Antonin Scalia

Some reports indicate seminars will be held bi-monthly, and others say there will be weekly meetings. In the video below, Bachmann says those interested in the Constitution will meet once a week to study it, the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights.

Note that the seminars are bipartisan, IF, Democrats choose to attend.  Bachmann’s Tea Party Caucus is open to all members of Congress, but so far, only Republicans have attended. The Caucus says its goal is to hold the Congress to legislating in accordance with the U.S. Constitution. With no Democrats as members, we can only assume they see no advantage in bringing constitutional principles to The People’s House, because Lord knows, we haven’t seen much of them for years.

Our Constitution and Bill of Rights “constitute” our federal government. They state what the government can do. What isn’t stated, can’t be done.  When there is a question of passing constitutional muster, the Supreme Court is the final arbiter. Now, a Supreme Court Justice comes to Congress to teach constitutional principles. How many Liberals do you think give a flip?

The second video is Washington Post’s Ezra Klein. He says the Constitution “has no binding power on anything.” I think he still has his job. The first video is courtesy of Right Wing Watch ?

Michele Bachmann: Seminar on US Constitution (video)

Second video courtesy of Citizen Wells:

Ezra Klein: The Constitution “has no Binding Power on Anything” (video)

Posted by Maggie@Maggie’s Notebook

Johnson’s comments came during a House Armed Services Committee meeting as he questioned Adm. Robert Willard, commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, about the impact of U.S. troops on the little island.

“My fear is that the whole island will become so overly populated that it will tip over and capsize,” Johnson said, straight-faced and seemingly serious.

The admiral seemed to take the question seriously, too. “We don’t anticipate that,” he said, proceeding to describe the population on Guam.

Yes, that’s real. Not an April Fools’ Day joke. Here’s the video. The key piece is at 1:15

[Direct link]

Is it any wonder that he rates 100% — lifetime — from the ACLU?

The stupider, the better, when it comes to a liberal agenda.

Keith Ellison, who is also Keith Hakim, is the first Muslim to be sent to Congress from any state, and the first to be sworn on the Koran. He is an attorney, a Democrat and an Black convert to Islam. He was raised Roman Catholic in Detroit and is a supporter of the Nation of Islam’s leader, Louis Farrakhan (aka Louis Eugene Walcott).

Ellison is a fundraiser for the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR). Nihad Awad, the head of CAIR and James Yee, a Muslim Guantanamo cleric were featured speakers at Ellison’s Congressional fundraiser.

The fact that the FBI has broken all ties with CAIR, saying CAIR is not “an appropriate liasion partner,” should be enough to divert Keith Ellison’s affection for the organization. This report quotes an FBI assistant director, Richard C. Powers, saying the FBI is unsure whether the relationship between CAIR and Hamas ever was severed. So, with all of CAIR’s presence on Capitol Hill, with their mammoth media blitzs and lobbying efforts, with their denial of terrorist ties, the FBI cannot support their claims…yet CAIR continues to walk the halls of Congress…and Keith Ellison continues to support the organization.

Okay, there are two women committed to running against Keith Ellison (aka Keith Hakim) in Minnesota. I’m a conservative, and so I am interested in the candidacy of Barb Davis White, but assuming this is a very blue district, I’m also interested in Lynne Torgerson, a Democrat – because neither of these women are Muslim. One of them must unseat Ellison.

Republican Barb Davis White is 49-years-old and single. She lost to Keith Ellison in record numbers according to the The Minnesota Independent, but she will “give it another go in 2010.” White is Black and an evangelical minister. In the video below you’ll hear her speak of the total lack of coverage of her previous run against Ellison  saying it was virtually impossible to get reporting on her candidacy:

A staunch conservative in the state’s most progressive district, White has burnished her credentials this year through involvement with the local Tea Party movement. “I want to be listed as a Christian and a patriotic right-wing conservative American,” she told Tea Partiers in April.

The online news source linked above said Davis has had ongoing difficulty with her FEC filings. No detail was given. In the video below, you’ll see that she is a dynamic speaker and a plain talker. Find White on Facebook here.

Minnesota’s 5th District is 73.5% White, 12.9% Black, 6.0% Hispanic, 5.2% Asian, 1.6%Native American and 3.2% other. She was recently chosen for the Frederick Douglass 2010 Freedom Calendar.

Before saying more about Torgerson, this is my disclaimer. She is not Muslim, she will not support CAIR or raise money for CAIR, and likewise, CAIR will not raise funds for Torgerson. This should give the good people of the 11th District of Minnesota pause to rethink their vote. Islamic faith cannot abide peacefully within the halls of Congress.

