Redstate

Posted at 3:45pm on Jun. 25, 2007 Roberts and Alito oppose free speech in WRTL

By PatHMV

Supporters of campaign finance limitations on free speech are casting today's Supreme Court decision in Wisconsin Right to Life as a "Big Win for Campaign Finance Deregulation." It's not. No, it's a defeat, a serious defeat, brought about by the hands of the two most recent appointments to the Court.

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Posted at 2:15pm on Aug. 16, 2006 Ned... Don't tax Mississippi to pay for Connecticut's schools!

By PatHMV

Should your tax dollars pay for more education in the richest state in the country? Ned Lamont thinks so.

In a Wall Street Journal column this morning, Lamont makes a serious misstep while trying to reassure businessmen that he will be "frugal" with taxpayers' money, and that he's a "fiscal conservative" [no, I'm not making that up, he really said it]. After bragging about his business acumen, he makes the typical "I'm not a politician" politician's attack on "career politicians", calling forth our Founding Fathers in all their grandeur. The closest he comes to talking about any specific policy is the need to improve education, as a way of investing in America's "human resources". And that's where the wheels fell off the wagon:

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Posted at 10:37am on May 5, 2006 The battle line matters

By PatHMV

Any competent military strategist knows that you want battles fought as far from your own territory as possible. Fight them on your own beaches if you have to, but far better to fight them on THEIR beaches. But this isn't a post about Iraq and the war on terror. This is about political battles, where the same principle applies. Fight the battles as far from the minimum acceptable position as possible, because the enemy will always push, will always try to invade. They will never say "well, you've acquiesced to a reasonable point, so we'll stop." They will push until you acquiesce to everything.

I previously wrote about the travesty of a cold-blooded murderer being spared the death penalty because he was just just 7 days shy of his 18th birthday when he murdered an innocent young man just past his 18th birthday. His death sentence was thrown out after Justice Kennedy decided to make the death penalty, as applied to 17 year old murderers, unconstitutional. But hey, at least there's life in prison without parole, right?

Maybe not. The murderer is now seeking to throw out his life-without-parole sentence ON THE SAME GROUNDS. If it's inhumane to execute someone of inferior mental judgment capacity, he says, it's surely inhumane to lock them up for the rest of their natural life. What if they become rehabilitated after 20 or 30 years?

This thug won't win his case. Nor will the next one to make the argument. But as the death penalty loses favor, the battle against crime will shift, and not in the right direction. Right now, death penalty opponents are perfectly happy to promote the alternative of life without parole. But once those activists don't have to spend energy fighting the death penalty, they will forget their previous support and begin attacking "draconian" life sentences, regardless of "rehabiliation".

The location of the battle line, in politics as in war, is crucial.

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Posted at 12:08am on Apr. 2, 2006 Rushing to Judgment

By PatHMV

I find it ironic and depressing that the same people rushing to judgment here are largely the same people demanding here and here that those accused of scurrilous behavior must be given more time to respond before conclusions are jumped to.

Now that she is actually on free soil, Jill Carroll has made it clear exactly what she thinks of the terrorist hoodlums who kidnapped her and killed her bodyguard. Maybe BOTH sides of the blogosphere would benefit from slowing down, giving EVERYBODY the benefit of the doubt, and thinking twice before making personal attacks.

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Posted at 6:04pm on Mar. 24, 2006 Loyalty

By PatHMV

We all have many loyalties: loyalty to employers, to friends, to family, to God. Some of the hardest decisions in life come when our loyalties conflict, and we must choose among them.

For men of principle, our highest loyalty must be to truth, which is to say to God. Others may place a higher loyalty on friendship and political ties. Such other men rationalize and excuse improper conduct to protect their friends. Men of principle cannot, lest they become the relativists they justly criticize.

However, loyalty to truth does not mean forgetting or abandoning friendship and other ties. Truth requires only acknowledgment, not desertion. But the acknowledgment must come.

I do not pretend to know the truth about the current affair. The attackers are certainly ruthless, venemous, bitter individuals, intent on personal destruction of all who dare criticize them. Their charges should be subjected to the most intense scrutiny before believed for one moment. But where that scrutiny reveals some truth, that truth must be accepted and acknowledged, not excused and rationalized.

