Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion

Howard Kurtz of The Washington Post profiles Chuck Todd of NBC News, NBC's Chuck Todd: White House correspondent, anchor, blogger, twitterer:

"Chuckie T," as he's sometimes called, is an unabashed political junkie from Miami who fed his habit during 15 years at the news digest Hotline. He seems most passionate on television talking about obscure House races and has an encyclopedic storehouse of political knowledge....

He proved to be a natural, but even now describes himself as a wordy writer who is always tempted to add a parentheses to jam in extra details.

I think I'm going to be ill. Seriously.

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One of the difficulties of adhering to constitutional federalism is that liberals always, always want to use conservative acknowledgement of any acceptable role for the federal government as an excuse to require federal government control of just about everything. The slope is very slippery, indeed.

In a column today, Ross Douthat made a point similar to the point I made about Rand Paul, which is that sometimes the weight of history and necessity require limiting one's political ideals:

No ideology survives the collision with real-world politics perfectly intact. General principles have to bend to accommodate the complexities of history, and justice is sometimes better served by compromise than by zealous intellectual consistency.

This was all that Rand Paul needed to admit, after his victory in Kentucky’s Republican Senate primary, when NPR and Rachel Maddow asked about his views of the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

“As a principled critic of federal power,” he could have said, “I oppose efforts to impose Washington’s will on states and private institutions. As a student of the history of segregation and slavery, however, I would have made an exception for the Civil Rights Act.”

This compromise, however, is a hole large enough for liberals to drive a truck through. And that truck is not civil rights, it is the entire liberal nanny state.

So observes a blogger at one of the few left-wing blogs I admire (shhh, don't tell anyone), TalkLeft, in taking on Douthat's column today:

The questions to be asked are obvious - what other "exceptions" should conservatives concede? Does Deep Water prove an "exception" is necessary for government regulation of commercial activities that affect the environment? Does the 2008 meltdown prove that an"exception" for government regulation of financial markets is in order? The "exceptions" swallow Douthat's conservative principles.

Yes, that is the problem. Give an inch, and they take a mile. The problem is not the conservative principles, however, but those who are driving the liberal truck.

As I have pointed out before, maritime affairs (no, not Monkey Business) is an area in which federal involvement is recognized in the Constitution, and regulating securities markets is a pretty unobtrusive interpretation of the Commerce Clause. You see, the Constitution does not prohibit the federal government from acting, but it also does not enable health care mandates and salt police.

Even so, sometimes the inch needs to be given. Even to a truck run amok.

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Of course, that depends upon what the meaning of "crazy" is.

News has leaked out through an article in Esquire Magazine that Eric Massa, the disgraced Democratic rock star (was he the tickler, or the tickle-ee?), claims that Dick Cheney conspired with Gen. David Petraeus to stage a coup.

As summarized by Glenn Thrush:

Former Rep. Eric Massa told Esquire Magazine earlier this year that he believed Vice President Dick Cheney and Gen. David Petraeus had committed the highest offense against the nation by plotting an electoral “coup” against President Barack Obama.

Massa’s version of the story led Esquire’s journalists to conclude that Massa, who resigned in March amid allegations of sexually harassing male aides, was “a little bit crazy.”

Nonetheless, Esquire reports in its forthcoming edition, that Massa told the magazine "Gentlemen, what we have here is a constitutional crisis … If what I've been told is true — and I believe it is — General David Petraeus, a commander with soldiers deployed in two theaters of war, has had multiple meetings with Dick Cheney, the former vice-president of the United States, to discuss Petraeus's candidacy for the Republican nomination for the presidency [in 2012]. And in fact, that's more than a constitutional crisis. That's treason.”

These allegations may be crazy, but they do put Massa in the mainstream of Democratic Bush/Cheney Derangement Syndrome:

• The Cheney Coup: "I promised myself I wouldn't bring this up, it's a hobbyhorse that I like to ride that has yet to excite anyone but me. But now that Dick Cheney is claiming his office is not an "entity within the executive branch" I can't help myself. You see, I believe the vice president conducted a de facto coup on 9/11 when he ordered the "shootdown" of civilian planes."
• Cheney's coup: "Since the coup d'état of Executive Order 13292, however, the vice presidency has been transformed."
• Cheney’s Plans for a Military Coup: "The Yoo memoranda set the stage for a military dictatorship, following exactly the sort of phased introduction that occurred in the cone of South America in the seventies and eighties."

