american czars - the new american magazine - jan 4 - 2010.pdf
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Climate “Teacup Tempest”? • The Second Amendment and the States • Forgotten Influences on the Founders
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January 4, 2010
Newt GingrichThe Establishment’s ConservativeClaiming conservative credentials, Newt Gingrich is here, he’s there, he’s everywhere — and he may or may not be running for President in 2012 — but are his new credentials for real? (December 7, 2009, 48pp) TNA091207
Enjoying ChristmasAs the worsening economy increasingly takes the tinsel and twinkle out of Christmas, it might be expected that the tradition of Christmas would diminish. “Not so,” says our cover story. (December 21, 2009, 48pp) TNA091221
Constitutional CandidatesAs the primaries for the 2010 elections draw closer, we examine several viable candidates who are running on a constitutionalist platform inspired by Ron Paul. (November 23, 2009, 48pp) TNA090923
The Diminishing DollarThe price of gold reaches new highs almost daily against the U.S. dollar. With the buying power of the dollar being a function of both how much money the Federal Reserve prints and international trust in the dollar as the world’s “reserve currency,” what’s the future of the dollar? (November 9, 2009, 48pp) TNA091109
American CzarsAmericans laud our electoral process and the separation of powers, but since the days of the New Deal, we have quietly accepted the appointment of “czars”: unelected men and women who control segments of our economy without oversight. (January 4, 2010, 48pp) TNA100104
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Cover Story
Politics
10Americanczarsby Jack Kenny — As the United States proudly foists American-style “democracy” on much of the world, presidentially appointed “czars” control large swaths of the U.S. economy, without oversight.
FeatureS
climAte
17climate“teacuptempest”?by William F. Jasper — When the released e-mails of some of the world’s most respected climate alarmists showed that they were manipulating data, environmentalists tried to downplay the deceit.
coNstitUtioNcoRNeR
22thesecondAmendment,thestates,andthePeopleby Edwin Vieira, Jr. — As the case McDonald v. City of Chicago, which will determine if States are allowed to have gun control, wends its way to the Supreme Court, the issues are examined.
BookReview
29“Rogue”orRuse?by Jack Kenny — Sarah Palin’s new book Going Rogue reveals little about her aspirations, hard-and-fast stances, or allegiances, so conservatives are left wondering about a possible Palin presidency.
HistoRy—PAstANdPeRsPective
34ForgotteninfluencesontheFoundersby Joe Wolverton II, J.D. — The Founding Fathers’ success at designing a Republic with safeguards to prevent citizens’ loss of liberty and to prevent federal despotism was the result of others’ insights.
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44FedBackersseekPowermorethanwealthby John F. McManus
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DepartmentS
5letterstotheeditor
7 insidetrack
9QuickQuotes
33theGoodnessofAmerica
41exercisingtheRight
42correction,Please!
10
vol.26,No.1 January4,2010
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President Pierce’s Constitutional SenseIn regard to Jack Kenny’s recent article “Constitutional Healthcare” (November 23 issue), while well researched and right on target, he missed one of the greatest quotes from our forefathers that could be used with this issue, issued by President Frank-lin Pierce.
Writing in an 1854 veto statement of a bill to authorize the giving away of federal lands for the erection of State-funded mental hospitals, Pierce penned a timeless warning against the unconstitutionality of federal in-volvement in healthcare:
I readily and, I trust, feelingly acknowl-edge the duty incumbent on us all as men and citizens, and as among the highest and holiest of our duties, to pro-vide for those who, in the mysterious order of Providence, are subject to want and to disease of body of mind; but I can not find any authority in the Consti-tution for making the Federal Govern-ment the great almoner of public char-ity throughout the United States. To do so would, in my judgment, be contrary to the letter and spirit of the Constitu-tion and subversive of the whole theory upon which the Union of these States is founded.
Born in the Founding era, Pierce was edu-cated on the wisdom of the Founders and spent nine years in Congress before serving as President.
John Weldon
Playa Del Rey, California
God’s Helping HandAn event unreported by Joe Wolverton in “Faith in the Face of Skepticism” (No-vember 23) indicates “the hand of God” helping the Pilgrims to establish their society. According to A. L. Rouse in The
Elizabethans and
America, a 1605 voyage to the Massachu-setts mainland brought some captured In-dians back to England. One of them was named Tisquantum, a Wampanoag from the tribal village at what is now Pawtuxet, Massachusetts. During his years in Eng-land, he learned the English language and way of life. In 1619, after various adven-tures, Tisquantum was able to return to his village. He was set ashore, only to find that his people were all dead from a disease — possibly bubonic plague — caught from European fishermen. Tisquantum then set-tled into the remaining Wampanoag tribe living in the area.
When the Pilgrims arrived, they were astonished to find an Indian who spoke fluent English. Without his assistance that first terrible year in the wilderness, the Pilgrims would likely have perished alto-gether. Squanto, as they called Tisquantum, showed them how to plant corn and fertil-ize the kernels with a fish, and otherwise increase their food production.
Less known is the fact that, acting for Massasoit, he provided food, advice, in-terpreter service, and guidance through the territory to locations where they could obtain commodities and seafood, and showed them how to build warm houses. He also provided hope in the face of ter-rible adversity.
The Pilgrims considered Squanto “a spe-cial instrument of God for their good beyond their expectation,” as Governor Bradford wrote in his History of Plymouth Plantation, 1620-1647. Squanto died of an illness during the second winter of the colony. Bradford noted that he died “desiring the Governor to pray for him that he might go to the English-men’s God in heaven.”
John White
Cheshire, Connecticut
Send your letters to: the neW AmericAn, P.O. Box 8040, Appleton, WI 54912. Or e-mail: [email protected]. Due to vol-ume received, not all letters can be answered. Letters may be edited for space and clarity.
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Joe Wolverton II, J.D.
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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
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President Barack Obama’s December 1 speech at West Point was meant to justify sending 30,000 more U.S. troops to Afghanistan at a cost of $30 billion per year, but he neglected to mention one small detail: U.S. intelligence officials estimate there are as few as 100 al-Qaeda operatives in all of Afghanistan.
President Obama called the al-Qaeda presence there a “can-cer,” but ABC News reported on December 2 that a senior U.S. intelligence official told them that “the approximate estimate of 100 al Qaeda members left in Afghanistan reflects the conclusion of American intelligence agencies and the Defense Department.” Obama was made aware of this so he could factor it into his deci-sion on whether or not to send in more troops.
Obama did not focus on the size of al-Qaeda’s presence in Afghanistan when he spoke, but rather said merely that “al Qaeda has not reemerged in Afghanistan in the same number as before 9/11, but they retain their safe havens along the border.” U.S. intelligence officials believe there are several hundred al-Qaeda fighters just across the Pakistani border, and an Obama adminis-tration official said the additional troops were needed to “sand-
wich” them between Pakistan and Afghanistan, preventing them from re-gaining a foothold in Afghanistan.
“So the real question is will Pakistan do enough,” said former White House counterterrorism official Richard Clarke, an ABC News consultant. “What if they take all the money we given them but don’t really follow through? What [is] the strategy then?”
The December 2 ABC News article clearly spelled out the hefty price tag for dealing with so few terrorists: “With 100,000 troops in Afghanistan at an estimated yearly cost of $30 billion, it means that for every one al Qaeda fighter, the U.S. will com-mit 1,000 troops and $300 million a year.”
Obama Ordered Troop Surge Despite Only 100 al-Qaeda in Afghanistan
When President Obama accepted the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway, on December 10, he addressed the incongruity of receiv-ing a prize for peace just after he escalated the war in Afghani-stan: “Perhaps the most profound issue surrounding my receipt of this prize is the fact that I am the Commander-in-Chief of the military of a nation in the midst of two wars.... I come here with an acute sense of the costs of armed conflict — filled with diffi-cult questions about the relationship between war and peace, and our effort to replace one with the other.”
Obama devoted much of his speech to a philosophical discus-sion of a “just war” and a “just peace.” Regarding the almost inevitable need to use force when circumstances warrant it, he said: “Negotiations cannot convince al Qaeda’s leaders to lay down their arms. To say that force is sometimes necessary is not
for U.S. Exit From AfghanistanObama administration officials on December 6 made it perfectly clear that American military forces will remain in Afghanistan for a long time, playing down President Barack Obama’s December 1 statement that “after 18 months [in July 2011], our troops will begin to come home.”
Defense Secretary Robert Gates, Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, and other top officials appeared in a coordi-nated series of television interviews. A key message was that any reduction starting in July 2011 would be slow, and this would only be the beginning of the transfer of responsibility to Afghan
a call to cynicism — it is a recognition of history; the imperfec-tions of man and the limits of reason.”
But what circumstances necessitate placing American sol-diers into harm’s way? And when such circumstances arise, who should make the decision?
The Nobel Peace Prize is an honor bestowed by what is es-sentially an arm of the Norwegian government, accompanied by a significant monetary award. When the President accepted the prize without seeking or receiving congressional approval, he violated Article I, Section 9 of the U.S. Constitution, which states: “No person holding any office of profit or trust under them, shall, without the consent of the Congress, accept of any present, emolument, office, or title, of any kind whatever, from any king, prince or foreign state.”
forces. The appear-ances of Obama’s senior staff mem-bers seemed geared toward easing the concerns of not only some U.S. officials but also officials in Afghanistan and Pakistan that the United States could be withdrawing too abruptly.
“There isn’t a deadline,” Gates said on CBS’s Face the Nation. “What we have is a specific date on which we will begin trans-ferring responsibility for security district by district, province by province in Afghanistan, to the Afghans.”
Obama’s Peace Prize
There’s No Deadline
Members of the South Carolina national guard in Afghanistan
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Inside Track
William F. Jasper, senior editor for The New AmericAN, and Alex Newman, contributor to The New AmericAN, attended the sec-ond week of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, which was still in progress when this magazine was sent to the printer.
The conference opened in the wake of the fallout over “Cli-mategate,” the appearance on the Web of incriminating e-mails written by and to global-warming alarmists connected with the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. For Jasper’s report on Climategate, see page 17.
The cover story articles in the next (January 18) issue of TNA, written by Jasper and Newman, will be devoted to the Copen-hagen story. In addition, we have already published, and will continue to publish, many online exclusives on global warming and Copenhagen at thenewamerican.com.
On the Scene in Copenhagen
A monopoly accomplishes for its creator the opportunity to gouge the public, a consequence generally well known, and generally despised. There is, however, one commodity existing as a mo-nopoly that the public does not loathe, the creation of money. This monopoly seems to most Americans to be the only way to pro-ceed. They are unaware that our nation once had competing cur-rencies and this competition led to honesty in the field of money.
Several Spanish coins made of precious metal were circulating during colonial days, even after the Declaration of Independence. In 1792, the U.S. Mint began its constitutionally authorized oper-ations, and the people brought their gold and silver to be stamped into coinage of a fixed size, weight, and purity. Also, there were private mints issuing precious metal coinage; the government did not have a monopoly in the field of coining money. But, today, the only legal money is fiat money issued by the Federal Reserve that is deemed money by law. Its value continues to decrease because there is virtually no limit on how much of it can be issued.
Congressman Ron Paul has become well known and admired
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has officially de-clared that carbon dioxide and other so-called greenhouse gases are dangerous to public health and welfare, paving the way for much stricter emissions standards.
EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson announced the “endangerment finding” on December 7. This ruling was needed to allow new emis-sions regulations for automobiles to move forward, and it sets the stage for large-scale emitters of these gases such as factories, power plants, and refineries to be hit with limitations on their output.
“These long overdue findings cement 2009’s place in history as the year when the U.S. government began addressing the chal-lenge of greenhouse-gas pollution and seizing the opportunity
for his advocacy of sound money and his opposition to the Federal Reserve. In addition to his bill calling for auditing the Fed (see page 44), he has now introduced the “Free Competition in Cur-rency Act of 2009” (H.R. 4248). He notes that, to be useful and honest, currency has to be durable, portable, divisible, uniform, stable, reproducible, and scarce. And he notes that mankind’s his-tory demonstrates that gold and silver, not paper bills, have been the choices arrived at for money throughout the millennia.
The Congressman’s new measure calls for three steps: Repeal legal tender laws that give paper bills issued by the Fed the mo-nopoly always sought by thieves and tyrants; eliminate laws that prohibit private mints from creating coinage to be used as cur-rency; and eliminate capital gains and sales taxes on gold and sil-ver coins. Regarding the latter, the Congressman provides a clear explanation of the absurdity and injustice of taxing the purchase of gold and silver coins by noting how stupid and unjust it would be if a sales tax were charged every time a person exchanged a 10-dollar bill for a roll of quarters. n
of clean-energy reform,” Jackson declared in a statement. The Obama administration had indicated earlier in the year that it would make this controversial decision, but the timing of the an-nouncement was meant to coincide with the opening of the global climate summit in Copenhagen, Denmark.
Global-warming alarmists argue that the release of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere by man is causing runaway global warming, despite the fact that most of the warming that has taken place since the late 1800s occurred before most of the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Moreover, viewing carbon dioxide as a dangerous gas overlooks the fact that it is essential for plant life, which absorbs it through photosynthesis.
Ron Paul Calls for Competition in Money
EPA Declares Carbon Dioxide a Danger to Public Health
Inside Track
8 THE NEW AMERICAN • JANuARy 4, 2010
William F. Jasper
Alex Newman
What About the U.S. Constitution?“For the first time in its history, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization invoked Article 5.... And the United Na-tions Security Council endorsed the use of all necessary steps to respond to the 9/11 attacks.”In his December 1 speech, President Barack Obama avoided mentioning the document he has sworn to abide by and pointed instead to NATO (a UN regional arrange-ment) and the UN itself for authorization of the war in Afghanistan.
His Huge Election Expenditure May Have Hurt the Political Process“He has done long-term damage to the system.”After New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg spent $102 million of his own money ($174 per vote received) to squeak out a reelection win, Public Interest Research Group’s Gene Russianoff contended that the city’s electoral process had been severely harmed.
European Union’s New Leader Another Globalist“The climate conference in Copenhagen is another step toward the global management of the planet.”Prior to taking office on December 1 as the initial President of the European Union (under the Lisbon Treaty), Belgium’s Herman Van Rompuy let the world know that he is an ardent globalist and an enemy of national sovereignty.
The Border Between the United States and Canada Is a Bigger Concern Than in the Past“We can’t take the chance that the footprints we see are somebody coming here to live the American dream or somebody coming here to destroy the American dream.”As the official in charge of the U.S. Border Patrol’s station in northern Vermont, Fernando Beltran has seen the number of agents in his office tripled to more than 300 since 9/11.
