"The gap between Americans who want to govern themselves and politicians who want to rule over them may be as big today as the gap between the colonies and England during the 18th century." — Scott Rasmussen (In Search of Self-Governance)
"The spirit of encroachment tends to consolidate the powers of all the departments in one, and thus to create whatever the form of government, a real despotism." — President Washington (Farewell address)
PEOPLE WHO LOVE POWER SIMPLY HATE OUR FOUNDERS. A Harvard University study says that liberals even hate 4th of July parades. I wonder what was their first clue? Perhaps it was the fact that our public schools can't stand to teach the American Revolution.
I've met three grads of the high school I attended in the 1950s who didn't know what July 4th commemorates. We gave them a clue, "England," and they all said the same thing: "The Beatles?"
Many of today's teens can't identify the countries we fought in World War II. When told, one kid asked "Who won?"
I asked a young person who had been admitted to a college "Who was James Monroe?" She said, "Marilyn Monroe's husband?"
Put me down as "stuck in the fifties" (when the celebrity culture was minimal. And clean). You ought to either throw out your TV set or pray for a return of Mortimer Snerd and Charlie McCarthy.
"SEVEN SOCIAL SINS THAT WILL DESTROY A SOCIETY" (attributed to Gandhi)
- Pleasure without conscience
- Knowledge without character
- Science without humanity
- Business without ethics
- Religion without sacrifice
- Wealth without work
- Politics without principles
BTW, a funny thing happened to the President on his way to the forum. He held a press conference. He thought his teleprompter was making perfect sense. He said, "You can still fly your jet, but it's going to cost you a little more."
I thought that was a mean-spirited, back-handed way to comment on his wife's trip to Botswana. Or was he referring to his own record-breaking number of frequent flyer miles? This couple reminds me of the way Carol Mosley Braun flew around the world in her one term as Senator from Illinois.
It has been reported that the White House limousine fleet now numbers 412 limos (up 73% in two years). Is that a result of having the mother-in-law living under the same roof or what? At least their veggie garden has been a success (without even getting any dirt under their finger nails).
This Prez has added three trillion to the national debt in only two years. Not to nit-pick or anything, but hey — Let them drink Guiness, eh?
This guy was helping run the state of Illinois just a few years ago. Now it is is debatable which state is in worse financial shape: New York, Illinois, or California. This is your future, Uncle Sam, on steroids — along with Portugal, Ireland, Greece, Spain, and Turkey (PIGSTY). Socio-economic Liberals all the way!
Anyway, this week attention returned to the "Debt Ceiling" in DC. The liberals will probably propose once again "100 million" in budget cuts — 33 cents for every man, woman, and chile — while balancing that with another 1 1/2 or two trillion dollar federal "budget" (that all depends on what you mean by budget — or "trillion")!
Our 14 trillion dollar national debt equates to about $46,666 for every man, woman, and chile (and they talk about "cutting" 33 cents in spending?). Yes, they DO think you're stupid. Cass Sunstein says that there's "a lot of Homer Simpson in us."
Anyway, have a nice 4th of July weekend. The Prez sez you can come along for the "ride," but "you gotta sit in the back" — if you're stuck in the fifties where we admired our Founding Fathers.
PPS: One more closing quotation:
"Under my plan of a cap-and-trade system, electricity rates will necessarily skyrocket."
- Barack Obama (2008)
Remember that one the next time you turn on your air conditioner!
Oh, and just one more thing, Mr. President -
"Don't quit your day job to go into teaching economics. That's way above your pay grade!"
Showing posts with label RENEW AMERICA. Show all posts
Showing posts with label RENEW AMERICA. Show all posts
Tuesday, July 5, 2011
There is no First Amendment without a Second Amendment
When we celebrate the Fourth of July, let's keep in mind that the first Americans won their independence from England with the force of arms. It was, in fact, a British effort in 1775 to confiscate military arms they believed were stored in Lexington and Concord, Massachusetts that sparked the war.
The Founding Fathers were so aware of the need for an armed citizenry that, after ensuring freedom of religion, speech, press and the right to peacefully assemble in the First Amendment, the Second guaranteed their right to bear arms.
Wherever authoritarian regimes were established in the last century, they took away this right and then proceeded to kill those deemed enemies of the state.
At this point in American history, the Obama administration constitutes a threat to the Constitution in general and the Second Amendment in particular.
More than 80,000,000 Americans are gun owners.
Two of the organizations that have been fighting to protect these rights are the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA), both led by Alan M. Gottlieb. Three quarters of the SAF budget is devoted to defending rights pertaining to the ownership of guns and to carry them for self-defense.
In March, the liberal Huffington Post had an article titled "Obama Looking for Ways Around Congress on Gun Policy" by Sam Stein. "Faced with a Congress hostile to even slight restrictions of Second Amendment rights, the Obama administration is exploring potential changes to gun laws that can be secured strictly through executive action, administration officials, say."
Since then we have learned of a U.S. Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms program, Fast and Furious, that actually facilitated the sale and transfer of guns to Mexico. How demented is that?
In May in my home state of New Jersey the SAF won a decision against officials for the deprivation of civil rights under the color of law when they had ruled that an applicant for a concealed carry permit had not demonstrated a "justifiable need" for it. In point of fact, the applicant, Philip Muller, had been kidnapped by members of a motorcycle gang who threatened to kill him. They had, however, grabbed the wrong man.
Despite support by local and state police, action on his application was delayed for six months. Morris County Superior Court Judge David Ironson issued a directive that a permit should be granted. The case is still on-going with other plaintiffs that include a part-time sheriff's deputy, an applicant who carries large amounts of cash in his private business, and a civilian employee of the FBI with legitimate concerns of an attack from a radical Islamic group.
Currently nearly thirty such cases have either been brought or joined by SAF to stop abuses of this most fundamental right of American citizens ranging from bans on interstate handgun sales, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's imposition of a $340 fee for a permit to keep a handgun in one's home, and a Chicago ban on gun ranges open to the public. These cases cost between $60,000 and $80,000 each!
The greatest single threat to gun ownership right now is a United Nations "Small Arms Treaty" falsely identified as an "international arms control treaty" allegedly to fight terrorism."
"In reality," says Gottlieb, it is "a massive, global gun control scheme. It's a sham. It's a fraud." If the U.S., under the Obama administration and with the consent of the Senate, were to sign on to this treaty, it would nullify the Second Amendment.
Suffice to say that the Obama administration wants to have the power to increase federal fees on guns and ammunition, to ban guns that are imported, to extend the waiting periods for permits, to ban the use of guns on all government property, and even to make it illegal if you own a gun and smoke!