Crazy is a relative term. Just like "in" and "is".

Update: After reading some of the comments, I realize I left out a critical part of Massa's conspiracy theory. Massa asserted that Petraeus would deliberately not accomplish "the mission" in Iraq and Afghanistan so that Obama would be blamed:

Massa went on to say that “In order to succeed electorally, he must fail in his mission. Were he to run and win — and if he were to run, he would win in a landslide — we would be witness to an American coup d'état. It is the functional equivalent of the political overthrow of the commander in chief.”

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Can We Get Back To Talking About Lying Politicians?
"I Did Not Serve In That Country, Vietnam"
Rewind: Massa A Dem Rock Star

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One of the perks of being a big time blogger (hah) is that sometimes people send me stuff for free. As in a free copy of Zev Chafets' biography of Rush Limbaugh, An Army of One.

Which now occupies a hallowed place on my bookshelf next to two of my favorite autobiographies by other famous dissidents, Vladimir Bukovsky's"To Build a Castle - My Life As A Dissenter," and Lev Kopelev's "To Be Preserved Forever."


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Why does Obama want us to be more like Europe, with its supposedly compassionate and fair welfare state?

The welfare state is not compassionate; it is the height of selfishness and generational cruelty:

Across Western Europe, the “lifestyle superpower,” the assumptions and gains of a lifetime are suddenly in doubt. The deficit crisis that threatens the euro has also undermined the sustainability of the European standard of social welfare, built by left-leaning governments since the end of World War II.

Europeans have boasted about their social model, with its generous vacations and early retirements, its national health care systems and extensive welfare benefits, contrasting it with the comparative harshness of American capitalism.

Europeans have benefited from low military spending, protected by NATO and the American nuclear umbrella. They have also translated higher taxes into a cradle-to-grave safety net. “The Europe that protects” is a slogan of the European Union.

But all over Europe governments with big budgets, falling tax revenues and aging populations are experiencing rising deficits, with more bad news ahead.

The Europeans have lived off of our system, both militarily and economically, for generations. Now we have a President who wants us to be more like Europe.

But we do not have anyone to support us in this folly, the way we supported Europe. It will not take two generations for the collapse with us.

Just two terms.

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From the day Barack Obama took office, the Obama administration and Democrats in Congress have been obsessed and possessed.

Everything took a back seat to passing Obamacare.

And other transformative legislation and regulations intended to turn us into the failing West European economic model.

Because "he recognizes his place in history long before he has created history."

Nitty gritty governance?

Not of interest, not historic, not transformative, not done.

The most historic administration "since the Great Depression" watched and waited and twiddled its thumbs and dawdled and ditherered and yawned and blamed others and did little when it counted most in the ongoing Gulf oil spill.

The psychological infirmity which gave rise to the obsession with transformation has left this nation weaker abroad, a laughingstock to every tinpot dictator with a Twitter account, a debt-engine heading for a cliff, in a jobless quagmire, and

with its first victims.

Saving a brown pelican from the oil spill

Update: Cowboy talk and street taunts are not going to do the job:

"We will keep our boot on their neck until the job gets done," U.S. Interior Secretary Ken Salazar told reporters after touring affected areas of the Gulf coast with Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano and a group of U.S. senators.

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The Washington Post on Elena Kagan:

Kagan's version of middle-age seems stuck in a time warp, back when 50-something did not mean Kim Cattrall or Sharon Stone, "Cougar Town" or "Sex and the City."

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When Arlen Specter switched parties in April 2009 in order to avoid a near certain loss in the Republican primary, it was not hard to guess the outcome, as I did:

Specter has become a caricature of the self-interested politician who hides his need for fame behind lofty talk of principles. More than anything, I feel sorry for Specter at a personal level, because we are watching someone going through his last hurrah. And the fact that he sold out the principles he spoke about just weeks ago regarding preserving the two-party system, demonstrates how pathetic Specter has become in his quest for a legacy. Unfortunately for Specter, his legacy will not be what he thinks it will be.