You Can Buy Mao Memorabilia in the Town Where He Was Born“Business is better than ever.”Mao Juxiang, a sales clerk in Shaoshan, China, will happily sell anyone items depicting the late dicta-tor’s image in a bronze bust for $85, a snow globe for $7, or a key chain for $4.25.
Army Family Members Skeptical About Afghanistan War Ending“We have a friend who’s been in the military seven years and has been deployed five of those years. I don’t think anyone in the military believes this is going to end soon.”The wife of an Army medic who faces another tour in a few months, Jessica Suckarieh, laments that her one-year-old son has seen his father for only two months.
A Sober Warning for Senior Citizens“I have a message for you. You’re going to die sooner.”Pointing to President Obama’s healthcare proposals, Senator Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), a medical doctor, claimed that planned cuts in Medicare would result in dire consequences for older Americans.
He Tossed a Shoe at President Bush and Now Has One Aimed at Him“He stole my technique.”The famous Iraqi shoe-tosser, Muntadhar al-Zeidi, issued his com-ment after he ducked to avoid being hit by a shoe thrown at him during a news conference in Paris. n
— compiled by John F. mcmAnus
Herman Van Rompuy
Muntadhar al-Zeidi
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QuickQuotes
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Barack Obama
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by Jack Kenny
I t may be considered a strange case of “Back to the Future,” halfway around the world. Twenty years after the
tearing down of the Berlin Wall and the apparent demise of Soviet communism, the United States appears to be emulating pre-Bolshevik Russia. Without knowing exactly how or why, America has become the land of the “czars,” men and women appointed by some undefined process, often of dubious legality, literally to rule over various segments and activities of our political, social, and economic life. Amer-ica has a Science Czar, a School Safety
Czar, a Car Czar, and even a Czars Czar.It didn’t start with President Barack
Obama, but the tendency to appoint un-elected officials, in many cases uncon-firmed by any legislative process, to high-level positions of authority over the political and economic life of the nation has greatly accelerated in the past year, owing in part to the fact that the United States has taken over corporations in the financial and automotive sector that had previously been governed primarily by a private-sector free market. Thus we have an Automotive Recovery Czar, a Compen-sation Czar, and others.
Some members of Congress, belatedly
jealous of their political turf, have been grumbling about the number of new of-fices that the President has created without Senate approval. Congress, of course, has control over appropriations, and running all of these new offices costs something — though many czars have been appointed with salaries undisclosed. Those who re-member our Republic’s founding docu-ments, those parchments preserved under glass in our nation’s capital, may recall one of the charges leveled against the British King in our Declaration of Independence: “He has erected a Multitude of new Offices and sent hither Swarms of Officers to harass our People and eat out their Substance.”
tHE NEW AMErIcAN • JANuAry 4, 201010
Politics
As the United States proudly foists American-style “democracy” on much of the world, presidentially appointed “czars” control large swaths of the U.S. economy, without oversight.
Thomas Jefferson and his fellow pa-triots might not have imagined that the new Republic they had midwifed would be the land of the (more or less) free and the home of the czars. But America in the age of Obama has made czar production a growth industry. House Minority Leader John Boehner has accused the President of circumventing and subverting the Consti-tution by appointing more than 30 “czars” to oversee government operations, most of them not subject to Senate confirmation. Many of the positions and responsibilities duplicate those of cabinet-level officials and their departments, he said.
“He clearly is circumventing the Con-stitution, in my view, and I think the heat continues to build on the administration to deal with this,” Boehner said last fall in an interview with Newsmax TV. “It’s one thing to have domestic policy advisors or international policy advisors, but to have this many people at the White House who have really more control than the Cabinet secretaries, I think is a subversion of the Constitution.”
Of course, the unconstitutionality en-tails not just the appointing of czars with-out Senate approval, but also includes much of what the czars are actually doing, from telling businesses how much they can compensate employees to regulating schools. We have, alas, reached a point in our history where subverting the Con-stitution is almost “as American as apple pie.” Indeed, though the Republicans may view it as an Obama phenomenon, czarist America goes back at least to the days of the New Deal and has been perpetuated by both Republican and Democratic adminis-trations ever since.
Any list of so-called czars is to some extent subjective, since the word “czar” is not in any official title and which posi-tions qualify for the designation may be debatable. According to Wikipedia, the current use of the term, once reserved for the rulers of pre-revolution Russia, start-ed during the administration of Franklin Roosevelt, who had 12 such appointees. The number dropped to six under Truman and one in Eisenhower’s White House. Reagan had only one, the Director of the White House Drug Abuse Policy, and George H.W. Bush had two. The number increased to seven under Clinton, then ballooned to 31 under George W. Bush,
according to the Wikipedia list. The 30-plus appointed by Obama is remarkable for an administration barely a year old.
The offices created by executive order of George W. Bush included the Chairman of the President’s Council on Bioethics, or the Bioethics Czar, and the Advisor to the President for Public Health Emergency Awareness, dubbed the Bird Flu Czar. The special counselors to the President included a Communications Czar. Bush created the Office of Faith-based and Community Initiatives, headed by the Faith-Based Czar, and even gave the nation a Birth Control Czar, formally the Deputy Assistant Secre-tary of Population Affairs in the Department of Health and Human Services. Former Assistant Secretary of State Elliot Abrams was the Deputy National Security Advisor
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AIdS Czar: Jeffrey Crowley
Auto Recovery Czar: ed Montgomery (right)
Car Czar: Ron Bloom (left)
for Global Affairs, known incongruously as the Democracy Czar.
Obama’s additions include an Advisor to the President and the Vice President on Domestic Violence and Assault Issues, or the Domestic Violence Czar. The Green Jobs Czar is the Special Advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise, and Innovation. There is a Health Czar who is the Director of the White House Office of Health Reform and Counselor to the President. There is also a Car Czar for the auto industry, a Com-pensation Czar for companies receiving “ordeal money” under the Troubled Asset Relief Program, which has its own TARP Czar, the Assistant Secretary of the Trea-sury for Financial Stability. The White House has both a Science Czar, the Assis-tant to the President for Science and Tech-nology, and a Chief Technology Officer known as the Technology Czar. The Di-rector of the Office of Safe and Drug-free
Schools is the Safe Schools Czar. There is even a Regulatory Czar, confirmed by the Senate, to regulate the regulators. The Director of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs is based within the Of-fice of Management and Budget.
On the international scene, there is the Guantanamo Base Closure Czar, who is a special envoy of the Department of State. The United States has former UN Ambas-sador Richard Holbrooke as the Special Representative for Afghanistan and Paki-stan, or the Afghanistan Czar. Former Sen-ate Majority Leader George Mitchell has an even broader role as the Special Envoy for Middle East Peace, or Mid-East Peace Czar. The Sudan Czar is officially the Spe-cial Envoy to Sudan.
Even in the comparatively czar-free Clinton years, when there were only seven, the President had an advisor to oversee the efforts of the other domestic policy advi-
sors. The chief domestic pol-icy advisor and Director of the White House Domestic Policy Council was called, simply, the “Czar Czar.”
“I think this whole issue has gotten way out of control in terms of the number of czars that he has and advi-sors around him,” Boehner said about the reign of czars under Obama. Some Senate
Democrats, including Dianne Feinstein of California and Russ Feingold of Wiscon-sin, also have expressed misgivings.
Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.) wrote Obama a letter warning: “The rapid and easy accumulation of power by White House staff can threaten the constitution-al system of checks and balances. At the worst, White House staff have taken di-rection and control of programmatic areas that are the statutory responsibility of Sen-ate confirmed officials.”
Just who are these czars? Some are newcomers to the national political scene. Only a couple even come close to hav-ing what might be considered household names. They include, as I have mentioned, special envoys, and there have probably been special envoys in every administra-tion, starting with George Washington’s. Obama has appointed diplomats to deal with particular areas, such as Holbrooke as the administration’s specialist in Af-ghanistan. As Boehner indicated, this kind of appointment has the potential for caus-ing confusion both at home and abroad.
Is it possible, for example, that Hol-brooke, the Afghan/Pakistan Czar, might, intentionally or otherwise, undercut the authority and influence of Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in Afghanistan and potentially elsewhere? Wars, as Secretary of Defense Robert Gates said recently, are fraught with unintended consequenc-es. The same is true with political wars. And it is not that long ago that Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton were locked in serious political combat. For political reasons, he could not leave her out of his administration altogether, and surely she had the knowledge and experience to take on the foreign policy issues the Secretary of State must confront. It may be unlikely that Obama would use Holbrooke or any other “czar” to deliberately undermine Clinton’s efforts abroad. But he might have in mind the possible advantage of having people, answerable only to the President, in Afghanistan and elsewhere to keep an eye on Secretary Clinton to be sure she is not undermining Obama’s efforts. He would not want her “going rogue,” after all.
And if Holbrooke is answerable only to the President, who makes sure that he and Secretary Clinton are on the same page, so to speak, and not sending “mixed
no sane person is in favor of any disease, especially a deadly disease. But politically speaking, AIdS is a favored disease and has been favored with its own czar. There is yet no publicly announced czar for typhoid fever or other communicable diseases.
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economic Czar: Paul Volcker
messages”? And might his mission un-dermine the authority of the U.S. Ambas-sador and other embassy officials in both Afghanistan and Pakistan? Holbrooke is also authorized to work with Gen. David Petraeus, head of CENTCOM, to inte-grate civilian and military efforts in the region. Is there someone in Washington, below the office of the President, who is making sure all these efforts are in harmony with one another? Is there an opening for a Special Assistant for Coor-dinated Communications or a Synchro-nization Czar?
Holbrooke is a veteran diplomat who was ambassador to the United Nations from 1999-2001. He has long been a fix-ture in the foreign policy establishment of the Democratic Party, and like most, if not all, of the czars, he is a member in good standing of the Council on Foreign Rela-tions cabal. He was Assistant Secretary of State for East Asia and the Pacific during the Carter administration (1976 to 1980). He began his work in Foreign Service under President John F. Kennedy in 1962 and remained employed therein through 1976. From 1972 through 1976, he was the editor of Foreign Policy magazine, the house organ of the Council on Foreign Relations. Holbrooke was useful on many fronts to President Bill Clinton. Prior to his appointment as UN ambassador, Hol-brooke brokered the Dayton (Ohio) Peace Accords to end the fighting in Bosnia.
Another veteran of international poli-tics and CFR member, George Mitch-ell, is also a veteran of the legislative chambers. The former U.S. Senator from Maine was Majority Leader from 1989-94 and was later Clinton’s Special Envoy to Northern Ireland, where he was instru-mental in bringing about an agreement to end the fratricide there. As Special Envoy for Middle East Peace, Mitchell’s job is to maintain the very shaky cease-fire be-tween Israel and Hamas. He is no strang-er to the Middle East, having led a fact-finding mission in the year 2000 to study violence in the region. His 2001 Mitchell report formed the basis for the so-called road map for Middle East peace.
A multi-talented investigator and dip-lomat, Mitchell has also been the lead investigator into steroid use in Major League Baseball, making him perhaps baseball’s first Juice Czar.
Other Czars AIDS Czar: Jeffrey Crowley, Director of the Office of National AIDS Policy. No sane person is in favor of any disease, especially a deadly disease. But politically speaking, AIDS is a favored disease and has been favored with its own czar. There is yet no pub-licly announced czar for typhoid fever or other communicable diseases.
The AIDS Czar reports to the President as part of the Executive Office of the President’s Domestic Policy Council. Crowley’s qualifications appear bomb proof. He has a Master of Public Health Degree from the Johns Hopkins University School of Hygiene and Public Health. His credentials include his work as Senior Research Scholar at Georgetown Uni-versity’s Health Policy Institute and Senior Scholar at the O’Neill Institute for National
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Border Czar: Alan Bersin
Climate Czar: Todd Stern
and Global Health Law, part of the Georgetown University Law Center. He was Deputy Executive Director for Programs at the National Association of People with AIDS. In his czarist role, Crowley coordinates HIV/AIDS policy not just domestically but also interna-tionally, since the United States provides billions of dollars in foreign aid to combat AIDS.
Auto Recovery Czar: Ed Montgomery, Director of Recovery for Auto Communi-ties and Workers. Montgomery was Deputy Secretary and Chief Economist at the Labor Department (1997 to 1998) and is Dean of the College of Behavioral and Social Sciences at the University of Maryland (2003 to present). He has a Ph.D. in economics from Har-vard, which should help him explain what he’s doing to the man to whom he reports, Larry Summers, the former president of Harvard who is now President Obama’s top
economic advisor. Montgomery also had the advantage of being a donor of $1,200 to Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign. He is married to the granddaughter of a General Motors worker from Portland, Michigan.
His task is to “leverage government resources” to support the workers, com-munities, and regions that rely on the American auto industry. To “leverage gov-ernment resources” sounds so much better than to “fleece the American taxpayers.” If he needs a third job, Montgomery may be in line for Euphemisms Czar at the Minis-try of Truthless Consequences.
Economic Czar: Paul Volcker, Chair-man of the President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board. If the bad economic news becomes too much for the honchos from Harvard, former Federal Reserve Chair-man Volcker will attempt to bring the mar-kets back from the brink. Appointed Fed chairman by Jimmy Carter in 1979, Vol-cker helped wring the inflation out of the economy too late to help Carter, but just in time to help Reagan in the mid-1980s He has reportedly taken on at no pay the task of offering independent, nonpartisan information, analysis, and advice to the President as he formulates and implements his plans for economic recovery. Perhaps Larry Summers thought that is what he had been doing because in the “eat or be eaten” world of Washington politics, there have been reports that Volcker has been margin-alized by Summers. Of course, the advice from these two is essentially the same — spend more, create more money out of thin air, pile up more debt, etc.
Border Czar: Alan Bersin, Assistant Secretary for International Affairs and Special Representative for Border Affairs. A double Ivy man, Bersin is a graduate of Harvard and earned his law degree at Yale. He was chairman of the San Diego Re-gional Airport Authority (2006 to 2009), Secretary of Education for California (2005 to 2006), and Superintendent of San Diego Public Schools (1998 to 2005). He was U.S. Attorney for San Diego from 1993 to 1998, during which time he was also Attorney General Janet Reno’s special representative on border issues. Now he reports to Homeland Security chief Janet Napolitano and is supposed to handle il-legal immigration and drug violence along the Mexican border. His view of illegal im-
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Science Czar: John Holdren
Stimulus Accountability Czar: earl devaney
migration, however, may be troublesome, since he said during his days as Clinton’s Border Czar that he wanted to focus on smugglers of both drugs and people and was not interested in prosecuting “eco-nomic migrants.” He did, however, insti-tute “Operation Gatekeeper,” which led to an increased presence of border guards to deter illegal border crossings. However, when Bersin left the position in 1998, bor-der arrests were on pace for an 18-year low of just more than 200,000.
