The Senate’s Arrogant Ignorance

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Dear friends,

Last night, I made the mistake of watching C-SPAN as the Senate voted for the woe begotten bailout plan. I find it amazing that we did not conduct a second American Revolution after C-SPAN was created and enabled Americans to see the staggering ignorance and incompetence of their elected officials on a daily basis. Senator Kay Baily Hutchison of Texas, unbelievably a Republican -- if that has any real meaning anymore, gave a speech saying that she and all her colleagues heard overwhelming opposition to the bailout plan from the people. However, she went on to say that she didn't think the people understood all the improvements the Senate added to the bill and how vital it really was. What patronizingly insipid bloody rubbish! The U.S. Senate may have a difficult time understanding basic economics, but the people seem to be doing just fine.

The people understand that bailout plan remains extremely immoral and totally unworkable, no matter how many frivolities the Senate used to decorate it. Money Morning has an excellent analysis of just why the Senate touchups won't come anywhere close to solving the problem, and actually make it far more difficult for us to recover.

Despite its alterations though, did the Senate change anything fundamental that the people would have difficulty understanding? No. The people still know that giving $700 billion of tax money we do not have to bail out the failures of private industry is immoral and stupid. Those who have been paying close attention also know that it is not nearly enough to even cover the bad mortgage debts, much less the countless other risky derivatives of unknown value, which are sitting out there on corporate books like ticking time bombs.

The people might be interested to know that this bill also allows the government to bail out not only our own banks and corporations, but also foreign firms. Apparently, Europe is no longer responsible for its own well being-they can wait for the American taxpayer to save them. After all, we have been printing more money so fast so often, it is probably easier for us to just keep the presses rolling.

Another thing that the people understand, but the Senate seems to have forgotten, is that controlled economies (i.e. communism and socialism) have proven to be astounding failures. Yet, now we hear senators saying that, while free markets are good in theory, we have to deal with reality right now. It seems that in the perverse world of the Senate, dealing with reality means falling back on known failures. The Financial Post has a good deal to say about that particular idiocy.

In a capitalist system, though, our markets are designed to quickly deal with failures. It allows us to purge ourselves of unworkable or poisoned assets and quickly refocus on good assets. If a company cannot do that effectively it will fail, and the viable parts of the market it formerly occupied will be quickly taken over by other, better run companies. This is what should happen. Indeed, as the Ludwig Von Mises Institute points out, this is exactly what has happened with the failure of Lehman Brothers and Merrill Lynch. There was no market catastrophe, there was simple readjustment. The Senate has failed miserably to understand these fundamentals. Worse, in their ignorance they have presumed to set themselves above the will and knowledge of the people. We should all remember that on election day-and we should be reminding the House members of that before they vote on this again on Friday.

We Won the Bailout Battle—But the War Continues

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Dear friends,

In my last column, "Stop the Bailout!" I said that we all needed to contact our Congress people and demand that they vote against the $700 billion bailout plan. Thanks to all of you, and millions of other people who did just that, we were successful in pushing Congress to kill that ghastly legislation. Congratulations! Nonetheless, we must remain vigilant.

The bailout bill was dreadful. My last column already referred to some of its problems, such as massively increasing our national debt, starting us on the road to hyperinflation, swiftly devaluing the dollar to the point of collapse, and entangling the Federal government in our economy to an extent never before seen. The final version Congress put out, though, also contained no meaningful restrictions on the spending or the price. It contained several arguably unconstitutional provisions, and fretted endlessly about executive compensation packages, which are almost irrelevant given the enormous scope of this bailout. In demanding that the companies involved repay the government in five years, it also failed to remove these bad debts from the market and created unrealistic expectations which serve to discourage outside investment and virtually guarantees that we will be saddled with these ailing companies for many years to come. Everyone agrees that it was a bad bill. Everyone also agrees that it was the only bill Secretary Paulson would approve. Fortunately, the secretary does not run this country. Nonetheless, though we won the battle, the war has only just begun.

Even now, the leadership in Congress is preparing to resubmit the bailout plan. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi seems to think she can get the votes she needs if the new package includes language that would ease bankruptcy laws to allow debtors to keep more of their assets, thus making it much easier to file for bankruptcy. Making it easier for people to default on their debts is not a cure for our economy. This would not make the bill better; it would make it far worse.

Unfortunately, our esteemed presidential candidates are not helping matters either. Those of you who watched the first presidential debate saw the deer-in-the-headlights looks they gave, and heard their obfuscating answers when they were asked about the economic issues we are facing. Neither of them has a good understanding of what is happening in our economy. The fact that they both supported the bailout is proof enough of that. They both have made the mistake of listening to Bernanke and Paulson, and maintain that Congress simply MUST do something or the consequences will be dire.

Not so. Though the market will undoubtedly go through some painful readjustments as it purges itself of these poisoned assets and failed companies, its recovery, if left alone, has the potential to provide good, strong investment opportunities. With low stock prices and increased savings, Money Morning predicts that U.S. domestic capital will actually increase, reducing outsourcing and improving our deficit of payments--a good thing. This will leave us in a much stronger economic position to face the real threats coming quickly at us, such as Peak Oil and the liquid fuels crisis. However, this may not be possible if Congress and our presidential candidates keep trying to drive us into a depression with their hasty and ill conceived plans. Thus, it remains incumbent upon us to show them what they need to be doing. Here is what you can do right now to help:

1. Educate yourself. If you have not done so already, find reliable people who have been predicting these problems for a long time (that rules out Benanke and Paulson). Listen to what they have to say about what caused the problems and what we have to do to solve them. For a start, I strongly recommend Financial Sense. It has many useful articles and the Financial Sense Newshour (3rd Hour with Jim Puplava and John Loeffler) is a wonderful weekly broadcast that will keep you abreast of everything you need to know in terms that are easily understood to laypeople.

