Time to Strip Lower Courts of Jurisdiction Over Immigration

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If pigs could fly conservatives would take back the White House and the legislative branch of government with solid constitutionalists in one election cycle. But even that tantalizing fairy tale would be rendered moot if nothing is done to immediately reform the federal judiciary and stave the coming tide of judicial tyranny. Nowhere is this more evident than with the Court’s unconstitutional doctrine of conferring super rights on illegal aliens.

A Constitutional Crisis in the Courts

As I noted following the Supreme Court’s bloodless coup on our constitutional form of government, as bad as 5-6 SCOTUS justices seem to be, they are on the level of James Madison when compared to some of the lower court judges. There are solid post-constitutional majorities on 9 of the 13 circuit courts as well as a majority of district courts. Obama has filled 53 of the 179 appellate judgeships in the federal circuits and over 250 of the 673 on a district level. These are people who believe that the Constitution is unconstitutional and that illegal aliens have the right to come here and demand services.

Why should we tolerate this for one more day?

Ponder this absurdity for a moment: Arizona is beleaguered by an endless flow of illegal immigrants and drug violence that have caused incalculable damage to the state’s schools, hospitals, security, criminal justice system, and public services. Even their elections and congressional apportionment are radically altered by those who lack the legal standing to be in their state. Yet, every time they attempt to pass laws protecting their state, they are sued by the bottomless money pit of left-wing legal defense groups. One after another, the courts have tossed out their common sense laws that have merely echoed the spirit of congressional laws.

Instead of protecting states like Arizona from this invasion on their border, as required by Article IV Section 4 of the Constitution, this Administration has joined in the law suits. All the while, they blithely ignore the sanctuary cities that thwart federal law.

Arizona is particularly flummoxed by the court system because they are within the jurisdiction of the 9th Circuit Court, the most radical circuit in the country. Democrat appointees maintain a 20-9 majority over GOP-appointees among active judges in the 9th Circuit. This court has overturned their common sense laws to deny bail to illegal aliens, require proof of citizenship to vote, and of course S.B. 1070 which allowed local law enforcement to simply enforce federal laws.

Another common sense Arizona immigration law tossed out by the 9th Circuit is their refusal to grant driver’s licenses to recipients of Obama’s “DACA” amnesty. Instead of following the Constitution, Judge Harry Pregerson accused Arizona of being racist. The LA Times reports that Pregerson, a Carter appointee, could not fathom why Arizona would do such a thing:

Arizona has incurred no ill effects because of the new, legal Dreamer drivers, said Judge Harry Pregerson. “Nothing horrible has happened on the highways of Arizona,” said Pregerson, who was appointed to the 9th Circuit in 1979 by President Carter. Pregerson asked why Arizona continued to try to deny benefits to Dreamers. “Does it come down to racism? Does it come down to discrimination against these people? What else does it come down to?” he asked.

Well, if Judge Pregerson wants to focus on political arguments instead of constitutional arguments, maybe he ought to speak to the mom of Brandon Mendoza, a promising young police sergeant, who was killed by a drunk-driving illegal alien who was travelling the wrong way on the highway. Or what about Tricia Bracho and her children who were injured on July 4 when an illegal alien high on drugs (over 74% of all those who received federal sentences for “simple possession” of drugs in 2014 were illegal aliens) slammed into their car head on?

Maybe the judge ought to check out the data showing how almost 30,000 driving offenses have been committed just by the 30,558 criminal aliens Obama released in fiscal year 2014. Yes, it must be racism. That’s the only reason a state would care about clamping down on illegal immigration.

More importantly, why is a federal judge ignoring the Constitution and focusing on political arguments? Arizona is merely following federal law (8 U.S.C. § 1225) which requires ICE to place aliens who are not “clearly and beyond a doubt entitled to be admitted” to the United States into removal proceedings. If they must be deported, they certainly have no entitlement to driver’s licenses. On April 4, 2013, Judge Reed O’Connor of the Northern District of Texas ruled that the Obama administration’s DACA program was in clear violation of Section 1225(b)(2)(A) of the INA, which requires ICE agents to place all illegal aliens into removal proceedings. Although that case has been tied up over questions of standing, the initial ruling on the merits was never challenged. Moreover, the courts have already ruled that Obama’s similar DAPA program is unconstitutional.

Yet, the 9th Circuit is not an aberration. The truth is conservatives got lucky with the DAPA case and with Reed O’Conner by getting a hearing in front of Republican-appointed judges – the minority of whom actually believes in the Constitution as it was written. With a growing majority of anti-constitutionalist judges, including those appointed by Republicans, we face a judicial time bomb in the coming years. We face a reality of a court system that will invalidate every state or federal effort to clamp down on illegal immigration, even if we win at the ballot box and elect pro-sovereignty political figures. Judges who uphold the rule of law are the exception not the rule.

There is no way around this. Republican presidential candidates must put forth a judicial reform plan – one that will begin by stripping at least the lower courts of the power to overturn immigration enforcement laws. There is nothing more foundational than protecting our sovereignty and we cannot afford to have unelected judges who don’t believe in our Founding values grant “constitutional” rights to the world’s population. They should also consider dividing up some of the circuits. All of this is within Congress’ purview and can be accomplished through the legislative process – without constitutional amendments.

