Tag Archives: government

It Doesn’t Wash

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The Department of Homeland Security wants a private company to provide a national license-plate tracking system that would give the agency access to vast amounts of information from commercial and law enforcement tag readers, according to a government proposal that does not specify what privacy safeguards would be put in place.

Such a national license-plate recognition database, ostensibly, would “help catch fugitive illegal immigrants.”  But once in existence, to what use would (not might) government put that database later?  Can you say NSA, boys and girls?  The danger is illustrated clearly, if unintentionally, by David Roberts, International Association of Chiefs of Police’s Technology Center Senior Program Manager:

We’d like to be able to keep the data as long as possible, because it does provide a rich and enduring data set for investigations down the line.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation understands (see the first link) the danger of Roberts’ goal:

Ultimately, you’re creating a national database of location information.  When all that data is compiled and aggregated, you can track somebody as they’re going through their life.

Such an open-ended dragnet of no one in particular, but simply of all of us, for vague, undefined future purposes in not consistent with individual liberty—or responsibility.

Even though the courts have ruled on “presumption of privacy,” they’ve gotten it wrong, basing their “assumption” on a measure of mindreading that simply doesn’t exist in our species.  The fact that the loud, vociferous, even zealous, hue and cry over evasions of privacy—real or perceived—even exists demonstrates that there is a very strong presumption of privacy held by each of us, even as we move about in public.

Indeed, the logic is flawed, also.  The fact that what we do is readily apparent to our fellow citizens as we wander the mall, walk the sidewalks, talk on our phones, drive on our streets, etc, is in no way an agreement the government can track our movements, much less create dossiers on each of us as we engage in these activities in the view of, or in concert with, our fellow citizens.

The government is not our fellow citizen; it is our political employee.  Even so, it has far too much power to be trusted with watching the things we let our fellow citizens see us do without a court’s oversight, without, for instance, a specific warrant for which a specific probable cause concerning a specific individual among us must first be demonstrated and sworn to by the government official desiring to investigate one of us.

The relationship between us—or any one of us—and government is not at all symmetrical, and there is very little reciprocity involved.  Arguments supporting such government activities as tracking of our out-of-home movements assume, erroneously, exactly that symmetry.

There’s no doubt that such a…tool…could achieve much good.  However, the good achieved is through convenience to government, not through a fundamental change in capabilities for hunting down specific bad guys.  The dangers such a tool represents to individual liberty and responsibility—to what it means to be an American—far outweigh the benefits of that convenience.

Update: Now HHS Undersecretary Jeh Johnson is saying the idea of having a private company develop a national database of our license plates has been canceled.  So, where are we?  Is the idea done?  Or is it being brought inside HHS, to be pursued sub rosa?

And why is the Undersecretary making this statement?  Where are the HHS Secretary, Kathleen Sebelius and her boss, President Barack Obama?

Progressive Gun Rights

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…are what government says they are.  Last week, though, the 9th Circuit, in a 2-1 decision, struck down a San Diego County, California law that asserted exactly that.  This law

requir[ed] residents to show a “pressing need” in order to get a permit to carry weapons in public.

However,

The judges found that in order to receive a permit, a person need only show a desire to defend himself outside the home.

Judge Diarmuid O’Scannlain, writing for the court, clearly does understand the situation.  Addressing three other Appellate Court rulings upholding public carry restrictions (a fourth Appellate Court struck such restrictions), he wrote

they misapprehend both the nature of the Second Amendment right and the implications of state laws that prevent the majority of responsible, law-abiding citizens from carrying in public for lawful self-defense reasons.

Jon Lowy, Director, Legal Action Project of the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence, demurred, however:

Neither history nor precedent supports this aberrant, split decision that concocts a dangerous right to carry hidden handguns in public places to people whom law enforcement has determined…have no good cause or qualifications to do so.

Rights are what a Progressive government says they are, according to this Progressive.

No, Mr Lowry.  You clearly do not understand inalienable rights, nor our Constitution.  The right to life is inalienable, and it carries with it the inalienable right to self-defense.  Neither are “concocted rights.”  These rights, moreover, carry within them the right to possess the means with which to carry out that defense.  Everywhere.  These inalienable rights are not at all limited to places convenient to government.  Full Stop.