Whatever the justification for the posi-tion — since the Department of Home-land Security has had from its beginning the mission of protecting our borders — Bersin appears eminently qualified for it. But the $50,000 he has given to political campaigns in the past 10 years, nearly all of it to Democrats, may have ensured that his qualifications would not be overlooked. And his membership in the establishment Council on Foreign Relations doesn’t hurt either.
Car Czar: Ron Bloom, Counselor to the Secretary of the Treasury. Not to be confused with the Auto Recovery Czar, a natural mistake. Another Harvard man, Bloom earned his MBA there. Prior to that he worked for the Service Employ-ees International Union. He was an in-vestment banker with Lazard Freres & Co. from 1985 to 1990. He co-founded the investment banking firm Keilin and Bloom. From 1996 to February 2009, he was special assistant to the president of United Steelworkers. He has negotiated restructuring deals for more than 50 com-panies, getting major concessions from both unions and corporations.
Bloom is a leader of the White House task force overseeing auto company bail-outs. He reports to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Larry Summers, head of the National Economic Council.
Climate Czar: Todd Stern, Special Envoy for Climate Change. Another Har-vard Law School grad, Stern was most recently a Senior Fellow at the Center for American Progress, where he focused on climate change and environmental issues. A top aide to President Bill Clinton, Stern was head of the Initiative on Global Cli-mate Change (1997 to 1999) and Advi-sor to the Secretary of the Treasury from 1999 to 2001. He helped negotiate the Kyoto Treaty on climate change during
the Clinton presidency, but the pact was not submitted to the Senate for ratification after the Senate, by a 95-0 vote, passed a resolution making it clear that the treaty would surely die there. He is responsible for developing international approaches to reduce the emission of greenhouse gases. He supports a national cap-and-trade sys-tem to limit carbon emissions and reduce our nation’s dependency on foreign oil. He reports to Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.
Science Czar: John Holdren, As-sistant to the President for Science and Technology, Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, and Co-chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology. Holdren is the top advisor to Obama on science and technology issues. He has taught at both Harvard and Berkeley and studied aerospace engineer-ing and plasma physics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He is an out-spoken advocate of the need to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions. In a 2008 New York Times op-ed, Holdren called climate-change skep-tics “dangerous” members of a “denier fringe.”
In 1971, he co-authored a paper on “Global Ecology”
suggesting “some form of ecocatastrophe, if not thermonuclear war, seems almost certain to overtake us before the end of the century.”
Conservative critics have quoted a state-ment in a book he co-authored in 1977, Ecoscience: Population, Resources and Environment. The controversial quotation says that “population-control laws, even including laws requiring compulsory abor-tion, could be sustained under the existing Constitution.” (James Madison, call your office!)
More troublesome, because it’s more recent than a 32-year-old book, is Hol-dren’s involvement in “Climategate,” the deliberate manipulation of scientific data, the stonewalling of Freedom of Informa-tion requests, and the overall propaganda efforts of scientists charged with studying the causes and effects of climate change.
In a book John Holdren co-authored in 1977, Ecoscience: Population, Resources and Environment, it says that “population-control laws, even including laws requiring compulsory abortion, could be sustained under the existing Constitution.”
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deposed green Jobs Czar: Van Jones
All of that, long suspected by skeptics of the climate crusade, was revealed and doc-umented after a hacker tapped into the e-mails of the scientists working on the proj-ect and made public their communications. Those communications, said Rep. James Sensenbrenner (R-Wis.) at a committee hearing, “show a pattern of suppression, manipulation and secrecy that was inspired by ideology, condescension and profit.” Sensenbrenner quoted Holdren from the e-mails and scolded him for “name-calling” of global-warming skeptics.
Stimulus Accountability Czar: Earl Devaney, Chair of the Recovery Act Transparency and Accountability Board. A former director of criminal enforcement at the Environmental Protection Agency, Devaney now leads the oversight board that monitors money distributed under the stimulus act. He reports to Vice President Joe Biden.
Green Jobs Czar: Van Jones, Special Advisor for Green Jobs, Enterprise, and Innovation at the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Jones’s mete-oric career rise has taken him from the Oakland, California, grass-roots orga-nizing scene to the leader of a national movement to spur the “green economy.” He is the founder of Green for All, an or-ganization focused on creating green jobs in impoverished areas, and co-founder of the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights
and Color of Change, which includes Bay Area PoliceWatch, a group devoted to “protect[ing] the community from police misconduct.”
His 2008 book, The Green Collar Econ-omy: How One Solution Can Fix Our Two Biggest Problems, made the New York Times bestseller list.
His job was to promote environmen-tally friendly employment within the ad-ministration and boost support for the idea nationwide. He reported to Nancy Sutley, head of the Council on Environmental Quality, or the Eco Quality Czar.
But Jones may be the first of the de-posed czars; his “reign” lasting only six months. Hired in March, he apparently was not adequately vetted by White House staff, another reason why critics of “czar-ist” government say appointees should go through the Senate confirmation process. By early September he was the center of controversy and issued two apologies, one for signing a petition circulated by 911Truth.org that questioned whether Bush administration officials may have allowed the terrorist attacks of 9/11 to go forward, “perhaps as a pretext for war.” The other was for using a crude term to de-scribe Republicans in a speech he gave be-fore joining the administration. Jones had also been involved with a radical group in the San Francisco Bay area called Stand-ing Together to Organize a Revolution-
ary Movement, or STORM, a group with Marxist roots. As if that were not enough, Jones, who began his career as an advo-cate of prison reform, generated still more controversy by his pleas for clemency for death-row inmate Mumia Abu-Jamal, who was convicted of shooting a Philadelphia police officer in 1981.
Safe Schools Czar: Kevin Jennings, Director of the Office of Safe and Drug-free Schools in the federal Department of Education. A former member of the ho-mosexual activist group ACT UP, famous for disrupting church services and throw-ing condoms at worshippers, Jennings is said to have funded a pornographic ACT UP exhibition at Harvard Univer-sity’s art museum. He is also founder and long-time leader of the Gay, Lesbian and Straight Education Network (GLSEN), a group that has condemned “heterosex-ism,” along with racism, sexism, and ho-mophobia, as “detrimental to a healthy school climate.” Indeed, Jennings himself has accused American schools of “pro-moting heterosexuality” and “recruit-ing children to be heterosexuals” by as-signing such literature as Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet.
Worse still, Jennings claimed in a year 2000 speech that he encouraged a teenager who was in a homosexual relationship with an adult male. If the child was underage, as Jennings said at the time, then today’s Safe Schools Czar may well have violated the law by not reporting the apparent statu-tory rape. Jennings later changed his story, saying the boy was past the legal age of consent.
But beyond the moral decadence lies another threat to American freedom in the form of an overgrown government. Even the best of public servants — and the ros-ter of czars contains a number that do not fit that description — seek to expand their power and to coerce and control those who do not conform to the ideological blueprint. When Sen. Russ Feingold, (D-Wis.) objected to invasions of privacy and other abuses of civil liberty in the Bush administration, he was told that his think-ing was “pre-9/11.” The administration’s, he replied, was “pre-1776.”
Between foreign terrorists and domestic tyrants, the enemies without and the czars within, American liberty remains under siege in the Age of Obama. n
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Safe Schools Czar: Kevin Jennings
by William F. Jasper
“As near as I can tell, Climate-Gate is almost entirely a tempest in a teacup,” wrote
Kevin Drum in a November 30 column for the left-wing magazine Mother Jones. “There’s nothing questionable there,” he insisted. The tempest-in-a-teacup/no-big-deal trope has been regularly invoked by the proponents of global-warming alarm-ism to dismiss the significance of what may be one of the biggest science scandals in history.
The “Climategate” to which Drum refers is, of course, the still-developing scandal involving the release of thousands of e-mails and documents from a British climate research center. The leaked docu-ments expose some of the biggest scien-tific names in the global-warming debate to serious charges of fraud, unethical at-tacks on colleagues, censorship of oppos-ing viewpoints, and possible criminal de-struction of, and withholding of, evidence.
The timing of Climategate has been a major boon to skeptics of catastrophic climate change and a monster headache to alarmists, breaking onto the world
scene only three weeks before the Unit-ed Nations Climate Change Conference (COP15) convened on December 7 in Co-penhagen, Denmark.
Michael Mann, James Hansen, Phil Jones, Michael Oppenheimer, Stephen Schneider, and Kevin Trenberth — some of the biggest names in global-warming alarmism — are unfavorably exposed in the documents that were posted on the In-ternet on November 20 by unknown hack-ers who penetrated the computer system of the Climate Research Unit (CRU) at Great Britain’s University of East Anglia. Phil Jones, the director of the CRU and a top guru in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the UN’s climate brain trust, comes off especially poorly in the e-mails. After initially balk-ing at calls to resign or step down, the university announced on December 1 that Jones would be taking temporary leave while an independent inquiry is conduct-ed into the matter.
Climatologist Patrick Michaels, who has long criticized the IPCC process, sees the e-mail scandal far differently than Kevin Drum, and chooses a much differ-ent metaphor to describe it. “This is not a
smoking gun,” says Dr. Michaels, “this is a mushroom cloud.” On the face of it, it would seem difficult to dispute Professor Michaels’ assessment. The Climategate e-mails provide powerful confirmation of charges by many scientists over the years that the UN’s IPCC process is po-litically — not scientifically — driven and that claims of scientific “consensus” to justify radical policies are a gross cor-ruption of science. In the past, scientists who questioned the Jones-Mann-IPCC “consensus” have been denounced as “deniers” — a vicious attempt to associ-ate them with Nazi holocaust denial — or “shills” for the fossil-fuel industries … or both. Now, however, scientists who can-not be classified as skeptics — indeed, some are prominent names in the alarmist camp — are challenging the IPCC and the Climategate defendants to come clean and release the data on which they have been basing their dire predictions, but have been withholding from the public and their sci-entific peers.
“Tricks” and “Consensus”In one damaging e-mail that has been widely publicized, Jones writes to col-
When the released e-mails of some of the world’s most respected climate alarmists showed that they were manipulating data, environmentalists tried to downplay the deceit.
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climate
Climate “Teacup Tempest”?
leagues that he has just used “Mike’s Nature trick” of adding other temperature data to “hide the decline” in recent global temperatures. They had to resort to such trickery because the data conflicted with their claims that anthropogenic (human-caused) global warming, or AGW, is heating up the planet to unacceptable levels and must be curtailed before it leads to irreversible global catastrophe.
The Mike referred to in this message is Michael Mann, professor of me-teorology at Pennsylvania State University, whose influential “hockey stick” graph utilized statistical manipulation to produce a curve that would support claims of recent human ac-tivities causing the warmest period in the past millennia. The now thoroughly discredited “hockey stick,” which was a big component of Al Gore’s Nobel Prize-winning documen-tary, An Inconvenient Truth, attempted to wipe the Medieval Warm Period, one of the most solidly established periods of climate history, from the historical re-cord.
During the Medieval Warm Period (about A.D. 800-1300), temperatures were higher than today; the Vikings colonized then-balmy Greenland and roamed the ice-free waters of the North Atlantic. If allowed to stand, this inconvenient truth would undercut the alarmists’ exaggerated claims that burning fossil fuels is causing the warmest temperatures in 1,000 years.
In trying to make the Medieval Warm Period disappear, the Jones/Mann team went too far, and other scientists respond-ed with a robust “smack-down” of this at-tempt to falsify the historical record. How-ever, before Mann was forced to retract some of his most egregious statistical fal-sifications, he and his allies had managed to vilify many reputable scientists and keep their sham going for several years. In 1998, astrophysicists Sallie Baliunas and Willie Soon of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics challenged the
Mann-Jones thesis, arguing in the journal Climate Research that the evidence sup-ported the existence of the Medieval Warm Period. Drs. Soon and Baliunas were soon subjected to a smear campaign and six editors at Climate Research were forced to resign for allowing the Soon-Baliunas article to be published.
Now the Climategate e-mails are show-ing that the corruption of science in the name of “saving the planet” from the sup-posed scourge of climate change is far more extensive and egregious than the public or the scientific community real-ized.
In an e-mail of January 29, 2004 to Mi-chael Mann, Phil Jones refers to the re-cent death of global-warming critic John L. Daly with this churlish comment: “In an odd way this is cheering news!” In the same e-mail, Jones then suggests to Mann that he has obtained legal advice that he does not have to comply with Freedom of Information (FOI) requests from other sci-entists to release data and codes underly-ing his research claims.
Some of the e-mails seem to confirm concerns that Jones, Mann, et al., have destroyed data that could expose their fraudulent methods. That appears to be
the case in a May 29, 2008 e-mail message, in which Jones writes to Mann about deleting data for the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (AR4):
Mike, Can you delete any e-mails you may have had with Keith re AR4? Keith will do like-wise.... Can you also e-mail Gene and get him to do the same?... Will be getting Caspar to do likewise.
In another e-mail that has shocked and infuriated many in the scientific com-munity, Jones reveals the lengths to which he is will-ing to go to sabotage fellow scientists in order to main-tain the myth of AGW “con-sensus.” In a July 8, 2004 e-mail, Jones assures Mann
that he (Jones) and Kevin Trenberth will censor opposing scientific views from the forthcoming IPCC report. Jones writes:
I can’t see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow — even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!
Similar e-mails paint a picture confirming the charges of critics that Jones, Mann, and other IPCC activists constitute a “cli-mate mafia” or “climate cartel” that pun-ishes dissenters and rewards those who toe the global-warming party line. The e-mails are shedding light on ugly episodes over the past decade or more in which the car-tel trashed the reputations of, and slammed doors on, distinguished scientists who dared to dispute the politically ordained AGW orthodoxy. With this kind of con-trol, claims of overwhelming consensus become a self-fulfilling prophecy; con-trary opinions are effectively barred from publication in accepted “peer-reviewed” literature. Besides Drs. Soon and Baliunas, other eminent scientists who are trashed or referred to crudely in the CRU e-mails in-clude Richard Lindzen; Hans Von Storch;
Climate alarmist James Hansen of NASA poses by a gravestone symbolizing casualties attributed to global warming.
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Sonia Boehmer-Christianson; Patrick Mi-chaels; Roger Pielke, Sr.; Robert Balling; Fred Singer; and Tim Ball.