Americans do not have to "justify" gun ownership. It is guaranteed by the Second Amendment. The reality is that enemies of this fundamental rights continue to wage an assault on it.
The Founding Fathers were so aware of the need for an armed citizenry that, after ensuring freedom of religion, speech, press and the right to peacefully assemble in the First Amendment, the Second guaranteed their right to bear arms.Wherever authoritarian regimes were established in the last century, they took away this right and then proceeded to kill those deemed enemies of the state.
At this point in American history, the Obama administration constitutes a threat to the Constitution in general and the Second Amendment in particular.
More than 80,000,000 Americans are gun owners.
Two of the organizations that have been fighting to protect these rights are the Second Amendment Foundation (SAF) and the Citizens Committee for the Right to Keep and Bear Arms (CCRKBA), both led by Alan M. Gottlieb. Three quarters of the SAF budget is devoted to defending rights pertaining to the ownership of guns and to carry them for self-defense.
In March, the liberal Huffington Post had an article titled "Obama Looking for Ways Around Congress on Gun Policy" by Sam Stein. "Faced with a Congress hostile to even slight restrictions of Second Amendment rights, the Obama administration is exploring potential changes to gun laws that can be secured strictly through executive action, administration officials, say."
Since then we have learned of a U.S. Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms program, Fast and Furious, that actually facilitated the sale and transfer of guns to Mexico. How demented is that?
In May in my home state of New Jersey the SAF won a decision against officials for the deprivation of civil rights under the color of law when they had ruled that an applicant for a concealed carry permit had not demonstrated a "justifiable need" for it. In point of fact, the applicant, Philip Muller, had been kidnapped by members of a motorcycle gang who threatened to kill him. They had, however, grabbed the wrong man.
Despite support by local and state police, action on his application was delayed for six months. Morris County Superior Court Judge David Ironson issued a directive that a permit should be granted. The case is still on-going with other plaintiffs that include a part-time sheriff's deputy, an applicant who carries large amounts of cash in his private business, and a civilian employee of the FBI with legitimate concerns of an attack from a radical Islamic group.
Currently nearly thirty such cases have either been brought or joined by SAF to stop abuses of this most fundamental right of American citizens ranging from bans on interstate handgun sales, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg's imposition of a $340 fee for a permit to keep a handgun in one's home, and a Chicago ban on gun ranges open to the public. These cases cost between $60,000 and $80,000 each!
The greatest single threat to gun ownership right now is a United Nations "Small Arms Treaty" falsely identified as an "international arms control treaty" allegedly to fight terrorism."
"In reality," says Gottlieb, it is "a massive, global gun control scheme. It's a sham. It's a fraud." If the U.S., under the Obama administration and with the consent of the Senate, were to sign on to this treaty, it would nullify the Second Amendment.
Suffice to say that the Obama administration wants to have the power to increase federal fees on guns and ammunition, to ban guns that are imported, to extend the waiting periods for permits, to ban the use of guns on all government property, and even to make it illegal if you own a gun and smoke!
Americans do not have to "justify" gun ownership. It is guaranteed by the Second Amendment. The reality is that enemies of this fundamental rights continue to wage an assault on it.
Thursday, June 16, 2011
The meaning of big government
Conservatives, libertarians, and Tea Party activists argue that America has drifted too far from the constitutional principle of limited government — that the federal government is becoming too big, too powerful, with an unlimited scope of authority.
Indeed, the phrase "big government" is now more than ever a pejorative in the American lexicon. Yet polls suggest that the public, though disliking the phrase, does not have a clear, tangible idea as to what exactly is so bad about big government. Two examples may provide an answer.
Creating chaos in the housing market
In their recently released book Reckless Endangerment, Gretchen Morgenson and Joshua Rosner reveal how Fannie Mae contributed to the financial crisis of 2008. Fannie Mae, a nominally private company that effectively operated as a government agency, used its government-granted monopoly to dominate the mortgage market and become the nation's second-largest debt issuer — second only to the U.S. Treasury.
Pushed by government officials, who in turn perpetuated its monopoly privileges, Fannie Mae violated traditional standards of underwriting, building up illusory profits in the process by issuing mortgages to people and households with insufficient assets. This was all done pursuant to a political agenda of increasing home ownership by the poor and minorities, but it ended up causing a financial debacle costing hundreds of billions of dollars, not to mention the harm caused to all the families who later defaulted on their mortgages and had their homes foreclosed.
Fannie Mae was able to engage in such reckless lending because of its government backing, which helped drive out competitors while at the same time insulating Fannie Mae from any bank-style regulation. This government backing was possible because the federal government had spread its tentacles into both the individual home-buying and mortgage-issuing sectors of the economy.Federalizing individual medical decisions
The second example involves the federal healthcare reform bill enacted last year. The unprecedented size and scope of this bill, touching every facet of an individual's healthcare decisions, has been well documented. But one of the inevitable consequences of huge size and unlimited scope is that the actual working details often get lost amidst that huge size and unlimited scope.
One such aspect of the healthcare law is the creation of a new federal agency called the Independent Payment Advisory Board ("IPAB"). This agency will have broad and pervasive power over healthcare prices in America — and through this power to control prices, the IPAB will effectively be able to ration the delivery of healthcare services to the American public.
As President Obama stated in his April 13 speech responding to Representative Paul Ryan's Medicare proposal, the IPAB's power over Medicare pricing is a key component of the president's own deficit-reduction plan. Unlike Rep. Ryan's plan, which focuses on patient choice to foster competition among medical providers, which in turn will work to lower healthcare costs, the president's only option for achieving cost reductions is to impose massive federal controls over pricing, which will inevitably — if history is any guide — lead to more healthcare rationing by the federal government.
And yet, despite promises that IPAB price controls will cut the Medicare deficit, White House deputy chief of staff Nancy-Ann DeParle admits that IPAB will not bring any cost savings for at least a decade. But the real danger is that if the government-control model is accepted over Ryan's patient-control model, the price controls instituted by a monopolistic IPAB will eventually drive all independent private healthcare insurers out of business, which in turn may lead to the worst scenario of all: increasingly stringent government healthcare rationing coinciding with continually rising federal deficits.
Ironically, in the abortion debate, pro-choice advocates argue that all medical decisions should be left to the doctor-patient relationship. Under the new healthcare reform bill, medical decisions will be dictated by the pricing and regulatory decisions of a federal agency.
Unbounded bureaucratic discretion and the threat to the rule of lawThe nature of big government is that it is almost always justified in terms of lofty, idealistic, even utopian (the-country-will-be-saved) arguments. And the acts of big government are almost always billed as reformist. But as demonstrated by such recent legislation as the healthcare reform act and the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill, these big government programs also provide for unbounded power and discretion by federal bureaucrats.