Moreover, the 2nd Amendment of our Constitution says this:

A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

The binding document, within which our governments—at all levels—must operate, has said all there is to say on our right to keep and bear arms.  Especially in public.  Governments have very little at all to add regarding “good cause or qualifications.”  Full Stop.

Freedom of Speech

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The House Ways and Means Committee voted—on party lines—to move to the full House for debate (and passage) a bill that would delay Treasury’s proposed regulations that would “limit the political activities of so-called social welfare groups.”  These regulations are targeted at 501(c)(4) groups and written in a way that will affect conservative groups more than liberal groups.

That’s not what interests me, though.  What does interest me is a Democratic Party Congressman’s remark decrying the bill.  Congressman Bill Pascrell Jr (D, NJ), who sits on the Ways and Means Committee, said,

It is about disclosure.  Nowhere in the Bill of Rights does it say you have the right to say anything you want—and also not pay any taxes.

There are a couple of things wrong in this short statement….

Actually, there is such a right, and it’s not just in the Bill of Rights, but in the Constitution as a whole.  Our Constitution is a document that explicitly limits the Federal government to a short list of permitted activities and powers with which to carry out those activities: the 18 clauses of Article I, Section 8, and the powers enumerated in Articles II and III are the sum total of what the Federal government can do.  Nowhere in there is there any tying of political speech to the payment of taxes.  An American citizen has no obligation whatsoever to pay a tax to the Federal government in order to receive permission to speak publicly.

Moreover, what rights American citizens do have under this Constitution, especially in relation to the powers of the Federal government, were clearly laid out in The Federalist [emphasis added]

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…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….

and in the 9th and 10th articles of the Bill of Rights which Pascrell seems not to have read:

The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.

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.

and in the 1st article of the apparently unread Bill of Rights, which says this, in part:

Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom of speech….

Notice that: nowhere in there is speech tied to the payment of a tax.  Quite the opposite.  Speech cannot be abridged in any way, and taxes exist primarily to fund the government’s ability to engage in its outward looking authorizations.  In particular, taxes cannot be used to regulate—to abridge—speech.

To say to an organization, “If you want excusal from paying taxes, you must engage primarily in these kinds of activities” is entirely legitimate.  To say to that same organization, however, “If you want excusal from paying taxes, you may not speak of these things which we will identify for you,” is exactly that abridgment.  This is, nakedly, a tax on speech.

Then there’s this: “It is about disclosure.”  No, Congressman, it isn’t.  The Federal government has no legitimate interest in who says what in the political arena.  The articles in The Federalist were, every one, written by Publius, even though the authors in fact were Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay.  Anonymity is, in fact, a major protection for a speaker against a government that might presume to object to that speech and seek to act against the speaker—by, for instance, demanding a tax payment as a condition of being allowed to speak.

A propos this whole free speech limitation that the Democrats want to impose on us is this statement with which “Publius” opened The Federalist:

It has been frequently remarked, that it seems to have been reserved to the people of this country, by their conduct and example, to decide the important question, whether societies of men are really capable or not, of establishing good government from reflection and choice, or whether they are forever destined to depend, for their political constitutions, on accident and force.

This is a typical Democrat’s lack of understanding of our Constitution.

Attacking the Institution of the United States Senate

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Senator Jeff Sessions (R, AL) had some thoughts on the matter last Thursday in a Senate floor speech.

Our late colleague Senator Robert Byrd liked to say that there have been two great Senates in history: the Roman Senate and the US Senate.  He understood the special and crucial role the Senate fulfills in our Constitutional Republic.

And

Yet, in the last few years, we have witnessed the dramatic erosion of Senators’ rights and the dismantling of the open legislative process.

We fund the government through massive omnibus bills that no one has had the time to read or analyze.  Senators are stripped of their right to offer amendments.  Bills are rushed through under threat of panic, crisis, or shutdown.  Secret deals rule the day, and millions of Americans are essentially robbed of their ability to participate in the legislative process.