2. Keep pressure on Congress. Keep writing and calling your Congress members-and maybe even the leadership. Tell them not to pass this bailout--in any form. If they never get any support from the people, they won't act, and they won't ruin our country. If we slack off, though, they are likely to pass some new horror that will be even worse than the last one. A dismantling of our bankruptcy laws would be just that.

3. If you want to tell Congress what it should be doing, you might suggest that they repeal some of the bad government programs that got us here in the first place such as the Community Reinvestment Act, which actually encouraged giving loans to high risk borrowers as a social engineering project. After that, they should think about reining in the Federal Reserve and its fast and loose monetary policy which has left us with terrible inflation, forced business into high risk investments just to get a decent rate of return given our piteously low interest rates, and left the dollar on the verge of collapse. After that, they need to think about eliminating certain corporate and capital gains taxes to encourage investment.

4. Protect yourself and your family. I am not a financial advisor, so I cannot tell you what would be best for you and your family. I can say, however, that there are plenty of opportunities to be had if you are paying attention. Gold, silver, and other precious metals are very good security again failure of the currency. In an economy where energy is increasingly becoming an issue, oil and other energy investments look good. Do not have too much faith in government, its programs, or its bonds, however. We are all seeing, right now, the dangerous actions our government has been willing to take with regard to our financial systems. We were able to stop the bailout, but there is no guarantee we will stop future idiocy. If the government's foolishness manages to utterly debase the currency, you do not want to be depending on that same government for your financial security.

Stop The Bailout! It Is Time To Demand Inaction

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Dear friends,

We are facing economic calamity. We stand upon the very brink of destruction yet, even now, we have the capacity to save ourselves from utter ruin and escape to heal our wounds. We must act quickly though, for the U.S. Congress, in its unerring stupidity, is poised to push us into the gaping maw of doom in a matter of days. It is now incumbent upon every citizen to defend this country by contacting their congress people and begging them NOT to pass this ghastly bailout.

Our choice is simple. We can choose not to pass this bailout, in which case the market will stumble a bit before correcting itself. Some companies will fail, jobs will be lost, and times will be hard. Then the good companies, who have managed to run themselves well, will begin to fill in the gaps left by the failures. Other, dynamic businesses will also grow into the market space, and we will recover.

The other option is to pass this bailout. Thus, we spend more than $700 billion we do not have for a result that is not guaranteed. In doing so, we prop up failed enterprises and create an unending dependence on the government that may require many billions of dollars more to sustain. We have none of this money. To do this, we either need to borrow more money and virtually double our national debt or print more money. Either way, inflation will skyrocket and the value of the dollar will be obliterated. What was a bad economic situation will become full economic ruin. In this case, the whole of the world's economy will face depression and we will not recover for a very long time.

Thus, we can restrain ourselves now, suffer through our hardships and recover as quickly as we can, or congress can pass this bailout and we can suffer terribly for a very long time in full economic ruin.

That is our choice. Congress does not see it because they are too busy looking at elections and think they must be seen to do something--something they do not understand. They are more afraid of losing an election than losing the country. In this case, though, they must do nothing. Only if they refrain from acting will we be saved. We all must write to our congress people immediately, before it is too late, and demand that they do not do this thing--that they do not sacrifice this nation to their ambitions-- and that they do not pass this bailout! Time is running out.

P.S. Ron Paul has issued a similar call you may read here.

Sarah Palin: A Change More Profound than Giving Speeches

By Julian Dunraven

If this election is really all about change, then November will offer voters a choice between candidates who like to talk about change, and candidates who live for change.

On the left, we have Sen. Barak Obama who, in his extremely short tenure in the U.S. Senate, has never once broken with his party's agenda to champion needed reforms. For his running mate, he has chosen Sen. Joe Biden, a bastion of the liberal establishment for the last 35 years.

On the right, we have Sen. John McCain, who has made a career of going against anyone he thought was wrong--even if that occasionally includes members of his own party. As his running mate, he has chosen Gov. Sarah Palin, who has already proven that she is a consummate and principled reformer. She took on some of the most powerful members of her own party--including Sen. Ted Stevens--to fight corruption and bring ethics and accountability back to government. She slashed budgets, cut taxes and even sold the governor's private jet on E-Bay to bring fiscal responsibility back to government. And unlike so many modern politicians who like to talk about values but rarely live by them, Gov. Palin doesn't just say she is pro life and pro-family--she chose to have her youngest baby even though she knew he would have Down Syndrome, and she has been incredibly supportive of her daughter, who is also choosing to have her baby--despite the difficulties of young motherhood.

Gov. Sarah Palin is a remarkable woman who somehow manages to impress both fiscal and social conservatives at the same time. I can't remember the last time Dr. James Dobson and I agreed on anything but the quality of the weather, yet we are both excited about Gov. Palin and I think the reasons for that are clear: she represents what the Republican Party, at its best, used to be, what it should be, and what it will be again.

Change is coming, but not with Obamamania. Long after that fever breaks and passes, the true reformers, John McCain and Sarah Palin, will be hard at work restoring the glory of this country which Congress and Bush have so badly tarnished.