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Posted at 11:00pm on Aug. 31, 2005 Looting is not just a property crime

By PatHMV

Looting won't stop at the stores. The looters will quickly move on to the homes in New Orleans. I don't know about other big cities, but in New Orleans, the rich neighborhoods and the poor neighborhoods and the middle class neighborhoods stand cheek by jowl to each other. The looters will move on to the houses next.

Looting from someone's house, or even a small business, is not just a property crime. It causes severe emotional damage to the owners of those homes.

Imagine you're a resident of New Orleans. You left just before the hurricane, taking little but the clothes on your back. You spend the next two weeks desparate for news about your home, whether it still even exists or not. Finally, two weeks from now, you're allowed to go in for the day to grab what you can and survey the damage. When you drive up, you discover that, miraculously, your home has survived the winds and flood and fire. You walk in, only to discover...

That looters have ransacked your house, taking your valuables, the necklace your grandmother gave you, your late mother's wedding ring, and your great-grandfather's World War I rifle. They've broken a lot of your other stuff, just because they resented the fact that you had it, and they don't.

For much of RedState, I'm preaching to the choir, I know. But for anybody who makes a mental distinction between "property" crimes and violent crimes, think hard how you would feel if this happened to you. Think how it would affect your outlook on your fellow man. Think what an emotional wallop it would pack at a time when you were already very low. Having lived through an analogous situation, and having prosecuted my share of "white-collar" crimes, I can tell you that some property crimes can indeed wreak incredible violence on the victims.

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Posted at 11:59am on Aug. 30, 2005 America's Wetlands

By PatHMV

Since the turn of the 20th century, as America has tamed the Mississippi and scoured the Louisiana coast for oil, we have lost 1.2 million acres of coastal wetlands. That's 1,900 square miles since the 1930s. We're currently losing 24 square miles a year, or about a football field every 38 minutes. If nothing is done, by 2050 we will lose an area the size of Deleware and the Washington-Baltimore metropolitan area combined.

The wetlands protect vital economic centers of our country. Including production from the outer continental shelf, Louisiana produces more crude oil than any other state, and ranks second in natural gas production. And a million tons of crude oil (12% of US total) is imported every day through the LOOP facility offshore. Louisiana ports carry 21% of our nation's waterborne commerce. Four of the top ten ports in the country are in Louisiana. We also catch 30% (by weight) of the seafood for the entire country.

The wetlands are responsible for or protect most of these economic engines. If we hadn't lost so much coastland and so many barrier islands over the years, they would have absorbed a lot of Katrina's fury before it hit the refineries and New Orleans. Loss of wetlands has already cost us. If they disappear entirely, the economic damage will be incalculable.

This country relies heavily on coastal Louisiana. But precious little of the economic benefits go to repairing the damage caused by 100 years of development and exploration. Louisiana has started a campaign to save America's Wetlands. We need only $14 billion for wetlands restoration which will protect hundreds of billions of dollars of economic activity. Please ask your Senators and Congressmen to support America's Wetlands.

(cross posted at Centerfield)

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Posted at 2:02am on Aug. 7, 2005 A liberal judge enters the political fray...

By PatHMV

Via Patterico, we learn that federal judge (Carter appointee) Marilyn Hall Patel has called on Judge Roberts to demand that the interest groups supporting his nomination cease all advertising on his behalf. If they do, then (and only then, apparently), Judge Patel says she and her colleagues (did all the federal judges get together and elect her spokesperson?) will "implore all proponents and opponents to refrain" from such advertising.

She casts her call in such high-brow terms, but at bottom she is claiming that the president and the supporters of Judge Brown are "sullying" the entire judicial system. Only a truly radical liberal could believe that it is the supporters of Judge Roberts who are sullying the dignity of the judicial appointment process. She makes no mention of Senators who demand that attorney-client privilege be breached so they can see what private advice Judge Roberts gave his former clients and superiors at the White House and the U.S. Department of Justice. Nor does she decry Senators and liberal interest groups who seek to impose a litmus test and require new appointees to swear fealty to very recent, wrongly-decided precedents. And she certainly fails to mention the damage to the judicial system's image which occurs when the paper of record to the country investigates the very adoption of a nominee's own children.