One of the items listed in the indictment of King George as part of the Declaration of Independence was the following:

“He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.”

With states like Arizona in mind, how can we tolerate the same sort of tyranny from unelected judges 239 after the adoption of our Founding document? (Posted with permission of the author, “Time to Strip Lower Courts of Jurisdiction Over Immigration”, originally appeared HERE)

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Election 2016: The Little Sisters of the Poor vs. The Big Merchants of Baby Parts

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Christians are called to live in the real, fallen world, not a wistful fantasyland where everyone tells the truth, secretly means well, and is just a winsome podcast or three-minute hug away from repentance and salvation.

Stuff’s getting real out there. The principalities and powers are waxing cocky. They’ve started to drop their masks and strut their horns and hooves by daylight. Believers can only benefit by calling things as they are. Our thin-skinned friends might wince at first and shun us, but give them a little while, and one after another will call late at night and say, “I thought you were paranoid, but I’m worried you might be right!” I’m getting quite a few such calls. Cold comfort, but I’ll take it.

Politics rarely overlaps directly with spiritual warfare. Most of the time there is plenty of right and wrong on either side. Sometimes there’s mostly wrong on both sides, as when Hitler’s regime invaded Stalin’s. It’s rare that you get a contrast so close to black and white as the RAF defending Britain from Nazi bombers. At such times, the wall between the seen and unseen world seems weak and thin, and you glimpse the hidden stakes of the battle: You are not even fighting these depraved or deluded people. You are wrestling with the spirits who feed them their evil ideas, who seek the destruction of all and the ruin of souls.

That is how clear American politics is becoming. Here’s what the next election should be about, if we do our jobs: The Little Sisters of the Poor vs. The Big Merchants of Baby Parts.

It really is that simple. We must press every politician in America to take a clear, explicit stand on two critical issues which can rouse the right passions of Americans: Religious freedom and abortion profiteering. No Republican who won’t support the First Amendment Defense Act and zero out federal aid to Planned Parenthood is worth even two seconds’ consideration. We should flee them as near occasions of sin.

We will be tempted, so tempted, to sloth and cowardice. But this thought should brace us: If Christians can’t force Republicans in the primaries to oppose the persecuting of religious orders and churches, and to put an end to the selling of baby parts (Is that too much to ask?) then we are worthless hirelings and the lambs whom we guard are doomed.

There’s a lot of junk in the Republican pond, but it still supports life from time to time. The Democratic, by comparison, is a mauve-coated pool of radioactive, flesh-eating bacteria. Their connection with any meaningful concept of the Good has long been tenuous, but now it has snapped. How else to explain apparently sane people who would use police and prisons to punish Christian bakers, but not the merchants of unborn children’s lungs and livers. The Republicans are imperfect but not committed to such monstrosities, showing glimmers of right reason on a list of important issues. Theirs is the only party where at least some leading politicians

Don’t want to actively persecute the church with punitive taxes and lawsuits if we don’t bless acts of sodomy at our altars and teach our kids to approve them in church schools.

Don’t want to send the police to stop nuns from caring for the poor unless they hand out abortion pills.

Don’t want to shovel half a billion dollars every year to the abortionists of racist-founded Planned Parenthood, who appear to be making a tidy profit selling organs from butchered babies.

Aren’t in the pockets of self-serving public employee unions that want to vote themselves the kind of benefits that just bankrupted Greece.

Aren’t so drunk on multiculturalist absinthe that they mix up jihadist thugs with Christian preachers.

Don’t want your taxes to fund sex-change operations for recently amnestied illegal aliens and felony prisoners.

It’s our job to determine which politicians really are against all this, against it passionately, with all the force and fervor that Ronald Reagan hated Communist tyranny, and loved American freedom. We need a pro-life, pro-religious freedom president with fire in his belly, who can stand up to his advisers, his friends from college and even his donor base.

We need someone who won’t be spooked when everyone from the mainstream media and the Ivy League denounces him as a troglodyte, a racist, an unfeeling bigot, an enemy of “love.” We need a candidate who will use such abuse as fuel, who will know that the fight is not against mere deluded flesh and blood opponents, but against powers of spiritual darkness that we must not permit to prevail. (Posted with permission of the author, “Election 2016: The Little Sisters of the Poor vs. The Big Merchants of Baby Parts”, originally appeared HERE)

Here are two recent interviews with the author on The Joe Miller:

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States Have Constitutional Duty to Seek Rehearing of Same-Sex Marriage Decision

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To the Attorneys General, Governors, and Legislatures of Michigan, Ohio, Tennessee, and Kentucky:

On June 26, 2015, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in the Obergefell case, purporting to overturn all state constitutional amendments and laws in your four states defining marriage as a covenant union between two people of the opposite sex. Since then, numerous efforts have been made, urging each state to file a Petition for Rehearing of that decision, as permitted in the Rules of the Supreme Court before the deadline of Tuesday, July 21, 2015. Apparently, to date, every such effort has been rebuffed. In response, various of your offices have stated that such a Petition would be: (i) unlikely to succeed; (ii) a waste of time: and (iii) a waste of money.

We know of two draft Petitions for Rehearing that have been prepared by outside lawyers. One of these was prepared by the U.S. Justice Foundation and has been circulated over the last week. The U.S. Justice Foundation’s Draft Petition for Rehearing can be found at www.usjf.net.