Take, for instance, the recent attempt by the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) to prevent, as an "unfair labor practice," Boeing's decision to build a production facility in South Carolina — which is a right-to-work state — instead of expanding existing facilities in the state of Washington, which is a closed-shop state. If the NLRB can act with such arbitrary and unbounded punitive discretion regarding a law-abiding corporation the size of Boeing, imagine what government agencies can do regarding individuals and small businesses.
The Framers, in drafting a constitution giving only limited power to the federal government, knew that a host of problems and liberty deprivations would occur with a centralized government of near unlimited activity and authority, including a lack of transparency and accountability, and the imposition by federal bureaucrats of uniform mandates on a large and diverse society.
There is also a rule-of-law problem posed by a government of vast powers. This problem is similarly illustrated by the healthcare reform bill, under which companies and unions are able to apply for waivers from various provisions of the bill. Indeed, the federal government has already granted hundreds of such waivers. But those waivers, by definition, are privileges given to a select few, as determined by the discretion of government officials. Words like "privilege" and "select few" and "discretion" do not go along with any notion of the rule of law.
We the peopleThe danger of big and unlimited government is that, over time, it can distort the most basic notion of sovereignty and principal-agent. Under the U.S. constitutional system, the people are sovereign: they are the principal, with government as their agent and servant. The current debt-ceiling debate demonstrates, unfortunately, how much that relationship has been inverted.
The government is spending too much, and will soon exceed its legally mandated debt limit. Yet those who wish to couple any increase in the debt limit with some kind of spending reduction plan are belittled as reckless ideologues — willing to risk a financial crisis for the sake of their ideological beliefs in limited government. Imagine that: accusing those who wish to require a government that is about to exceed its $14 trillion debt limit to cut spending of being reckless ideologues with no legitimate foundation for their position.
Clearly, we have come to a situation where government has gone beyond its role as agent of the people. It now seems to have an independent existence that in turn must be supported by the people merely for the sake of perpetuating a government that has no limits.
Monday, June 13, 2011
Media blackout: CIA director accused of links to Communist spy contact -- scandal ignored
If you have been depending on the mainstream media for your news the past few days, you are probably learning here for the first time that CIA Director Leon Panetta has been called out for his links to an important open member of the Communist Party.
Some background
When this writer first arrived in Washington, D.C., as a reporter in 1968, one of my assignments was to cover the congressional delegation from Washington State.
Occasionally, both Democrat and Republican members of Congress from the Evergreen State would obliquely mention the name of Hugh DeLacy — either with a knowing snicker or muffled sound of disapproval.
It was as if they were shamefacedly acknowledging their state's dirty little secret.
This much I gathered: Hugh DeLacy was a Communist who entered Democrat politics in Seattle and served in Congress, later to be defeated because of his pro-Red affiliations.
That name — stashed away for years in a reporter's mental file — re-emerged in 2011 when (not for the first time) intrepid researchers did the work the mainstream media should have been doing.
It seems that the late Communist Hugh DeLacy and the man who now heads this nation's spy agency were good buddies.
An oldie in the files re-emerges
Although hearings were held last Thursday on Panetta's nomination (by President Obama) to become Secretary of Defense, not one word appeared in any major newspaper or TV news channel about the allegations.
The June 9 morning hearings by the Senate Armed Services Committee did not elicit any mention of the newly revealed information of the Panetta/DeLacy connection. That afternoon, the senators scheduled an executive session behind closed doors. No information as to whether the issue was brought up then.
Documentation
Researchers Trevor Loudon and Cliff Kincaid have documented the following:
Director Panetta for years maintained a friendly relationship with the late Hugh DeLacy. One "Dear Hugh" letter from then-Rep. Leon Panetta (D-Calif.) in 1977 offered a summary of a report on U.S. military operations which, according to Panetta, was "unavailable for distribution." In his conclusion, Panetta writes, "If there is anything I can do for you in the future, Hugh, please feel free to call on me." This "Dear Hugh" business did not appear to be a routine ingratiating courtesy on the part of a politician to a constituent (DeLacy later lived in Santa Cruz, California). When DeLacy passed away in 1986, Congressman Panetta spoke at his memorial service.
In 1983, Mr. Panetta paid tribute to DeLacy and his wife and entered it into the Congressional Record. "The causes for which they have dedicated their lives [including] a halt to the dangerous arms race — are causes for which we are still working today," intoned Congressman Panetta.
"Dear Hugh's" real activism
In an obituary on DeLacy, the Los Angeles Times stated, "In 1954, he [DeLacy] invoked the Fifth Amendment when asked by the House Un-American Activities Committee if he was or ever had been a Communist."
Two years later, the House committee heard testimony from Barbara Hartle, a former Communist who had resigned and renounced her membership in the Party and since then had shared information with the FBI and other authorities in their efforts to combat the Communist conspiracy. Said she:
"I had attempted to break contact with the Communist Party in the underground on the wrong assumption that if I broke contact that they would leave me alone." Instead, Hartle testified under oath, she was then "pursued by the Communist Party in the persons of its leaders, attempting to discipline me, attempting to bring me back into activity and responsibility." The harassment became so pervasive, Hartle added, that she concluded the Communist Party "was a gigantic hoax, that it has raised havoc with my life, that it was a danger to the country."
House Committee Staff Director Richard Arens then asked the witness to "tell this committee while you are under oath, the names of any persons to your certain knowledge, who were Communists and officers or leaders of the Northwest Committee for the Protection of the Foreign Born [a Communist front]."
Mrs. Hartle: Hugh DeLacy.
Mr. Arens: And by the way, if it is agreeable with you, give us just a comment about the individual, what you know about him.
Mrs. Hartle: Hugh DeLacy was at one time president of the Washington Commonwealth Federation of the state of Washington, was one time a Congressman from the First District of the state of Washington [for one term, 1945-47]."
Mr. Arens: And Mr. Chairman [Rep. Clyde Doyle D-Calif. was chairing the hearing], I think it would not be inappropriate that in anticipation of our [planned] hearings in Ohio, we made a vigorous search for Hugh DeLacy in order to subpoena him. Our best information is that he has been dodging the subpoena.
Communist-backed candidate
The lead in the L.A. Times obit identified DeLacy as "a Founder of the Progressive Party that nominated Henry Wallace for President in 1948." That party was organized and dominated by the Communist Party. Wallace himself admitted later in life that he had been duped and used. Christopher Andrew, a University of Cambridge historian — working with evidence in the Mitrokhin Archive — has stated publicly that he believed Wallace was a KGB agent.