The Huffington Post reports “the growth of anti-Muslim sentiment in Minnesota.” That’s a good thing, in my opinion. Here’s a quote from Holger at Holger Awakens in August 2008 in a post about Somali immigrants, the tuberculosis they brought with them and their habit of never, with one exception, integrating into society:

…the one documented act of assimilation into Minnesota society by the Somalis was in 2006 when they massed at the voting precincts in Minneapolis to cast their votes. And who did they help elect? The mouthpiece for the Nation of Islam, Keith Ellison.

According to Lynne Torgerson’s website, she believe that life begins at conception:

She wants a strong Homeland Security, and goes wobbly when she talks about animals and being “green on the environment.” We are all “green” on the environment – but we differ on the measures necessary to keep the environment green.

Torgerson is for a health care public option, but does not want to eliminate the private sector (naive at best), she supports the Second Amendment and is a gun owner, seems to be strong on immigration control (although she wanders a bit as she tries to express her thoughts), she supports Israel, and wants to stop Iran’s nuclear aggression. Torgerson wants to “eliminate our dependence…on foreign oil,” wants to develop clean energy, keep jobs in America, and she opposes the auto bailout.

When it comes to freedom of speech and freedom of religion, Torgerson says that freedom of religion does not include criminal behavior in the name of religion. This gets her to Islam:

Torgerson cites Ayaan Hirsi Ali’s book Infidel and the proof of “repugnant” behavior which is contrary to the First Amendment. She asks and answers “what else do I know of Islam.” This strikes me as an earnest question made by a woman sincerely concerned about the threat of Islam and trying to be “real” about it.

I’ll say it again, she is a Democrat who is not Muslim, she will not support CAIR, will not raise funds for CAIR and CAIR will not raise funds for her. Find Torgerson on Facebook here.

Barb Davis White Challenges Keith Ellison in 2010 (video)

Our world is upside-down. Democratic leaders say they do not share the concerns of the Republican members of the House Intelligence Committee that Nidal Hasan’s red flags were, perhaps, ignored.

Just a few short months ago, Speaker Nancy Pelosi called the CIA liars, offered no proof and then refused to talk about it again – leaving the stain on the agency’s  credibility in full view for the world to see.

Yesterday, Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) accused Obama of withholding “critical” information. The House Intelligence Committee, chaired by a Democrat, dismissed Hoestra’s concerns.

Rep. Hoekstra went even farther and effectively said the President was not truthful when he claimed that Hoekstra and other intelligence committees had been “briefed:”

Rep. Pete Hoekstra (R-MI) is blasting President Obama for withholding from the Congressional intelligence committees information on the Fort Hood killings suspect, while at the same time acknowledging the leaders of those panels — including Hoekstra himself — have indeed been briefed on Nidal Malik Hasan.

In his statement, Hoekstra repeated Obama’s plea that we not “jump to conclusions” about the alleged Fort Hood killer:

…but the administration is in possession of critical information related to the attack that they are refusing to release to Congress or the American people,” Hoekstra said

Hoekstra said he was concerned that more information had been provided, piecemeal, to the news media by anonymous sources than had yet been provided to the Committee. He criticized the Obama administration for not being more immediately forthcoming with details and specifically requested information, and for restricting the limited information provided so far to the so-called “Gang of Eight.”

So perhaps the Gang of Eight is the problem? No. Hoekstra is a member of the Gang of Eight. Members are Nancy Pelosi, John Boehner Harry Reid, Mitch McConnell, Silvestre Reyes, Pete Hoekstra, Diane Feinstein and Kit Bond. So what is going on? Was Hoekstra appropriately briefed as Obama claims, or was he not? And how about Pelosi and Reid? What do they know?

This is the height of hypocrisy and the culmination of evil. The administration and Democrats are salivating over Eric Holder’s investigation into CIA so-called torture of Guantanamo prisoners - after promising the Bush administration that they would drop that atrocious idea.

But today, with the Fort Hood memorial tribute still on the calendar, they have no concern that intelligence and the U.S. Army may have put troops side-by-side with a radical jihadist – with red flags flaring.

Democrats know Americans are fed up with their politically correct posture. We know Americans are dying in this country, in Afghanistan and still yet in Iraq because military fears the wrath of Congress, and the administration, loathes any attempt to profile or point a knowing finger at an extremist. In the video below, Hoekstra speaks about preventing terrorism and keeping soldiers safe…February 2008. Listen as he talks about homegrown terrorism. Democrats told him the “threat is not real.”

Pete Hoekstra  “threat not real”

A few days ago, Hans Bader writing for Stop the ACLU reported on the hate crimes legislation Bill. This article is intended to be a further discussion of what is behind the language in the Bill. The question is, is double jeopardy a factor in this new legislative language?

