Reflections From a Murky Pond

Jared Lee Loughner’s shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and 19 other people — six of whom were killed, including a 9 year-old girl — in Tucson, AZ on Saturday, January 8, 2010 should have shocked the nation. That, at least would be the normative common consensus about such a brutal and sudden massacre, coming, as it did, without forewarning and leaving so many people dead and/or wounded.

Obviously such shock is part of the innocence that America has lost over the years; it was not in evidence that Saturday. The victims’ bodies hadn’t finished bleeding out, much less grown cold, before the ghouls of the Left were doing their best to capitalize upon the lethal attack.

The Professional Left

Within minutes of Loughner’s attack Liberal pundits and the Left-Wing, “lamestream” media were trying to blame Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Sharron Angle, the Tea Party, and American patriots in general for “inciting” the attack with their rhetoric.

These filth didn’t know at that time what had actually happened or who the attacker was, much less what his motivations were but that didn’t stop them from feasting on the fresh corpses for the sake attacking their American rivals.

The Race-Baiters

Right behind the Professional Leftists were the race-baiters, though there is, of course, an overlap between two varieties of ghouls They did, perforce, have to wait until Loughner was identified as being a White. Once he was known to be White though, they dove right into the feast.

This particular breed of domestic enemy was, after establishing the Whiteness of the attacker, was as quick as always to paint the whole incident in racial terms and attempted to tie it into immigration laws even though Giffords was not a proponent of porous and insecure borders.

After that initial spate of anti-Americanism came the Muslims and their shills who jabbered on about how, if Loughner were a Black or Muslim, he’d have been treated differently by the media and would have been called a terrorist as opposed to a murderer.

The Gun-Grabbers

Finally came the ghouls amongst the gun-grabbers, hell-bent on using anything to disarm the law-abiding members of American society.  They were last to the feast because they had to wait until the evidence pointed to Loughner attempted assassination of Rep. Giffords being the act of a madman as opposed to a political act.

They Hunger For Blood Of The Innocent

Both Americans and our Liberal and Progressive enemies knew this sort of cynical use of the Tuscon, AZ rampage was going to happen. It’s part and parcel of realpolitik and is firmly embedded in modern ideological warfare.

You never want a serious crisis to go to waste, and what I mean by that is an opportunity to do things that you didn’t think you could do before.

— Rahm Emanuel

What is disgusting is how fast the Leftist ghouls descended on the victims and twisted their deaths and injuries, and the resultant anguish of their loved ones, into agenda-driven political and ideological attacks against America, Americans, and fundamental American values.

President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama led the nation in a moment of silence Monday morning in honor of the victims of Saturday’s mass shooting in Tucson, AZ. As laudable a symbolic gesture as that was, the nation would have been better off if the Left had held a moment or two of silence on Saturday before starting their macabre orgy.

It is truly amazing – horrifying really to any true American – the lengths to which Liberals and Obama cultists will go to justify ObamaCare.

Their arguments are not only false, in the sense that they’re not actual arguments, but they’re unhealthy and dangerous to America because they fly in the face of the Constitutional restraints placed upon the federal government.

Peter Coy’s commentary on US District Court Judge Henry Hudson’s decision in Virginia v. US Dept. of Health and Human Services is par for the course when it comes to these quasi- and non-arguments.

To win the legal battle—as well as the battle for public opinion—the Obama Administration must address directly the qualms about overreaching that Hudson expressed in his opinion. The way to do that is to make a persuasive case that mandatory coverage is not the first step on a slippery slope to totalitarianism.

The best case against the slippery slope argument isn’t even a legal one. It’s in an amicus curiae brief filed in November in a broader Florida case by 41 top economists, including three Nobel laureates, Kenneth Arrow of Stanford, Eric Maskin of Princeton, and George Akerlof of Berkeley. They argue that health care has unique characteristics that justify the congressional mandate—and since other markets such as food and housing don’t have those characteristics, Congress will never have any justification to intervene in them to the same degree.