From the Loudon/Kincaid files
Panetta — as a member of Congress — and DeLacy — as a street activist — shared an affinity for communist scoundrels in Latin America.
While DeLacy visited Nicaragua and paid tribute to its communist Sandinista regime, Panetta — on Capitol Hill — fought President Reagan's efforts to undermine the Sandinista Moscow puppets.
Leon Panetta, as the Loudon/Kincaid files show, collaborated with the Institute for Policy Studies, a think tank that promoted the Chilean Marxist and Cuban Intelligence agent Orlando Letelier who conducted Communist political operations in Washington. (See this writer AIM Report — "Robert Novak Versus the Media Establishment," Sept. 18, 2007)
And there's more
The California Senate Fact-Finding Committee on Un-American Activities named Hugh DeLacy as having been associated with the American Peace Mobilization Committee. That front was organized during the Hitler-Stalin pact to "sabotage our national defense program," culminating in a "mass picket line around the White House" until shortly before Nazi Germany turned on its erstwhile ally, the Soviet Union — at which point, the U.S. Reds suddenly became "great patriots" for FDR's "waw effaht."
Add to all the above the fact that DeLacy was not only a prominent member of the Communist Party USA, but also a personal contact of identified Soviet spies Solomon Adler and Frank Coe and accused spy John Stewart Service, and one has to wonder: What was there about DeLacy's background and record that attracted the friendship of the man who is now CIA Director and has been nominated to assume an even higher national security post — Secretary of Defense?
The late columnist Robert Novak told me that he had learned shortly after arriving in Washington in the fifties that the press corps had imposed a "self-censorship" in ignoring certain stories — that among these were congressional investigations of Communist influence in our society. He added this de facto "cartel" turned a blind eye to "a lot" that was "still" going on even then (at the time of our 2007 interview).
Beyond that, the question persists in 2011: Why have the media — even some non-liberal ones — not followed up on the information that the man who heads our premiere spy/counterspy agency was a good friend of a Communist Party member? Only a few websites — including this one — have paid attention to the story.
If Panetta's nomination for Secretary of Defense makes it through the Senate Armed Services Committee — and barring indications to the contrary, it would appear "the skids are greased" — then what? Is there not one conservative senator prepared to raise this issue on the floor when the confirmation is up for debate? Not one? Why?
Some backgroundWhen this writer first arrived in Washington, D.C., as a reporter in 1968, one of my assignments was to cover the congressional delegation from Washington State.
Occasionally, both Democrat and Republican members of Congress from the Evergreen State would obliquely mention the name of Hugh DeLacy — either with a knowing snicker or muffled sound of disapproval.
It was as if they were shamefacedly acknowledging their state's dirty little secret.
This much I gathered: Hugh DeLacy was a Communist who entered Democrat politics in Seattle and served in Congress, later to be defeated because of his pro-Red affiliations.
That name — stashed away for years in a reporter's mental file — re-emerged in 2011 when (not for the first time) intrepid researchers did the work the mainstream media should have been doing.
It seems that the late Communist Hugh DeLacy and the man who now heads this nation's spy agency were good buddies.
An oldie in the files re-emerges
Although hearings were held last Thursday on Panetta's nomination (by President Obama) to become Secretary of Defense, not one word appeared in any major newspaper or TV news channel about the allegations.
The June 9 morning hearings by the Senate Armed Services Committee did not elicit any mention of the newly revealed information of the Panetta/DeLacy connection. That afternoon, the senators scheduled an executive session behind closed doors. No information as to whether the issue was brought up then.
DocumentationResearchers Trevor Loudon and Cliff Kincaid have documented the following:
Director Panetta for years maintained a friendly relationship with the late Hugh DeLacy. One "Dear Hugh" letter from then-Rep. Leon Panetta (D-Calif.) in 1977 offered a summary of a report on U.S. military operations which, according to Panetta, was "unavailable for distribution." In his conclusion, Panetta writes, "If there is anything I can do for you in the future, Hugh, please feel free to call on me." This "Dear Hugh" business did not appear to be a routine ingratiating courtesy on the part of a politician to a constituent (DeLacy later lived in Santa Cruz, California). When DeLacy passed away in 1986, Congressman Panetta spoke at his memorial service.
In 1983, Mr. Panetta paid tribute to DeLacy and his wife and entered it into the Congressional Record. "The causes for which they have dedicated their lives [including] a halt to the dangerous arms race — are causes for which we are still working today," intoned Congressman Panetta.
"Dear Hugh's" real activism
In an obituary on DeLacy, the Los Angeles Times stated, "In 1954, he [DeLacy] invoked the Fifth Amendment when asked by the House Un-American Activities Committee if he was or ever had been a Communist."
Two years later, the House committee heard testimony from Barbara Hartle, a former Communist who had resigned and renounced her membership in the Party and since then had shared information with the FBI and other authorities in their efforts to combat the Communist conspiracy. Said she:
"I had attempted to break contact with the Communist Party in the underground on the wrong assumption that if I broke contact that they would leave me alone." Instead, Hartle testified under oath, she was then "pursued by the Communist Party in the persons of its leaders, attempting to discipline me, attempting to bring me back into activity and responsibility." The harassment became so pervasive, Hartle added, that she concluded the Communist Party "was a gigantic hoax, that it has raised havoc with my life, that it was a danger to the country."
House Committee Staff Director Richard Arens then asked the witness to "tell this committee while you are under oath, the names of any persons to your certain knowledge, who were Communists and officers or leaders of the Northwest Committee for the Protection of the Foreign Born [a Communist front]."
Mrs. Hartle: Hugh DeLacy.Mr. Arens: And by the way, if it is agreeable with you, give us just a comment about the individual, what you know about him.
Mrs. Hartle: Hugh DeLacy was at one time president of the Washington Commonwealth Federation of the state of Washington, was one time a Congressman from the First District of the state of Washington [for one term, 1945-47]."
Mr. Arens: And Mr. Chairman [Rep. Clyde Doyle D-Calif. was chairing the hearing], I think it would not be inappropriate that in anticipation of our [planned] hearings in Ohio, we made a vigorous search for Hugh DeLacy in order to subpoena him. Our best information is that he has been dodging the subpoena.
Communist-backed candidate
The lead in the L.A. Times obit identified DeLacy as "a Founder of the Progressive Party that nominated Henry Wallace for President in 1948." That party was organized and dominated by the Communist Party. Wallace himself admitted later in life that he had been duped and used. Christopher Andrew, a University of Cambridge historian — working with evidence in the Mitrokhin Archive — has stated publicly that he believed Wallace was a KGB agent.