The answer is kinda-sorta. It’s really more about The Dual Sovereignty Doctrine negating the double jeopardy clause in the 5th Amendment.

The government now does have the right to try hate crime suspects after they have been tried by the state, and even if already tried and found guilty by the state. This position is confirmed by a letter from the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights to members of the U.S. Senate. Read it at NationaReviewOnLine. So how does it happen a person can be tried twice for the same crime?

Here is a portion that I believe gives the DOJ the opportunity to retry a hate crime: (The text of the Bill is here).

(b) (1) IN GENERAL – No prosecution of any offense described in the subsection may be undertaken by the United States, except under the certification in writing of the Attorney General, or his designee, that- (C) the verdict or sentence obtained pursuant to State charges left demonstratively unvindicated the Federal interest in eradicating bias-motivated violence; or (D) a prosecution by the United States is in the public interest and necessary to secure substantial justice.

(b) (2) RULE OF CONSTRUCTION- Nothing in this subsection shall be construed to limit the authority of Federal officers, or a Federal grand jury, to investigate possible violations of this section.

This gives the DOJ the right to try any case on behalf of a victim they feel has not received justice, while also eliminating “the badges…and relics of slavery and involuntary servitude.”

A quick reading of the Bill might lead you to think it will simply “support” state’s with money, but it goes much deeper than the $5 million to be given to states in each of the years 2010 and 2011. If a state can “certify” the need for government assistance to “investigate or prosecute the hate crime,” then that state will get that assistance. But read about the”sham and cover” exception a few paragraphs below. We have to ask why this administration believes this legislation is necessary.

The Dual Sovereignty Doctrine expects those administering under the Doctrine to “limit” their actions. This from TheFreeLibrary:

The court did not, however, fully eliminate the double jeopardy prohibition from this context. The dual sovereignty doctrine continues to be limited by what is referred to as the “sham” exception, which was described by the Bartkus Court.

The sham exception provides that a prosecution by one sovereign cannot be used as a “sham and a cover” for another sovereign’s re-prosecution of the same defendant.

This doctrine would operate to prevent, on double jeopardy grounds, a prosecution brought by one sovereign with the encouragement and support of another sovereign that has already failed in its attempt to prosecute the same defendant.

The doctrine is founded on the rationale that the two sovereigns are acting as one. Unfortunately, this exception has been construed so narrowly as to make it difficult to be utilized successfully.

Apparently, this DOJ and Barack Obama believe that justice is not done often enough, and courts do not punish, often enough, those who commit hate crimes. So the question remains: is it possible for any violent crime to be classified as a “hate crime” when it is perpetrated against a Jewish or a white person?

[Emphasis by Lobo]

Democrats in Congress are outraged that the Pentagon and CIA were developing a plan to “assassinate” al Qaeda in Iraq. The assassination teams would be CIA personnel, and not U.S. Military. Especially heinous to Congress is that the Pentagon did not brief appropriate Congressional members about the incomplete and unimplemented plan.

CIA

Americans are no longer shocked to hear that we have not always targeted all al Qaeda members, including leaders…especially leaders…since the war began after 9-11. We are no longer shocked at much we hear, because doing what makes no sense is exactly what Congress always does. Nevertheless, while not shocked, we are surprised, and along with our surprise comes puzzlement. Why would we need a secret program, even assuming Congress is briefed, to kill top al-Qaeda members?

Targeted killing of terrorists is prohibited by presidential orders banning assassinations that date back to the Ford administration. But the president can waive that order, said Vicki Divoll, a former CIA counsel, because there is no specific federal law that bans the practice.

There’s also no legal difference, she said, between killing al Qaeda targets with a hit team or with an unmanned drone, because the “intent to kill a targeted person” defines an assassination.

The “air strikes” are what made this never-implemented plan different. According to officials, it was okay to target and kill al Qadea with air strikes, but not okay to target and kill al Qaeda “at close range,” – what might include hand-to-hand combat. Killing “at close range” might risk “civilian casualties.” For now, the CIA will have to be satisfied with Predator Drones – except that Congress can’t keep it’s mouth shut about them either. While Pakistan recently complained about Predator drones taking off and landing inside their borders, officials assured Pakistan that only surveillance drones are used inside the country, not the Predator which is capable of launching missiles.

Privately, though, Pakistani officials doubt that claim, especially after the chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Diane Feinstein, (D-CA), suggested 10 days ago that the CIA Predator drones do indeed use Pakistani airfields and not necessarily Afghan airfields, as most assume.

According to an anonymous source at the CIA, Dick Cheney directed the agency not to inform Congress of the specifics of the secret program.

Panetta told the committees there was no indication that there was anything illegal or inappropriate about the effort itself, the official said.

