Liberty Maven

Majority Leader Harry Reid wants a vote on Chris Dodd’s financial regulation bill as soon as Thursday.

In recent weeks, we’ve exposed several dangers of this bill, but the most important is that the bill is unconstitutional. In fact . . .

In the bill’s 1,336 pages, no provision of the Constitution is ever mentioned!

This is why we need the Enumerated Powers Act (EPA).

The EPA requires that every bill must specify its source of Constitutional authority. This would . . .

* make Congress be more deliberate
* or induce them to make propose tortured constitutional rationales that will discredit them in courts of law and public opinion

Most importantly, the failure of members of Congress to support the EPA exposes their contempt for the Constitution.

The Enumerated Powers Act has 68 cosponsors in the House. You can see their names by clicking “show cosponsors” on this page.

The Senate version has 23 cosponsors which you can see by clicking “show cosponsors” here.

Please tell Congress to oppose the financial reform bill and to pass the Enumerated Powers Act instead.

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Like my liberty-loving brethren I’m ecstatic tonight at Rand Paul completely trouncing Trey Grayson in the Kentucky Senatorial GOP primary, but what about tomorrow?

In between all of the surface-dwellers still attacking Paul because they think he was named after Ayn Rand (he was not), there is a mathematical hard truth that his campaign must come to grips with now that a new campaign is beginning. The numbers do not lie and they can be a bit sobering.

With 99.2% of the precincts reporting a full 167,286 more votes were cast in the Democratic primary than the Republican primary. Rand Paul’s total number of votes were less than the Democratic loser. Does this mean that Paul has an uphill battle for winning the general election against Democrat Jack Conway? Maybe, maybe not.

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Why is it, I’ve often wondered, that when I tell people at parties that I’m a high school English teacher, even adding, since June, that I’m retired, I note a brief wave of anxiety cross their faces? You’d think people would be delighted to have the opportunity to talk to someone who really knows which predicate nominative to use after a copulative verb. But something dawned on me yesterday, during a silence after I’d said, “This is he” to someone who’d asked for me on the phone. Had I really just burdened some poor sod with the equivalent of “This is he whom you’ve called”? Far from erudite, it sounds like Lily Tomlin’s operator asking, “Is this the party to whom I’m speaking?”

It got worse later in the day when I was reading an article about California Governor Schwarzenegger’s attempts to find the state ways to save money. The Governor was quoted as saying, “We literally have to take the ladder from the tree and shake the whole tree.” My response: “Really, you’re going to literally shake a tree?” Wouldn’t a normal person have wondered how we could balance the books without impacting the needy? Is it really necessary to put Arnold back in the 8th grade for a lesson on the difference between metaphorical and literal?

Here’s the horror of it: “Yes,” I think, “he should be taught the difference.” No kidding, a little creature within me believes someone should advise Arnold about his violations of figurative speech. “That settles it!” you say, “English teachers are like cops who give you a ticket for being the third car in the intersection to turn left while five people just ran a red light with impunity. They’re like robots turned loose on society to keep anyone from saying, ‘She went to the mall with my friend and I.’”

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AP and FOX News and other outlets are all reporting that Rand Paul is the projected winner of the Kentucky GOP Senate Primary. With about 30% reporting he is up 58.9% to Grayson’s 36.5%.  Results.

This is wonderful yet expected news. More later.

It’s bad enough when Congress exercises unconstitutional powers. It’s even worse when unelected bureaucrats do it. The FDA has decided, all on its own, that it has the power to reduce the amount of salt in your diet.

Depending on your genetic predisposition and health history, this move could be life threatening to YOU.

The FDA wants you to forget that . . .

* the Constitution gives the federal government no jurisdiction over your nutritional choices
* every person is unique — many people might benefit from less sodium, while others could be harmed by it (see the sample letter below for examples)

DownsizeDC.org’s Write the Laws Act (WTLA) would prevent bureaucratic schemes like this. It would . . .

* Restore the Constitution’s separation of powers by requiring Congress to approve all regulation
* Restrict executive branch agencies like the FDA to implementation and enforcement
* Prohibit unaccountable bureaucrats from imposing their social engineering projects on your life

Please send a letter telling your Representative and your Senators to introduce and pass the WTLA.

You may borrow from, modify, or copy this letter . . . .   Read More »

Back in December of 2009 I authored an article titled, “Why Rand Paul Will Win“. Today if everything goes the way the polls suggest Rand Paul will clear the first major hurdle toward winning the Kentucky U.S. Senate seat being vacated by Jim Bunning. The Kentucky primary is today and the most recent poll shows Rand Paul with an 18% lead over his opponent, Trey Grayson.

One area of potential concern that I wrote about last October is that Trey Grayson is in charge of the election results since he is the Secretary of State. Paul later suggested that he step down from that role, but unsurprisingly, Grayson refused. The margin matters here. If Paul wins by as much as the polls indicate then there should be no worries, but if the results are much closer then the polls it would not surprise me to see some accusations fly around.

Rand Paul has been endorsed by Sarah Palin, Jim DeMint, Dick Armey, James Dobson, and a slew of other prevalent names in GOP circles. Grayson has received endorsements from just about every typical establishment Republican neo-conservative including Dick Cheney, Mitch McConnell, and Rudy Giuliani. Rand also has the backing of the Tea Party so a win for Rand Paul today will be a big win for the Tea Party.