Huge government grants, impressive computer models, and guaranteed head-line stories from sympathetic activists in the media have transformed climate sci-entists into celebrities and power brokers. However, even with their super computer programs, political connections, and pres-tigious awards, they still haven’t learned how to predict the weather, let alone con-trol it.
An amusing admission against interest is this comment in an October 12, 2009 Climategate e-mail from Dr. Kevin Tren-berth. He is stunned that not only have temperatures not warmed as predicted, but the temperatures have actually hit historic lows in his area, contradicting the suppos-edly authoritative pronouncements of the climate cartel. Trenberth comments:
Well I have my own article on where the heck is global warming? We are asking that here in Boulder [Colo-rado] where we have broken records the past two days for the coldest days on record.
Trenberth then goes on to admit: “The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the mo-ment and it is a travesty that we can’t.”
Not only did Trenberth, Jones, Mann, et al., miss the current tem-perature downturn, but none of the IPCC’s highly praised computer models foresaw the global mean temperature decline of the past dec ade. However, their inability to explain away this enormous fact, which Trenberth admits is “trav-esty,” has neither diminished the cartel’s certitude nor dampened its zeal for implementing a planetary climate regime.
“Ignore That Man Behind the Curtain”For years, the IPCC climate cartel has been using the “Wizard of Oz” defense every time some “Toto” pulls back the curtain to expose the IPCC’s secretive machinations and its sanctimonious claims of
“transparency,” “openness,” and “overwhelming consen-sus.” Inquiring scientists and the general public alike are told not to pay attention to the mysterious process be-hind the curtain where the fantastic and frightening sce-narios of impending doom are being created.
However, two Canadian “Totos” refused to stop tug-ging on the curtain, and, as a result, have successfully exposed some of the trickery of the IPCC “wizards.” Re-tired businessman and statistician Stephen McIntyre and economist Ross McKitrick have doggedly pursued the truth and have subjected the IPCC’s “climate science” to rigorous examination. Troubled by unex-plained statistical anomalies in Mann’s infamous “hockey stick” graph, they contacted Mann to request copies of his data sets. Mann balked and also refused to divulge publicly the algorithm he had used to concoct his “hockey stick” graph. McIntyre and McKitrick published sever-al articles challenging Mann’s work on a number of key points. Their path-breaking research sparked a congressional hearing
validated by two independent academic panels, one of which was appointed by the National Academy of Sciences.
McIntyre and McKitrick have continued their independent investigations on their award-winning Internet website, Climate-Audit.com, which has won the respect of even many AGW proponents. However, it is clear that Mann, Jones, and the climate cartel regard the two dauntless sleuths as the enemy, and they are the subject of many Climategate e-mails, often referred to as “MM” or “the two MMs.”
In an incriminating CRU e-mail of Feb-ruary 2, 2005, Jones writes to Mann:
The two MMs have been after the
The now thoroughly discredited “hockey stick,” which was a big component of Al gore’s nobel Prize-winning documentary, An Inconvenient Truth, attempted to wipe the Medieval Warm Period, one of the most solidly established periods of climate history, from the historical record.
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CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a Freedom of In-formation Act now in the UK, I think I’ll delete the file rather than send to anyone.
Oops! The Dog Ate ItThe climate cartel, it appears, has already carried through on the data deletion threat. Scientists at the University of East Anglia CRU have admitted throwing out much of the raw data on which their ominous pre-dictions are based.
In a statement on its website, the CRU said: “We do not hold the original raw data but only the value-added (quality controlled and homogenised) data.” What happened to the original data? According to the CRU, it was discarded back in the 1980s. What this means is that the original CRU data cannot be checked or replicated, which means that the graphs, research, and predictions supposedly based on the missing data is worthless. The available “value-added” and “homogenised” data would also then be worthless, since there would be no way to verify or replicate it.
How many other data sets have likewise been “lost” or “accidentally deleted”? We may soon find out, as official investigations and FOIA lawsuits progress. In the mean-time, we are simply supposed to trust the IPCC “experts” who say that we must “in-vest” trillions of dollars for mitigation and reparation of past carbon consumption, as well as for prevention of future warming.
IPCC vice-chairman Jean-Pascal van Ypersele tried to minimize the signifi-cance of the e-mail scandal as the Copen-hagen conference opened by claiming that Climategate only pertains to one data set out of many that confirm the serious peril posed by anthropogenic global warming.
“It doesn’t change anything in the IPCC’s conclusions,” said van Ypersele, “it’s only one line of evidence out of doz-ens of lines of evidence.” This is the party line echoed by most of the AGW alarmists
in government, media, and environmental activist circles. Along with this corollary: The skeptics (or “deniers,” “shills”) are exploiting the e-mail controversy simply to sabotage Copenhagen and distract the scientists and politicians from the impor-tant work they must conclude there.
“We mustn’t be distracted by the be-hind-the-times, anti-science, flat-earth climate sceptics,” British Prime Minister Gordon Brown told the Guardian. “We know the science. We know what we must do. We must now act and … seal the deal.”
Brown’s Environmental Secretary, Ed Miliband, was even more scathing, de-scribing skeptics as “dangerous and de-ceitful.” “The approach of the climate saboteurs is to misuse data and mislead people,” he charged. Miliband’s accusa-tions are especially audacious, inasmuch as it is his alarmist camp, not the skep-tics (or “climate realists,” as many prefer to call themselves), that has been caught red-handed misusing data. “The skeptics are playing politics with science in a dan-gerous and deceitful manner,” Miliband
continued, then concluded with this warning: “There is no easy way out of tackling climate change despite what they would have us believe. The evidence is clear and the time we have to act is short. To abandon this process now would lead to mis-ery and catastrophe for millions.”
According to van Ypersele, “We
are spending a lot of useless time discuss-ing this rather than spending time prepar-ing information for the negotiators.”
Professor Judith Curry has provided van Ypersele, Miliband, Brown, the IPCC, and other alarmists with an easy solution to this problem: Stop hiding your data and stop engaging in the hostile “tribalism” displayed in the infamous e-mail attacks on fellow scientists. Dr. Curry is no “cli-mate skeptic.” In fact, she is an AGW true believer, an IPCC expert reviewer, and chair of the School of Earth and Atmo-spheric Sciences at the Georgia Institute of Technology. Dr. Curry says:
Scientists claim that they would never get any research done if they had to continuously respond to skep-tics. The counter to that argument is to make all of your data, metadata, and code openly available. Doing this will minimize the time spent re-sponding to skeptics; try it! If anyone identifies an actual error in your data or methodology, acknowledge it and fix the problem. Doing this would keep molehills from growing into mountains that involve congressional hearings, lawyers, etc.
In other words, why not actually practice the transparency and openness that the UN and IPCC claim to favor? Don’t hold your CO2 while waiting for that to happen. n
Trenberth then goes on to admit: “The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t.”
Michel Jarraud, Secretary-General of the United Nations’ World Meteorological Organization, at the December 2009 UN Climate Conference in Copenhagen, holds up a revised “Hockey Stick” graph claiming to show the past decade was the warmest on record.
AP
Imag
es
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by Edwin Vieira, Jr.
Amazing as it may seem, since ratification of the Bill of Rights in 1791, the Supreme Court has never provided a definitive statement as to wheth-
er, in the Justices’ opinions, the Second Amendment ap-plies to the States as well as to the General Government. Until now. For the Court has just agreed to hear McDonald v. City of Chicago, in which finally that issue is squarely presented. This case is being heralded as being of ground-breaking significance.
For among most contemporary judges, lawyers, and members of the legal intelligentsia, the reach of the Second Amendment passes for a controversial question; however, both the original Constitution and the Second Amendment made abundantly clear that “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” applies to every level of government, with-out exception, throughout the United States.
According to the resolution of the Congress that submit-ted the Bill of Rights to the States for ratification in 1789,
the first 10 Amendments to the Constitution constituted “further declaratory and restric-tive clauses” added “in order to prevent mis-construction or abuse of its powers.” In The Federalist, No. 84, however, Alexander Ham-ilton argued that “bills of rights ... are not only unnecessary in the proposed Constitution but would even be dangerous. They would con-tain various exceptions to powers which are not granted; and, on this very account, would afford a colorable pretext to claim more than was granted.... The truth is ... that the Consti-tution is itself, in every rational sense, and to every useful purpose, a bill of rights.” In the case of “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,” Hamilton was quite correct.
The Second Amendment provides that “[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.” The Amendment did not purport to create, for
the first time in 1789, “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,” though. Instead, it recognized that right’s prior existence, in order to guarantee its future exercise. Indeed, the original Constitution actually required both the General Government and the States, not just to protect, but also af-firmatively to promote, that exercise. This is because the original Constitution incorporated within its federal struc-ture “the Militia of the several States.”
Inasmuch as neither the original Constitution nor the Second Amendment defined the term “Militia,” its mean-ing must be drawn from antecedent American law — in particular, from the great mass of pre-constitutional Co-lonial and State Militia statutes that regulated the Militia of the Colonies and then the independent States from the 1600s through the late 1700s. Four salient principles of the Militia derived from these statutes: First, the Militia were State governmental institutions. Second, every able-bodied free male from 16 to 50 or 60 years of age had a duty to serve in the Militia in some capacity. (Today, that universal duty would extend to every able-bodied female
22 tHE NEW AMErIcAN • JANuAry 4, 2010
As the case McDonald v. City of Chicago, which will determine if States are allowed to have gun control, wends its way to the Supreme Court, the issues are examined.
The Second Amendment, The States, And The People
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as well.) Third, every member of the Militia, not specially ex-empted for some good and sufficient reason supportive of the common defense and the general welfare, was required at all times to possess in his own home his own firearm, ammunition, and necessary accoutrements (“to keep ... Arms”), and whenever necessary to bring forth that equipment into the field (“to ... bear Arms”). Fourth, all such armaments were specifically suitable for Militia service — which meant that Militiamen’s firearms had to be at least equivalent to those the regular armed forces carried. Thus, what the Second Amendment later described as “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” was first and foremost a duty. Yet it was a right as well — because, if an indi-vidual has a duty of citizenship, embodied in law, “to keep and bear Arms,” he must as well have a corresponding right to do so, protected against any interference not only by other citizens but also by rogue public officials.
In keeping with these principles, when (as the Preamble to the Constitution states) “We the People of the United States” “ordain[ed] and establish[ed] th[e] Constitution” “in Order to ... provide for the common defence,” the Constitution delegated to Congress the power and the duty “[t]o provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia.” Self-evidently, the power “[t]o provide for ... arming ... the Militia” absolutely excludes a contrary power “[t]o provide for ... [dis]arming” them. Moreover, because Congress cannot “provide for ... arming ... the Militia” without somehow arming all of “the people” of the several States — that is, “We the People of the United States” — who consti-tute the Militia, Congress has a duty “[t]o provide for ... arming” every individual possibly eligible for duty in the Militia.
Consistent with the Constitution, Congress cannot fail, ne-glect, or refuse to arm — let alone attempt affirmatively to dis-arm — “the people,” because that would effectively destroy “the Militia of the several States.” And Congress has no more author-ity to destroy the Militia than it does to destroy any other parts of the States’ governmental structures. Or to destroy the States themselves, for “the security” of which the existence of “well regulated Militia” is “necessary.” Or to destroy the Constitu-tion’s federal system, of which the States and their Militia are components as vital as Congress.
Thus, as against the General Government, “the people” in each State enjoy “the right ... to keep and bear Arms” under the original Constitution.
Because the Constitution is “the supreme Law of the Land,” and because “the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers ... of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support th[e] Consti-tution,” the States are powerless to interfere, in any way, with the performance of Congress’s duty “[t]o provide for ... arming ... the Militia.” Therefore, no State (or any political subdivision thereof) may prevent “the people” within her own jurisdiction either from being “arm[ed]” by the provision of Congress or from arming themselves on their own recognizance with equip-
ment suitable for Militia service should both Congress and that State’s government fail, neglect, or refuse “[t]o provide for arm[ing]” them. Plainly, too, no State may affirmatively dis-arm “the people,” particularly when Congress and that State’s government have failed, neglected, or refused to arm them, and “the people” have therefore been compelled to arm themselves in order to fulfill their constitutional duty.
This limitation on the States’ power to infringe “the right ... to keep and bear Arms” was acknowledged (albeit only in dicta — a judge’s remark not binding as legal precedent) in the Supreme Court’s decision in Presser v. Illinois, 116 U.S. 252, 265 (1886):
It is undoubtedly true that all citizens capable of bearing arms constitute the reserve military force or reserve militia of the United States as well as of the states, and, in view of this prerogative of the general government, as well as of its general powers, the states cannot, even laying the [Second Amendment] out of view, prohibit the people from keep-ing and bearing arms, so as to deprive the United States of their rightful resource for maintaining the public security, and disable the people from performing their duty to the general government.
Of course, Presser was plainly wrong in asserting that “all citi-zens capable of bearing arms” constitute a “reserve militia of the United States.” For no “militia of the United States” exists under the Constitution. Rather, “all citizens capable of bearing
23www.theNewAmerican.com
Alexander Hamilton
arms” comprise “the Militia of the several States,” and at all times, not just as “reserves.” Nonetheless, the essential point remains true, that no State can constitutionally “prohibit [her] people from keeping and bearing arms” that they would need for their Militia service.
In addition, the original Constitution commanded “[t]he United States” to “guarantee to every State in this Union a Republican Form of Government.” When the Constitution was ratified, each of the States had “a Republican Form of Government.” Minor v. Happersett, 88 U.S. (21 Wallace) 162, 175-176 (1874). Prior to ratification, each of the States (or, earlier, Colonies) had long maintained her own Militia. Indeed, the Articles of Confederation had required that “every state shall always keep up a well regulat-ed and disciplined militia, sufficiently armed and accoutred.” So, in the America of the late 1700s, “a Republican Form of Govern-ment” meant nothing less than a government that incorporated a Militia — “composed,” as Virginia’s Declaration of Rights stated in 1776, “of the body of the people, trained to arms.” That being so, if any State today were to infringe her people’s “right ... to keep and bear Arms” — and thereby undermine her own “Repub-lican Form of Government” — “the people” could demand that the United States should intervene to protect that right.
Thus, as against each of the States, “the people” enjoy “the right ... to keep and bear Arms” under the original Constitution.
Solidified by the Second AmendmentThe Second Amendment strongly amplified the original Consti-tution’s guarantee of “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,” as against both the General Government and the States.