CIA directors since 2001 agreed with Cheney’s decision not to inform Congress because the highly classified operation, described as “sporadic” and “embryonic,” never managed to turn up the intelligence needed to carry out a kill and was not considered a covert operation, according to a former intelligence official. That official also was not authorized to discuss the program and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Congress has a right to know everything the CIA does, but the president can by law limit those told about covert operations to just the top four members of the House and Senate from the two parties and the senior members of the intelligence committees. Democrats on the House intelligence committee are pushing for a legal provision that would require the president to brief both committees in their entirety more often, but the White House has threatened to veto the move.

DefenseTech.org reminds us of Sandi Berger letting Osama bin Laden escape in Afghanistan, rather than chance civilian casualties: Doesn’t this sort of smack of Sandi Berger-esque national security policy?

We know from the 9-11 commission report that Berger got cold feet when he had bin Laden in his sights for a proxy raid in Afghanistan because he was afraid of collateral damage and blowback. Now some of the same national security policy minds are back in the driver’s seat so we can cancel a program to kill bad guys using CIA assets.

Here is the directive for how and when the CIA program would have been implemented:

Had it become fully developed, the CIA’s aborted plan would have been a covert-action program. At the outset, the potential operation wouldn’t have been limited to particular countries. The use of hit teams was in accordance with the authority granted by the 2001 order, said a former national-security official familiar with it.

In the most recent iteration of the project, top CIA leaders instructed officers involved to narrow its focus and report the plans to Congress if they reached a critical point where moving forward would involve activities that, if discovered, could embarrass the U.S., according to a former senior intelligence official.

Among all the punditry on this subject, we’ve heard little to nothing about the distinction between targeting for air strikes or targeting for “close contact,” but surprisingly to me, there is a U.S policy prohibiting the “assassination” of anyone, not just heads of State!

Targeted killing of terrorists is prohibited by presidential orders banning assassinations that date back to the Ford administration. But the president can waive that order, said Vicki Divoll, a former CIA counsel, because there is no specific federal law that bans the practice.

There’s also no legal difference, she said, between killing al Qaeda targets with a hit team or with an unmanned drone, because the “intent to kill a targeted person” defines an assassination.

However, that is not the end of the story. The rest of the story involves the Joint special Operations Command (JSOC). The JSOC is a somewhat secret branch of the U.S. Special Operations Command. The Special Operations Command is made-up of “special mission units.” Among these units are the Delta Force and Seal Team Six. During the Iraq War other elite groups were known as “Grey Fox,” “Capacity Gear” and “Titrant Ranger.”

Pulitzer Prize winning investigating “journalist,” Sy Hersh has charged that during the Bush-Cheney years the JSOC reported directly to Dick Cheney and no one else. He termed it an “executive assassination ring.” The New York Times columnist didn’t make the accusations in the NYT, but from podiums on college campuses, at the ACLU and public radio. New York Magazine writer Chris Suellentrop calls Hersh “the runaway mouth of America’s premier investigative journalist.”Bill Roggio writing for the Weekly Standard Blog says the Hersh claims that the JSOC reports to no one, or only to Cheney during the Bush-Cheney years, is false; they report to the Secretary of Defense and also falls under congressional oversight.

From Marc Ambinder:

JSOC units are very active in Iraq and Afghanistan; in those countries, since the U.S. is formally at war, their conduct can’t really be analogized to an extra-legal hit squad….What’s objectionable, in theory, is that the President can designate anyone as a terrorist and task JSOC with finding and executing them — even if the person is not living in the war theatre and has never been charged with a crime. In practice, that’s what presidents from Richard Nixon to Ronald Reagan to Bill Clinton have believed (the following from a 2001 report).

Senior intelligence officials confirm that a secret finding recently signed by President Bush, building on an earlier one by President Clinton, grant the CIA legal authority to conduct assassination operations against individuals designated as terrorists. As a result, the CIA is devising strategy and policy to that end, and is developing assets for assassinations within both the CIA and “uniformed military units,” as well as foreign agents in Middle Eastern countries.

The outrage is likely a convenient smoke screen designed to take the focus off of Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s accusation that the CIA “lies all the time.” Target Dick Cheney’s so-called assassination plots and the Dems might think they have a winner. Complain that the CIA targets al Qaeda and the Dems might think they have a winner…but maybe not. Just maybe we expect Congress to support every tactic possible to win these wars.

Have you wondered why any baby born on American soil with illegal parents is considered a legal American citizen? The answer may shock you as much as it did me.

My reference is a discussion at the Heritage Foundation, dated March 30, 2006 by John C. Eastman, Ph.D.

—John C. Eastman, Ph.D., is Professor of Law at Chapman University School of Law and Director of The Claremont Institute Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence. This memorandum stems from an amicus brief filed by the Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence in support of respondents in Hamdi v. Rumsfeld.