Now, having lost the Democratic primary, Specter's legacy is written in stone, and it is not good. From The NY Times:

But after the long campaign that ended his career on Tuesday, Mr. Specter, 80, may be remembered more for switching to the Democratic Party after 44 years as a Republican, a brazen act of political jujitsu that rarely ends well. For the moment, his legacy has been boiled down to a teachable moment on the perils of such maneuvers, especially so late in life....

“He has been a serious and consequential senator for three decades,” said Thomas Mann, a longtime Congress watcher at the Brookings Institution, “yet mostly ungenerous words come to mind: driven, tenacious, arrogant, self-righteous, opportunistic.”

And now, Mr. Mann said, Mr. Specter’s legacy is “his insistence at 80 years of age to do everything possible to try to stay in office.”

Nice job, Arlen.

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Gringomask.com appears to be a real, not spoof, website in protest against the Arizona immigration bill. (h/t)

The site proposes that as a protest people wear a mask featuring a blond-haired white person's face (image right). According to the website:

The objective of this action is to dignify and support the Hispanic community, with the firm intention of taking it to the streets and confronting Arizona’s statute SB 1070. Proud of where we come from, and what we do and are for this country.

These people need lawyers, not masks.

Because wearing a mask in public is illegal in many states, so the wearing of the Gringo Mask in and of itself would be grounds to be stopped by the police (and a resulting identity check?).

In many states, these laws grew out of the desire to have a legal basis to prohibit the wearing of hoods at Ku Klux Klan rallies. In New York, interestingly, the law "can be traced back in substance to legislation enacted in 1845 to thwart armed insurrections by Hudson Valley tenant farmers who used disguises to attack law enforcement officers." (Citation, at 10)

New York Penal Law § 240.35(4), which has been upheld by the federal Court of Appeals (in a decision in which now Justice Sotomayor participated) makes it an offense of "loitering" for a person to be masked in public:

Being masked or in any manner disguised by unusual or unnatural attire or facial alteration, loiters, remains or congregates in a public place with other persons so masked or disguised, or knowingly permits or aids persons so masked or disguised to congregate in a public place; except that such conduct is not unlawful when it occurs in connection with a masquerade party or like entertainment if, when such entertainment is held in a city which has promulgated regulations in connection with such affairs, permission is first obtained from the police or other appropriate authorities.

Here is a list (a/o 2005) of states which criminalize the wearing of masks (Arizona is not on the list, having repealed its anti-mask law in 1978).

I wonder, though, whether in states like Arizona where it is not illegal to wear a mask, the wearing of a mask combined with other factors, e.g. walking into a bank, could provide grounds at least to question someone.

This is the latest in a series on the use of the race card for political gain:

Joan Walsh at Salon.com sought to atone for her prior use of the race card, in this observation (h/t James Taranto) in this column, Asking the wrong question about Rand Paul:

I'm coming to regret using the term "racist" about the Tea Party. "Racist" is a personal insult, and it's almost as impossible to prove it as to disprove it. It's not a terribly illuminating term, either: If you call me a racist, you haven't really described anything I've done that's objectionable. You've just somehow designated me, and my so-far unchallenged arguments, outside the pale, so to speak.

If we are to call people our for the false accusation of racism, then we should credit them for recognizing the error of their ways.

Walsh's observation (not necessarily anything else she says in the column) pretty much is the point of the Saturday Night Card Game series.

The accusation of racism is the liberal mechanism for ending the debate on an issue, to put an argument outside the pale without addressing the merits.

The race card is the most common symptom of the disease of left-wing epistemic closure.

I like Taranto's description:

But we have argued for years against the pernicious practice of falsely imputing racism to one's opponents in order to discredit them--a practice so common among liberals that entire academic subspecialties are devoted to it. It is tremendously encouraging to see someone of Walsh's persuasion acknowledge the point.

More from Taranto in this audio podcast on Rand Paul and Joan Walsh.

Now I'm waiting for the other people highlighted in this series to admit the error of their ways, so we can have honest policy debates without the trash talk which is the race card.

Come on, Charles Blow, Norah O'Donnell, Chris Matthews, Max Blumenthal, Sheldon Whitehouse, Harry Reid, Joy Behar, Matt Taibbi, Jesse Jackson, John Cole, Digby, Southern Poverty Law Center, Jesse Taylor, DownWithTyranny, and Oliver Willis.