Supreme Court Unleashes Legal Beast To Trouble Colorado's 2nd District

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

I have never liked campaign finance reform laws. The notion that one can take the influence of money completely out of politics seems, at best, woefully naive and, at worst, ridiculously absurd. Nonetheless, in so many ways our lawmakers and activists continue to try. After they finish attempting to put all sorts of fetters on the evil beast of our political system, the Supreme Court inevitably comes by and proceeds to cut about half the restraints. Of course, this simply creates a very angry beast that has to lurch clumsily about using only one leg and one arm. And people wonder why campaign regulations are always such a disaster. Well, the Supreme Court has, yet again, taken its judicial scissors to the latest Congressional fetter: the Millionaire Amendment of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA). And yes, the beast is already crashing about angrily.

Let me try to sum up the bizarre laws at issue in very brief terms. Between the meddling of Congress and the stilted reasoning of the Court, the government may impose limits on how much money people may contribute to any given campaign, but not on how much money the campaigns can spend. Also, there is no limit to how much an individual candidate can contribute to his campaign. The reason for this is that money is speech. Contributions may be limited because they still express the message of support for a candidate but, in being limited, also prevent corruption or the appearance thereof. However, the candidate is free to use as much of his own speech/money to promote his cause as he wants. To limit that would be to limit his speech too directly.

Naturally, this creates an advantage for rich candidates. They can spend their own money without limit while a poorer candidate, who may have rich friends, cannot get as much money out of those friends because of the campaign contribution limits. Thus, Congress passed the so called Millionaire Amendment so that if a rich candidate used enough of his own money, the contribution limits for the poorer candidate would be near tripled while the contribution limits for the richer candidate would remain the same. This would continue until the two candidates had eliminated the financial difference between them.

Now, though, Justice Alito, writing for the majority, has declared in Davis v. Federal Election Commission that this balancing scheme is unconstitutional. Apparently, this imbalance does not directly limit speech, but creates a substantial penalty for a rich candidate who chooses to exercise his right to speech robustly (i.e. spend a lot of his own money and trigger the provisions of the amendment). Thus, the Court has declared that the law must go.

Naturally, the government has objected that this means that rich candidates will once again have a huge advantage in elections given the contribution limits. The Court is aware of this. However, Justice Alito reminds us all that it was Congress who created this problem in the first place with its bizarre attempts to regulate campaign contributions. Congress also has the power to fix this situation. He recommends:

If the normally applicable limits on individual contributions and coordi­nated party contributions are seriously distorting the electoral process, if they are feeding a "public perception that wealthy people can buy seats in Congress," Brief for Appellee 34, and if those limits are not needed in order to combat corruption, then the obvious remedy is to raise or eliminate those limits. But the unprecedented step of imposing different contribution and coordinated party expenditure limits on candidates vying for the same seat is antithetical to the First Amendment.
In my own humble opinion, Congress would be well advised to adopt Justice Kennedy's recommendations from his dissenting opinion in Nixon v. Shrink Missouri Government PAC, 528 U.S. 377 (2000). He pointed out that all of these attempts to limit the flow of money just serve to create problems or push it underground where there is virtually no accountability or transparency (such as 527 groups). Thus, he suggests that, rather than limiting contributions or expenditures, Congress should simply require that all contributions be reported and made public. Certainly, the internet is more than capable of providing instant access to this information for anyone who wants to know. In that way, the public could judge for themselves whether a candidate was too beholden to any particular donor or interest group and vote accordingly. Now there is a novel thought: trusting the voters to make decisions themselves.

For those of you interested in what the dissent had to say, Justice Stevens seems to think there is nothing at all wrong with this imbalanced scheme. Indeed, he goes so far as to contend that Congress should limit both contributions and expenditures. It seems he feels that if the campaigns were forced to spend less, then the quality of their message would be forced to improve and he would not have to ensure watching so many of these annoying and repetitious political advertisements on television any longer. It is rare that a Justice so plainly expresses his personal opinions and tastes as a matter of law. Preventing the Court from being populated by others who feel at liberty to do so may be the single most important reason to elect John McCain as our next president-despite the fact that he is partially responsible for saddling us with these nightmarish campaign laws in the first place.

In the meantime, we shall watch the beast of our current system flail about in the 2nd Congressional district where the millionaire idiot author of Colorado's ethics debacle, Jared Polis, just triggered the now unconstitutional amendment and his opponents, Joan Fitz-Gerald and Will Shafroth, are left without the benefit of the increased contribution limits it would have provided them.

On Heller

By Julian Dunraven

Today, virtually every newspaper and broadcaster across the nation has been trumpeting the news that we have a newly expressed fundamental freedom: an individual right to keep and bear arms, courtesy of the U.S. Supreme Court's decision in The District of Columbia v. Heller. If you woke up this morning breathing a bit easier and feeling a little more free, that is why. What every article and story will tell you is that the Court struck down the D.C. handgun ban. However, most stories seem to be missing two important points: the opinion was quite funny, and it went a lot further than people seem to be grasping.

Justice Scalia wrote for the majority. To read his opinion is to be transported back to grade school, listening to your teacher patiently instruct you on basic grammar. If you ever wondered what use it was to learn all those annoying rules governing punctuation, Scalia will be happy to explain how one of your basic rights rests upon the use of three commas in the Second Amendment.

The amendment reads: "A well-regulated militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed."

Throughout, the opinion, Scalia expounds on the use of those commas, the differences between prefatory and operative clauses, and even goes so far as to dissect and rearrange the Amendment as a grammar school teacher might demonstrate to his students while diagramming sentences. Remember those sentence diagrams? He then instructs us as to the differences between singular and plural, the use of verbs and their objects, modifiers, prepositions, and idiomatic usage. English teachers everywhere should be rejoicing.