Her comments are phrased as support for the integrity of the judicial system (which would also be served if she added a demand that Judge Roberts' opponents not demand to breach attorney-client privilege or interrogate him on his opinions on issues which will come before the Court) because she is trying to make sure her comments come within Canon 4 of the Code of Judicial Ethics. The fact that she targets only one side shows that in reality her diatribe is political activity, which is prohibited to judges by virtue of Canon 7 of the Code. If anybody has sullied the integrity of the American judiciary, it is Judge Patel, by intruding into such an overtly political issue on one side.

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Posted at 5:00pm on Jul. 18, 2005 Plame and the Hatch Act?

By PatHMV

I had forgotten that one of the complaints about the leak of Valerie Plame's name and status as a CIA employee was that it also revealed the name of her covert cover company employer, Brewster-Jennings & Associates. Why was this uncovered almost immediately after her name was revealed?

Because she listed that company as her employer when she made a contribution to Al Gore's presidential primary campaign in 1999. Are CIA employees governed by civil service? Are they legally allowed to make political contributions to federal campaigns which will determinee who their boss will be? It appears (pdf file) not. While a 1993 amendment to the Hatch Act removed some restrictions on federal employees making political contributions, employees of the CIA and a few other sensitive agencies were apparently not included in the liberalization of the rules.

And is it wise to list a secret company in a public disclosure like a campaign contribution?

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Posted at 11:13pm on Jul. 1, 2005 Support Senators who support us... a proposal

By PatHMV

All conservative organizations who care about the approval of justices in the vein of Rehnquist, Scalia, and Thomas should come together and sign a simple pledge committing each of them to vigorously support the reelection of any Republican Senator and to not oppose the reelection of any Democratic Senator, who votes in favor of one of the President's nominee (assuming the President doesn't give up the fight before it starts). If Nelson, or Chafee, or even McCain takes a hard, close vote on our side, then all of these conservative organizations will back them up and repay their support with support of our own. Conversely, of course, we commit to resolutely oppose any Senator, regardless of party, who votes against such a nominee.

Let's not give up the fight before it starts. Let's commit to taking it to the wall.

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Posted at 10:59pm on Jun. 29, 2005 A proposal to test the left's judicial theories...

By PatHMV

As I noted in the first comment here, from a legal perspective, I found the recent Roper decision, which found the death penalty unconstitutional as applied to those who were 17 or younger when they committed their horrible murders, to be one of the very worst, most transparently undemocratic decisions in recent memory. It exemplifies the perils and insanity of the "living Constitution" theory proposed by those who cannot get their way at the ballot box. Justice Kennedy had, just 16 years ago, voted in favor of the constitutionality of the death penalty for 16 and 17 year olds. This year, Justice Kennedy decided, not that he was wrong 16 years ago, but that times had changed and that such a penalty was no longer constitutional.

So of course the Constitution was amended by majority of the Congress and 3/4 of the states during those 16 years, right? Of course not. It appaently only takes 5 states to amend the Constitution, so long as the "trend" comports with foreign law, apparently.

The only thing which changed in those 16 years between Justice Kennedy's shifting constitutional position was that 5 states which had previously allowed the juvenile death penalty no longer did (4 by legislative action, 1 by state judicial action). To Justice Kennedy, this "trend" was sufficient to establish that "evolving standards of decency" now rendered unconstitutional the actions of those states who hadn't joined the trend.

So I propose this. Let's identify 5 states which have the death penalty for adults but which had banned it for 16 and 17 year olds prior to the Roper decision. In each of those 5 states, find one or two horrific recent murder cases by a 17 year old. Use the legislative process to reenact in each of those states the death penalty for such crimes by such "juveniles". Then use that legislative action to show that society's standards of decency evolved some more to protect innocent lives and punish the guilty in a manner as equivalent as can be accomplished to the horror of their evil actions.

If Justice Kennedy and the rest of the judges on the left who favor a "living Constitution" really mean what they say, then they would have no justifiable alternative other than to uphold the constitutionality of such actions, because the "trend" would be in favor of tougher action against criminals. In reality, of course, their response would demonstrate their true believe, that they are the super-legislature intent on imposing their will on the population, rather than let us govern ourselves.

