The Constitution on Trial

Let us examine the current Obama policies and legislation being challenged and debated in the Supreme Court:

1. Healthcare Reform Individual Mandate (and at least 3 or 4 other healthcare reform laws)
2. HHS' declaration that everyone must provide contraception (including the "morning after pill") in their insurance health benefit packages (even organizations who are morally opposed to such things).
3. "Recess" appointments by the president when congress has declared that it is NOT in recess (therefore bypassing the Constitutional mandate that congress must approve appointments).

Keeping in mind that Supreme Court justices are sworn to "uphold and protect" the Constitution, all of the rulings on these issues are likely to go against the current administration. Examining recent decisions further enforces this opinion that even with 4 liberal leaning judges seated, when in doubt, the court has erred on the side of liberty as they are instructed to do by the Constitution.

In EEOC vs. the Lutheran Church for example, the EEOC filed a claim suing the Lutheran Church for firing a Bishop on "religious grounds". The lawsuit was rejected unanimously 9-0. The Supreme Court ruled that the federal government does not have the power to say who religious organizations can or cannot fire based on religious teachings.  Number 2: the "contraception" rule is far more intrusive and will probably be rejected unanimously as well.  

With these likely defeats on the horizon, what is the new strategy of the "Liberal Masterminds"? Attack the document being upheld by the Supreme Court, of course. Ever the elitists, they believe their socialist beliefs and agenda is flawless and therefore, it must be the Constitution that is flawed and not their utopian schemes. The Constitution should be "interpreted" the way the "masterminds" say it should… not as it was originally written.

Why is it the Constitution is the greatest document ever written when it upholds and protects liberal interests and policy, but when it actually protects individual liberty (it's primary purpose), it is "outdated", "limited" and "archaic".

Reading this particular article on the subject makes me think some of these loons actually crave an oligarchy-ish, monarchial system where our "betters" rule over us because they and other world leaders know what is good for us more than we do. Didn't we cross an ocean and fight a revolutionary war over 200 years ago to get away from that?

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/07/us/we-the-people-loses-appeal-with-people-around-the-world.html?_r=2&ei=5065&adxnnl=1&partner=MYWAY&adxnnlx=1328637613-+AkT3u1KQxLRuuqIyXFssA

I find it shocking that two seated Supreme Court Justices appear to have little to no regard for the very document they are sworn to uphold, but that is not what this particular blog is about.

Some of the more alarming criticisms from the NYT piece are as follows:

"Americans recognize rights not widely protected, including ones to a speedy and public trial, and are outliers in prohibiting government establishment of religion. But the Constitution is out of step with the rest of the world in failing to protect, at least in so many words, a right to travel, the presumption of innocence and entitlement to food, education and health care. "

This article (and this sentence in particular) shows just how ignorant some in liberal circles are when it comes to our constitution. The "rights" the Constitution enumerates are our natural "unalienable rights" granted by "our Creator" and therefore, not the government's to bestow. We are born with these rights, regardless what legislation is passed, who the current and temporary president is and what the current make up of congress is. We are not born with a right to food, for example. At the very minimum, we must work to clean, prepare and cook it (even if we did not have to work to earn it). The Constitution is a document laying out how the government is organized and designed and how this construct is meant to protect individual liberty in every way possible, from the three separate branches (who are suppose to be pitted one against the other limiting tyrannical rule by a select few) to the military's allegiance to the Constitution above all (rather than the commander in chief, for example).

Furthermore, the bill of rights is not about what the government MUST do for its citizens, it is about what the government CANNOT do TO it's citizens. The government cannot, for instance, limit or forbid free speech. It cannot make laws regarding religion or the establishment of a religion, prosecute a citizen without due cause (and even then, it must be a speedy and public trial… a wonderful "outlier", I'd say). It cannot ban firearms.  These are examples of what the bill of rights is all about. Despite what the utopian elitists would have you believe, rights and entitlements are not the same things.