In the footnotes, scattered throughout, one can imagine that Teacher Scalia has just been interrupted during lecture by a question from a student-a particularly annoying little boy who bears a strong resemblance to a miniature Justice Stevens. Scalia, like any good teacher, generally responds by patiently explaining why his pupil's assumptions are mistaken. Occasionally though, like all good teachers driven to distraction by particularly annoying students, Scalia offers a sharp rebuke, openly speculating as to whether Justice Stevens might have leapt through the looking glass to study law with the Mad Hatter. He also describes Stevens' grasp of the English language as "dead wrong," "an absurdity," and "grotesque." Judging from Scalia's remarks, by the time I got to the dissent I was expecting to find near illiterate ravings.

For example, here is a small sample of the opinion as Scalia responded to Stevens' contention that "bear arms" did not just mean "to carry weapons or armor" but "to carry weapons in a military context."

In any event, the meaning of "bear arms" that petitioners and JUSTICE STEVENS propose is not even the (sometimes) idiomatic meaning. Rather, they manufacture a hybrid definition, whereby "bear arms" connotes the actual carrying of arms (and therefore is not really an idiom) but only in the service of an organized militia. No dictionary has ever adopted that definition, and we have been apprised of no source that indicates that it carried that meaning at the time of the founding. But it is easy to see why petitioners and the dissent are driven to the hybrid definition. Giving "bear Arms" its idiomatic meaning would cause the protected right to consist of the right to be a soldier or to wage war--an absurdity that no commentator has ever endorsed. See L. Levy, Origins of the
Bill of Rights 135 (1999). Worse still, the phrase "keep and bear Arms" would be incoherent. The word "Arms" would have two different meanings at once: "weapons" (as the object of "keep") and (as the object of "bear") one-half of an idiom. It would be rather like saying "He filled and kicked the bucket" to mean "He filled the bucket and died." Grotesque.

He also remarks that:

A purposive qualifying phrase that contradicts the word or phrase it modifies is unknown this side of the looking glass (except, apparently, in some courses on Linguistics). If "bear arms" means, as we think, simply the carrying of arms, a modifier can limit the purpose of the carriage ("for the purpose of selfdefense" or "to make war against the King"). But if "bear arms" means, as the petitioners and the dissent think, the carrying of arms only for military purposes, one simply cannot add "for the purpose of killing game." The right "to carry arms in the militia for the purpose of killing game" is worthy of the mad hatter.

In any case, Scalia manages to save the English language from being tortured and ravaged by Justice Stevens. As a result, we now have a solidly expressed individual right to keep and bear arms defined by a most amusing opinion. We have quite a bit more than that too.

Most articles are reporting that Scalia's opinion preserves gun control laws regarding schools, certain public places, and bans on automatic weapons. This is not precisely true. The opinion simply states that those items were not at issue before the Court and will therefore be presumed to be valid until specifically contested. Yet the Court just issued a very broad embrace of an individual right to keep and bear arms, especially in the interest of self defense. Moreover, it also adopted, as a standard for protected weaponry, that which is "in common use at the time." The only limit the Court articulated was to say that, "that the Second Amendment does not protect those weapons not typically possessed by law-abiding citizens for lawful purposes."

In the dicta, Scalia acknowledged that, as standard issue for our infantry, M-16s might be protected. However, as they are not commonly used by the citizenry, they might not be protected. As he points out toward the end of the opinion, the Court only expressed a fundamental individual right to keep and bear arms. He openly invites further lawsuits to help determine just how far that right may go-much to the chagrin of the dissenting Justices who rightly see a flurry of litigation coming and the probable overturning of a good number of longstanding regulations.

This is an exciting time, the first formal expression of a right we have had for 200 years. I look forward to seeing how we develop this right. In the meantime, teachers, you now have solid evidence which to prove to your truculent students that good grammar can lead to greater freedom.

Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Climate Change Blasphemy Must Be Prosecuted Says NASA Scientist

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

It always amazes me to see how people view the legal system. Dr. James Hansen, vaguely referred to by The Guardian as one of the world's leading climate scientists (presumably due to the fact that he becomes hysterical more swiftly than the others), now thinks we should prosecute oil company executives for, "high crimes against humanity and nature, accusing them of actively spreading doubt about global warming."

Last time I checked, expressing doubt as to any theory, and then trying to disprove that theory, was part of the scientific method--not a violation of the criminal code. But never mind that, we have important criminal accusations to consider.

So, what are crimes against humanity and nature anyway? Article 7 § 1 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court defines crimes against humanity as:

any of the following acts when committed as part of a widespread or
systematic attack directed against any civilian population, with knowledge of
the attack:

(a) Murder;
(b) Extermination;
(c) Enslavement;
(d) Deportation or forcible transfer of population;
(e) Imprisonment or other severe deprivation of physical liberty in
violation of fundamental rules of international law;
(f) Torture;
(g) Rape, sexual slavery, enforced prostitution, forced pregnancy, enforced
sterilization, or any other form of sexual violence of comparable gravity;
(h) Persecution against any identifiable group or collectivity on
political, racial, national, ethnic, cultural, religious, gender as defined in
paragraph 3, or other grounds that are universally recognized as impermissible
under international law, in connection with any act referred to in this
paragraph or any crime within the jurisdiction of the Court;
(i) Enforced disappearance of persons;
(j) The crime of apartheid;
(k) Other inhumane acts of a similar character intentionally causing great
suffering, or serious injury to body or to mental or physical health.

Strangely, it says nothing about climate at all. Even if it did, Global Warming might be widespread, but could hardly be called a systematic attack upon any civilian population by oil company executives from the lawful operation of their businesses.