Let’s hope the polls are accurate and Paul wins by a landslide today. After that happens things will get interesting as the effort shifts gears toward campaigning and winning a general election. Should Paul’s near flawless primary campaign extend to the general election I think my prediction back in December of 2009 will come true.

We may be addressing him as Senator Paul before long.

Check back later tonight for the results.

Quote of the Day: “Government’s view of the economy can be summed up in a few short phrases: If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. And if it stops moving, subsidize it.” — Ronald Reagan (paraphrased)

The politicians meddle with everything. For example, when it comes to energy production there are . . .

* Direct subsidies
* Tax breaks and tax penalties
* Liability limits, but also potential fines if you don’t do things just right

What a meddling muddle! This is why . . .

It’s fair to say that the federal government played a hidden role in the BP oil spill. To learn more read the sample letter to Congress below.

We think it would be better . . .

* For oil companies to pay all the costs and carry all the potential risks of each drilling project
* To have all of these costs and risks reflected in the prices consumers pay, rather than hidden in legislation and regulations

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Yes, it is true I’m a big fan of permitting terrorists to own guns. What?, you may ask. Apparently, that is the attack being used by some in our almighty government who hope to infringe upon our right to defend ourselves.

Consider this recent Senate Homeland Security hearing on Capitol Hill:

On Tuesday, as chairman of the Senate Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee, Lieberman held a hearing to give Lautenberg and King the opportunity to promote their bills S.1317 and H.R.2159, to prohibit the possession of firearms by people on the FBI’s “terrorist watchlist,” and Lautenberg’s S. 2820, to maintain records of approved instant background check transactions for a minimum of 180 days. The watchlist bills further propose that a person seeking relief in court from these new restrictions would be prevented from examining and challenging “evidence” against him, and that the judge deciding whether the person had been watchlisted for good reason be limited to summaries and redacted versions of such “evidence.”

So we are to rely on our government to come up with a list of people who they decide is a terrorist or has terrorist “leanings”. Well, we already are relying on our government to do this, and like many things the government gets involved in, this too is a big fat failure.

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One of the most convenient targets of moral outrage these days is the “obscene” remuneration for corporate CEO’s. “Obscene” is in quotes, not because I disagree with the usage, but because it’s worthwhile to take a look at the word. It’s from the Greek “obscaenus,” meaning the familiar “abominable, repulsive,” but also, surprisingly, “ill-omened.” I propose, in light of this, that in addition to the moral repulsion we feel when a CEO’s pay goes up while share prices go down, we also feel a dread based on our perceptions of the CEO’s “ill-omened” mental state.

Not that overpaid CEO’s are crazy. You have to be pretty sharp to be where they are, and to remain there. But they suffer, in my view, from what I term “personal inflation.”

I define the phrase as a devaluation of one’s personal property, including physical possessions as well as currency, caused by mere possession. Thus, after you’ve made your first $1 million, that million does not have the value that it would for a struggling middle-class family. In fact, it is no longer $1 million. It may in its new form represent an embarrassingly puny sum, compared with the vaster earnings of your new peers. And it doesn’t matter what you buy with your million. A Lexus? A comfy spread in Malibu? These too will be devalued. You’re still keeping up with the Joneses, just new Joneses. So when someone who is already among the richest people on earth, possibly among the richest people who have ever lived, spends his or her days in frantic search of new ways to squeeze profit from stones, that person is, in his or her mind, a pauper, a subsistence laborer one mistake away from utter ruin.

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“I remember a German farmer expressing as much in a few words as the whole subject requires; ‘Money is money, and paper is paper.’” – Thomas Paine

Originally published May 13, 2010 at http://towneforcongress.com/economy/americas-ridiculous-toy-money-1

America’s monetary situation is becoming fairly ridiculous.  This Monday, the Wall Street Journal carried “Will Nickel-Free Nickels Make a Dime’s Worth of Difference?” on its front page.  The article shares the government’s dilemma that minted each $100 box of nickels costs very close to $200, and that the metal content of the coin is worth more than the face value of 5 cents.  The penny, which was already debased from almost 100% copper to 2% copper in 1982 also costs more to mint than its face value.  The pre-1982 pennies are now worth over double their face value.

The nickel’s mass is 5 grams and consists of 25% nickel and 75% copper.  It is the only US coin to never have been devalued by using cheaper metals since it was first minted in 1866.  At that time, both the penny and nickel were worth far, far less than their face value, but were used as placeholders for gold and silver coins.  America’s dimes, quarters, half-dollars were all 90% silver up until 1964 when the silver content became worth more than the face value.  Today’s dimes, quarters, and half-dollars are nickel plating – done on purpose to resemble silver – sandwiched over a cheap copper core.

While the WSJ hems and haws between substituting wood, plastic, aluminum or zinc in the coins, one of the issues with “toy money” or devaluing the coin currency is that it could cause a psychological trigger as citizens realize Congress and the printing operators at the Federal Reserve intends to pursue its permanent monetary policy of inflation, which is a hidden, insidious tax on all Americans who hold dollars.   Read More »