Another fine example of liberal lunacy for the NYT article:

"Other nations routinely trade in their constitutions wholesale, replacing them on average every 19 years. By odd coincidence, Thomas Jefferson, in a 1789 letter to James Madison, once said that every constitution "naturally expires at the end of 19 years" because "the earth belongs always to the living generation." These days, the overlap between the rights guaranteed by the Constitution and those most popular around the world is spotty."

Again… rights are not granted by the Constitution… they are natural. Also, if you believe Jefferson is advocating the dissolution and rewriting of the Constitution every 19 years as the writer seems to think, read the article in its full context. This paragraph sums it up well:

"But with respect to future debts; would it not be wise and just for that nation to declare in the constitution they are forming that neither the legislature, nor the nation itself can validly contract more debt, than they may pay within their own age, or within the term of 19 years? And that all future contracts shall be deemed void as to what shall remain unpaid at the end of 19 years from their date?"

Furthermore, if the writer is so keen on the framers' take on constitutional law, perhaps he should read up on what Thomas Jefferson's also thought about the right to bear arms.

"And what country can preserve its liberties, if its rulers are not warned from time to time, that this people preserve the spirit of resistance? Let them take arms. The remedy is to set them right as to the facts, pardon and pacify them. What signify a few lives lost in a century or two? The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time, with the blood of patriots and tyrants. It is its natural manure."

Many people have forgotten (or simply not been taught) that the primary reason we have a right to bear arms is the very same reason a Constitution and Bill of Rights was written. To protect "We the People" from an overly powerful, tyrannical government.

Thomas Jefferson would be on a Homeland Security watch list today if he said such things.

The DOJ's Desperate Obamacare Defense

Two months from now, the Supreme Court will hear a case that will affect every citizen of this country for centuries to come. The ruling will either push the boundaries of government power even further in on us all, or they will re-assert the constitution’s specific and enumerated limitations on the federal government’s power.

The biggest obstacle to the "Affordable Care Act" becoming permanent law is the individual mandate… that is the portion of the law that requires every citizen buy insurance policies or pay a fine to the federal government.

In our 250+ year history, the federal government has never before forced citizens to participate in commerce with a third party. Many people (including the administration) claim precedence for this includes drivers being required to buy automobile insurance and automobile manufacturers being required to install seat belts in every car sold in America. The seat belt thing is nonsense and I can’t believe they even posit that as precedence (people are not all automobile manufacturers, nor are we all trying to sell goods to other people). The automobile insurance argument is also a flimsy argument (and has already been ridiculed by lower courts) as insurance laws are passed by the states and are therefore not subject to constitutional limitations on the federal government. Furthermore, powers not granted to the federal government in the constitution are specifically passed on to the states.

It should also be pointed out that automobile insurance is not a total mandate on every citizen. As a condition of driving on state and federal highways, you must buy automobile insurance. The health care bill sets a new and unprecedented standard that states that as a condition of being an American citizen and living and breathing, you must buy health insurance.

In a remarkable turn of events that bodes well for the proponents of the repeal of the health care reform bill, the Department of Justice has filed a brief with the Supreme Court of the United States in regards to the mandate.

In the memo, the DOJ is essentially arguing that if the mandate is ruled unconstitutional, most of the bill could and should remain intact. The DOJ even goes so far as to claim it was the intention of congress that the bill should stand if any part was ruled unconstitutional. A dumbfounding and astounding claim that will likely be laughed out of the building if the mandate is indeed ruled unconstitutional. Why, you ask? The bill has no “severability” clause. That is, a clause that specifically states that if any part (or just specific parts) of the bill are ruled unconstitutional; the rest of the bill can still stand because the legislation is not dependant on any particular part (or it is dependant, as the case sometimes is). Congress has been including such clauses in legislation for 200 years. It is not the DOJ's place to determine congress's intent. Congress wrote a two thousand plus page document laying out their intent.