The key to the 14th Amendment which defines U.S. citizenship are the words “subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” which means that no one can be a U.S. citizen if their allegiance is to any other country. For instance, an Ambassador to the U.S., living in the U.S. but serving allegiance to another country cannot be a U.S. citizen – and neither can the Ambassador’s child…well, maybe.

The Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amend­ment provides that “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.”[1] As manifest by the con­junctive “and,” the clause mandates citizenship to those who meet both of the constitutional prerequi­sites: (1) birth (or naturalization) in the United States and (2) being subject to the jurisdiction of the United States.

Today’s incorrect viewpoint, according to Dr. Eastman:

The widely held, though erroneous, view today is that any person entering the territory of the United States—even for a short visit; even illegally—is considered to have subjected himself to the juris­diction of the United States, which is to say, sub­jected himself to the laws of the United States. Surely one who is actually born in the United States is therefore “subject to the jurisdiction” of the United States and entitled to full citizenship as a result, or so the common reasoning goes.

Why that viewpoint is incorrect:

The “subject to the jurisdiction” provision must therefore require something in addition to mere birth on U.S. soil. The language of the 1866 Civil Rights Act, from which the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment was derived, provides the key to its meaning. The 1866 Act provides: “All persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States.”[3] As this formulation makes clear, any child born on U.S. soil to parents who were temporary visitors to this country and who, as a result of the foreign citizenship of the child’s par­ents, remained a citizen or subject of the parents’ home country was not entitled to claim the birth­right citizenship provided by the 1866 Act.

An historical example: In Elk v. Wilkins, John Elk was born on an Indian reservation and eventually moved off the reservation, renounced his tribal allegiance and applied for U.S. Citizenship. He was denied citizenship because at birth, his allegiance was not subject to the jurisdiction of the United States. According to the Supreme Court, he “owed immediate allegiance to” his tribe and not to the U.S. – and his tribe was considered an alien nation. In a geographical sense, Elk was born within the U.S., but according to the 14th Amendment was not subject to U.S. jurisdiction.

Then comes the Court action that changed everything.

In Wong Kim Ark, Justice Horace Gray, writing for the Court, held that “a child born in the United States, of parents of Chinese descent, who at the time of his birth were subjects of the emperor of China, but have a permanent domicile and resi­dence in the United States,” was, merely by virtue of his birth in the United States, a citizen of the United States as a result of the Citizenship Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment

Justice Gray [who also served on the Court in the Elk case] appears not to have appreciated the distinction between partial, territorial jurisdiction, which subjects all who are present within the terri­tory of a sovereign to the jurisdiction of that sover­eign’s laws [such as an Emperor, a King, a Prince, a Queen] and complete political jurisdiction, which requires allegiance to the sovereign as well.

By limiting the “subject to the jurisdiction” clause to the children of diplomats, who neither owed alle­giance to the United States nor were (at least at the ambassadorial level) subject to its laws merely by virtue of their residence in the United States as the result of the long-established international law fic­tion of extraterritoriality by which the sovereignty of a diplomat is said to follow him wherever he goes, Justice Gray simply failed to appreciate what he seemed to have understood in Elk, namely, that there is a difference between territorial jurisdiction, on the one hand, and the more complete, alle­giance-obliging jurisdiction that the Fourteenth Amendment codified, on the other.

Gray “astoundingly” ignored the Constitution’s requirement for a citizen to swear an oath to support the Constitution of the U.S. and renounce all allegiance to any other country.

Finally, Justice Gray’s position is incompatible with the notion of consent that underlay the sover­eign’s power over naturalization. What it meant, fundamentally, was that foreign nationals could secure American citizenship for their children merely by giving birth on American soil, whether or not their arrival on America’s shores was legal or illegal, temporary or permanent.

Justice Gray saw only two classes of children ineligible for U.S. citizenship: the children of ambassadors and other foreign diplomats, and the children of members of invading armies who were born on U.S. soil while it was occupied by a foreign army.

…apart from these two narrow exceptions, all children of foreign nationals who managed to be born on U.S. soil were, in Justice Gray’s formulation, citizens of the United States. Children born of parents who had been offered permanent residence but were not yet citizens, and who as a result had not yet renounced their allegiance to their prior sovereign, would become citizens by birth on U.S. soil.

Children of parents residing only temporarily in the United States on a student or work visa would also become U.S. citizens. Children of parents who had overstayed their temporary visas would like­wise become U.S. citizens, even though born of parents who were now in the United States ille­gally. And, perhaps most troubling from the “con­sent” rationale, even children of parents who never were in the United States legally would become citizens as the direct result of the illegal action by their parents. This would be true even if the par­ents were nationals of a regime at war with the United States and even if the parents were here to commit acts of sabotage against the United States, at least as long as the sabotage did not actually involve occupying a portion of the territory of the United States.