That leaves crimes against nature. Crimes against nature are not international crimes at all. They are generally part of state law. They forbid things like masturbation, oral sex, and sodomy. After the Supreme Court’s opinion in Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003), most of the so called crimes against nature are unconstitutional as they violate our fundamental right to privacy. Of course, bestiality and necrophilia are both still forbidden, but Global Warming just does not seem to fit into this category does it? Then again, perhaps it does.

It seems the oil companies have violated neither international nor domestic law with their pernicious doubts about Global Warming. Of course, this is not the real problem here. The particular criminal charge does not matter so long as we can find one that will work to silence these doubters once and for all.

Generally speaking, true scientists want a lot of doubt expressed about their theories. They want the whole scientific community to have a go at them, and, if they still stand up, undamaged, at the end of the day the whole world is likely to embrace them. Such is not the case with Global Warming, though. Almost any rational person can manage to find considerable holes in the Global Warming theories. A scientist would say this means it requires more research and study.

Dr. Hansen and his ilk, however, remind us that this is about more than just science or law: it is about moral goodness. More research and more study takes time. Persuading lawmakers to act takes even longer. But we know what is evil now. Global Warming is evil. Those who doubt it are evil. There are many of them out there—doubting—and they are getting away with it!

There was once a time when our legal system would have accommodated such thinking. Indeed, both Church and State tried for a long while to prosecute irritating “doubters” for insufficient belief. Back then, though, we did not use those words. Instead, we used words like Inquisition, heretics, and blasphemy. The system had a splendid effect upon morality, but apparently science lagged a bit. We called that time the Dark Ages. Ironically, today, any government that tried to manage belief in such a way would be prosecuted for crimes against humanity. See supra, Article 7 § 1(h).

Vote No– The Government Says So

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable Friends:

The U.S. Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) has decided Colorado citizens need assistance from the federal government in deciding how to vote this November. Specifically, the DEA doesn’t want mere citizens getting confused about what’s good for them and voting to legalize something as terrible as possessing an ounce of marijuana. Thus, the federal government is condescending to inject itself into our state ballot process and campaign against this initiative. “DEA raises cash to fight pot issue.” Already, the DEA has $10,000 to spend on its campaigning efforts.

The agency tells us we shouldn’t worry about this, though, and that their efforts are completely legal. Given that the applicable law was designed to prevent the executive agencies from partisan campaigning, and did not contemplate non-partisan ballot initiatives, the DEA may in fact be correct that it is acting within the technical bounds of law, if not its spirit. Still, it is rather telling that the DEA’s campaign fund comes from private donations and not tax dollars, despite the DEA’s contention its actions are proper. Surely, if the agency directors are avoiding the use of tax money, it must occur to them on some level that their actions are wrong.

Whether one agrees with Amendment 44 or not, the actions of the DEA should worry us all. The executive branch of government is designed to enforce the laws. Yet, the executive branch has become so large, that Congress cannot possibly have time to deal with all the issues that arise as each executive department carries out its mandate. Thus, executive agencies have the power to create administrative policies and regulations in their spheres of influence that are every bit as binding as legislatively made law. Thus, they have taken on a good deal of legislative power as well as executive. Moreover, many federal agencies have their own administrative courts to oversee disputes arising from their actions, thus assuming judicial power. This is a huge collection of power in the executive branch. Now, the executive branch seeks even to assert itself into citizen law making processes by telling people how to vote. This is simply too much. We must restrain this behemoth, many headed monster that is the U.S. executive branch.

Now, to be fair, I do not doubt that the input of the DEA might be useful in debating Amendment 44. However, that input should be solicited by citizen opponents of the amendment. It is those independent citizens who should then be raising money to campaign against the amendment, and they who should decide how to use the DEA’s information in that campaign. The DEA and the executive branch of the federal government should not be intervening in our state elections to tell our people how it thinks we should vote. Last I checked, that sort of behavior was expected of Communist and Socialist regimes. In this country, the people are supposed to be telling the administration what to do—not the other way around.

We have grown used to a sort of nanny state in this country. We have decided that we want our government to provide certain programs as safeguards against our own stupidity. So be it. If, however, we now truly desire a state that eliminates even the need to think for ourselves, a state all to happy to tell us what our opinion should be, then we have no business calling ourselves a free country. We should simply shut up about those annoying things called civil liberties, take our state issued pacifiers, and let the government do whatever it thinks best. As I am not quite ready for permanent mental infancy, I think it would behoove Congress to amend the Hatch Act, and prevent the executive branch from campaigning period.

Judge Rules Against Bush for Wiretapping Without Warrants: Triumph or Tragedy?

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable Friends:

All day long, I have listened to the shrieking of my conservative friends as they denounce the ‘terrible’ decision by a U.S. district court judge to end the Bush administration’s warrantless wiretapping program. ACLU v. NSA. It seems they think the honorable judge has put all of national security at risk with the naive notion that we can fight terrorism according to the same rules we use to fight common criminals. Knowing the miserable quality of reporting the major media sources continually exhibit on questions of law, I understand why they hold such a dismal opinion of this case. However, having read the honorable judge’s opinion myself, I am thoroughly convinced that she has actually strengthened national security, and that conservatives would be the last people to take issue with this decision if they only took the time to read it. It is based soundly in traditional conservative principles. Let me see if I can condense it here.

First, no state secrets were ever at risk. The court considered the legality of the wiretapping program based on statements the Bush administration has already made public: (1) The wiretapping program exists. (2) The Bush administration monitors communication between U.S. citizens and people overseas suspected of having some connection, to a terrorist organization. (3) The monitoring is conducted without warrants.