Here is why a Petition for Rehearing must be filed. Since the Supreme Court’s decision, it has been assumed that the “rule of law” requires not just your four states, but every State, to recognize the “fundamental right” of same sex couples to marry. However, this assumption overlooks two critical factors: (i) whether some of the Justices who participated in issuing that decision did so unlawfully; and (ii) the nature of the express limitations set out by Justice Kennedy in that decision. Because of these two critical factors, we urge all of you as Attorneys General, or at least one of you, file a Petition for Rehearing of this decision. Additionally, we urge all elected officials in those four states to impress on you the need to file a Petition for Rehearing. Although the Court’s decision purports to apply to all states — including the states that did not have an opportunity to present their arguments to the Court — only your four states can seek rehearing.

First, the Issue of “Recusal” by Justices Ginsburg and Kagan.

The participation by Justices Ginsburg and Kagan in the Obergefell decision violated federal judicial ethics, and a federal statute. These Justices were under a duty to recuse and not participate in that decision. Without their two votes in favor of same sex marriage, the traditional marriage laws in your states would have been upheld on a vote of four to three, with two justices not participation. Until the decision was issued, the American people had no way to know if these two justices were going to recuse. Now that the decision is issued, we know that they did participate — unethically and unlawfully.

There is no regular means to enforce the law against the U.S. Supreme Court Justices. The matter of recusal has generally been considered a personal matter, to be evaluated by each Justice for himself or herself. The other Justices do not try to enforce the law against their colleagues. Neither the President nor the Attorney General of the United States seek to enforce the law of recusal against the High Court. The Congress has not taken action to ensure that its laws are followed by the Supreme Court. In other words, each Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court is a law unto himself or herself.

Two Motions for Recusal was filed with the U.S. Supreme Court, but never ruled upon. Indeed, neither was even posted to the Supreme Court docket sheets until the Court was embarrassed for failure to post them. Even then, only one of the motions shows on those docket sheets, mis-labeled a “request” rather than a “motion.”

Properly understood, without Justices Ginsburg and Kagan participating, the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court in Obergefell actually was in favor of traditional marriage, by a vote of 4-3 with two judges not participating. Even if only Justice Ginsburg was disqualified, the vote would have been 4-4, and the decision of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit upholding traditional marriage would be left standing.

A Petition for Rehearing must be filed challenging the legality of the votes purportedly cast against the constitution and laws of your state by Justices Ginsburg and Kagan.

Second, the Issue of the “No Risk” Limitations in the Decision.

A careful reading of the holding of the Kennedy opinion reveals that the right to marry recognized by the Supreme Court is not at all what has been assumed.

At the end of a lengthy review of the Court’s due process and equal protection precedents, in which he concluded that same-sex couples could no longer be denied the liberty to marry, the “fundamental right to marry,” Justice Kennedy pronounced that “the State laws challenged [by the same-sex couple] Petitioners in these cases are now held invalid to the extent they exclude same-sex couples from civil marriage on the same terms and conditions as opposite-sex couples.”

In the very next section of his opinion, Justice Kennedy addressed the States’ counterclaim that the Court should withhold its decision to allow more “democratic discourse” before rendering its decision. On the basis of the record, including the perceived urgency of the petitioning couples’ needs, Justice Kennedy declined to “stay [the court’s] hand,” noting specifically that, while the four State respondents, had claimed “that allowing same-sex marriage will cause the harmful outcomes they describe,” the States had failed to “show a foundation for that conclusion.” In anticipation, however, that if such a foundation could be laid in a future case, Justice Kennedy was prompted to “observe [that these cases involve only the rights of two consenting adults whose marriages would pose no risk of harm to themselves or third parties.”

In light of the Justice Kennedy’s own words, there is no doubt that the Court acknowledged that the absence of any “risk of harm” to either the two persons in the marriage or to third parties is an important predicate for its decision. Indeed, the Court’s own due process and equal protection jurisprudence allows for discriminatory treatment of enjoyment even of a fundamental right based upon whether the right would be subjected to strict scrutiny, to determine if there might be a legitimate overriding governmental interest to deny access to that right. Significantly, the Court did not engage in any such inquiry in the four cases before it because of the lack of a foundation showing “harmful outcomes” should same-sex marriage be permitted. Thus, Justice Kennedy limited the Court’s holding to those cases that involve no risk of harm to the married couple or to third parties. To that end, the Petition for Rehearing that we have drafted contains an Appendix documenting many of the “harmful outcomes” that Justice Kennedy stated were never considered by the Court in Obergefell.

We urge you to do your duty according to your oaths to the Constitutions of your State and of the United States to defend your state constitutions and state laws. The People of your State deserve no less.

________________

If you believe a Petition for Rehearing should be filed, you can contact the following state Attorneys General:

Michigan Attorney General Bill Schuete

(517) 373-1110

Ohio Attorney General Mike DeWine

(800) 282-0515

Tennessee Attorney General Herbert H. Slatery III

(615) 741-3491

Kentucky Attorney General Jack Conway

(502) 696-5300

________________

Herbert W. Titus taught Constitutional Law for 26 years, and concluded his academic career as the Founding Dean of Regent Law School. William J. Olson served in three positions in the Reagan Administration. Together they have filed over 80 briefs in the U.S. Supreme Court, and dozens more in lower courts, addressing important public policy issues. They now practice law together at William J. Olson, P.C. They can be reached at [email protected] or twitter.com/Olsonlaw.