The economists’ argument bears attention. Arrow, 90 years old, has been probing the peculiarities of the health sector since 1963, when he wrote a much-cited paper, “Uncertainty and the Welfare Economics of Medical Care,” that’s mentioned in the brief. Arrow and the other economists say—in agreement with the Obama Administration—that a health insurance system that must accept all comers but can’t require everyone to join will quickly enter a death spiral. Healthy people won’t opt in until they need coverage, so many or most of the insured will be sick and costly. As a result, insurers will have to raise rates, pushing the last few healthy customers out, forcing rates on the rest to go even higher, and so on until it leads to collapse. Amitabh Chandra, an economist at Harvard University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government who joined the amicus brief, writes in an e-mail: “We don’t let people buy car insurance after they’ve wrecked their cars, or after we find their house is on fire. For the same reason, the individual mandate is absolutely key.”

— Peter Coy
Commentary: The Health-Care Act on Trial

Firstly, this is a false argument. Judge Hudson did not state his ruling as being a bulwark against some “the first step on a slippery slope to totalitarianism.” His ruling was based on the Individual Mandate being, in and of itself, an unconstitutional expansion of government interference.

Neither the Supreme Court nor any federal circuit court of appeals has extended Commerce Clause powers to compel an individual to involuntarily enter the stream of commerce by purchasing a commodity in the private market. In doing so, enactment of the [individual mandate] exceeds the Commerce Clause powers vested in Congress under Article I [of the Constitution.]

–U.S. District Court Judge Henry Hudson
Virginia v. US Dept. of Health and Human Services

Secondly, argumentum ad consequentiam has always been a piss-poor response to receiving an unfavorable ruling and, in this case it’s a dangerous argument to be used or entertained. There is never a valid justification for allowing the federal government to exceed its constitutional granted powers over the American people and that attempt at justification is all that these “economists'” amicus curiae is.

“Reviewing court must strike down unconstitutional law even though that law is “designed to promote the highest good. The good sought in unconstitutional legislation is an insidious feature, because it leads citizens and legislators of good purpose to promote it, without thought of the serious breach it will make in the ark of our covenant, or the harm which will come from breaking down recognized standards.”

– US SCOTUS Opinion,
Bailey v. Drexel Furniture Co., (259 U.S. 20), May 15, 1922

It doesn’t matter a whit whether or not ObamaCare is worthwhile or not; it matters even less whether or not ObamaCare will fail without the Individual Mandate. What matters is whether or not the Individual Mandate is unconstitutional – and the US Federal Courts have repeatedly, though not unanimously, decreed that it is not constitutional.

While it’s dangerous close to the “slippery slope” argument, I’ll put forth that ignoring our Constitution and the limits it places upon the federal government is a far more dangerous and unhealthy enterprise than anything that currently perceived as wrong with our overly intertwined health insurance and healthcare industries. I say this because legal precedents linger for a very long time and are often used to justify future rulings largely unrelated to the original cases.

Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-NY) has been convicted on 11 of 13 charges of violating House ethics rules and bylaws.  Now the inveterate “playa,” founding member of the racist organization known as the Congressional Black Caucus, and “representative” for Harlem will face what amounts to a sentencing hearing before the entirety of the House Ethics Committee, who will pass on their punishment recommendations to the House.

Don’t expect much of anything to come of this though, despite the relative seriousness of the ethics violations that Rangel has been found guilty of.

Rangel Was Convicted Of The Following Counts

Count 1: Violating solicitation and gift ban: Soliciting donations and other things of value on behalf of the Rangel Center from persons or entities with business before him or his Ways and Means Committee.

Count 2: Violating code of ethics for government service: Accepting benefits under circumstances that could be construed as influencing the performance of his governmental duties, with respect to soliciting donations and other things of value on behalf of the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Policy at City College of New York.

Counts 4 and 5, merged into one count: Violating postal service laws and franking commission regulations: Mr. Rangel was accused of using his franking privileges for the benefit of a charitable organization and for solicitation of funds.

Count 6: Violating House Office Building Commission regulations. Mr. Rangel and his staff drafted solicitation letters on House property.

Count 7: Violation of the Purpose Law and the Member’s Congressional Handbook: Mr. Rangel used House employees and other official House resources for work related to the Rangel Center and used his Congress member’s allowance to pay expenses related to the Rangel Center.

Count 8: Violation of letterhead rule: Mr. Rangel sent letters related to the Rangel Center on House letterhead.

Count 9: Violating Ethics in Government Act and House Rule 26: Mr. Rangel submitted incomplete and inaccurate financial disclosure statements, and failed to report or erroneously reported items he was required to disclose under the Ethics in Government Act from 1998 through 2008. In particular, Mr. Rangel amended certain financial disclosure statements only after a House committee began investigating his reporting of income from his Dominican villa.