From the Loudon/Kincaid files
Panetta — as a member of Congress — and DeLacy — as a street activist — shared an affinity for communist scoundrels in Latin America.
While DeLacy visited Nicaragua and paid tribute to its communist Sandinista regime, Panetta — on Capitol Hill — fought President Reagan's efforts to undermine the Sandinista Moscow puppets.
Leon Panetta, as the Loudon/Kincaid files show, collaborated with the Institute for Policy Studies, a think tank that promoted the Chilean Marxist and Cuban Intelligence agent Orlando Letelier who conducted Communist political operations in Washington. (See this writer AIM Report — "Robert Novak Versus the Media Establishment," Sept. 18, 2007)
And there's more
The California Senate Fact-Finding Committee on Un-American Activities named Hugh DeLacy as having been associated with the American Peace Mobilization Committee. That front was organized during the Hitler-Stalin pact to "sabotage our national defense program," culminating in a "mass picket line around the White House" until shortly before Nazi Germany turned on its erstwhile ally, the Soviet Union — at which point, the U.S. Reds suddenly became "great patriots" for FDR's "waw effaht."
Add to all the above the fact that DeLacy was not only a prominent member of the Communist Party USA, but also a personal contact of identified Soviet spies Solomon Adler and Frank Coe and accused spy John Stewart Service, and one has to wonder: What was there about DeLacy's background and record that attracted the friendship of the man who is now CIA Director and has been nominated to assume an even higher national security post — Secretary of Defense?
The late columnist Robert Novak told me that he had learned shortly after arriving in Washington in the fifties that the press corps had imposed a "self-censorship" in ignoring certain stories — that among these were congressional investigations of Communist influence in our society. He added this de facto "cartel" turned a blind eye to "a lot" that was "still" going on even then (at the time of our 2007 interview).Beyond that, the question persists in 2011: Why have the media — even some non-liberal ones — not followed up on the information that the man who heads our premiere spy/counterspy agency was a good friend of a Communist Party member? Only a few websites — including this one — have paid attention to the story.
If Panetta's nomination for Secretary of Defense makes it through the Senate Armed Services Committee — and barring indications to the contrary, it would appear "the skids are greased" — then what? Is there not one conservative senator prepared to raise this issue on the floor when the confirmation is up for debate? Not one? Why?
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Consequences of Global Ruling Class policies: more unintended than intended
On June 3, the BBC broadcast a report on how fishermen were forced to throw back perfectly good caught fish dead into the sea. The report failed to mention that EU regulations were the root cause of this wastefulness.
Precisely because of such media blackous, we need to be reminded that the Western elites are wasteful and harmful to the poor and disadavantaged, whether intentionally or out of sheer stupidity, despite their avowed "environmentally friendly" and "Third World friendly" policies, which almost never seem to achieve the purported goals.
I mentioned it before, but it bears repeating, that the treaty between the EU and Panama, for example, had 2 adverse effects, one on the environment and the other for the poor in the Third World:
1 — The day after the treaty was signed, the price of fish, the number one protein staple in Panama, doubled, converting this staple into a luxury item that many Panamanians can now eat only on special occasions.
2 — The transport of the fish to Europe is by air, which translates into several times as much CO2 emissions as shipments by sea.
As we read in the report linked above, before this treaty went into effect, the EU had implemented a fishing policy for Europe that also had disastrous effects on the environment there and on European fish prices, which indirectly led to treaties between the EU and the Third World related to fish and seafood trade.
In drafting, issuing and enforcing such regulation, the EU has followed the guidelines of UN Agenda 21, which purportedly is aimed at reducing pollution and especially CO2 emissions, and at helping the poor and middle class in Third World countries. Agenda 21 was attributed largely to the efforts of Maurice Strong, who was then Under-Secretary General of the UN.
The above-outlined unintended consequences of the Panama treaty are being repeated all over the Third World and reflect the total inability of out-of-touch spoiled billionaire white men like Maurice Strong, and his American counterpart George Soros, to intervene meaningfully and positively in the affairs of ordinary people with ordinary problems of survival and supporting families.
These results also reflect the inability of government (whether supranational or other) to control systems like the world economy, which, though not perfect, worked fairly well before all of this meddling by global governance aficionados with too much time on their hands.
The more they meddled, the worse the economy became, until today we stand on the brink of a collapsing dollar, a collapsing euro, historical high unemployment and staggering debt that threatens whole generations to come.
Unintended consequences?
Or mission accomplished?
BBC report:
http://www.ashleymote.co.uk/?p=3325
Agenda 21:
http://laiglesforum.com/sustainability-agenda-21-doesnt-sustain/2431.htm
EU destroying European farming:
http://laiglesforum.com/eu-still-taking-down-farmers/188.htm
Environmentalism run amok:
http://laiglesforum.com/high-level-eco-terror-or-incompetence/1448.htm
The new royalty — EU spending sprees (they think it's divine right)
http://synonblog.dailymail.co.uk/2011/06/new-report-on-lavish-commission-spending-eu-elite-lead-lives-of-renaissance-popes.html
Precisely because of such media blackous, we need to be reminded that the Western elites are wasteful and harmful to the poor and disadavantaged, whether intentionally or out of sheer stupidity, despite their avowed "environmentally friendly" and "Third World friendly" policies, which almost never seem to achieve the purported goals.
I mentioned it before, but it bears repeating, that the treaty between the EU and Panama, for example, had 2 adverse effects, one on the environment and the other for the poor in the Third World:
1 — The day after the treaty was signed, the price of fish, the number one protein staple in Panama, doubled, converting this staple into a luxury item that many Panamanians can now eat only on special occasions.
2 — The transport of the fish to Europe is by air, which translates into several times as much CO2 emissions as shipments by sea.
As we read in the report linked above, before this treaty went into effect, the EU had implemented a fishing policy for Europe that also had disastrous effects on the environment there and on European fish prices, which indirectly led to treaties between the EU and the Third World related to fish and seafood trade.
In drafting, issuing and enforcing such regulation, the EU has followed the guidelines of UN Agenda 21, which purportedly is aimed at reducing pollution and especially CO2 emissions, and at helping the poor and middle class in Third World countries. Agenda 21 was attributed largely to the efforts of Maurice Strong, who was then Under-Secretary General of the UN.
The above-outlined unintended consequences of the Panama treaty are being repeated all over the Third World and reflect the total inability of out-of-touch spoiled billionaire white men like Maurice Strong, and his American counterpart George Soros, to intervene meaningfully and positively in the affairs of ordinary people with ordinary problems of survival and supporting families.
These results also reflect the inability of government (whether supranational or other) to control systems like the world economy, which, though not perfect, worked fairly well before all of this meddling by global governance aficionados with too much time on their hands.