This article is part of a series on “Building Resistance to Same-Sex Marriage.” Please support this important work with a contribution to the U.S. Justice Foundation. Permission is freely granted to publish, copy, reproduce, distribute, or excerpt from this article for any purpose.

12 Reasons Iran’s “Dreams Have Come True” and Why the Deal Endangers the US

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[Yesterday], the leader of Iran’s evil regime, Hassan Rouhani, declared, “today major world powers recognized Iran’s nuclear program. Our dreams have come true.”

And indeed, this nuclear deal that Obama essentially cut with Iran months ago, recognizes much more than just their nuclear program.

Today, you will hear many references to Neville Chamberlain, but the truth is that Chamberlain merely appeased the enemy of his country; he didn’t create an alliance with Germany.

Moreover, he was negotiating from a position of weakness, whereas America had Iran on the ropes from years of sanctions. Obama is handing them their nuclear program and regional hegemony on a silver platter as a reward for killing and maiming thousands of U.S. troops in Iraq over the past decade. John Kerry even apologized for the years that sanctions were in place.

Here are the important details and outcomes of this alliance Obama has forged with Iran:

1) Keep the Centrifuges: Iran can keep more than 5,000 centrifuges with one-third of them continuing to spin in perpetuity. For context, Pakistan created a bomb with just 3,000 centrifuges. In return for them keeping most of their infrastructure, they are entitled to receive $140 billion in sanctions relief.

2) Phony Inspections: Iran will have the discretion to block international inspectors from military installations and will be given 14 days’ notice for any request to visit any site. But there are several layers of bureaucracy that will elongate any period of inspection beyond the 14 days, and that is assuming the IAEA (International Atomic Energy Agency) will pursue an inspections regime in any meaningful way. Iran’s objections to inspections at military sites can be overturned by an international commission, something that will never occur. Also, the inspectors can only come from countries with diplomatic relations with Iran. Hence, no American inspectors.

3) Lifting of Weapons Embargo: One of the latest additions to the alliance deal was a lifting of the embargo on the sale of weapons to Iran. The embargo will officially be lifted in 5 years, but as we’ve seen from the past few years of negotiations, the embargo has already been de facto lifted because nobody will enforce any violations.

4) If you like you’re delivery system…: The embargo on Iran’s ICBM program will be lifted after 8 years (again, lack of enforcement will likely occur earlier). Coupled with the nuclear materials they will be allowed to keep and the operation of advanced centrifuges, they could have a delivery system in place by the time they break out with a nuclear weapon.

5) Keep Your Infrastructure: The heavy water reactor in Arak and the underground nuclear facility in Fordo will be kept open, in direct contravention to Obama’s own red lines.

6) Arms Trades Already Underway: As if on cue, the Russians are already agreeing to sell Iran s-300 anti-missile rocket systems in exchange for 500,000 barrels of oil. This makes it clear they will never agree to reinstate sanctions on Iran if they cheat on the agreement.

7) Covert Program Untouched: The P5+1 nations already dropped demands that Iran disclose its past research. The publicly-discovered nuclear sites are irrelevant because Iran has already hid the ball.

8) Sanctions Already Laughed Off: Iran knows they don’t have to agree to any significant concession because the sanctions have already been ignored across the board by the West. Iran is already boasting about record oil exports.

9) All Sanctions Fall Together: Needless to say, Iran is continuing to build their ballistic missile program and expand their terrorism and regional hegemony. None of this was even a part of the negotiations from day one. For months, the Obama administration swore that the sanctions targeting Iran’s terror, human rights abuses, and its ballistic missile program would remain in place. But last month, the AP reported that all of the sanctions will collapse once the nuclear sanctions are removed.

10) Paying Iran to Make a Bomb: If you thought this “deal” was a joke, you are not missing anything. The AP has reported that Obama has agreed to help Iran with technical assistance to develop their nuclear program…all for domestic purposes of course. It appears that this will be part of the final deal.

11) Killing U.S. Soldiers Pays Off: Sanctions were lifted on critical parts of Iran’s military, including restrictions on the Quds Force commander Qasem Soleimani. This man is responsible for the deaths of numerous U.S. soldiers in Iran.

12) Continue to Illegally Torture American Prisoners: While Soleimani is being freed to travel abroad, the U.S. hostages in Iran will remain in prison.

Where Things Stand

Thanks to the unconstitutional Corker-Cardin bill, the Senate has ceded its power to ratify a treaty, which would have required two-thirds of the Senate to affirmatively approve of the deal in order for the sanctions to be lifted. Now, the sanctions will automatically be lifted unless Congress musters two-thirds in opposition to the deal in both bodies of Congress – 67 votes in the Senate and 290 in the House. Given the radical nature of the modern-day Democrat Party, there is no way Republicans will come close to mustering the votes. Sen. Joe Manchin (D-WV) has already expressed support for Obama’s Iranian alliance.