And

One of the tactics by which Majority Leader [D, NV, Harry] Reid has suppressed Senators’ rights and blocked open debate has been a technique called “filling the tree.”  What this means, basically, is that when a bill comes to the floor, the Leader will use his right of first recognition to fill all of the available amendment slots on a bill and block any other Senator from offering amendments.  One man stands in the way of his 99 colleagues.  But, not alone really.  His power exists only as long as his majority concurs and supports his actions. This…prevents Senators from being held accountable by their votes on the great issues of the day.
…
In so doing, the Leader denies the citizens of each state their equal representation in the Senate.  Majority Leader Reid, in his effort to protect his conference from casting difficult votes—in order to shield his Majority from accountability—has essentially closed the amendment process.  He has shut down one of the most important functions that Senators exercise to represent the interests of their constituents.

And

Recently, this tactic manifested itself in a dramatic way.  To the surprise and shock of many, the December spending agreement contained a provision that cut the lifetime pension payments of current and future military retirees—including wounded warriors—by as much as $120,000.  I and other Senators had many ideas for how to fix this problem, but we were blocked from offering them by the Majority Leader.
…

So I would ask my colleagues: … Do you believe the Senate should operate according to the power of just one man?

There are other avenues of attack, also.

The erosion of the Senate has also been front and center in the budgeting process.  We are now in our fifth year without adopting a congressional budget resolution.  Instead, taxpayer dollars are spent through a series of backroom deals and last-minute negotiations.  Then we face a massive omnibus that is rushed to passage without amendment or meaningful review.  The American people have no real ability to know what’s in it or hold us, their elected representatives, accountable.

And

[U]nder the tenure of Majority Leader Reid, the budgeting process has been totally mismanaged.  We have ceased consideration of appropriations bills altogether, relying more and more on autopilot resolutions and catch-all behemoth spending packages.  In fiscal year 2006, for example, every single appropriations bill was debated, amended, and passed in the Senate.  In 2013, none were.

And

A more ominous development, however, is how the breakdown of the appropriations process in the Senate is now infecting the House of Representatives, and spreading like the plague.  In the first year of their majority, the Republican-led House marked up six appropriation bills and sent them to the Senate.  The Senate didn’t consider a single one.  Last year, the House passed eight appropriation bills and sent them to the Senate.  Again the Senate didn’t act.  This year, the futility of the House efforts began to show as the House passed only four bills.  But why should they?  Why should the House expose their members to politically tough votes when they know the Senate won’t?

Finally [emphasis added],

All of us owe our constituents an open, deliberative process where the great issues of the day are debated in full and open public view.  Each Senator must stand and be counted—not hide under the table.

Remember all of this, as you consider for whom to vote for your Senator in the upcoming primaries and mid-term elections.

The VA Strikes Again

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Used to be, veterans could apply for disability via letter, even a hand written note.  Further, when that note arrived, coverage began for the applicant, should his application be accepted, including backdated payments to cover the period between receipt of the application and its acceptance.  Not anymore.

The Department of Veterans Affairs says the many ways that requests for disability compensation arrive actually hamper its ability to administer benefits, and they contribute to a claims backlog that has about 400,000 veterans waiting more than 125 days for a decision.  At times, workers spend so much time trying to figuring out what’s being claimed and trading letters with applicants that it’s slowing down decisions for everyone.

Never mind that the Godfather of the VA, General Omar Bradley, its first MFWIC, told VA staff that they were there to serve the veterans, not themselves.

According to the VA’s bright idea,

the first communication from a veteran may not trigger anything.  Those veterans who put their claims in writing would have to completely fill out a standard form [generally on line], and the clock that determines how far back the government will pay, won’t begin ticking until the VA receives the successfully completed form.

And that form better be filled out correctly.  If it’s not, there’ll be delays, including the possibility the form will be returned “for resubmittal in 90 days for further disapproval.”  Oh, and never mind that critics of this move point out that

veterans who are the most vulnerable—the homeless, those with traumatic brain injury, and those with a limited education—would have the most trouble meeting the new standard.

The VA emphasizes its online form, which is more convenient for the VA bureaucrats.  After all,

The VA said that veterans who don’t have a computer can go to the closest VA facility to get help.

Never mind that lots of veterans, especially those in rural areas and the elderly, either don’t have access to the Internet, or they don’t have a computer at all.