The more they meddled, the worse the economy became, until today we stand on the brink of a collapsing dollar, a collapsing euro, historical high unemployment and staggering debt that threatens whole generations to come.
Unintended consequences?
Or mission accomplished?
BBC report:
http://www.ashleymote.co.uk/?p=3325
Agenda 21:
http://laiglesforum.com/sustainability-agenda-21-doesnt-sustain/2431.htm
EU destroying European farming:
http://laiglesforum.com/eu-still-taking-down-farmers/188.htm
Environmentalism run amok:
http://laiglesforum.com/high-level-eco-terror-or-incompetence/1448.htm
The new royalty — EU spending sprees (they think it's divine right)
http://synonblog.dailymail.co.uk/2011/06/new-report-on-lavish-commission-spending-eu-elite-lead-lives-of-renaissance-popes.html
Obama administration makes minister get court order to mention Jesus in Memorial Day prayer
The Founders expected religious values to inform public policy and religious expression to be welcome in the public square and the religious clauses of the First Amendment were intended to assure that.
What is astonishing (and outrageous)is not that a federal judge (the honorable Lynn Hughes) ruled that the Department of Veterans Affairs cannot bar a Houston pastor from invoking Jesus Christ in a Memorial Day prayer, but that the Obama Administration forced the issue to be taken to court in what the United States Supreme Court once referred to as a Christian nation.
The Obama Administration had to be told that it was "forbidden from dictating the content of speeches — whether those speeches are denominated prayers or otherwise — at the Memorial Day ceremony of National Cemetery Council for Greater Houston."
Judge Hughes:
"The government cannot gag citizens when it says it is in the interest of national security, and it cannot do it in some bureaucrat's notion of cultural homogeneity. The right of free expression ranges from the dignity of Abraham Lincoln's speeches to Charlie Sheen's rants."
"The Constitution does not confide to the government the authority to compel emptiness in a prayer, where a prayer belongs."
"The gray mandarins of the national government are decreeing how citizens honor their veterans. This is not a pick-up-your-trash sign; this is a we-pick-your-words sign."
Congratulations to Rev. Scott Rainey and Texas' Liberty Institute, a non-profit devoted to protecting freedoms and strengthening families, for doing what never should have been necessary to do.
Liberty Institute General Counsel Jeff Mateer lamented: "There certainly is a climate in our country that precipitates" such things as attempts to prohibit a minister from mentioning Jesus in a prayer.
"Secularists and separationists are trying to push an agenda that is telling government that you can't have any religion in public," Mateer said.
Rev. Rainey, the lead pastor of the Living Word Church of the Nazarene, had given the Memorial Day invocation at the cemetery for the past two years and in each case mentioned Jesus Christ without incident.
The event is held at Houston National Cemetery, a public place, and run by a private group, the National Cemetery Council for Greater Houston.
This year Rev. Rainey was asked to submit his prayer for review and submitted a seven-paragraph prayer that spoke of God in a non-denominational way in the first five paragraphs and closed with a recitation of the Lord's Prayer and the line, "While respecting people of every faith today, it is in the name of Jesus Christ, the risen Lord, that I pray. Amen."
Rainey was told that he would not be allowed to pray unless he removed references to one religion. Rainey appealed to the general counsel of the Department of Veterans Affairs and its Deputy General Counsel, John Thompson, decided that "the ceremony will commemorate veterans of all cultures and beliefs, and the tone of remarks must therefore be inclusive."
Judge Hughes issued a temporary restraining order allowing the prayer to be recited as written.
Rev. Rainey's rraction: "While I am very disappointed we had to take legal action, I am glad that the judge agreed that removing Jesus' name from my prayer is unconstitutional. I am honored to be allowed to pray in the name of Jesus at this somber remembrance of our nation's fallen."
The Founders would be aghast.
The United States Constitution is dated "in the Year of our Lord."
That's Jesus, the first to pray the Lord's Prayer and the One in whose name Rev. Rainey intended to and ultimately did pray.
Perhaps Rev. Rainey's should have quoted John Quincey Adams!
On July 4, 1837, the 61st anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Adams declared:
"Why is it that, next to the birthday of the Savior of the World, your most joyous and most venerated festival returns on this day.
"Is it not that, in the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior? That it forms a leading event in the Progress of the Gospel dispensation?
"Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer's mission upon earth?
"That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity and gave to the world the first irrevocable pledge of the fulfillment of the prophecies announced directly from Heaven at the birth of the Savior and predicted by the greatest of the Hebrew prophets 600 years before."
The Founders expected religious values to inform public policy and religious expression to be welcome in the public square and the religious clauses of the First Amendment were intended to assure that.
What is astonishing (and outrageous)is not that a federal judge (the honorable Lynn Hughes) ruled that the Department of Veterans Affairs cannot bar a Houston pastor from invoking Jesus Christ in a Memorial Day prayer, but that the Obama Administration forced the issue to be taken to court in what the United States Supreme Court once referred to as a Christian nation.
The Obama Administration had to be told that it was "forbidden from dictating the content of speeches — whether those speeches are denominated prayers or otherwise — at the Memorial Day ceremony of National Cemetery Council for Greater Houston."
Judge Hughes:
"The government cannot gag citizens when it says it is in the interest of national security, and it cannot do it in some bureaucrat's notion of cultural homogeneity. The right of free expression ranges from the dignity of Abraham Lincoln's speeches to Charlie Sheen's rants."
"The Constitution does not confide to the government the authority to compel emptiness in a prayer, where a prayer belongs."
"The gray mandarins of the national government are decreeing how citizens honor their veterans. This is not a pick-up-your-trash sign; this is a we-pick-your-words sign."
Congratulations to Rev. Scott Rainey and Texas' Liberty Institute, a non-profit devoted to protecting freedoms and strengthening families, for doing what never should have been necessary to do.
Liberty Institute General Counsel Jeff Mateer lamented: "There certainly is a climate in our country that precipitates" such things as attempts to prohibit a minister from mentioning Jesus in a prayer.
"Secularists and separationists are trying to push an agenda that is telling government that you can't have any religion in public," Mateer said.
Rev. Rainey, the lead pastor of the Living Word Church of the Nazarene, had given the Memorial Day invocation at the cemetery for the past two years and in each case mentioned Jesus Christ without incident.
The event is held at Houston National Cemetery, a public place, and run by a private group, the National Cemetery Council for Greater Houston.
This year Rev. Rainey was asked to submit his prayer for review and submitted a seven-paragraph prayer that spoke of God in a non-denominational way in the first five paragraphs and closed with a recitation of the Lord's Prayer and the line, "While respecting people of every faith today, it is in the name of Jesus Christ, the risen Lord, that I pray. Amen."