Count 10: Violating code of ethics for government service: Mr. Rangel leased a rent-stabilized apartment on Lenox Terrace in Harlem for residential use only, but was allowed by the landlord, a developer whom Mr. Rangel dealt with in his Congressional capacity, to use the apartment as office space for his campaign committee. The arrangement could be construed as influencing the performance of Mr. Rangel’s official duties.

Count 11: Violating the Code of Ethics for Government Service: Mr. Rangel violated the code by failing to report rental income on his Dominican villa.

Count 12: Violating the letter and spirit of House Rules listed above.

Count 13: Conduct reflecting discreditably on the House: Mr. Rangel’s improper solicitations and acceptance of donations for the Rangel Center; his misuse of House staff, letterhead and franking privilege for the Rangel Center solicitations; his failure to file full financial disclosure statement; his failure to report the rental income on his Dominican villa; and his use of his rent-controlled residential apartment for his campaign office all brought discredit to the House.

The House could expel him from Congress over charges such these, but anyone with even half a brain knows that they would never enact such a punishment upon Rangel.

Most likely all that Rangel will receive as punishment for his multi-decade career of corruption is a “sternly worded letter of reprimand” that will be delivered to him in relative private. At the very most, and this is highly unlikely, the House will formally censure him, which means that “sternly worded letter of reprimand” will be read aloud before the House and entered into the House records verbatim.

Do not, even for a second, believe that the American people can get justice from Congress or expect them to police their own. The only way we, the People can moderate their behavior is to take matters into our own hands and enact such justice or retribution upon them as we see fit.

It is a long recurring theme, the call to have no regrets and/or to live one’s life without regret. Both the young and the middle-aged seeking to find their lost youth herald this idea as a measure of courage and personal growth.

It is one of the more laughable ideas that I’ve heard issue from the mouths of fools and people trying to sell me something. It also would be dangerous if generally achievable.

Let’s leave aside for the moment the fact that only the severely mentally deficient and/or damaged, the most shallow of narcissists, and total sociopaths could ever hope to achieve a life with no regrets. Let’s concentrate instead upon those deluded fools who might attempt this largely in vain.

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As most Americans know and Liberals bemoan, Keith Olbermann was suspended without pay indefinitely by NBC on November 5, 2010 for violating NBC News ethics policies. Specifically, he was removed for contributing to the election campaigns of three Democratic candidates this election season.

Silencing Olbermann is a great thing for America but I’m not sure this was the way to do it.

The stated reason for NBC’s suspension of the hyper-Liberal Olbermann was that he directly and willfully violated NBC’s Newsroom Policy when he made those donations with the one to Raul Grijalva being made immediately on the same day that Olbermann hosted Grijalva on his show:

Anyone working for NBC News who takes part in civic or other outside activities may find that these activities jeopardize his or her standing as an impartial journalist because they may create the appearance of a conflict of interest. Such activities may include participation in or contributions to political campaigns or groups that espouse controversial positions. You should report any such potential conflicts in advance to, and obtain prior approval of, the President of NBC News or his designee.

There is no doubt that Keith Olbermann violated NBC’s policy which is based upon the journalistic ethics code called – ironically given the foul and perfidious degeneration of the NY Times – the code of the Grey Lady.

Where doubt, both ethical and logical, arises is in whether or not such standards and policies should be applied to Olbermann.

The ethical question arises from NBC’s policies themselves. Legal or not, is it right to require as terms of continued employment that employees refrain from full participation in the civic process? These employees are private citizens, and there’s an ethical  issue with any employment requirement that impinges upon their freedoms of speech and association.

The logical problem is nothing more than a result of a logical fallacy based upon an utterly false and well-disproven postulate, that Keith Olbermann is a journalist or even an employee of a news agency. MSNBC is not a news agency by a creditable definition of the term and Keith Olbermann doesn’t even attempt to bear any resemblance to journalist.  Applying the code of the Grey Lady to him is patently ridiculous.

So, for what little it’s worth in the grand scheme of things, I’m ambivalent about Olbermann suspension. I’m ecstatic that he’s been, at least temporarily, stopped from further polluting the airwaves with his filth, but I’m not fond of why he was removed.