact, to refuse to provide and cover so-called “gender transition” procedures. The case and the government’s “enforcement” vagaries center on

how the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and US Equal Employment Opportunity Commission (EEOC) interpret Section 1557 of the Affordable Care Act, which prohibits discrimination by gender identity, and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act in relation to RFRA [Religious Freedom Restoration Act].

Just the News mildly referred to that as the government being coy.

The government’s attorney, Assistant US Attorney Ashley Chung, then went so far as to tacitly threaten the judges:

She warned the judges not to “open the floodgates to premature litigation” based on “uncertainty” over how agencies might respond to new legal interpretations or court rulings.

This is a cynical argument by Chung. The judges won’t be opening floodgates for “premature” litigation. HHS and EEOC already have opened those floodgates with their carefully thought out decision to be “uncertain” in their “interpretation” of Obamacare, Title VII, and associated regulations and to be vague on their enforcement procedures for those.

Fundamentally Transform America

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Hillary Clinton, Progressive-Democrat and once a candidate for President and always a carper about the unfairness of her loss, now worries that were Donald Trump (D) to run for President again in 2024 and win, it

could be the end of our democracy.
Especially if he had a Congress that would do his bidding, you will not recognize our country[.]

“Our” America, says Clinton. She means her Progressive-Democrat travesty of a democracy were Party able to achieve its proudly stated goal of fundamentally transforming our nation with the socialist-driven economic policies they’re pushing so hard to enact and the racist and sexist identity politics moves they’re pushing so hard to implement.

That’s an America average Americans don’t want. We prefer a nation closer to that of our founding—limited government, personal responsibility, personal obligation, with that limited government stepping in only as a last resort, not the default.

Whether Trump runs and wins, or another Republican or Conservative President runs and is elected in 2024 to go with—hopefully—a majority Republican and Conservative House and Senate, we most definitely need to block the Clinton/Progressive-Democrat version and undo the damage Party already has done.