Rather than play defense, it’s time for conservatives to go on offense and force leadership to jettison their liberal agenda and use every must-pass bill to block the Iran deal. Next week, Congress plans to approve the annual defense bill. This is a perfect vehicle for blocking a deal with Iran. They must also use the upcoming budget bill as well to block any sanctions relief. A steady and relentless stream of legislative pressure on Democrats is the only way they will feel the heat on the issue.

Congress can’t afford to wait until September to block the lifting of sanctions. This deal was not written with the “Corker-Cardin review process” in mind. The UN Security Council can approve the lifting of sanctions within a few weeks while members of Congress are having fun in the sun. Shouldn’t Republicans assert the prerogative to keeping members in session until this deal is blocked?

Some things are worth fighting for, and if Republicans can’t muster the courage to wield the power of the purse over the worst international capitulation of our generation, there is no purpose to their existence. (“Iran Deal Endangers the US”, originally posted HERE)

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Black People’s Problems Are Not Civil Rights Problems

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Let’s list major problems affecting black Americans. Topping the list is the breakdown in the black family, where only a third of black children are raised in two-parent households. Actually, the term “breakdown” is incorrect. Families do not form in the first place. Nationally, there is a black illegitimacy rate of 72 percent. In some urban areas, the percentage is much greater. Blacks constitute more than 50 percent of murder victims, where roughly 7,000 blacks are murdered each year. Ninety-five percent of the time, the perpetrator is another black. If a black youngster does graduate from high school, it is highly likely that he can read, write and compute no better than a white seventh- or eighth-grader. These are the major problems that face black Americans.

Let’s look at some of the strategy since the beginning of the civil rights movement. The black power movement of the ’60s and ’70s held that black underrepresentation in the political arena was a major problem. It was argued that the election of more black officials as congressmen, mayors and city council members would mean economic power, better neighborhoods and better schools. Forty-three years ago, there were roughly 1,500 black elected officials nationwide. According to the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, by 2011 there were roughly 10,500 black elected officials, including a black president. But what were the fruits?

By most any measure, the problems are worse. There is the greatest black poverty, poorest education, highest crime and greatest family instability in cities such as: Detroit, St. Louis, Oakland, Calif., Memphis, Tenn., Birmingham, Ala., Atlanta, Baltimore, Cleveland, Philadelphia and Buffalo, N.Y. The most common characteristic of these predominantly black cities is that, for decades, all of them have been run by Democratic and presumably liberal administrations. What’s more is that in most of these cities, blacks have been mayors, chiefs of police, school superintendents and principals and have dominated city councils.

Political power has not lived up to its billing.

So what should black politicians and activists now be focused on to address some of the problems confronting black people? Let’s look at some of the fiddling by some black politicians, white liberals and some intimidated white conservatives. How about banning the Confederate flag from public places because it is alleged to be a symbol of slavery? What would that do for black problems? By the way, one could make the case for also banning the American flag. Slave ships sailed under the American flag. (Read more from “Black People’s Problems Are Not Civil Rights Problems” HERE)

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When the Feds Demand Same-Sex Marriage, What Will Our Bishops and Pastors Do? [+video]

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If the logic of same-sex marriage as a constitutional right is pushed to the limit — and its giddy supporters show no sign of restraint, looting the culture like a horde of victorious Vikings — the federal government could soon strip orthodox churches of their tax exemptions. Then they’ll send church leaders the bill for hundreds of millions of dollars. Property taxes will be assessed on cathedrals and soup kitchens, on hospices and pregnancy shelters, on nursing homes and universities. School principals will pay business tax on the tuition scraped together by low-income families to shoestring religious schools, so they’ll have to raise it or close them. The money you give to your church will not be tax deductible — as it would have been if you gave it to Planned Parenthood. The state will treat your tithes the same as the money you lost in Vegas; perhaps you can write some of it off as an “entertainment expense.”

And I wonder what the leaders of our churches will do. I speak here as a Catholic, though I’m sure that my Protestant brethren are wrestling with their own set of anxieties. I was cheered when the Sunday after the same-sex marriage decision, the bishop here in Dallas had a statement read in all parishes, reaffirming our church’s commitment to natural, biblical marriage. But I have been less than inspired by other things that I’ve seen. On Fox News, Bill O’Reilly complained that his producers had approached bishop after bishop, seeking some spokesman to give the Church’s position. No one would do it.

There’s a palpable fear of Caesar at work here, but also something else. I am trying to figure out what that “x factor” is.

Explain for me, someone, the response of progressives’ dreamboat Chicago Archbishop Cupich to the same-sex decision: Along with a pro forma restatement of church teaching, he reasserted the need for “real, not rhetorical” respect for homosexuals and promised to “extend support to all families, no matter their circumstances, recognizing that we are all relatives, journeying through life under the careful watch of a loving God.” He made no mention of the court’s challenge to religious liberty.

What’s going on in London, where the Cardinal-Archbishop of Westminster, the leader of Britain’s Catholics, approved a group of “Catholic” gay activists marching in London’s gay pride parade? His spokesman explained that their presence was a form of “evangelization.” Could that well-paid church bureaucrat keep a straight face as he said that? How beaten-down, docile, or foolish does he think we Catholics are? Do Catholic civil-rights groups march arm-in-arm with the Klan as an evangelistic enterprise?