The notion that the framers of the Fourteenth Amendment, when seeking to guaran­tee the right of citizenship to former slaves, also sought to guarantee citizenship to the children of enemies of the United States who were in its terri­tory illegally is simply too absurd to be a credible interpretation of the Citizenship Clause.

The U.S. Congress has the sole power to grant U.S. citizenship to children of foreign nationals. but so far, this has not happened. The idea of “birthright” citizenship, is, Dr. Eastman says, “contrary to the principle of consent that is one of the bedrock principles of the American regime.”

In 2006, the Heritage Foundation called for Congress to revive it’s “constitutional power over naturalization.”

It is time for the courts, and for the political branches as well, to revisit Justice Gray’s erroneous interpretation of the Citizenship Clause, restoring to the constitutional mandate what its drafters actually intended: that only a complete jurisdic­tion, of the kind that brings with it a total and exclusive allegiance, is sufficient to qualify for the grant of citizenship to which the people of the United States actually consented.

“While Congress seems to be reluctant to get at odds with a “co-equal” branch of government, (exercising it’s own constitutional authority to interpret the Constitution in [a] way contrary to the pronouncements of the courts) Eastman says it is their sole duty to do so.

Congress’s power over natu­ralization is “plenary,” [complete, entire, absolute] while “judicial power [Supreme Court] over immigration and naturalization is extremely
lim­ited.

Dr. Eastman’s entire paper is well worth a read – you’ll find much more detail. Look for the comments about creating redundancy within the Constitution interesting.

The Citizenship clause in the 14th Amendment was written by Senator Jacob M. Howard (MI). 14th Amendment.us gives us his own words to explain the meaning and intention of the Citizenship clause:

Mr. HOWARD: I now move to take up House joint resolution No. 127.

The motion was agreed to; and the Senate, as in Committee of the Whole, resumed the consideration of the joint resolution (H.R. No. 127) proposing an amendment to the Constitution of the United States.

The first amendment is to section one, declaring that all “persons born in the United States and Subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the States wherein they reside. I do not propose to say anything on that subject except that the question of citizenship has been fully discussed in this body as not to need any further elucidation, in my opinion. This amendment which I have offered is simply declaratory of what I regard as the law of the land already, that every person born within the limits of the United States, and subject to their jurisdiction, is by virtue of natural law and national law a citizen of the United States. This will not, of course, include persons born in the United States who are foreigners, aliens, who belong to the families of ambassadors or foreign ministers accredited to the Government of the United States, but will include every other class of persons. It settles the great question of citizenship and removes all doubt as to what persons are or are not citizens of the United States. This has long been a great desideratum in the jurisprudence and legislation of this country.

The above discussion continues with Senator Howard responding to Senator Lyman Trumbull who was chairman of the Judiciary Committee and author of the 13th Amendment. Then Senator Johnson takes the floor:

…all this amendment [citizenship clause] provides is, that all persons born in the United States and not subject to some foreign Power…shall be considered as citizens of the United States. That would seem to be not only a wise but a necessary provision. If there are to be citizens of the United States there should be some certain definition of what citizenship is, what has created the character of citizen as between himself and the United States, and the amendment says that citizenship may depend upon birth, and I know of no better way to give rise to citizenship than the fact of birth within the territory of the United States, born to parents who at the time were subject to the authority of the United States.

There is more discussion and more confirmations from members of the U.S. Senate as to the original intention of the 14th Amendment. Please visit 14th Amendment.us. If you are interested in illegal immigration, you’ll want this document bookmarked.

A reminder: Congress is solely responsible for citizenship.

Related Reference:
Citizenship clause of the 14 Amendment

House Republican Leader, John Boehner, in an op-ed written for RedState.com, lays out the issues we can expect the Minority Leadership to stand against. After Boehner’s list you’ll find links to all Senate and House Committees as well as the ranking Republican committee member for each.

* If an Obama presidency means “spreading the wealth around” by raising taxes on small businesses, families and investment to pay for more spending in Washington, DC, Republicans will have no choice but to fight it vigorously in favor of a pro-growth plan for rapid economic recovery.

* If an Obama presidency means cutting defense and troop funding while we’re fighting a war against terror, Republicans will stand opposed on behalf of our military men and women and the nation they protect.

* If an Obama presidency means doing the bidding of radical special interests by taking away workers’ right to secret ballot elections, forcing workers to join unions, rolling back school choice for low-income children on behalf of powerful Washington teachers unions, and making it easier for dishonest trial lawyers to extort money through job-killing, frivolous lawsuits, Republicans will fight to put the country’s interests first.