If Joan Walsh can do it, so can you. At least try. Pretty please.

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Saturday Night Card Game

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You can run, but it's too late to hide anymore:

President Barack Obama is trying to ride the wave of anti-incumbency by taking on an unpopular politician steeped in the partisan ways of Washington.

It doesn’t matter that George W. Bush left office 16 months ago.

The White House’s mid-term election strategy is becoming clear – pit the Democrats of 2010 against the Republicans circa 2006, 2008 and 2009, including Bush.

Pathetic and weak:

Some Democrats would like Obama to shift his argument.

“The president needs to indict not simply Bush or even Republicans. He is a visionary thinker, and his rhetoric should reflect that,” said Democratic strategist Paul Begala. "I want President Obama to make a consistent, compelling indictment of conservative ideas.”

That should work, in a country dominated by people who self-identify as conservative.

How about this for a Democratic campaign slogan, "You people are stupid, so just shut up and do as you are told."

Or better yet, "You people are ignorant racists, blah blah blah blah." Fail:

Boston and Los Angeles were among the first to announce boycotts of Arizona, but 68% of Americans say it’s a bad idea for other cities or states to boycott Arizona over its new immigration law.

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey shows that only 14% of Adults think it’s a good idea for cities or states to join that boycott. Ten percent (10%) don’t care one way or the other, and nine percent (9%) more are undecided.

Forty percent (40%), in fact, say they would avoid doing business with any city or state that boycotts Arizona. Forty-three percent (43%) disagree and would continue to do business with boycotting cities or states. Seventeen percent (17%) aren’t sure.

Fifty-five percent (55%) of voters nationwide favor passage of a law like Arizona’s in their own state. When asked specifically about the chief provision of the Arizona law, support is even higher. Sixty-nine percent (69%) of voters believe a police officer should be required to check the immigration status of anyone stopped for a traffic violation or violation of some other law if he suspects the person might be an illegal immigrant.

It worked in 2008, but lightening doesn't strike twice.

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Can we get back to Richard Blumenthal.

Remember him? The DEMOCRATIC candidate for Senate whose multiple lies about serving in Vietnam over the course of multiple years dominated an entire 24 hour news cycle.

The guy whose dissembling of his own words was Clintonesque in the extreme, as in "it depends upon what the meaning of 'in' is."

The guy around whom DEMOCRATS are rallying so strongly you'd think he had abused an intern.

The guy for whom it was not enough to be an academic and political superstar, he had to be a war hero as well.

The guy who was rescued when Rand Paul discussed, quite honestly, the dilemma of balancing individual freedom of association and speech with the need for racial equality and non-discrimination.

Can we please get back to talking about politicians who look you straight in the eye and lie?

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I'm glad I spent most of yesterday traveling, so that I missed much of the blogospheric tsunami regarding Rand Paul's libertarian views on the virtue of the federal government banning racial discrimination in private businesses.

Where I come down on the issue is that the history and entrenched nature of racial segregation and discrimination both by government and by the private sector in some areas of the country necessitated government action, such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964.

As anyone who reads this blog knows, I do not equate limited government with no government, which is the strawman argument frequently raised to attack conservatives. While in an ideal world we could have let the market work out discrimination in private businesses, the world was not ideal.

I acknowledge that there is a slippery slope of government intrusion, such that protecting civil rights ends up with regulations mandating the purchase of private health insurance and restricting how much salt one can put on one's food. The existence of a slippery slope, however, does not mean that necessary societal steps are not taken at all.

Regardless of one's political philosophy, however, there was no justification for the attacks on Paul as a racist. Paul was very clear in his original statements and subsequent clarification that he was against racism even in private businesses, the issue being one of political philosophy as to how racism was to be eliminated.

The nature of our political debate is such that Democrats' official strategy for the 2010 campaign cycle is to find wedge issues, and there is no bigger wedge in our society than the issue of race. This did not start with Rand Paul; it happens on issues such as health care, immigration and almost every political issue.

The charges of racism against Paul will have little political effect because Democrats have cried wolf so often using the race card that charges of racism in politics have become background noise for most, and counter-motivators for many who resent falsely be called racist.

While Memeorandum filled almost its entire home page with blog posts on the subject, I'd be willing to venture a bet that the vast majority of people in the country are hardly aware of the dispute, and do not care because the issue was settled several decades ago.