It’s alarming to recall that several prominent bishops at the last Synod on the Family proposed language that would have undermined Catholic teaching on this subject at its root, asking that the Church recognize the special gifts that gay Catholics bring by virtue of their sexual orientation. That language was mercifully struck from the final draft of the document, but those bishops were not disciplined, or even publicly corrected. Indeed, they recently held a secret meeting planning their strategy for the next Synod.

The bishops acted forthrightly against the HHS mandate, which demanded that Catholic institutions underwrite their employees’ use of contraceptives, including abortifacients. It was brave but a no-brainer, since unborn lives were involved. That factor attracted support from many Protestant churchmen, and brave owners of businesses such as Hobby Lobby. Everyone accepts the fact that Catholic bishops oppose abortion, and they would have been utterly discredited had they done anything else.

But I wonder, really wonder, what bishops will do in this case, if the Feds insist that they hire people in same-sex “marriages” to teach in Catholic schools, and then that they perform same-sex weddings in their churches — or else pay tens of millions of dollars in taxes on their property.

Few noticed the reaction when the Obama administration insisted that non-profit groups who receive federal contracts must comply with non-discrimination rules, and hire openly gay employees, including those in same-sex marriages. This order seemed to threaten lucrative partnerships with the federal government, especially the bishops’ involvement in resettling immigrants.

Our bishops condemned the order, but I have been unable to find the names of any Catholic federal contractors who lost government business rather than comply. (Perhaps they exploited the loophole in the order allowing church agencies to refuse to hire gays for specific jobs germane to the “religious identity” of the agencies.) Catholic Charities, which since 1997 had pressured the church in San Francisco to offer benefits for domestic partners, responded by announcing it was pleased with the order, and already in full compliance. Catholic Relief Services condemned the order, but a year later we learn that a vice-president of Catholic Relief Services is a gay activist who has contracted a same-sex “marriage.”

Bill O’Reilly cited the sex abuse crisis as a possible source of bishops’ reticence to speak out in defense of religious liberty. He wondered if they thought their credibility was too tainted, given that as of 2002, two-thirds of U.S. bishops had been implicated in cover-ups. I disagree; the bishops seem quite unabashed about intervening in U.S. politics when it comes to poverty programs and immigration. But many bishops’ behavior in the sex abuse crisis does give us an ominous hint about how they might act in the current crisis.

As prosecutors argued in court summation arguments and internal church documents reveal, the best explanation of bishops’ appalling failure to remove and report sex abusers is simple: worldliness. When confronted with middle-aged men who seduced vulnerable teenagers, their reaction was to worry about the church’s bottom line. If they didn’t stifle this secret, would they be subject to lawsuits? Would the church’s reputation suffer, and would donors divert their money elsewhere? What would happen to their diocese’s insurance premiums? At all costs, at the cost of countless ruined lives, of young souls twisted and alienated from Christ, these bishops acted to save the bricks and mortar. And in an irony worthy of Dante, that very choice cost them hundreds of millions of dollars.

The bishops could soon face a much more ominous threat to their finances, and instead of tort lawyers they would be threatened by the full force of the U.S. federal government. Will they stand firm and risk those magnificent Gothic buildings, those vital health care centers, that network of schools that serves the urban poor? Or will they tell themselves that the really “Christian” thing to do will be to listen to the culture, to maintain their mission as best they can by tweaking their public witness, to save not souls but bricks and mortar?

It might just take a miracle to keep the Catholic hierarchy in America on track with the church’s perennial teaching on marriage. But all things are possible with God. (“If the Feds Demand Same-Sex Marriage, What Will Our Pastors Do?”, originally posted HERE)

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The New Totalitarians Are Here

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There’s a basic difference in the traditions of political science between “authoritarians” and “totalitaritarians.” People throw both of these words around, but as is so often the case, they’re using words they may not always understand. They have real meaning, however, and the difference between them is important.

Simply put, authoritarians merely want obedience, while totalitarians, whose rule is rooted in an ideology, want obedience and conversion. Authoritarians are a dime a dozen; totalitarians are rare. The authoritarians are the guys in charge who want to stay in charge, and don’t much care about you, or what you’re doing, so long as you stay out of their way. They are the jefe and his thugs in a brutal regime that want you to shut up, go to work, and look the other way when your loudmouthed neighbor gets his lights punched out by goons in black jackets. Live or die. It’s all the same to the regime.

Totalitarians are a different breed. These are the people who have a plan, who think they see the future more clearly than you or who are convinced they grasp reality in a way that you do not. They don’t serve themselves—or, they don’t serve themselves exclusively—they serve History, or The People, or The Idea, or some other ideological totem that justifies their actions.

They want obedience, of course. But even more, they want their rule, and their belief system, to be accepted and self-sustaining. And the only way to achieve that is to create a new society of people who share those beliefs, even if it means bludgeoning every last citizen into enlightenment. That’s what makes totalitarians different and more dangerous: they are “totalistic” in the sense that they demand a complete reorientation of the individual to the State and its ideological ends. Every person who harbors a secret objection, or even so much as a doubt, is a danger to the future of the whole project, and so the regime compels its subjects not only to obey but to believe.