No one doubts that the Amendment’s command reaches the General Government. Confusion arises, however, from the Su-preme Court’s erroneous decision in Barron v. City of Baltimore, 32 U.S. (7 Peters) 243 (1833), that the Fifth Amendment — and by extension the entire Bill of Rights — does not apply to the States. Although this decision has been followed many times in different contexts, it is simply wrong. See generally William W. Crosskey, Politics and the Constitution in the History of the United States (Chicago, Illinois: University of Chicago Press, 1953), Volume 2, Chapter XXX.
To be sure, the entirety of the First Amendment — “Congress shall make no law...” — and part of the Seventh Amendment — “no fact tried by a jury, shall be otherwise reexamined in any Court of the United States...” — can apply to the General Gov-ernment only. But the remainder of the Bill of Rights is phrased in broad language that contains not even an implicit limitation to “Congress” or “the United States.” For example, both the Ninth and Tenth Amendments must apply to the States as well as to the General Government — or how else logically could “the people” fully “retain[ ]” the “rights,” and have fully “reserved to ... them” the “powers,” to which those Amendments refer?
The Second Amendment’s application to the States is even more obvious. First, in general, the Amendment’s reference to “a free State” cannot conceivably embrace only the General Gov-ernment, and not as well the very States that comprise the fed-eral system, and without which the General Government would never have been formed in the first place and could not continue to exist. In particular, the Amendment declares that “[a] well
regulated Militia” is “necessary to the security of a free State.” But the Constitution provides for no “well regulated” — or even any — “Mi-litia of the United States,” only “the Militia of the several States.” (Although the Constitu-tion allows “the Militia of the several States” to “be employed in the Service of the United States” in certain circumstances, it does not deprive them of their status as State institu-tions through such temporary “Service.”) So “a free State” for which “[a] well regulated Militia” is “necessary” must include each and every one of “the several States.” Now, inas-much as “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” is operationally essential to “[a] well regulated Militia,” and “[a] well regulated Militia” is “necessary to the security of a free State,” then “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” must be “necessary to the se-curity of a free State.” And inasmuch as no
The Second Amendment strongly amplified the original Constitution’s guarantee of “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms,” as against both the General Government and the States.
Short-shrifting rights: Many believe that the Second Amendment only applies to Congress — not to States — thereby allowing States to issue gun-control laws. But only the First and Seventh Amendments are limited to controlling Congress, and other Amendments, such as the Ninth and 10th, must apply to States.
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“free State” may undermine her own “security” — especially by “infring[ing]” “the right of [her own] people” which her own “supreme Law” declares to be “necessary to th[at] “security” — that “right” must be enforceable against each of the States.
Second, perhaps not every “free State” everywhere in the world must be “a Republican Form of Government”; but every “Republican Form of Government” in America must be “a free State.” The Second Amendment declares that “[a] well regulated Militia” is “necessary to the security of a free State” — which means that such a Militia is “necessary to the security of a [Re-publican Form of Government].” “[T]he right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed” because the actual exercise of that right is one of the primary characteristics of “[a] well regulated Militia.” Therefore, inasmuch as each State must maintain herself as “a Republican Form of Government,” or be compelled to comply with that requirement by the United States, each State must guarantee “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” both within her own jurisdiction through her own laws, and within the jurisdiction of every other State through her participation in the General Government. That is, the Second Amendment applies not just to each State individually, but even to all of the States collectively.
Fourteenth Amendment ConfusionMany people who mistakenly accept or acquiesce in the doctrine of Barron v. City of Baltimore believe that the Second Amend-ment can nevertheless be applied to the States through Section 1 of the 14th Amendment, which (in relevant part) provides that “[n]o State shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any State deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.”
Effectively overruling the Supreme Court’s erroneous deci-sions in Barron and Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. (19 Howard) 393 (1857), Section 1 (correctly construed) includes within “the privileges and immunities of citizens of the United States” all of the freedoms included in the Bill of Rights. See generally Cross-key, Politics and the Constitution, Volume 3, Chapter XXXI. This is particularly obvious in the case of the Second Amend-ment’s “right of the people to keep and bear Arms,” inasmuch as Chief Justice Taney opined in Scott that, if Negroes were citi-zens of the United States and thereby “entitled to the privileges and immunities of citizens ... it would give them the full liberty of speech ...; to hold public meetings upon political affairs, and to keep and carry arms wherever they went.” 60 U.S. (19 How-ard) at 416-417. (Emphasis added.) If Taney knew any sources for these “privileges and immunities” other than the First and Second Amendments, he failed to identify them.
Properly applied in this particular, the 14th Amendment would be especially valuable, because it prohibits every State from “mak[ing] or enforc[ing] any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens.” Now, a State can “make” a “law” only within her own jurisdiction. But she can “enforce” not only her own “law[s],” but also all valid “law[s]” enacted by the General Government. See, e.g., Testa v. Katt, 330 U.S. 386 (1947). So, properly construed, the Amendment would preclude the States, not simply from making and trying to enforce their own invalid “law[s],” but also from participating in any manner in the enforcement of each and every unconstitutional “law” of the United States. Indeed, the Amendment would even require the States to oppose within their own territories the attempted enforcement of all such invalid “law[s]” by rogue agents of the United States. Correctly understood, then, Section 1 of the 14th Amendment would provide a firm constitutional basis for the doctrine and practice of “interposition,” through which the States could protect their citizens from usurpation and tyranny at the hands of rogue officials of the General Government.
Unfortunately, the Judiciary has made a thorough mish-mash of the jurisprudence of the 14th Amendment. Notwithstand-ing the Amendment’s evident purpose and expansive power to secure individuals’ fundamental freedoms from abridgment by both the States and the General Government, the Supreme Court has perversely but consistently misconstrued the “privi-leges and immunities” language so as to render it more or less useless. See Crosskey, Politics and the Constitution, Volume
Right and duty: The Constitution commands the General Government to provide for arming the militia of the States. Since the federal government must arm States’ citizens, it is logical to conclude that States may not rightfully disarm their citizens.
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3, Chapter XXXII. So, unless the contemporary Court is will-ing to reverse a long line of decisions, “lose face” both intel-lectually and politically, and pry open a massive judicial can of worms with respect to numerous freedoms protected by the Bill of Rights but as yet not protected at all or only partially protected by the 14th Amendment, it will not apply the Second Amendment to the States under the “privileges and immuni-ties” rubric.
The Court has held, though, that some freedoms guaranteed by the Bill of Rights (and even others that are not) can be en-forced against the States under the aegis of the 14th Amendment by “incorporating” those freedoms within “due process of law” by judicial fiat. This doctrine is particularly amorphous and in-sidious, because it licenses the Justices to decide, not only which freedoms are to be “incorporated” at all, but also the extent to and the conditions under which they are to be protected. None-theless, the typical formulae in favor of “incorporation” that the Court has enunciated over the years strongly support protection of “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms.” For instance, that “due process of law” protects: (i) “those fundamental prin-ciples of liberty and justice which lie at the base of all our civil and political institutions” — Hurtado v. California, 110 U.S. 516, 535 (1884); or (ii) “the fundamental principle[s] of liberty and justice which inhere ... in the very idea of free government and [are] the inalienable right[s] of a citizen of such a govern-ment” — Twining v. New Jersey, 211 U.S. 78, 106 (1908); or (iii) those tenets “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty” — Palko v. Connecticut, 302 U.S. 319, 325 (1935).
Self-evidently, inasmuch as the Second Amendment itself
declares, as a matter of constitutional fact and law that even the Supreme Court cannot disregard let alone deny, that “[a] well regulated Militia” is “necessary to the security of a free State” — the only place in the Constitution in which any es-tablishment or organization is described as “necessary” for any purpose — and inasmuch as that Amendment directly links “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” with such a Militia in a cause-and-effect relationship, then that “right” must “lie at the base of all our civil and political institutions,” because without it those “institutions” can have no lasting “se-curity.” Similarly, for those reasons, “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” must be in the very forefront of “the inalienable rights of a citizen of [a free] government” — for surely every “citizen of [a free] government” has “the inalien-able right[ ]” and duty to defend it, and to expect his fellow-citizens and public officials to assist him in doing so. And being a defining characteristic of “[a] well regulated Militia,” which is itself “necessary to the security of a free State,” “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” must be, not only “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty,” but withal “neces-sary” to achieve and preserve it.
So, even under the Supreme Court’s misconceptions about the 14th Amendment, “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” should be held applicable to the States.
Of course, one may wonder why, if the Second Amendment’s application to the States is so patent, the Amendment has never been so applied until now — that is, why States’ gun-control laws have never been challenged in the Supreme Court. The answer is two-fold. First, during the entire 19th century and a good part of the 20th, America suffered from no pervasive “gun control” of the modern variety. For decades, most adult free males were members of “the Militia of the several States,” and therefore statutorily required to be armed. Many other Ameri-cans armed themselves voluntarily. No well-financed and politi-cally influential pressure groups touting “gun control” existed. Traditional conceptions of “State’s rights” — to which Barron v. City of Baltimore paid court — were still widely held. And limitations in various States’ laws on individuals’ rights “to keep and bear Arms” often aimed solely at such narrow mat-ters as concealed weapons, or were discriminatorily enforced only against African-Americans and other minorities. Second, judicial review of legislation has always been cumbersome and slow, and particularly where constitutional issues are involved depends upon precisely the right case coming up for review. As “gun controllers” gained political power in both the General Government and the States, though, and increasingly manifested their intent to strip everyone outside of the Armed Forces and police agencies of every aspect of “the right ... to keep and bear Arms,” more and more Americans found themselves the vic-tims or at least the targets of ever-more-invasive restrictions on that right. In response, proponents of the Second Amendment began actively to assert “the right of the people to keep and bear
Permitting only popguns: Since the General Government is required to arm the militia for the purpose of possible military service, citizens must be allowed to have guns of military utility.
news.navy.mil
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Arms” through litigation and lobbying for remedial legislation. Under these circumstances, it was only a matter of time until the conflict in the States between “gun control” and the Second Amendment finally came to the fore judicially.
A Legislative Solution PreferableNonetheless, a great pitfall threatens any case such as McDonald v. City of Chicago. For the Court could end up deciding that, although “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” does apply to the States, it is merely a so-called “individual right” disconnected from “[a] well regulated Militia,” and therefore subject to whatever “regulations” of State and local govern-ments judges and legislators may deem appropriate. Actually, such a result is far more likely than not, in light of the mess the Court made of the Second Amendment on the same grounds in District of Columbia v. Heller. See “Gun Rights on Trial,” the neW AmericAn (September 1, 2008).
Notwithstanding that many patriots believe the notion of an “individual right” to be correct, and even though it may provide some protection for “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” in isolated instances, at base the notion that the Second Amendment protects only an “individual right” is part and par-cel of the strategy the enemies of “ordered liberty” are employ-ing in order to deceive Americans so that they will not organize themselves in the one and only way the Constitution itself tells them is “necessary to the security of a free State.” First, these miscreants contend that no real “right of the people to keep and bear Arms” exists at all, but that public officials can impose
whatever “gun controls” they deem politically expedient. When that argument meets too much political resistance, they concede that such a “right” does exist, but that it is merely an “individual right” related in some murky manner to personal self-defense alone — and, being merely an “individual right” alone, must always yield to all “reasonable regulations” enacted in the ser-vice of “compelling governmental interests,” as public officials define those terms. Which inevitably results in the transmogri-fication of a true “right of the people to keep and bear Arms” into nothing more than a temporary license controlled by public officials for their own purposes — which returns the argument to its starting point.
The purpose of this black propaganda, of course, is to pre-vent Americans from thinking through, and acting upon, the constitutional directive that the preservation of “a free State” absolutely depends upon the maintenance of “[a] well regulated Militia,” and that the existence of “[a] well regulated Militia” ab-solutely depends upon “the people’s” permanent personal pos-session of firearms, ammunition, and necessary accoutrements suitable for Militia service. This is hardly surprising. Aspiring
usurpers and tyrants expect that if “the people” will not learn how to organize themselves for col-lective self-defense in times of domestic tranquil-lity, they will not be able to organize themselves during the confusion and even terror of a major social crisis, when time is short and actions must be taken in the face of repression by the usurpers’ and tyrants’ armed forces and para-militarized police. Therefore, the success of usurpation and tyranny depends upon keeping “the people” as disorganized as possible for as long as possible.
This is why the Second Amendment declares that “[a] well regulated Militia” is “necessary to the security of a free State,” and why “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” must be understood and exercised in that context. To that end, “the people” need to be concerned less with judicial protection of that right for a few individuals here and there, and more with leg-islative enforcement of it, so that “the Militia of the several States” — each “composed of the body of the people, trained to arms” — become the dominant political institutions through this country, just as the Constitution requires. n
Even under the Supreme Court’s misconceptions about the 14th Amendment, “the right of the people to keep and bear Arms” should be held applicable to the States.
Not minding the militias: After the Civil War, States’ militia activities slowly came to a halt, prompting gun-control activists to claim that civilian gun-ownership rights have been negated.
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73013
by Jack Kenny
“I love to write, but not about my-self,” wrote Sarah Palin on page 409 of a book that is almost en-
tirely about herself. Going Rogue is sub-titled “An American Life,” but Sarah Palin is hardly the typical American “hockey mom.”
How many women have won a local beauty contest, finished second runner-up in the state pageant, then gone on to be Mayor, Governor, and vice presidential candidate of one of the two major par-ties, all while giving birth to and raising five children? How many have earned the nickname “barracuda” for toughness in athletic competition and “Miss Congeni-ality” in the aforementioned state beauty pageant?
No doubt about it: Sarah is special. And contrary to the speculations of some in the Washington punditocracy, she did not take leave of her senses in July of this year when she resigned as Governor of Alaska to… well, she didn’t say exactly what she was going to do.
Was it because she hadn’t made up her mind? Or was it that she wanted to get an early start in campaigning for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination? Ob-viously, she had committed to writing a book and received a princely sum for a simple, 45-year-old hockey mom — $1.5 million, in fact — as an advance. But is the book tour an end in itself? Or is it the pre-lude to a campaign to be (sorry, Hillary) the first woman ever nominated for and
perhaps elected to the office of President of the United States?
The GOP was soundly beaten in ’06 and again in ’08, but there are signs of new life in the old Party, and who better than a youngish mom with battle scars to point the way to a better tomorrow, to offer a Re-publican version of “hope” and “change”?
But before you shell out $28.99 at your local bookstore, be advised if you are looking for a hint or confirmation of her future plans, you won’t find it. The conventional wisdom is she is already running for the White House. That, more than sexism, may be why Newsweek chose the Runner’s World magazine shot of the glamorous Palin posing in running shorts for its cover of November 23. She is, like, running, get it? The issue that followed George Bush’s win in the Iowa caucuses in 1980 showed “Poppy” Bush out jog-ging. True he was wearing a sweat suit instead of shorts, but who would want to see Bush’s legs, anyway?