* If an Obama presidency means blocking production of American energy that would help lower costs, create jobs, and reduce our dependence on foreign oil, Republicans will fight for enactment of an energy plan that does “all of the above” – increased conservation, innovation, and domestic production.

* If an Obama presidency means spending billions of dollars annually on wasteful pork-barrel projects, including taxpayer-funded “monuments to me” and earmarks “airdropped” into bills at the last possible minute to avoid scrutiny, Republicans will fight it vigorously.

* If an Obama presidency means repealing state and federal laws that protect the rights of unborn children and respect the sanctity of innocent human life, we’ll fight it vigorously.

* If an Obama presidency means regulating free speech and stifling dissent on the airwaves [the Fairness Doctrine], Republicans will fight it vigorously.

* If an Obama presidency means forcing people out of their private health insurance and into a government-run program, Republicans will oppose it and fight for real solutions that keep Americans’ health care in the hands of patients and doctors, not government bureaucrats.

* If an Obama presidency means ignoring the looming fiscal tsunami in our entitlement programs –- ducking a problem that could eventually make the current financial crisis look like a tempest in a teacup – Republicans will have no choice but to fight it and demand responsible reforms to protect current and future generations of Americans.

* If an Obama presidency means cutting off job-creating trade with the rest of the world, Republicans will stand opposed and fight to open foreign markets to products created by American workers.

* If an Obama presidency means blocking investigation of the role Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, ACORN, and subprime mortgages played in the financial meltdown, Republicans will fight for accountability, transparency, and real reform to ensure taxpayers are never again put at such risk.

* If an Obama presidency means sweeping ethical issues involving Members of Congress under a rug, Republicans will fight for transparency and accountability, while holding ourselves to the highest possible ethical standards.

Everything begins in Committee. Below you will find the House and Senate Committees with a link to the Committee homepage as well as a link to the website of the ranking Republican member. If the ranking member, or other Republican committee members is/are not from your state, don’t let that slow you down.

Pick your issues. Stay up-to-date. Make the contact. Catch the legislation early and often. Give Congress the courage to do the hard work needing to be done.

Senator John Boehner, House Republican Leader

The website for the House Republican Leader, John Boehner, should be on your toolbar or in your favorites folder for easy access.

List of House Committees Homepage:

House Agriculture: Ranking Republican Bob Goodlatte (VA)
House Armed Services: Ranking Republican, Duncan Hunter (CA)
House Budget: Ranking Republican Paul Ryan (WI)
House Education & Labor: Ranking Republican Buck McKeon (CA)
House Energy and Commerce: Ranking Republican, Joe Barton (TX)
House Finance Services: Ranking Republican Spencer Bachus(AL)
House Foreign Affairs: Ranking Republican Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL)
House Homeland Security: Ranking Republican Peter King (NY)
House Judiciary: Ranking Republican Lamar Smith (TX)
House Administration: Ranking Republican Vernon Ehlers (MI)
House Natural Resources: Ranking Republican Jim Saxton (NJ)
House Oversight & Reform: Ranking Republican Thomas Davis III (VA)
House Rules: Ranking Republican David Dreier (CA)
House Science-Technology: Ranking Republican Laura Richardson (CA)
House Small Business: Ranking Republican Steve Chabot (OH)
House Standards of Conduct: Ranking Republican Doc Hastings (WA)
House Transportation: Ranking Republican John Mica (FL)
House Veterans Affairs: Ranking Republican Steve Buyer (IN)
House Ways & Means: Ranking Republican Jim McCrery (LA)

Senator Mitch McConnell, U.S. Senate Republican Leader

Another link for your toolbar: Republican Senate Homepage

List of Senate Committees Homepage:

Senate Agriculture & Forestry: Ranking Republican Richard Lugar (IN)
Senate Appropriations: Ranking Republican Thad Cochran
Senate Armed Services: Ranking Republican, John McCain (AZ)
Senate Banking: Ranking Republican, Richard C. Shelby (R-AL)
Senate Budget: Ranking Republican Judd Gregg (NH)
Small Business: Ranking Republican Olympia Snowe (ME)
Senate Comm & Transp: Ranking Republican Kay Bailey Hutchison (TX)
Senate Energy, Nat Resources, Ranking Republican Pete Domenici (NM)
Senate Environment: Ranking Republican Jim Inhofe (OK)

Other Sources:

The Congressional Record (the official record of the proceedings and debates in Congress)
House.gov
House Legislative Archive
List of U.S. Representatives
Senate Legislation & Records
List of U.S. Senators
The Library of Congress
Congress.org To Go

Let us not think back on the past weaknesses of our Conservative leaders. Now is the time to demand boldness from them.