This is what George Orwell understood so well in his landmark novel “1984.” His dystopian state doesn’t really care about quotidian obedience; it already knows how to get that. What it demands, and will get by any means, is a belief in the Party’s rectitude and in its leader, Big Brother. If torturing the daylights out of people until they denounce even their loved ones is what it takes, so be it. That’s why the ending of the novel is so terrifying: after the two rebellious lovers of the story are broken and made to turn on each other, the wrecks left by the State are left to sit before the Leader’s face on a screen with only one emotion still alive in the husks of their bodies: they finally, truly love Big Brother.

Americans Are Getting Too Comfortable With Thought Control

I’ve gone down this road of literary and academic exposition because I fear an increasing number of my fellow Americans are, at heart, becoming totalitarians. (Read more from “The New Totalitarians Are Here” HERE)

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Justice Kennedy’s Naked Politics and the Hypocrisy of the Court

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The flagrant duplicity of Justice Anthony Kennedy’s Supreme Court decisions this term should render his opinions as lawfully binding as a sermon from Barney Frank. In other words: they are bloviating examples of politics before the rule of law. He has exhibited a complete disregard for the fundamental rights Americans possess, or that are protected under a simple reading of the Constitution, because he lacks any coherent jurisprudence. His hypocrisy on federalism reveals a naked political motivation for specific, and often diametrically opposed, outcomes.

In 1997, there was a case before the Supreme Court, Washington v. Glucksberg, regarding physician-assisted suicide that mirrored the arguments proponents of homosexual marriage have asserted. Despite the fact that proponents of the right to assisted suicide offered stronger arguments than those recently seeking to overturn state marriage laws and redefine the institution from the federal bench, the Court still ruled in favor of the state 9-0. Three of the justices – Kennedy, Breyer, and Ginsburg – completely contradicted themselves with the ruling on marriage.

The respondents in Glucksberg, led by Washington physician Harold Glucksberg, asserted a “liberty interest” and fundamental right to assist terminally ill patients in committing suicide. They contended that state law banning assisted suicide violated their “substantive” due process under the 14th Amendment.

Interestingly, the word substantive is never mentioned in the Constitution, but has been created by usurpation of power and revisionist history, and has now become the porta potty of post-constitutional jurisprudence for those too cowardly to pursue their societal transformation through the democratic process. It is a legal fiction meant as a means to an end – that is, societal transformation via ‘judicial legislation.’ (See, U.S. v. Carlton, J. Scalia concurring.)

On paper, the respondents in Glucksberg had a much better case than those who sought to invalidate state marriage laws. They were asserting the right of self-sovereignty and were simply asking the state to not interfere with their act. In the Obergefell case, they were asking the court to redefine an institution that has been defined by natural law and all of history until just a few years ago. They were also asking for a state benefit and recognition, the opposite of the relief the respondents sought in the assisted suicide case.

Yet, in Glucksberg, the court completely shredded the idea that there is a fundamental right under the 14th amendment to assisted suicide. The litmus test the court used, based on decades of past precedent, in determining whether the Due Process clause of the 14th amendment protects a specific act is whether the asserted right is “deeply rooted in this Nation’s history and tradition,” and “implicit in the concept of ordered liberty,” such that “neither liberty nor justice would exist if they were sacrificed.”

Chief Justice Rehnquist, writing the unanimous opinion (although the four liberals disagreed slightly in a concurring opinion), noted that bans on suicide were a part of Anglo-American common law for 700 years and that “by the time the Fourteenth Amendment was ratified, it was a crime in most States to assist a suicide.” So, rather than the asserted right having deep roots in history and tradition, Rehnquist observed that the state laws were rooted in history and tradition. This was similar to Scalia’s point in his dissent in Obergefell when he observed that every state defined marriage as between one man and one woman at the time the 14th amendment was ratified.

The second requirement the court established in Glucksberg was that those asserting the new right provide a “careful description.” This is especially important because, as Rehnquist noted, “by extending constitutional protection to an asserted right or liberty interest, we, to a great extent, place the matter outside the arena of public debate and legislative action.”

Much like in the marriage case, Rehnquist observed that despite the centuries of iron-clad opposition to suicide for terminally ill, attitudes were changing. But it has no bearings on the Constitution, because those are political decisions and need to be dealt with in the states through the political process. That’s why in upholding the state ban on assisted suicide, Rehnquist made a point of declaring the following in conclusion: “Throughout the Nation, Americans are engaged in an earnest and profound debate about the morality, legality, and practicality of physician assisted suicide. Our holding permits this debate to continue, as it should in a democratic society.”

Now step back for a moment and ponder, in light of this court’s unanimous decision – including the votes of Kennedy, Breyer, and Ginsburg – to uphold the ban on assisted suicide, how irrational it is to overturn state laws defining marriage the way it has been defined for all of civilization? The notion that such a fundamental societal question – which was decided by 32 states directly by the people – could be overturned and all debate be shut off, based upon an asserted right stemming from an idea that never existed prior to this generation, is outrageous. Rehnquist observed that “most states” in 1868 banned assisted suicide. Well, all states, as Scalia noted in his Obergefell dissent, defined marriage as between one man and one woman.