In considering these facts, the court looked to our history. It pointed out that searches and seizures without warrant were among the offenses committed by King George III against the American colonists prior to the Revolutionary War. These searches terrified the people and chilled any speech or publication that might criticize the King for fear of being labeled seditious. After the American Revolution, the Founders enshrined two amendments into the Constitution in order to prevent such abuses from ever occurring again. We now know these as the First and Fourth Amendments to the U.S. Constitution:

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.--U.S. CONST. Amend. I.

The right the of people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, andeffects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, andno Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath oraffirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.--U.S. CONST. Amend. IV.

These two amendments work together to protect some of the most basic liberties we hold so dear. However, Congress is mindful, too, that when it comes to national security, the obligations of these amendments might be too cumbersome to carry out in the ordinary course of business. Thus, Congress passed the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) as, “the exclusive means by which electronic surveillance of foreign intelligence communications may be conducted.” 18 U.S.C. §2511(2)(f). This act sets up a special and secret court to grant surveillance warrants to the administration. Acknowledging the need to act quickly in matters of national security, it even gives the administration up to 72 hours after already beginning surveillance to seek a warrant. And so Congress has wisely provided for the administration to see to the needs of national security, while still permitting to judiciary to ensure the protection of civil liberties.

The Bush administration, however, has argued this is insufficient. It claims the President, as Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces under Article II of the U.S. Constitution, should have the right to see to matters of national security as he sees fit, independent of the laws of Congress and the warrant reviews of the judiciary. As one of the great Founders, James Madison, wrote in the Federalist Papers, though, “The accumulation of all powers, legislative, executive, and judiciary, in the same hands, whether of one, a few, or many, and whether hereditary, self-appointed, or elective, may justly be pronounced the very definition of tyranny.” THE FEDERALIST NO. 47. The court refused to allow President Bush to usurp both the Legislative and Judicial branches of government, and reminded the President that he is sworn to uphold and abide by the entire Constitution, not just Article II.

“He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil power. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation .”-- The Declaration of Independence

Thomas Jefferson wrote those words over 200 years ago describing a few of the offenses committed by King George III against the American colonists. Today, they could as easily apply to the warrantless wiretapping program of President George Bush II—or they would had the court not stuck it down. In this case, the court defended the U.S. Constitution and the liberties it enshrines, protected the separation of powers from dissolving into tyranny, and provided legitimate means for the defense of this country—all principles long cherished by conservatives. In the end, the court managed to strengthen our national security, both against the terrorists that seek to destroy us from outside our borders, and the possibility of tyranny that could destroy us from within.

As the court noted in its conclusion, “Plaintiffs have prevailed, and the public interest is clear, in this matter. It is the upholding of our Constitution. As Justice Warren wrote in U.S. v. Robel, 389 U.S. 258 (1967):

Implicit in the term ‘national defense’ is the notion of defending those values and ideas which set this Nation apart. . . . It would indeed be ironic if, in the name of national defense, we would sanction the subversion of . . . those liberties . . . which makes the defense of the Nation worthwhile. Id. at 264.”

Justice, Privacy, and JonBenet Ramsey

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Honorable Friends,

What is your favorite freedom this year? That is the question one of my dear friends asks my salon every 4th of July. It is interesting to listen to the answers. In 2003, my favorite freedom was privacy, and the right given to all people, both heterosexual and homosexual, to develop their most intimate relationships free from government intrusion. Lawrence v. Texas, 539 US 558 (2003). This year, only a month removed from Independence Day, I again think privacy is one of my favorite freedoms—but I no longer see government as the only mortal threat to it.

Tonight, my salon again considered the importance of privacy as we learned of the latest developments in the JonBenet Ramsey Case. One honorable gentleman argued quite passionately that the entire media system owes the Ramsey family a very good apology. It is hard to argue with that. The news media overtly accused the entire Ramsey family of murder, and splashed their morbid theories across the front pages of nearly every paper in the country for weeks. Meanwhile, countless books flooded the presses, excoriating one Ramsey after another. Yet, there was never any trial of justice. No court of law or rules of evidence ever governed the accusations hurled at the Ramseys by the media. Now, it seems the Ramseys may finally be vindicated. My honorable friend is correct to say that the media has done this family a horrible injustice to add to their terrible loss.

Yet, if the media acted villainously, it did so only because such behavior was selling papers—and books and magazines, and all manner of tripe. Offering readers a window into the glamorous lives of the wealthy, all the intrigue and deception of a mystery novel, and the self satisfying illusion of moral superiority to the rich, the JonBenet story appealed to the basest voyeurism that has been one of this country’s most disgusting vices for more than a century.

Not so long ago, the media would publish intimate details and itineraries of celebrity figures. The population loved it—and so did assassins. They used the timelines to target Presidents Lincoln, Garfield, McKinley, Kennedy, F. Roosevelt and Reagan, as well as notables such as George Wallace, Robert Kennedy, and John Lennon. Most recently, their intrusive tactics have directly cased the death of Lady Diana, Princess of Wales. Though these tragedies have finally convinced at least the U.S. media to stop publishing celebrity itineraries, the media seems to have found new ways to ruin lives. I speak of the life dissecting trial by press, which indulges in the most gruesome and appalling speculations no court of law would ever allow, and Justice herself would recoil in horror. My honorable friend has called this most frightfully un-Christian, and yet this mostly Christian population cannot seem to get enough of it. “Love your neighbor’s misery as yourself,” seems to be the new Golden Rule.