But I do also think there is enormous hypocrisy here, because it is Democrats who perpetuate institutionalized race-based discrimination through affirmative action programs which include the color of one's skin as part of the decision-making process. This may be legal in certain circumstances, and may even be desirable to remedy historical imbalances, but it is discrimination nonetheless.

The irony is that it is Republicans and Tea Partiers who hold most true to Martin Luther King, Jr.'s dream of a nation where people were not judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

But you wouldn't know it to read Memeorandum yesterday.

Update: We've seen this movie before, A Warning For The Next Scott Brown

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They Have Nothing To Fear, But Fear Itself
"Limited Federal Government = No Government" (or something like that)
Saturday Night Card Game (When The Race Card Met Godwin)

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When Democrats get on one of their rants about the dangerous effects of corporate campaign money, what they really mean is that they are against corporate campaign money which might support Republicans.

The money which comes from unions to support Democrats is quite alright with them:

At least two influential unions will spend close to $100 million on the 2010 election, with most of those funds going to protect incumbents.

Union officials told The Hill they plan to help endangered members — particularly freshmen — who made politically difficult votes in a year during which an anti-incumbent mood has filled the country.

And the number will be even higher since the AFL-CIO declined to give its figures.

So the next time you hear Obama or other Democrats moaning about the Supreme Court's decision in the Citizens United case, remember ...

It's just politics.

P.S. How about donating some of that money to Central Falls, Rhode Island?

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Rhode Island City Files For Receivership

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There is a legal and political drama unfolding in Central Falls, Rhode Island, which has national implications for municipalities suffocating under union contracts and pension obligations, but which has received little attention outside Rhode Island.

As I posted two days ago, the City of Central Falls (whose slogan is "A City With a Bright Future") filed for receivership, the state equivalent of bankruptcy. Rhode Island law does not allow a municipality to file for federal bankruptcy protection, but provides the state receivership alternative.

A temporary receiver was appointed by Rhode Island Superior Court Justice Michael Silverstein, an experienced business lawyer and well-regarded judge.

The Petition (embedded below) for appointment of a receiver details the financial problems, and highlights two items, pensions and union contracts.

First, Central Falls' "actuarial accrued liability" for pensions exceeds $35 million, but there are only $4 million in assets. The annual contribution required by the actuaries for 2009 was $2.7 million, of which the City actually contributed $0. No funds are available for 2010 contributions.

Second, of the $18 million budget, $6.5 million is for employees with collective bargaining agreements. According to The Providence Journal, "City Solicitor John T. Gannon said the city is in the middle of all its municipal employee union contracts. Mayor Charles D. Moreau has been trying to negotiate concessions, he said, but without success."

The implications of the Central Falls receivership are enormous. Under receivership, the receiver has the power to modify all contracts, including union contracts.

Central Falls could be the first union domino to fall, as municipalities see receivership (or bankruptcy, if permitted by state law) as the only viable option to escape unsustainable union contracts. As reported in The Providence Journal (emphasis mine):

“You have just seen the future,” said state Rep. Laurence W. Erhardt, R-North Kingstown. “The very fact that you opened the door to say it is a possibility, a couple other communities may not be far behind.”

While receivership does long-term damage to a city’s bond rating, the move also gives the receiver — named Wednesday was local attorney Jonathan N. Savage — unique power to modify union contracts and other debts.

“You’re getting rid of all the problems that have been created for generations, just by filing for receivership,” said Warwick Mayor Scott Avedisian, adding that he would never support the move for his city. “If you can wipe out an entire generation of contracts, and if Central Falls gets away with that, then what would be the incentive for other communities not to do the same?”

AFL-CIO secretary-treasurer Maureen Martin said a domino effect could be “devastating.”

Expect the court battle -- and the negotiations with the unions -- to be intense, because the stakes are so high. A court hearing is scheduled for June 9 as to whether the temporary receivership will be made permanent.

I will be following this case and will keep you posted.


Central Falls, Rhode Island, Petition for Appointment of Receiver

Update 6-14-2010: Unions Rescued In Rhode Island

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Dem. Legislator Files Arizona-Like Immigration Bill in Rhode Island
Unions Pushing States Toward Broken Promises

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