In fact, early versions of the health care reform bill itself did included “severability” clauses. Somewhere along the line, the clause was intentionally removed. More than likely, one of the architects of the bill or one of their many advisers pointed out how bad it would be for the medical business in this country (and therefore, patients) if insurance companies were forced to cover preexisting conditions and every other arbitrary procedure forced onto them without the increased pool of members to share the risk. They knew the bill would absolutely not work without the forced participation of as many people as possible. Regardless of why the “severability” language was removed, it WAS removed.

 Imagine the DOJ lawyers trying to tell Supreme Court judges that congress intended the mandate to be severable after congress had specifically removed that clause. Add to that the many explicit statements of the bill’s architects that it will not work without the mandate, and you are left with the undeniable conclusion that the entire bill should (and almost certainly WILL) be struck down if the mandate is ruled unconstitutional. A proposition that seems more likely now that the DOJ appears to be hedging their bets in embarrassingly desperate legal memos.

The 15% Tax Meme

I’ve decided to take a break from my blogging exile, mostly to point out a recent problem I’ve seen in the Republican primaries that is driving me crazy. I’m talking about the 15% tax meme. While I’m not the biggest Mitt Romney fan, attacking him over his 15% tax rate is just plain stupid and takes a page from the Democrats’ class warfare playbook. 

The mainstream media and pundits get all they can out of this particular class warfare tactic. They never bother to explain how it is these people manage a perfectly legal 15% tax rate, though. 

Romney pays 15% on his INVESTMENTS income, which is all he has at the moment. If he had a paycheck, he'd pay payroll tax like everyone else. Think about this. You earn $1000. You pay taxes on that thousand dollars. You have about $700 left over and decide to invest it. A year later you decide to sell that stock... now you have to pay another 15% in taxes on the money you get from selling the investment. You've already paid taxes on the money you used to buy it! It's the called capital gains tax... and it's actually too darn high. Double taxation sucks. Just like income tax, it is a progressive tax meaning most people in the lowest income brackets pay 0% for their capital gains taxes. It is only the top brackets that even pay the 15%. 

If you start taxing any higher than that on the trade of stocks and bonds, who in their right mind would invest anything at all, unless it was an extremely long term investment, especially when you consider stocks can already be a risky investment. These stocks are what companies (both large and small) use to gather start-up capital, expand and grow. If you enforced a 30% tax rate on capital gains, the economy would collapse worse than it ever has because no one would invest. The odds that any stock would gain enough value in a reasonable amount of time (less than 20 years) to offset a 30% tax when you sell it are nearly astronomical. 


A stock certificate is nothing more than a piece of a company. An individual who owns stock in a company owns a piece of that company. Dividends are paid out to stock holders (owners) of said company based on the profits they made. Before that happens, however, those profits are taxed at the CORPORATE tax rate. The corporate tax rate in America is already among the highest tax rates in the world (depending on the state, it averages about 39% in the US). This doesn’t even take into account the myriad of taxes and fees associated with for normal operating expenses like gasoline for product transportation, property taxes on capital held by those companies and the many, many other fees paid to the government. As part owner of these companies he’s invested in, he’s already paid that tax on the “front end”. In addition to that 39%, he has to pay another 15% if he decides to sell the stock he has (and as I’ve already pointed out, the money invested into those stocks had already been taxed one time before). 

To insinuate that Romney or any other investor hasn’t paid their “fair share” is to buy into the “class warfare” philosophy of the modern Democratic Party, and it is why the economy will never grow or recover with these people in charge.

Candidates should try to build support for themselves by clearly communicating their own positions and policy intentions. Trying to build opposition to the other candidates by fueling resentment and class envy does not make you a more viable candidate. Like all personal attacks, it simply shows the weakness of your own platform. What Romney pays in taxes should be a non-story unless he breaks the law by not paying what he should. He has paid every penny of tax that was assessed against his income. Period.