Let us encourage the Republican wing of Congress to get to the microphones, write editorials, send emails, seek out Conservative radio, and take on the subtle issues that are designed to move Conservatism off the map.

Let us know that while the Conservative voice is not strong enough to make “all the difference,” it is strong enough to make “some difference.”

Let us get to know the Committees of Congress, identify the Conservative members and stay in contact with them. Let us know the Bills coming to Committee, have a feel for their dispensation and make our arguments directly to the Conservative Committee members. Let us never allow our Senators and Representatives to bow to the Majority without putting up a loud fight – strongly making the Conservative case. Even when we lose – let them hear from us.

Let us know all we can about the United Nations. Let us note every word uttered about the U.N., by our President and our U.N. Ambassador. Blog about it. Watch it. Blog about it even more.

Let us be informed about Senator Obama’s Global Poverty Bill (s.2433). Let us get to know that Bill intimately. Let us determine how tying the U.N.’s Millennium Goals to that Bill can be imposed on America. Let us have conversations with our Conservative Congressmen about s.2433.

Let us renew the cry for Drill Here, Drill Now. This issue has not been defeated with an Obama-Biden win, but there is no doubt the struggle will be long and hard. Let us not make the battle easy for Liberals.

Let us demand that all those executives complicit in the bailout be known and punished. This must not fade away, lost in the helpless feeling that we can do nothing. We need a battle cry.

Let us not throw up our hands and wait for the next election. Our Senators and Representatives receive a paycheck from us, and it has not been money well spent. Let us make them work for their pay, and in doing so, let us help them strengthen their voice in the hallowed halls of our Capitol.

Let us not just lie down and take it. Let us offer daily support against Senator Reid and Speaker Pelosi. Let us be in IM mode.

Finally, let us continue to seek answers to the questions we’ve been asking about Senator Obama’s background. There will be a groundswell now to put all that behind us and move forward. If there is nothing worthy to be disputed, I’ll accept that, but not until I know.

As I write this, Fox News has a clip of last night’s rally for Obama in Grant Park. In the center of the screen is the red flag of Communism – the hammer and sickle flag is physically being help up for the camera.

This photo is not a subliminal message – it’s a threat

Philip Berg’s lawsuit against Barack Obama and the DNC has been dismissed in a Philadelphia Federal Court.

Jeff Schreiber at America’s Right is reporting that Judge Surrick finds that Berg lacks “standing,” and further from Schreiber:

A judge’s attitude toward the factual foundation of a plaintiff’s claims is an essential factor in understanding just who indeed has standing to sue. The question running to the heart of the standing doctrine is whether or not the plaintiff indeed has a personal stake in the outcome of the otherwise justiciable matter being adjudicated. As has been discussed before many times here at America’s Right, a plaintiff wishing to have standing to sue must show (1) a particularized injury-in-fact, (2) evidence showing that that the party being sued actually caused the plaintiff’s particularized injury-in-fact, and (3) that adjudication of the matter would actually provide redress.

In this case, Judge Surrick’s attitude toward the evidence presented by Berg to support his allegations figures in heavily because, while there is a three-pronged test to standing in itself, there is no definitive test by which the court can determine whether a certain harm is enough to satisfy the first element of that three-pronged test by showing true injury-in-fact. Traditionally, it hasn’t taken much to satisfy the need for an injury-in-fact, but as the plaintiff’s claimed injury is perceived as being more remote, more creative, or more speculative, the injury-in-fact requirement becomes more difficult to satisfy.

What this means is that our Federal courts do not consider a possible fraudulent filing for the office of U.S. President, possible fraudulent campaign for President and possible fraudulent taking of the oath of office, and stepping into the Oval Office as an “injury” to the people of this country. That’s the bottom line. Until an unqualified person actually takes the office, “we the people” have not been injured.

So who does have standing, Schrieber asks?: “According to the Hon. R. Barclay Surrick, that’s completely up to Congress to decide.”

If, through the political process, Congress determines that citizens, voters, or party members should police the Constitution’s eligibility requirements for the Presidency, then it is free to pass laws conferring standing on individuals like Plaintiff. Until that time, voters do not have standing to bring the sort of challenge that Plaintiff attempts to bring in the Amended Complaint.

Assuming this is true, are we so naive as to think that Congress does not know this?

Maybe the DNC has properly vetted their candidate, but it appears they may not have done so, simply because they have not put this matter to rest.

I have had numerous commenters claiming that the DNC knows his citizenship status – because, as one commenter said “they check these things, you know.” Well, if that is so, why would the Senate not have stepped up with a non-binding resolution declaring his natural born status, as they did on John MaCain’s behalf? How incredible is this?

Read Schreiber’s entire report which is packed with additional info.