So it seemed a bit chippy of Palin to ob-ject to the cover on the grounds of “sexism,”
especially since she describes her days as a student athlete, making mention of “the liberating effect Title IX [had] on women’s sports.” It might have been refreshing if, at that juncture or later in the book, Governor Palin would have pointed out something that used to be a talking point for conser-vative Republicans: the role of the federal government in elementary- and second-ary-school education. Simply put, there isn’t one, constitutionally speaking. But school districts, hooked on federal grant money, are required to make athletic op-portunities equally available to both (all?) genders as well as students of all races, religions, and ethnic derivations. So if not enough girls come out for the high-school wrestling team, then the school jolly well better let the girls who do want to wrestle get down on the mat and wrestle with the boys. What does Sarah Palin, champion of traditional family values, think of that? Her book doesn’t tell us.
The politically interested reader has to ask himself: Do I know any more about Sarah Palin’s political ambitions or core be-
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Book Review
Sarah Palin’s new book Going Rogue reveals little about her aspirations, hard-and-fast stances, or allegiances, so conservatives are left wondering about a possible Palin presidency.
“Rogue” oR Ruse?
liefs at the end of the book than I did at the beginning? Aside from a few vague hints of something deeper, the answer is “no.”
The question is important because nearly every vice presidential candidate is considered among the “top tier” of candi-dates for the next opportunity to run for President. But running mates do not speak their own minds. They articulate — even parrot — the talking points of the presi-dential candidate and his handlers.
Sarah Palin, for the first time since she entered the national spotlight, is in a posi-tion to speak for herself. But what she says is rather muted.
She is for free enterprise, she says. And local government. Against bailouts for failing businesses. She is for small busi-ness and small government. She knows energy issues, especially in Alaska with its trillions of cubic feet of natural gas and its rich oil reserves. She knows also that the supply is non-replaceable and she knows a thing or two about energy conservation and wind and solar power, and she under-stands the value of keeping a scenic land beautiful and preserving abun-dant outdoor opportunities, pro-tecting fisheries, and standing up to big oil companies.
But hardcore conserva-tives may wonder if she is re-ally “one of us.” Does she be-lieve in the pre-W conservative agenda and Republican platforms that called for the elimination of the federal departments of Energy and Education? She sued the federal Environmental Protection Agency for putting polar bears on the Endangered Species list, an act of rebellion that might endear her to the Party’s conservative base. But curiously, she makes no men-tion of that in her 413-page book. She
shies away from endorsing “abstinence only” sex edu-cation and says she supports contraception, though she is strong in her stand against abortion. But that might make you wonder if she is aware that most forms of ar-tificial contraception are re-ally abortifacients and if she can look the culture of death in the face and recognize it for the evil that it is.
On military and foreign policy mat-ters, she seems to think we need to “stay the course” in Afghanistan and Iraq. Our diplomacy, she says, must make it clear that we support freedom for all and, of course, we must be constant in our sup-port of Israel.
On pork-barrel spending, she is against Senator Clinton’s proposal to build a me-morial to the Woodstock celebration in New York and a proposed monument to mules and other pack animals in Califor-nia and the infamous “Bridge to Nowhere” in Alaska. Pause over that last one before it goes by in a blur.
In an interview with ABC’s Charles Gibson zeroed in on Palin’s statement, made at the Republican National Con-vention and elsewhere, “I told Congress, ‘Thanks, but no thanks, on that Bridge to Nowhere.’ If our state wanted to build a bridge, we were going to build it our-selves.” In fact, Gibson pointed out, she was lobbying for federal funding for the
bridge before she was against it and was against it only after it had become a politi-cal embarrassment. Well, every Governor lobbies for projects for her state, Palin countered in a desperate, artless dodge. But Gibson, to his credit, focused in on the duplicity of pretending to have been against it all along. Sometimes those dog-gone network news people, for all their liberal biases, get it right.
During the campaign, Palin was ground down by all the scripted answers, the talk-ing points, all the orders from campaign “headquarters” to say nothing and only to the right people. Headquarters was risk aversive and continually opposed to her “going rogue.” Talk in platitudes, give scripted non-answers, play it safe, and don’t forget to remind people you’re a “maverick,” just like John McCain.
That has essentially been the Republi-can strategy for the last 70-plus years. It is the Republican Party’s equivalent of the NFL’s “prevent defense.” If you employ that strategy when you have a big lead, there is a chance you might not blow all of it.
Palin needs to do still more to break away from the Party establishment and show her own “true grit.” She could stop listening to the foreign-policy “experts” on the Council on Foreign Relations and start reading Pat Buchanan’s books on how America is following in the failed footsteps of past empires. She could stop exulting about how we are “spreading de-mocracy” and “building schools” in Af-ghanistan and reflect on why civilians who see their loved ones killed by unmanned bombers in Afghanistan and Pakistan may not see America as the “shining city on a hill.” She could recall what Ron Paul said about bridges and how we have been tax-ing the American people to bomb bridges
in Iraq and then taxing (or borrowing) some more to rebuild those bridges.
Meanwhile our bridges here are falling apart. She might recall
Paul’s admonition that Ameri-ca should try leading “by the
force of example, instead of the example of force.”
Okay, that’s trite, too. But it has the advantage of being true. And it doesn’t take 413 pages to say it. n
The GOP was soundly beaten in ’06 and again in ’08, but there are signs of new life in the old Party, and who better than a youngish mom with battle scars to point the way to a better tomorrow, to offer a Republican version of “hope” and “change”?
30 THE NEW AMERICAN • JANuARy 4, 2010
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Good News GarageIn this day and age, it’s probably safe to say that a reliable car is pretty much a necessity, especially for those who work outside the home. For Kim Yacobucci of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, that is definitely the case. Yacobucci is a single mother who not only has to commute to work each weekday, but also has to com-mute an extra 120 miles a week to trans-port her son, Connor, to his living facility. Connor has severe autism, mental retarda-tion, and cerebral palsy; he requires 24-hour care, so Yacobucci must take him to a residential care center to live during the workweek.
The trip would be tiresome even in a trustworthy car, but Yacobucci had an older car that not only had no heat (a se-rious problem in the New England win-ters), but was notoriously unreliable. “I got in and would cross my fingers and pray it got me where I needed to go,” she told the November 24 Foster’s Daily Democrat of Portsmouth. Being unable to afford a newer car, Yacobucci would still be crossing her fingers if it weren’t for the Good News Garage (GNG), which supplied her with a “new” used car in November.
According the GNG website, good-newsgarage.org, Good News Garage was founded in Vermont in 1996 by Hal Colston, Lutheran Social Services, and the Wheat Ridge Foundation “to provide safe, reliable and affordable transporta-tion options to individuals and families in need ... to help them move from welfare to work.” They have now expanded to Con-necticut, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, and Rhode Island.
Good News Garage collects donated vehicles, which they repair and offer to low-income individuals in need of reli-able transportation. They maintain several drop-off locations, and will also tow do-nated cars free of charge. As of last May, the charity had collected, repaired, and donated more than 3,200 cars throughout the New England area.
The car that Yacobucci received was a 2008 Chevy Impala with only 18,000 miles on it. In November, NASCAR team owner Rick Hendrick donated $10,000
cash and 10 of the 2008 Impalas to the ga-rage, and two recipients from each of the five states were chosen by GNG to receive one of Hendrick’s cars.
Yacobucci is immensely grateful for her new car, in spite of its one drawback: It is so “peppy” that she has to make it a point not to get speeding tickets. All things considered, that’s not a bad prob-lem to have.
What Goes Around Comes AroundLast November, Fenton, Michigan, resi-dent Joe Yousif was shopping at the local Walmart; in his back pocket were his wal-let and a stack of $50 bills. When he re-turned to work, though, the cash was gone. He immediately called the store to see if the money had been turned in, but it had not; he was told to call back later in the day to check again.
Assuming the cash was lost, Yousif waited until the following day to call. He was immensely surprised — and relieved — to learn that someone had indeed found his money. Sixteen-year-old Skylar Welti was shopping when she came across the folded-up stack of bills. Though it would have been so tempting to the teenager (not to mention an adult!) to keep the money — which she figured to be about $1,000 — and put it down to her “lucky day,” the honest teen did the right thing and turned the money in. “I picked it up and looked at this wad of $50 bills and I just knew I needed to turn it in,” Welti told the Novem-ber 24 livingstondaily.com. “I wouldn’t be able to feel right keeping somebody’s money. For the few minutes I held on to it, it felt like I had the weight of the world on my shoulders.”
After confirming from the store’s sur-veillance video that it was Yousif who dropped the money — actually $3,000 — Walmart returned it to him the follow-ing day. Yousif told Michigan’s ABC12 News that recently he had also returned “found” money: $1,000 that his bank had mistakenly given him. He believes he was being rewarded for returning the $1,000 by having his $3,000 returned to him, and
Yousif in turn rewarded Welti with $100, thus illustrating the maxim that what goes around comes around.
Unsticking the DogOne may not normally associate the occu-pation of wastewater mechanic with hero-ism, but on October 22 Mat Grabowski, Louis Rivera, and Chris Nicoletti were definitely heroes in the eyes of the Chadha family of Union City, California. That was the day that two of the Chadhas’ dogs, Spike and Leo, escaped the confines of their yard and headed off on an adventure. They made it as far as the creek behind their neighborhood.
As reported in the November 23, 2009 Oakland Tribune, Union City Sanitary District mechanics Grabowski, Rivera, and Nicoletti were working on a main sewer line in the area when they noticed the two dogs stranded in the chilly, swirl-ing waters. The three men tried to coax the canines to swim toward them, but the smaller one, Leo, was stuck in the mud and the larger, Spike, was faithfully standing by his companion. Trying to protect Leo, who could not move, Spike was growling and barking to keep the rescuers at bay.
Poor Leo was sinking deeper and deep-er into the mud, and his head was partially under water already when the dogs’ owner, Balvinder Chadha, who had been search-ing for the dogs for almost two hours, ar-rived at the creek. Chadha was able to lure Spike toward himself and pull the pooch out of the water. Realizing that Leo didn’t have much time, Grabowski tied a rope around his waist and swam out to the dog. He was able to extract Leo from the thick mud, and Rivera and Nicoletti towed both safely to shore.
Extremely grateful to the three work-ers for saving their cherished pets, the Chadha family presented the men with a giant homemade thank-you card, signed with the pups’ paw prints. The tale was summed up aptly by an article in the Cali-fornia Water Environment Association’s bulletin: “Leave it to a Wastewater Me-chanic to get something unstuck — even a puppy dog!” n
— liAnA stAnley
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THE GOODNESS OF AMERICA
by Joe Wolverton II, J.D.
O ur own Founding Fathers were convinced, and history has prov-en them prescient, that they were
building a new and everlasting republic that would do what other republics of the ancient world had failed to do: survive the effects of the maladies of self-government and bequeath to the subsequent genera-tions of Americans a sound and stable re-public — if they could keep it.
For the ingredients necessary to brew the right antidote to the poisons of de-mocracy and tyranny, the Founders drew from several sources. From the recent past, there was the English legacy of the right of the people to the enjoyment of certain unalienable rights such as trial by jury and due process; there was the legacy of ancient Greece and Rome that citizens are and by rights should be en-trusted with the power of self-determina-tion; and there was the faculty of renown
continental thinkers and jurists who pro-pounded the principle of natural law and its blessings and burdens better than any theorists before or since. The Founders wisely chose from among the best and brightest, and combined their words and deeds into a potent concoction that they then reduced down with the fire of revo-lution into a remedy that, despite its base of history, was uniquely American.
There are many illustrious names whose books and treatises were read and assimilated by our Founding Fathers. Some of those influences are still well known, and their names and their ideas (or at least a vague notion of their ideas) are still heard in lectures on government (Locke and Montesquieu, for example). There are others, however, whose iden-tity and influence are now largely lost to Americans in general, and the books and papers that were once always at hand for Madison, Hamilton, Jefferson, et al., are now to be found only in dusty “Special
Collections” rooms at the library and on-line repositories of the foundational tracts of American political philosophy.
Four of these forgotten influences on the Founders are the subject of this article. Their names may sound peculiar, but their wisdom, as distilled through the handi-work of our Founding Fathers, will have as familiar a ring as “We the People” or “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” Their names are (in order of their birth): Algernon Sidney, Samuel von Pufendorf, Jean-Jacques Burlamaqui, and Emmerich de Vattel.
These great thinkers may be rightly called the Four Horsemen of American liberty, the antithesis of the “Four Horse-men of the Apocalypse,” who brought havoc and upheaval. These men and their enlightened interpretations and exposi-tions on self-government informed and inspired our Founding Fathers, and their words were as lamps lighting the feet of pioneers searching diligently to find and
tHE NEW AMErIcAN • JANuAry 4, 201034
— Past aNd PeRsPectiveHistoRYHistoRY
The Founding Fathers’ success at designing a Republic with safeguards to prevent citizens’ loss of liberty and to prevent federal despotism was the result of others’ insights.
Forgotten Influences on the Founders
avoid pitfalls that doomed the best-laid plans of other equally earnest lawgiv-ers. Their ideas forged a new way in the wilderness of man’s attempts to break the shackles of tyranny and to take upon himself the burden of self-restraint and self-rule.
And it is from the study and debate of the works of these Four Horsemen that the Founding Fathers learned the keys to ably maneuvering steadily and safely among the traps and trials of establish-ing a system of government. The keys to producing a government that at once was powerful and dynamic enough to unite distinct peoples and yet limited enough to give sway to the noblest impulses of its citizens was, first, the recognition of the supremacy of natural law and the fettering of the branches of government through a system of checks and balances and powers expressly enumerated in the constitutional documents of the nation. The first subject of this brief survey is Algernon Sidney.
Algernon SidneyAlgernon Sidney (1623 – 1683) was the son of Robert Sidney, the 2nd Earl of Leicester. All extant evidence points to-
ward Sidney’s early devotion to republi-can principles. So pure and deeply rooted was Sidney’s adherence to the principles of mixed government that he opposed the execution of English monarch Charles I for treason, and he distanced himself from former allies after becoming disillusioned with Oliver Cromwell, the 1st Lord Pro-tector of the Commonwealth of England, for abandoning republican principles, including heavy-handedly side-stepping Parliament.