Rainey was told that he would not be allowed to pray unless he removed references to one religion. Rainey appealed to the general counsel of the Department of Veterans Affairs and its Deputy General Counsel, John Thompson, decided that "the ceremony will commemorate veterans of all cultures and beliefs, and the tone of remarks must therefore be inclusive."
Judge Hughes issued a temporary restraining order allowing the prayer to be recited as written.
Rev. Rainey's rraction: "While I am very disappointed we had to take legal action, I am glad that the judge agreed that removing Jesus' name from my prayer is unconstitutional. I am honored to be allowed to pray in the name of Jesus at this somber remembrance of our nation's fallen."
The Founders would be aghast.
The United States Constitution is dated "in the Year of our Lord."
That's Jesus, the first to pray the Lord's Prayer and the One in whose name Rev. Rainey intended to and ultimately did pray.
Perhaps Rev. Rainey's should have quoted John Quincey Adams!
On July 4, 1837, the 61st anniversary of the Declaration of Independence, Adams declared:
"Why is it that, next to the birthday of the Savior of the World, your most joyous and most venerated festival returns on this day.
"Is it not that, in the chain of human events, the birthday of the nation is indissolubly linked with the birthday of the Savior? That it forms a leading event in the Progress of the Gospel dispensation?
"Is it not that the Declaration of Independence first organized the social compact on the foundation of the Redeemer's mission upon earth?
"That it laid the cornerstone of human government upon the first precepts of Christianity and gave to the world the first irrevocable pledge of the fulfillment of the prophecies announced directly from Heaven at the birth of the Savior and predicted by the greatest of the Hebrew prophets 600 years before."
The Founders expected religious values to inform public policy and religious expression to be welcome in the public square and the religious clauses of the First Amendment were intended to assure that.
Democracy or mobocracy: which? (the Electoral College)
Not too long ago, a congressional staffer made the argument in a private meeting that in America as a democracy, the majority must always rule no matter what. If 51 percent of the people want Shariah (Islamic) law in this country, he argued, then we should have Shariah law nationwide.
What?
That such ignorance exists in the office of an elected official is chilling. And it leaves little doubt as to why so much nonsense comes out of Washington these days, including the notion that we should scrap the Electoral College because it does not guarantee that the President of the United States will always — 100% of the time — be elected by a majority of the electorate.
There are concerted efforts to do away with that method so as to make way for direct election of the president and vice-president. Accordingly, some history is in order at this point.
Democracy or Mobocracy
The Founding Fathers, when they penned the document that created a nation like no other, instinctively understood that freedom, in order to work with stability, required a concomitant respect for responsibility.
Hence, to cite some examples:
1 — The Constitution requires that a presidential veto of legislation duly passed by a majority of both houses of Congress can be overridden only by a vote of two-thirds of both the House and Senate.
2 — The make-up of Congress is in itself a compromise between outright democracy and the rights of the each of the states. The House of Representatives reflects majority rule, with the number of congressmen in each state dependent on the state's population. Each of the nation's 435 congressional districts is roughly equal in population size.
The Senate, on the other hand, accords equal representation to all 50 states. Regardless of size (California or Wyoming), each state has two senators. Originally, the Constitution made certain that those two senators truly reflected the priorities of their states, as determined by elected representatives in the state capitols whose role was to focus on state concerns. Hence, the framers decided that state legislatures should choose their state's U.S. Senators.
Nearly 100 years ago, the Constitution's 17th Amendment was ratified, whereby the U.S. Senate would henceforth be elected directly by the state's voters.
It is my opinion that the original system worked better in terms of a state's prerogatives and concerns. But I also believe that the number of House seats should be vastly expanded so as to put "the people's House" (the "majority rule" segment of the congressional equation) in closer contact with the voters. All of that is a matter for another column. Suffice it to say that — either way — there is a balance between the direct majority (the House) and the more deliberative "cooling saucer" (the Senate).
Brakes on the impetuous
3 — The Senate can avoid outright majority rule through the much-maligned (albeit sometimes abused) "filibuster." This process of "talking an issue to death" has evolved into a situation whereby, for all practical purposes, a 60/40 majority is required in order for the Senate to approve almost anything that is radioactively controversial.
4 — Then there is the question of treaties with other nations — the ratification of which requires a two-thirds vote only in the Senate (as the president sends the treaty there).
5 — The judicial branch of government is responsible for arbitrating legal disputes of what a given law means and whether the law comports with the intent of the Constitution. Moreover, as per those yardsticks, the judiciary can toss out laws enacted by Congress, and also laws that were popularly approved by the voters in ballot initiatives. One reason judicial nominees have become the center of bitter controversy in recent years is that the elected branches have failed to reach finality on some of the most hotly disputed issues.
Majority rule, but.....
We could cite more detail in the above. But we go through all of this civics discourse merely as a reminder that, no — 51 percent does not necessarily prevail in every instance, nor should it. There is a balance between the momentary emotional popular will and the responsibilities that go with self-rule.
Put another way: There is in fact such a thing as the tyranny of the majority. Civil rights laws of the 20th century — whatever arguments might be made as to constitutionality, etc. — were enacted precisely because of a perceived majoritarian "tyranny."
For that matter, public hangings can reflect "majority rule" in a specific place at a given moment. It was the sheer genius of the Founders that they clearly understood where to draw the lines between democracy and mobocracy
So, as we approach a discussion of the issue of the Electoral College as a means of choosing our president, let us dispense with the idea of scrapping that system solely on the basis of its failure to reflect majority rule 100 percent of the time.
Later, we will deal with the specific issue of the Electoral College per se, and why we should be wary of efforts to negate it through the back door, as is being attempted through an end-run attack on the Constitution.
What?That such ignorance exists in the office of an elected official is chilling. And it leaves little doubt as to why so much nonsense comes out of Washington these days, including the notion that we should scrap the Electoral College because it does not guarantee that the President of the United States will always — 100% of the time — be elected by a majority of the electorate.
There are concerted efforts to do away with that method so as to make way for direct election of the president and vice-president. Accordingly, some history is in order at this point.
Democracy or Mobocracy
The Founding Fathers, when they penned the document that created a nation like no other, instinctively understood that freedom, in order to work with stability, required a concomitant respect for responsibility.
Hence, to cite some examples:
1 — The Constitution requires that a presidential veto of legislation duly passed by a majority of both houses of Congress can be overridden only by a vote of two-thirds of both the House and Senate.