The great political heroine, Alice Roosevelt, daughter of Teddy Roosevelt and icon of the Republican Party, dedicated much of her life to the cause of privacy and ending these invasive and life threatening practices. She set a marvelous example. It would be so nice to hear politicians trumpet that cause once again. And yet, when it comes to matters of privacy, it is Alice’s own party—the Republican Party-- that betrays the cause most terribly. It is the Republican Party--the devoutly Christian Republican Party—that stands most ready to comment on the private lives of others and to overtly condemn the constitutional right to privacy. For the sake of Justice, for the sake of decency, and for the sake of liberty, the Republican Party—my party—needs to honor the memory of its great mistress and make privacy one of its favorite freedoms too.

Discussing the Ceasefire in Lebanon—Alice Roosevelt Style

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

Perhaps one of my favorite political figures in American History is Alice Roosevelt Longworth, daughter of Teddy Roosevelt, wife of Speaker of the House Nicholas Longworth, known as the Grande Dame of the Republican Party, the Other Washington Monument, and the Witch of Washington. It was said in her time that dinner at the White House was nice, but you were not anyone special until you had tea at Alice’s. When Alice hosted tea, she always tried to sit Democrats next to Republicans, Catholics next to Protestants, and Liberals next to Conservatives claiming that if there was not at least one good argument by the end of the night it was to be regarded as a great failure.

Recently, my own guests for afternoon tea have done their best to emulate Alice’s salon, and by her standards my teas have been marvelous successes. Say what you will of this iconic lady, she certainly knew how to have a good time. The brawl began yesterday after one gentleman guest proclaimed his deep satisfaction with the ceasefire agreement in Lebanon and the great victory it meant for Israel and the United States. Suddenly, I felt like I was in the Knesset, so fiercely did my other guests denounce him. Though President Bush seems to support his argument, boldly proclaiming a victory in this morning’s press, Hezbollah, Syria, and Iran did the same thing. I am afraid I am more inclined to agree with the later—and the majority of my guests.

It is without doubt that Israel managed to successfully seize and occupy much of southern Lebanon. This much was never in doubt and, in absolute terms, I suppose it can be called a victory. That said, Hezbollah managed to launch its rockets into Israel right up to when the ceasefire agreement took effect. Its leadership is still in tact; its militia is still well armed. Worse, no one forced it to sue for peace; rather, it is choosing to accept the ceasefire agreement as if it were a state actor. Finally, though Israel remains in existence, Hezbollah never expected to wipe it out in this conflict. All it needed to do was survive with a few teeth in order to show the entire world that standing up to Israel and, by proxy, the United States and Great Britain, is quite possible. This it managed to do with smashing success.

Israel and its British and American allies, however, were trying to obliterate Hezbollah. This they failed miserably to achieve, and now must content themselves with a ceasefire and hope the international force somehow manages to disarm, or at least restrain, Hezbollah—both extremely doubtful prospects. From where I am sitting, that looks like a defeat. Simply striking an enemy and knocking him over is useless. He will only get up again, angrier than ever, and find a way to hit back. Rather, if you strike at all, it should be such a blow that your enemy will not rise again. If anyone really believes that Hezbollah has been struck with such a blow, I can recommend several talented psychiatrists that can help work out such delusions.

A young lady acquaintance was the next person to jump into the fray. She contended that, victory or defeat, she thought Israel was totally out of line to react so forcefully to a few kidnappings. A shocked silence fell over my guests at this statement and the only sound was a slight plop and splash as the remaining bit of my crumpet leapt from my hand to drown itself despairingly in my tea.

The silence was brief, though, and both Democrat and Republican guests began to pepper her with questions: What about the barrage of rockets sent daily into Israel? What about the avowed purpose of Hezbollah to destroy Israel? Doesn’t Israel have a right to defend itself?

To these questions she could only wish that the two sides could tolerate one another. Faced with the fact that Israel has never disputed any other state’s right to exist, she wished that Muhammad was back to remind the Arab world of the virtues of peace. When she learned that Muhammad himself led the conquest of Arabia, she gave up entirely. She did not however, give up her position. She maintained that she simply felt that war was terrible and that Israel should have maintained peace above all.

To borrow again from the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his "Letter from Birmingham Jail," she, “is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of direct action”.”

Both of these positions display a fundamental misunderstanding. My gentleman friend mistakenly believes that a technical victory on the field is enough to defeat the ideological motivation of Hezbollah. My lady friend refuses to believe that her feelings are insufficient to shape reality and that sometimes justice demands conflict. To cling to peace solely for the sake of peace even in the absence of justice is to accommodate evil. It is the position of a moral midget. Perhaps that is not a very nice way to depict one of my guests, but as Alice Roosevelt Longworth was fond of reciting, “If you can’t say something nice about someone, come sit right here next to me.”

Gay Rights, the Clash of Civilizations, and the Danger of Moderates

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

After my last posting, I received a few comments telling me that I am underestimating the importance of the clash of civilization between the Islamic world and the West. I beg to differ. Though my last posting may have carried a whimsical flavor, I am well aware of how deep the differences go.

This November, the people of Colorado will vote on no less than three ballot issues dealing with gay rights. In this country, in this state, that means we will argue over the minutia of various legal rights possessed by married couples and whether to extend those legal rights to gay couples. Members of the GLBT community are, arguably, the most disenfranchised citizens of the United States, and yet the most important issue affecting that group at the moment is the bundle of property rights that go into making a legal marriage. If a country’s level of civilization can be judged by how it treats its underclass citizens, than I would say the United States is doing fairly well.

Now, let us compare U.S. civilization with that of Iraq. There, gay rights do not even begin to contemplate the nuances of various property claims and marriage contracts. In Iraq, those who support gay rights ask only that homosexual people be allowed the right to live at all. Jennifer Copestake reports in The Observer that Shia death squads now roam the land executing gay men. “Gays flee Iraq as Shia death squads find a new target.” Barbaric as that seems, it is made worse by the fact that these death squads also target and execute young boys who have been forced into prostitution.