Sidney left England and was living in France when the English monarchy was restored in 1660. He spent the years of self-imposed exile trying to negotiate with the governments of Holland and France to back a republican invasion of England. Unsuccessful in his diplomatic efforts, Sidney returned to England in 1677 and immediately joined his fel-low republicans in opposi-tion to Charles II, who had ordered the dismissal of Par-liament. Soon, Sidney was implicated on the flimsiest of evidence in the Rye House Plot, a scheme to assassinate Charles II and his brother, and was forthwith arrested.
His arrest was chiefly a means to silence one known to be antithetical to despotism.
As the trial began, the King’s solicitors decried Sidney as a “false, seditious, and libelous traitor” whose writings fomented revolution by inciting the people to “rise up in arms against the King.” While Sid-ney denied the charges of fomenting an uprising, he did not deny that he was an enemy of absolute monarchy. His study of history made it apparent that the best of all government was a mixed government wherein the royal prerogatives are limited and restrained, and are counterbalanced against the inviolable and natural right of a free people to be self-governing. A book of his beliefs, Discourses Concern-ing Government, was used against him by the prosecution.
Discourses Concerning Government
As with many of the ancient historians and our own Founding Fathers, Vattel recognized the insidious harm done to constitutions by those who weaken it from the inside over time.
Algernon Sidney
King Charles II
www.theNewAmerican.com 35
was a response to Patriarcha, an apology of the divine right of absolute monarchy written by Robert Filmer. Filmer argued that the monarch was the father of the people and that as such he had a divine and unassailable right to rule as he saw fit. The people, as the children of the mon-arch, thrived best when they were obedient to the monarch’s sovereign rule, according to the philosophy of Filmer. Sidney refut-ed Filmer, pointing out that monarchs are more apt to be despots than father figures. His work was a classic in political theory and a standard work in the canon of re-publicanism.
But Sidney did not argue in favor of “tak-ing up arms” against the King. Rather, he simply and without fear or favor reminded
the King that he was but one branch of the mixed government so sagaciously support-ed by the wisdom of the ages. He reminded his readers that Englishmen were freemen and that the King was no more entitled to deference than was the House of Lords or the House of Commons.
That the people possessed basic rights that could not be denied by a King was not a new principle our Founding Fathers discovered in the pages of Sidney’s writ-ings, for this was their inheritance as free-born Englishmen, bequeathed to them in the articles of the Magna Carta of 1215. What they found in Sidney, however, was a cogent near-poetical explication of the import of this right:
Those who have already fallen into all that is odi-ous, and shameful and miserable, cannot justify fear.… Let the dangers never be so great, there is the possibility of safe-ty while men have life, hands, arms and courage to use them but that peo-
ple must surely perish who tamely suffer themselves to be oppressed.
These words sounded sharp and clear as a clarion in the ears of American patri-ots, rousing them to righteous indignation and fastening their resolve to throw off the shackles of tyranny and monarchical abuse.
Algernon Sidney was born an aristocrat, lived as a republican, and died a fearless martyr for the cause of liberty on the gal-lows of a tyrant.
Samuel von PufendorfLook in the index of any collection of writ-ings by any of our Founding Fathers, and you will find numerous references under the name Samuel von Pufendorf. The writ-ings of this illustrious German jurist were as oft-quoted as any of the extraordinary thinkers whose words enlightened the hun-gry minds of our Founders. Pufendorf was remarkable not only for his prolific opuses, but for the approachable and direct manner of his prose. His political philosophy was an essential element of the curriculum for all educated men of the 18th century and was an indispensable source of well-crafted reasoning in the supremacy of natural law.
Pufendorf was born in 1632 in the Ger-man state of Saxony. His father was a Lu-theran minister, and Pufendorf intended to follow in his father’s ecclesiastical foot-steps. Fatefully, Pufendorf found the dog-matic approach of the faculty of the school of theology too narrow and restrictive, and he decided to undertake the study of law.
Arriving at the University of Jena in Germany, Pufendorf’s excellence and in-dependence of character began to flourish. At Jena, he was exposed to the writings of earlier natural-law theorists such as Hugo Grotius and under the influence of such luminaries, Pufendorf set forth his own theories of man’s rights and responsibilities under the law of nature and nature’s God.
Two of Pufendorf’s books were of unparalleled appreciation by America’s Founders. The first and longer of the two works was an intimidating 1,400-page ex-position of natural law entitled Of the Law of Nature and Nations. The philosophy and commentary expounded in this book was later condensed and more narrowly tailored in Pufendorf’s next offering, Of the Duty of Man and Citizen. This shorter
Burlamaqui’s words and the spirit of his explanations of the laws of man and nature were digested and then quoted liberally by James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, and the like.
James Madison
THE NEW AMERICAN • JANuARy 4, 201036
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and more accessible volume was a vigor-ous analysis of one of the foundational maxims of American political philosophy: that all men are created equal.
In Of the Duty of Man and Citizen, Pufendorf affirmed that “since human nature belongs equally to all men, and no one can live a social life with a person by whom he is not rated as at least a fellow man, it follows, as a precept of natural law, that ‘every man should esteem and treat another man as his equal by nature, or as much a man as he is himself.’” Pufen-dorf’s animated defense of the equality of man was restated simply and soundly in the lines of the Declaration of Indepen-dence as a “self-evident” truth.
It is to Samuel von Pufendorf’s master-ful amalgamation of the spiritual and the scientific that America owes much of the strength of the foundation of liberty upon which she was erected.
Jean-Jacques BurlamaquiAnother brilliant thinker and author now relegated to the lonely stacks of musty libraries is Jean-Jacques Burlamaqui. Burlamaqui was born on June 24, 1694 in Geneva, Switzerland. Burlamaqui was familiar with the works of Pufendorf, as
he was a disciple of Jean Barbeyrac, the eminent editor of Hugo Grotius and Sam-uel von Pufendorf. His mentor encouraged him to study the works of his contempo-raries and adjust them to the world as he sought fit. Burlamaqui dutifully followed his master’s advice and at the age of 25, Burlamaqui’s skill in internalizing and co-gently and coherently restating the theo-ries of natural law was so advanced and well regarded that he was appointed a pro-fessorship of ethics and the law of nature at the University of Geneva.
Before assuming this distinguished post, however, Burlamaqui traveled throughout Europe seeking enlightenment on these subjects from some of the greatest lights alive. To his credit, Burlamaqui, for all his notable achievements and skill, rec-ognized that he would be of greater service to his pupils and to the world at large if he were to dedicate himself to the acquisition of learning and insight from those more advanced, well versed, and accomplished than himself. This humility and clear thinking would serve the young school-man well as he set his feet on a course that would bring him fame and respect from scholars, thinkers, and most importantly, American patriots.
Two of Burlamaqui’s works left an im-mense imprint on the minds of American political thinkers who were to become the architects of the world’s most endur-ing republic. James Madison, Thomas Jefferson, and Alexander Hamilton all considered Burlamaqui an example of re-markable clarity of thought and breadth of understanding. Burlamaqui’s two influen-tial books were Principles of Natural Law (Principes du Droit Naturel), published in 1747, and Principles of Political Law (Principes du Droit Politique), published posthumously in 1751. The learning and admonitions set out in these books were published to the world just in time to be of significant influence on the education of our Founding Fathers. Burlamaqui’s words and the spirit of his explanations of the laws of man and nature were digested and then quoted liberally by James Madi-son, Thomas Jefferson, and the like. In fact, all of our revered Founders eagerly gleaned insight from the pages of Bur-lamaqui’s magnificent contribution to the natural-law canon.
Of all Burlamaqui’s American students, Thomas Jefferson was probably the most devout. It was his reading and distillation of Burlamaqui’s theories that inspired Jef-
Samuel von Pufendorf
emmerich de Vattel
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ferson’s most famous phrase: “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness,” though Jef-ferson restated the principles of natural law he learned from his study of Burlama-qui. Burlamaqui’s words swayed him and fellow Founder James Wilson to list “hap-piness” as a natural right as opposed to the more familiar denomination of “property,” also convincing Jefferson that while the designation of property as an “unalien-able right” was politically uncertain, it was philosophically well grounded. With Burlamaqui as support, Jefferson felt con-fident to include the phrase in our nation’s bold Declaration of Independence from England.
Emmerich de VattelThe fourth of the Four Horsemen of American liberty is Emmerich de Vattel. Although last in this list of forgotten in-fluences, it can be claimed, without exag-geration, that it is Vattel’s interpretations and writings on the subject of the prop-er constitution of government that was most influential on the Founders of the American Republic. As a matter of fact, Thomas Jefferson, indisputably one of the lead framers of our nation’s government, ranked Vattel’s seminal The Law of Na-tions, or the Principles of Natural Law as highly as similar treatises by Grotius and Pufendorf. Further proof of Vattel’s im-pression on the Founders is the fact that Vattel’s interpretations of the law of nature were cited more frequently than any other writer’s on international law in cases heard in the courts of the early United States, and The Law of Nations was the primary textbook on the subject in use in American universities.
The Swiss-born Vattel learned to love God from his father, a pastor in the Re-formed Church. It was Vattel’s belief that the law of nations was given to man by God for their happiness. Vattel wrote that
the best constitution was that constitution founded most firmly on natural law and least liable to be unmoored from it. Vat-tel stated, “It is … the constitution of a state which determines its progress and its aptitude to attain the ends of a soci-ety.” These words were instructive to the authors of the American Constitution and encouraged them in the sometimes ardu-ous struggle to frame a well-constructed and long-lasting Constitution for the new republic. They learned from the distin-guished Vattel that if a country is to be successful then it must begin as it means to continue, built upon an unshakeable foundation of natural law and separated power.
As with many of the an-cient historians and our own Founding Fathers, Vat-tel recognized the insidious harm done to constitutions by those who weaken it from the inside over time. James Madison’s warning in this re-gard is oft quoted: “I believe there are more instances of the abridgment of the free-
dom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations.” Madison undoubtedly believed this independently, but he was certainly inspired by his read-ing in The Law of Nations wherein Vattel admonished: “The constitution and laws of a state are rarely attacked from the front; it is against secret and gradual attacks that a nation must chiefly guard.” In this instance and many others, one can appreciate the weight and value of Vattel’s theories on those of our most illustrious thinkers.
Words of WisdomThe lessons our Founders learned from the wise men discussed in this article are just as valuable for us, their political and philosophical heirs. We must vigilantly and zealously guard and treasure the re-publican government established by the Constitution and the eternal principles of natural law upon which it is built. Let us be fervent and grateful protectors of liberty and resist all attempts to wrest our gov-ernment from us or from its firm founda-tions of popular sovereignty and the right of self-determination. n
Thomas Jefferson
38 THE NEW AMERICAN • JANuARy 4, 2010
— Past and PeRsPectiveHistoRYHistoRY
Of all Burlamaqui’s American students, Thomas Jefferson was probably the most devout. It was his reading and distillation of Burlamaqui’s theories that inspired Jefferson’s most famous phrase: “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”
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Tax-free FirearmsAre you ready for a “Second Amendment Weekend”? Shoppers in South Carolina certainly were, as the state had its second 48-hour tax break on guns just after mid-night the Friday after Thanksgiving. Ac-cording to the Associated Press, shoppers didn’t have to pay any local or state taxes on gun purchases, but taxes still applied to ammunition and accessories. The state had the nation’s first tax-free gun holiday last year. Government officials in South Caro-lina estimated that the state would miss out on roughly $15,000 in tax revenues. Other states are joining in on the fun. Louisiana had its own sales-tax holiday in Septem-ber, which was even broader than South Carolina’s and included any item “that can be used for hunting or fishing.”
“Packing” PoliticiansIt appears very likely that five out of the nine members of the Detroit City Council could be “packing heat” very soon. The fact that Detroit has one of the highest crime rates in the nation has driven some politicians to acquire concealed carry permits, even though the politicians are assigned a personal security force. Ac-cording to mlive.com, four members “re-vealed ... they each have a concealed pistol permit” and a fifth planned “to get one by Thanksgiving.”
Councilman Reverend Andre Spivey told the Detroit Free Press in November, “It’s not an indictment upon the citizens of Detroit but just for my own personal as-surances. I was concerned that the city of Detroit not turn into the wild, wild West, but I’ve talked with several incumbents, and the office presents some challenges. I don’t feel I have to use it, but I’ll feel more comfortable having it…. I hope no one will be out to hurt me or any council person. But we’re in a different age.”
Bankers Bear ArmsPoliticians aren’t the only ones looking into pistol permits. DailyFinance.com reports that some of the top bankers in the nation are preparing for the growing fury aimed at them. The AOL money and
finance site explains: “Goldman Sachs Group (GS) is at the focal point of the American public’s rage against Wall Street — and probably for good reason. The firm’s former chief executives have populated the highest echelons of Ameri-can government, which has turned around and given Goldman — and its partner in the current financial collapse American International Group (AIG) — billions of dollars in taxpayer money.” According to Bloomberg news, as the time for year-end bonuses draws nearer, some execs are worried that those rising tensions will boil over into violence. Some “senior Goldman people have loaded up on firearms and are now equipped to defend themselves” in anticipation of a populist uprising.
Advice for an Unfair FightMichael Rayburn, a 27-year veteran of law enforcement, adjunct instructor at the Smith & Wesson Academy, and author of law-enforcement related books, wrote an article entitled “Even the Score: Going Up Against Multiple Assailants” that was posted December 1 at HumanEvents.com. Rayburn warns that in the majority of cases involving criminal assaults, victims will find themselves facing more than one attacker. So what is his advice for how to handle such a situation? “Your first priority is to move. Move to cover if possible.… If your cover is not within a couple of steps, your best bet is to move laterally … pref-erably to your gun (strong) side.… You’ll want to shoot the closest person to you first, no matter what weapon they possess.”
ObamaCare vs. Gun Rights?President Obama’s push to nationalize healthcare in this nation just ran into an-other obstacle. National Public Radio re-ports that the group Gun Owners of Amer-ica (GOA) has jumped into the healthcare debate. Larry Pratt, executive director for GOA, wrote a letter to Senators urging them to vote against the bill. On Novem-ber 19, Pratt wrote, “This bill will most likely dump Americans’ gun-related health
data into a government database…. This includes any firearms-related information your doctor has gleaned … that can pre-clude you from owning firearms. More-over, the special ‘wellness and preven-tion’ … would allow the government to offer lower premiums to employers who bribe their employees to live healthier life-styles — and nothing within the bill would prohibit rabidly anti-gun HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius from decreeing that ‘no guns’ is somehow healthier.” These dis-counts can be anywhere up to 30 percent by some estimates.