2 — The make-up of Congress is in itself a compromise between outright democracy and the rights of the each of the states. The House of Representatives reflects majority rule, with the number of congressmen in each state dependent on the state's population. Each of the nation's 435 congressional districts is roughly equal in population size.The Senate, on the other hand, accords equal representation to all 50 states. Regardless of size (California or Wyoming), each state has two senators. Originally, the Constitution made certain that those two senators truly reflected the priorities of their states, as determined by elected representatives in the state capitols whose role was to focus on state concerns. Hence, the framers decided that state legislatures should choose their state's U.S. Senators.
Nearly 100 years ago, the Constitution's 17th Amendment was ratified, whereby the U.S. Senate would henceforth be elected directly by the state's voters.
It is my opinion that the original system worked better in terms of a state's prerogatives and concerns. But I also believe that the number of House seats should be vastly expanded so as to put "the people's House" (the "majority rule" segment of the congressional equation) in closer contact with the voters. All of that is a matter for another column. Suffice it to say that — either way — there is a balance between the direct majority (the House) and the more deliberative "cooling saucer" (the Senate).
Brakes on the impetuous
3 — The Senate can avoid outright majority rule through the much-maligned (albeit sometimes abused) "filibuster." This process of "talking an issue to death" has evolved into a situation whereby, for all practical purposes, a 60/40 majority is required in order for the Senate to approve almost anything that is radioactively controversial.
4 — Then there is the question of treaties with other nations — the ratification of which requires a two-thirds vote only in the Senate (as the president sends the treaty there).
5 — The judicial branch of government is responsible for arbitrating legal disputes of what a given law means and whether the law comports with the intent of the Constitution. Moreover, as per those yardsticks, the judiciary can toss out laws enacted by Congress, and also laws that were popularly approved by the voters in ballot initiatives. One reason judicial nominees have become the center of bitter controversy in recent years is that the elected branches have failed to reach finality on some of the most hotly disputed issues.
Majority rule, but.....
We could cite more detail in the above. But we go through all of this civics discourse merely as a reminder that, no — 51 percent does not necessarily prevail in every instance, nor should it. There is a balance between the momentary emotional popular will and the responsibilities that go with self-rule.Put another way: There is in fact such a thing as the tyranny of the majority. Civil rights laws of the 20th century — whatever arguments might be made as to constitutionality, etc. — were enacted precisely because of a perceived majoritarian "tyranny."
For that matter, public hangings can reflect "majority rule" in a specific place at a given moment. It was the sheer genius of the Founders that they clearly understood where to draw the lines between democracy and mobocracy
So, as we approach a discussion of the issue of the Electoral College as a means of choosing our president, let us dispense with the idea of scrapping that system solely on the basis of its failure to reflect majority rule 100 percent of the time.
Later, we will deal with the specific issue of the Electoral College per se, and why we should be wary of efforts to negate it through the back door, as is being attempted through an end-run attack on the Constitution.
What are "enumerated powers" and why do they matter?
"Enumerated powers" have an academic sound to them. It sounds like something you would read about in a history book. Simply put, enumerated powers are those powers specifically delegated to the Congress by the US Constitution. By the way, they are still there.
Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution lists the seventeen powers specifically enumerated to the Constitution. All of these things are important and the government's function in these areas was supposed to be strong, in order to protect the liberties of every American. Some of the things delegated to Congress include standard weights and measures, coining money, post offices and post roads, the protection of intellectual property, and a national defense. Beyond these and a few other very specific items, there was not much for which the federal government was responsible.
So how did new medicines get regulated? How would certain industries be licensed? What about the many other things done today by the federal government, who would do them? Those powers not enumerated to Congress were left to others, as seen in the Tenth Amendment of the Constitution: "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." That word, reserved, speaks of exclusivity. This was not a preferential view of public policy ("it would be better if the states and people took care of these things"), but a mandate (if it is not listed in the US Constitution, it is for the states and the people). The vast majority of regulations that exist in states came into place from states watching the works of one another. With the many states, our country had a vibrant laboratory with new ideas being brought to the surface and each state emulated those laws that worked best.
The ideas behind this system are both simple and profound. The state governments had virtually unlimited powers, but limited amounts of money. It could not "print money" to fund its programs, because only the federal government had the power to do such. On the other hand, the federal government only had 17 enumerated powers and it had no reason to use inflation as a vehicle to fund its programs. This contributed to the value of the US dollar remaining steady from the era of the founding until the early part of the 20th century (during the New Deal we began to devalue our currency to pay for "extra Constitutional" or unconstitutional government programs).
The Founders of this republic believed in the dispersion of power. They did such in order to maximize individual freedom and to protect the power of the states. This unique system helped to limit the amount of money taxpayers spent on programs they disagreed with because on the federal level, all the enumerated powers were beneficial to all. Meanwhile, people had the power and freedom to move from state to state in order to find a government that best suited their needs. That power to "vote with their feet" kept most state government very small.
Article I, Section 8 of the Constitution lists the seventeen powers specifically enumerated to the Constitution. All of these things are important and the government's function in these areas was supposed to be strong, in order to protect the liberties of every American. Some of the things delegated to Congress include standard weights and measures, coining money, post offices and post roads, the protection of intellectual property, and a national defense. Beyond these and a few other very specific items, there was not much for which the federal government was responsible.
So how did new medicines get regulated? How would certain industries be licensed? What about the many other things done today by the federal government, who would do them? Those powers not enumerated to Congress were left to others, as seen in the Tenth Amendment of the Constitution: "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." That word, reserved, speaks of exclusivity. This was not a preferential view of public policy ("it would be better if the states and people took care of these things"), but a mandate (if it is not listed in the US Constitution, it is for the states and the people). The vast majority of regulations that exist in states came into place from states watching the works of one another. With the many states, our country had a vibrant laboratory with new ideas being brought to the surface and each state emulated those laws that worked best.
The ideas behind this system are both simple and profound. The state governments had virtually unlimited powers, but limited amounts of money. It could not "print money" to fund its programs, because only the federal government had the power to do such. On the other hand, the federal government only had 17 enumerated powers and it had no reason to use inflation as a vehicle to fund its programs. This contributed to the value of the US dollar remaining steady from the era of the founding until the early part of the 20th century (during the New Deal we began to devalue our currency to pay for "extra Constitutional" or unconstitutional government programs).
The Founders of this republic believed in the dispersion of power. They did such in order to maximize individual freedom and to protect the power of the states. This unique system helped to limit the amount of money taxpayers spent on programs they disagreed with because on the federal level, all the enumerated powers were beneficial to all. Meanwhile, people had the power and freedom to move from state to state in order to find a government that best suited their needs. That power to "vote with their feet" kept most state government very small.
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