One might think the new Iraqi government and law enforcement would be appalled by such behavior. But one would be wrong. You see, under Islamic law, or Sharia, homosexuality is so reviled that to kill a gay man is no crime at all. Rather, it is considered an honor killing and will actually increase the killer’s chances of getting into heaven. Anyone who doubts this has only to visit the Middle East Research Institute’s TV Monitoring Project and view its collection of clips from Arab networks on homosexuality. In one notable clip from MEMRI TV, Saudi cleric 'Abd Al-Qader Shiba Al-Hamad, a teacher at the Al-Nabawi Mosque in Al-Madina, elaborates on the proper means of killing homosexuals: by flogging, beheading, or rolling down a mountain until dead. Under Islamic law, the underclasses of society have no rights, and should count themselves lucky just to survive.

I am well aware that this barbaric view does not dissipate merely through interaction with our Western culture. Many terrorists, dedicated to the absolute destruction of the West, have received their educations here in the United States or in the United Kingdom. Yet, they do not see our successes and freedoms; they see only our ‘sinful’ opulence and the riches their own nations do not have. I stand by my previous statements that, in the end, our trade and cultural exports can succeed in willingly seducing the Islamic world to our way of life. However, I also reiterate that those demanding that all people either follow the strict dictates of Islam or face death must themselves learn the meaning of fear and terror. Those who would force this barbarism on others must be met with merciless opposition.

This is not a politically correct view at the moment, I know. In this past week, I have heard the media bleat endlessly about the dangers of offending moderate Muslims. This, however, seems utterly ridiculous to me. Moderate Muslims should be offended. They should be shocked and appalled by the behavior of their fellow Muslims and the barbarism of Islamic law. I am beginning to agree with Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his low opinion of so called ‘moderates.’ In his “Letter from Birmingham Jail,” expressing his frustration with white moderates, he states that, “Shallow understanding from people of good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering than outright rejection.” Similarly, in the current situation, it is far more difficult to understand the ‘moderate’ Muslims who see the evil and barbarism of their fellows and do nothing than it is to understand those terrorist Muslims acting under the delusion of righteousness. Those who see evil and do nothing are more terrifying to me than those too stupid or deluded to see the evil in the first place.

Celebrating a Simple Life and Middle East Peace

By Julian Dunraven, J.D., M.P.A.

“But today, of all days, it is brought home to me: it is no bad thing to celebrate a simple life.” So says Mr. Bilbo Baggins in Peter Jackson’s epic production of The Lord of the Rings. How very right he is. And how very valuable are all those little touches that go into keeping our lives simple. We almost never think about them and yet without them our simple lives become quite impossible.

You see, two days ago, one of my most trusted and beloved servants quit my employment after many years without complaint. Neither notice nor explanation was given. There was no time to find any proper replacement. It happened quite suddenly. After a brief period of shocked disbelief, I found myself facing the horrible reality that my centralized air conditioning system was not going to work again. Panic provided the only chill to be found.

For those of you shaking your heads and clucking your tongues, I advise you to spend some time here in Colorado this summer. The weather might explain why many of our friends on the left are so desperate to grasp at any means, however far fetched, to combat Global Warming. For myself, I was just desperate to grasp for a fan as I suffered through the sweltering days and stifling nights, bemoaning how difficult it is to find good help these days.

Bemoaning, however, is somewhat taxing in such heat and it gets to be rather dull after a while. Eventually, my mind wandered to lighter subjects and began contemplating the Middle East peace process. After some reflection, I determined that the West should provide air conditioning to every home in the region and let it run for a year. After that, whenever trouble flairs up, power should be cut off for a while. That would do it.

No. I am not crazy. Well, not completely anyway.

I didn’t always have centralized air-conditioning. Back in England and the rest of the European continent, it is still quite rare. Now that I do have it though, I think of it as a basic necessity of life no civilized being should be without. More, because I am so accustomed to its presence in my life, its absence causes me intolerable discomfort and I am willing to do almost anything to restore it. I want that for the Middle East too. I want them to really know the benefits of Western Civilization—not just as seen on TV or preached to them by the Imams and Ayatollahs—but experienced first hand. ‘Piety’ of Islamic living is easy to maintain when that is all you have. ‘Blasphemy’ is easy to hate when it is someone else’s sin. Blasphemy doesn’t look so bad though when you come home from 110 degree weather to an air-conditioned home, chilled nicely to 70 degrees. Who cares if it is infidel work?

This has already worked with much of the region’s wealthy elite. Holding on to that wealth and the Western comforts it brings is perhaps the only real reason they cooperate with us at all. Now, it is the people who must learn to love our ways. The ancient Romans kept the same strategy when bringing their civilization to the outer reaches of the Empire—we call it Hellenization. It is a wonderful map to peace and stability—not to mention prosperity. Of course, it also requires that any refusal to engage in this civilized trade, and certainly any open hostility, must be met with such punishing and cruel reprisals as to make any the very thought of resistance painful. Both aspects of this strategy need to be reviewed closely by the Western powers. We are not doing nearly enough to Hellenize the people of the Middle East, nor do we seem willing to make resistance too painful even to contemplate.

In the meantime, I sit languidly in the heat and wait anxiously for the repairman to install the new unit. As I watch him work, I marvel at how much of a difference such a device has made in my life, and what such simple, thoughtless amenities might do for the world. “But today, of all days, it is brought home to me: it is no bad thing to celebrate a simple life.”