White House Communications Direc-tor Dan Pfeiffer was quick to respond to Pratt’s criticism via the White House blog. “It’s amazing that after so many months debating health insurance reform, some-times a myth we see being spread about it can still surprise us.” While Pfeiffer quickly dismissed Pratt’s complaints as off-base, others see a real danger posed to gun owners by the administration’s gov-ernment takeover of healthcare.
David Kopel, author, attorney, and well-known proponent of gun ownership, explains in a post for the Volokh Con-spiracy blog that the definition of well-ness programs “is extremely broad, and the assertion that it is not broad enough to encompass gun ownership appears to be incorrect.” Kopel explains in detail how there is a lot of anti-gun research, most of which he considers to be “junk science,” that claims that gun ownership is a large health risk for a family. “The existence of dozens of articles in public health and medical journals would almost certainly be enough for an anti-gun definition of ‘Wellness Program’ by the Dept. of Health and Human Services.” Kopel warns gun-owning Americans that even though “it is politically unlikely” that the government would immediately take such anti-gun steps, there is no guarantee that it might not be pursued at some future date. “But since the Reid bill is intended to make per-manent changes in American healthcare, no one can predict what a HHS [Health and Human Services] Secretary might do in 10 or 30 years, when political calcula-tions might be different.” n
— pAtrick krey
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“... the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” EXERCISING THE RIGHT
Ballooning Education BillITEM: An MCT News Service article in the Chicago Tribune for November 4 reported: “During a speech … in Madi-son, Wis., [President] Obama plugged the federal government’s $4.35 billion Race to the Top program, which will soon allot extra federal stimulus funds to states based on the strength of the education re-forms those states enact.”
Quoting the President, the report con-tinued: “‘We’re putting over $4 billion on the table, four billion with a “B,” one of the largest investments that the federal government has ever made in education reform,’ he said. ‘But we’re not just hand-ing it out to states because they want it. We’re not just handing it out based on population. It’s not just going through the usual political formulas. We’re challeng-ing states to compete for it.’”ITEM: In a December 4 editorial, head-lined “Michigan lawmakers must adopt reforms to liberate schools,” the Detroit News commented: “Michigan’s applica-tion for President Barack Obama’s Race to the Top competition for education grants is due, and the state is one of just two in the nation that is unprepared to apply. What’s at risk: at least $500 million for public schools desperate for cash. Brutal budget cuts are projected for almost every district in the state — and this competitive federal stimulus money would help buffer the im-pact on education. The Race to the Top competition was designed to spur states to undertake overdue education reforms that will make the U.S. an economic and education leader once again. The basic requirements are that states hold educa-tors accountable for the performance of students and provide alternatives to failing schools and teachers….
“The push to beef up education attain-ment has been stalled, in large part, by the state’s strongest teacher union, the Michi-gan Education Association (MEA), which has cowed timid lawmakers.”ITEM: An opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal for November 24 was written by Harold E. Ford, Jr., chairman of the Demo-cratic National Leadership Council; Louis
Gerstner, Jr., former chairman of IBM and former chairman of the Teaching Commis-sion; and Eli Broad, founder of the Broad Foundations. They wrote: “Competition among the states is also vital to reform. The administration is resisting the temptation to award funds to as many states as possible. And that’s good. To be effective, Race to the Top funds cannot become a democratic handout. Competition brings out the best performance. That’s true in athletics and in business, and it’s true in education.”CORRECTIOn: A lot of lip service gets paid to the value of competition in educa-tion, coming from those with both liberal and conservative reputations. Most of it is double-talk and empty rhetoric.
Unmentioned of course is that education is not the proper responsibility of the federal government. Under the Constitution, there is no authority for the Congress to fund or operate schools, or for lawmakers to set up an educational bureaucracy to regulate edu-cational standards, curriculum, and policies of school systems. This was long and right-ly handled at the state and local levels of government. States could really compete if they ran and funded their own programs — or, better still, many champions of liberty believe, they could phase out involvement
in education and allow private education to flourish. Indeed, overall results have fallen the deeper the feds have gotten into educa-tion and our pockets.
However, the Department of Education — whose very existence represented a po-litical payoff by President Jimmy Carter to the National Education Association — pays little heed to such matters as the Constitution. Most legislators also con-sider paying attention to such matters to be quaint and outmoded.
There’s also a tendency among many of those with a conservative bent to think that anything opposed by teachers’ unions must be worthy of their support. Not necessar-ily. Just because some union leaders don’t want their members to be held accountable doesn’t mean that swallowing the federal government’s latest big-spending panacea is an apt remedy. Chucking more federal taxes at state education monopolies be-cause they fill out the proper forms and jump through certain bureaucratic hoops is not a formula for success. Yet state of-ficials prefer to pretend that this is “free” money and disregard the fact that federal monies always have strings attached.
The Race to the Top program is yet an-other federal scheme to bribe taxpayers
tHE NEW AMErIcAN • JANuAry 4, 201042
with their own money. Unfortunately, state governments eager to receive handouts from Washington prefer to beg at the fed-eral table for scraps rather than try to raise necessary monies directly. Nevertheless, the United States will not achieve educa-tional excellence by having Washington spend more money. If merely shoveling out dollars did the job, the country would be well-nigh full of geniuses — consid-ering that the federal government has splurged almost $2 trillion on federal edu-cation programs since 1965.
And there are still those who claim there is not enough being spent on public schooling. This is simply untrue. Consid-er the most recent federal data available, employing inflation-adjusted, per-pupil spending, public-school expenditures al-most doubled between the 1975-1976 and 2005-2006 school years. Was this just be-cause there were more pupils? Nope. In 1990, there were 9.2 students per public-school employee. By 2006, that number had dropped to 8 students per employee. Not surprisingly, having more “education” employees didn’t translate into a compa-rable increase in achievement.
Washington has already squandered $100 billion or so on “education” in Presi-
dent Obama’s so-called stimulus package, but that just whet the appetite of the estab-lishment that wants to set standards and curricula for every school in the nation. The bureaucratic track record strongly suggests that more of its top-down national standards will come to a bad end. As pointed out by the Wall Street Journal, “Between 1970 and 2004, per-pupil outlays more than doubled in real terms, and the federal portion of that spending nearly tripled. Yet reading scores on national standardized tests have remained relatively flat.”
To be sure, real competition frequently does bring out the best. But Michael Phelps did not win his gold medals because a De-partment of Swimming concocted a Race to the End of the Pool program.
Writing in the New York Daily News, Andrew Coulson observed that, “Cell phone makers have not relentlessly im-proved their products because of nation-al mandates. They’ve done it to attract customers away from their competitors. Amazon did not diversify its business and create the Kindle because a consortium of Internet vendors demanded it, but because Amazon sought to beat its competition.” The author of the study “Comparing Pub-lic, Private, and Market Schools,” Coulson continued:
At the dawn of the 21st century, three quarters of American children are still assigned to schools based on where they live, by bureaucrats who have never met them. Stellar public schools cannot grow and take over less successful ones. Ineffective public schools have little fear of los-ing students to competitors because they have no real competitors — they enjoy a monopoly on $12,000 per pupil in public spending.
I published a paper in the Journal of School Choice collecting every scientific study I could find compar-ing public and private school out-comes. These scores of findings span the globe and cover everything from academic achievement and cost-ef-fectiveness to parental satisfaction. And they favor competitive market
school systems over state-run mo-nopolies by a margin of 15 to 1.
The competition said to be so beloved (see above) by Messrs. Ford, Broad, and Gerst-ner attracted the attention of Neal McClus-key, who recalled, for example, a previous Wall Street Journal piece by Gerstner. In that December 2008 article, McCluskey observed, Gerstner “declared that the na-tion should have just 70 school districts (versus about 15,000 today and 130,000 in the late 1920s), national academic stan-dards and tests, and a longer school year. In other words, exactly the kind of central-ization that has proven a total disaster for decades … only on steroids!”
McCluskey, who is associate director of the Cato Institute’s Center for Educational Freedom, is no fan of Race to the Top, for good reason. As he noted of this supposed incentive, “The money is a one-shot deal — once paper promises are accepted and the money delivered, it’s over.” He went on:
Mostly this plan, while not requiring any real reform, pushes an unprec-edented centralization of education power. It calls for state data systems to track students from pre-kindergarten to college graduation. It calls for states to sign onto “common” — meaning federal — standards. It tries to dictate state budgets. In other words, it does exactly what’s been wrong with Amer-ican education for decades: centralize power in the hands of ever more dis-tant, unaccountable bureaucrats rather than leaving it with the communities, and especially parents, the schools are supposed to serve.
There is little that is new about this “race” being pushed by the Department of Educa-tion and White House except the number of tax dollars that will be scattered from Washington. The spendthrift politicians and all-too-amenable federal bureaucrats are just trying to keep the greenbacks flow-ing effortlessly into the pockets of their allies while they disguise the truth: True education is not received, it is achieved. n
— WilliAm p. hoAr
www.theNewAmerican.com 43
The prime architect of the Federal Reserve was German immigrant Paul
Warburg. Arriving in America in 1902 with brother Max, he married into the family control-ling Kuhn, Loeb and Company, America’s prime international banking firm. By 1907, he was earning $500,000 annually, an enormously generous salary at a time when there was no income tax and inflation had not begun eroding the value of the dollar.
Already conversant with the power possessed by European central banks, Warburg insist-ed for the next few years that America needed a similar banking establishment. He teamed up with Rhode Island’s Senator Nelson Aldrich and, in 1910, the two were among the seven who met secretly at Jekyll Island, Georgia, to plot creation of the Federal Reserve. Enacted by Congress supposedly to curtail the power of the “money trust,” the Fed did exactly the opposite. And when Paul Warburg left Kuhn, Loeb and Company to accept a post on the first Federal Reserve Board, he would earn only $12,000 yearly.
Warburg’s willingness to take such a huge cut in salary is only one clue to the most important purpose of the Fed. From its in-ception, the acquisition of power, not wealth, was the goal of its creators, even though many opponents of the Fed down through the years have indicated otherwise. When Mayer Amschel Roth-schild of the European banking empire bearing his name stated, “Let me issue and control a nation’s money and I care not who writes the laws,” he indicated that a nation’s political leaders would do the bidding of those who controlled money. No one has ever proved him wrong.
Professor Carroll Quigley’s 1966 opus Tragedy and Hope contains many important revelations. He bared the existence of a secret society that planned to rule the world, even nam-ing the Council on Foreign Relations as its American branch. He labeled this secret group’s remarkably ambitious project a “network” rather than a conspiracy because he had no aversion to any of its goals. He further admitted gaining permission to ex-amine “its papers and secret records” for several years. (Where he went to do such examining has never been revealed.) But early in his 1,350-page book, the Georgetown University his-torian pointed to the “far-reaching goal” of the “network” he so admired. He wrote that the “powers of financial capitalism” sought “nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole.”
That squares exactly with the goal of power mentioned years
before by Rothschild. Quigley then offered: “This system was to be controlled in a feudalistic fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences.”
Central banks of other na-tions would act “in concert.” Didn’t the Fed rescue some European banks when the eco-nomic crisis hit? As for the “se-cret agreements “arrived at in frequent private meetings and conferences,” isn’t this what goes on at the Bilderberg con-ferences; Council on Foreign
Relations and Trilateral Commission meetings; annual sessions in Davos, Switzerland; and elsewhere? While no participant at these closed-door powwows is poor, the goal of the movements into which they have immersed themselves has always been power more than personal wealth.
John Birch Society founder Robert Welch knew well the true purpose of the Federal Reserve. In a statement he wrote in 1972, he scornfully dismissed the attitude held by some that the goal of the conspirators who foisted the Fed on America was simply money. “What all of these Insiders were after was not money but power,” he insisted. And he continued, “They were even careful to plan the whole arrangement so that the bulk of any commercial profit made by the Federal Reserve would go to the federal gov-ernment as a coverup for their nefarious intentions.”
Congressman Ron Paul has earned the thanks of all true Americans with his efforts to combat the Fed — not only to have it audited but also eventually to have it abolished. His “Audit the Fed” proposal in the current Congress has been inserted into a measure calling for broad new financial regulatory powers. Because he strongly disapproves of this addition to the federal government’s meddling where it doesn’t belong, he has indi-cated he won’t vote for the measure. “I will not vote for some-thing that’s a disaster because one or two or five percent of it is an improvement,” he stated. It may yet pass, and there may be some movement toward an audit.
But his calling attention to the power of the Fed, and his suc-cessful gathering of 317 cosponsors of his audit measure in the House, has already created a huge awakening about the Fed among millions of Americans. All freedom-loving Americans should continue to alert fellow citizens about the power and overall purpose of the Fed so that it will soon be properly audit-ed and eventually abolished. Stressing that power is its goal, not money, should help to stimulate many to make this extremely important campaign succeed. n
Fed Backers Seek Power More Than Wealth
44 tHE NEW AMErIcAN • JANuAry 4, 2010
THE LAST WORDby John F. mcmAnus
AP
Imag
es Ron Paul
Clouds Over America 2What will it take to return to the Constitution?
The Clouds Over America 2 conference will be held Friday, January 22nd & Saturday, January 23rd, in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.
For information phone 405-348-9991Conference cosponsored by Reclaiming Oklahoma for Christ and the Oklahoma Chapters of The John Birch Society
This conference is designed to educate and motivate citizens to restore our nation. Biblical truth and reestablishing respect for the United States Constitution can be accomplished through education, organization, and commitment. The conference begins Friday at 1:30 p.m. The afternoon session concludes at 6:00 p.m. The dinner session lasts from 6:30 p.m. until 9:00 p.m. Breakfast is available Saturday morning for $8.00. Saturday's session begins at 8:45 a.m. and concludes at noon. Room accommodations are available at the Character Conference Center, 520 West Main St., Oklahoma City, OK. 405-526-0001. For tickets make checks payable to Oklahoma Projects and mail to 415 West 15th St. Suite 2, Edmond, OK 73013
Total combined cost for afternoon and morning sessions: Adults $25 • Couples $40 • Students $10Dinner and dinner session $25 per person
Pastor Paul Blair Hate-crimes Legislation
Pastor Stephen Broden Restoring America &
the Progressive Agenda
John F. McManusHistory of the Opposition
Rep. Mike Ritze, MDMedical Care Solutions
Dr. Everett PiperToday's Culture War
Art ThompsonGrowing the Movement
Pastor Dan Fisher Liberty & the Black
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Dr. Sterling LacyReligious Neutralism
Charlie MeadowsEducation & Solutions
Rep. Jason MurpheyReducing Government
Rep. Charles KeyState Sovereignty
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