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Posted at 10:41am on Jun. 10, 2005 Because it's so much better to blame Bush....

By PatHMV

E. J. Dionne has this column today, whining that it's time for the Democrats to "end their addiction to the Kerry alibi".

For a moment, I feared I had slipped into Bizarro World, where everything is backwards:

This habit is dangerous because dissing Kerry is an easy way for Democrats to evade discussion of what the party needs to do to right itself. By focusing on the past, the Kerry alibi allows Democrats to avoid engaging the future. In 2008, the Democrats could nominate a candidate who combines Harry Truman's toughness, JFK's charm and FDR's gifts of leadership -- and still face many of the problems Kerry confronted. Blaming everything on Kerry as a supposedly elitist, stiff and indecisive Massachusetts liberal is the Democrats' version of cheap grace.

Fortunately for my sanity, I soon discovered that the preceding was merely cover to get back to the usual excuse addiction of the Democrats:

Bush's lieutenants always understood that their candidate couldn't win unless his Democratic opponent was turned into Frankenstein. This crowd may not know how to beat the Iraqi insurgency, but they sure know how to make Democrats look bad.

And just to complete his reversion into the usual bluster, Dionne pumps up the Kerry health-care and outsourcing plans:

Well, Kerry's plan on health care was genuinely innovative. His ideas on outsourcing clung to the pro-business center -- the very place where many of Kerry's critics say the party belongs.

Please. Kerry tried to put a pro-business spin on his out-sourcing plan ("I've had shop stewards say, will you promise me you're going to stop all this outsourcing? I can't do that") but was in fact aimed at pandering to those very unions: "As president, I will stand with American workers and fight to end the outsourcing of American jobs..." In fairness to Dionne, maybe the pro-business part comes in when Kerry went on a trade mission to China in order to help an Boston company help American manufacturers move factories to that country. And we won't even get started on Kerry's health care policy.

As for Dionne, somebody please keep him writing. If he's the strongest voice the media can offer to help the Democratic Party, the Republicans are in good shape.

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Posted at 5:49pm on May 29, 2005 A French mandate?

By PatHMV

Looks like the French are overwhelmingly rejecting the E.U. Constitution, by a vote of 57-43.

Is this a big enough margin to qualify as a "mandate"? We've already seen that the European elite aren't going to take this until they get the "right" vote, but this isn't even close.

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Posted at 11:57am on May 7, 2005 What a difference a week makes...

By PatHMV

Dale Dwayne Craig kidnapped and murdered an innocent college freshman just to steal his Bronco. The jury decided that firing several shots into the victim's head during an armed robbery and kidnapping was brutal enough to warrant the death penalty. Since that murder, Craig has tried to escape twice (once from death row) and attempted to kill a prison guard.

But because Craig was only 17 years and 358 days old when he shot Kip Gullet (who had barely reached his 18th birthday and will never see his 19th) his sentence has been reduced to life imprisonment. Read what a difference a week makes here.

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Posted at 8:50pm on Mar. 24, 2005 Something pro-lifers can all agree on...

By PatHMV

Can we give Terri's case a rest for a moment and all agree that 14 year olds should not be allowed to have their children aborted without their parent's consent? And that nobody should lie to a teenager who is being essentially forced into an abortion by the baby's father's mother about the fact that her own mother is  desparately looking for her and wants her to not have an abortion?

This looks like a pretty nasty case, and could be a strong example to use to fight for change. The boy's mother checked the girl out of school and drove her to the abortion clinic. The girl's mother found out her 14 year old had left school early, being checked out by her "grandmother". The  girl's mother drove to the local abortion clinic and tried to see her daughter, but the staff wouldn't let her, telling her that the decision was up to the daughter. The mother started calling for the daughter, and the clinic had her arrested. The girl asked to send a message to her mother, but the clinic staff lied to her and told her that her mother had left.

Let's start a national outcry in favor of parental consent laws, and let's try to do something about the police who apparently didn't even go see the girl to determine whether she was there of her own free will.

Here's the story:

http://www.illinoisleader.com/news/newsview.asp?c=23788

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