But what is even more outrageous about Kennedy’s violation of the Glucksberg precedent is that the marriage case involves coercing states to provide the parties with benefits, not merely preventing the states from prohibiting homosexual acts, which was permitted nationwide in Lawrence v. Texas (2003) [in itself a reversal of precedent]. As Clarence Thomas asserts in his Obergefell dissent, “since well before 1787, liberty has been understood as freedom from government action, not entitlement to government benefits.” [emphasis added]

The fact that Kennedy signed onto Glucksberg, yet blithely overrules it in Obergefell, plus makes a huge jump from his own decision in the Lawrence anti-sodomy case, exposes a shameless policy preference that is pre-empted not just by our constitutional system of law but by the very liberal deities of stare decisis (court precedent) that Kennedy so fervently embraces. The only substantive due process that is being violated is the due process of the millions of citizens who voted to define marriage and are now being denied that democratic process through what Scalia aptly called “societal transformation without representation.”

Why are homosexuals given extra rights?

Kennedy’s transparently cloddish replacement of legal jurisprudence for perceived public opinion and personal social preference is even more apparent by, as Justice Roberts notes, his insertion of the adjective “two” into his edict redefining marriage as between any two individuals of the same or opposite sex. Once the premise is made that 5 black robes can redefine marriage like redefining gravity and bestow a constitutional right that is antithetical to the intent of the framers, it is indefensible to exclude polygamist marriages. Polygamists can procreate, and unlike homosexuals who didn’t even recognize their relationships as marriages until this generation, polygamy is “deeply rooted in history” and in some traditions.

Moreover, so much of Kennedy’s ruling is rooted in his fabrication of new constitutional rights; namely, the right to “dignity,” “nobility,” protect against stigmas, and “the right to define and express their identity.” If Kennedy believes it is his responsibility and prerogative to bestow those new post-constitutional rights on, perhaps, the most powerful and trendy class of people in the country, how much more so for a group that is still scorned, stigmatized, and denied their dignity to express their identity.

But again, Kennedy’s opinion is 100% politics, and the inclusion of a relationship that is not in vogue would undermine the acceptance of his political polemic.

Kennedy overrules himself on states’ rights

Nowhere is Kennedy’s modus operandi of ‘choose a political outcome first, backfill the legal rationale later’ – even when it is self-contradictory – more palpable than with his reversal of his decision in Windsor just two years ago. When writing the majority opinion in striking down the federal Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), Kennedy dedicated seven pages to the importance of state control over marriage dating back to the founding of the country. “[R]egulation of domestic relations is an area that has long been regarded as a virtually exclusive province of the States.” “[T]he Federal Government, through our history, has deferred to state-law policy decisions with respect to domestic relations.”

Let’s put aside the fact that DOMA never interfered with the states that adopted gay marriage; it was merely a protection for the states that chose not to redefine marriage, in addition to defining marriage for federal purposes, such as immigration law. But how can Kennedy say that the federal government cannot define marriage for its own purposes because states have exclusive power and then, just two years later, create a federal constitutional right precluding states from defining marriage as it has always been defined by those very states he so recently observed had marriage laws since the nation’s founding? How can he say that state laws with regard to marriage are supreme and then force every state to redefine its very essence?

Answer: naked politics and lawlessness.

For far too long, we have casually sat back and accepted opinions of the Court to be the law of the land, even when they clearly violate the basic tenants of our Constitution.

Appalling hypocrisy on popular sovereignty

Just a few days after rewriting the Constitution and countermanding the preamble of the Declaration, Kennedy signed onto a majority opinion in a seemingly unrelated case (Arizona State Legislature v. Arizona Independent Redistricting) that reveals even more hypocritical legal analysis designed to net the opposite result when it suits his personal politics. This case involved the Arizona state legislature suing for control over the redistricting process in their state after voters handed over the power of redistricting to an unelected commission. Writing for the majority, Ginsburg ruled that when Article 1 Section 4 grants the “Legislature” control over the manner in which federal elections are conducted in the state, it really also means the people of the state through ballot initiatives. This, despite the fact that the Constitution mentions the word Legislature 17 times, and in most cases, it’s impossible to be describing anything but its plain textural meaning.

As Thomas observed in his dissent in Arizona State Legislature v. Arizona Independent Redistricting, the majority (of which Kennedy was a co-signer) extolls the virtues of ballot initiatives and allowing the people of the state to decide redistricting, even though this is one of the few things preempted by the plain language of the federal Constitution. Yet, these same justices, during the same term, gaily overturned ballot initiatives of 32 states dealing with one of the most foundational and contentious societal issues of our time – all for highbrow concepts that are never mentioned anywhere in the Constitution and are indeed an anathema to the 10th Amendment and to the concept of fundamental rights – rights that were solely based on nature’s God.

For far too long, we have casually sat back and accepted opinions of the Court to be the law of the land, even when they clearly violate the basic tenants of our Constitution. But what we have seen in recent years is such a naked pursuit of politics from the bench that the political justices won’t even remain consistent in their own legal analysis precisely because they are solely focused on preferred outcomes. What has occurred this term in general, and in the marriage case in particular, has crossed a line.

Based on the tradition of all civilization, the founding principles of liberty expressed in the Declaration, the system of government established in the Constitution, and precedents of the court established by some of these very same political hacks – this opinion is null and void and should carry no weight among the states.

This fight is far from over. (“Justice Kennedy’s Naked Politics and the Hypocrisy of the Court”, originally posted HERE)

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Will Samantha Power Be the First American UN Ambassador to Abandon Israel?

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Last week, mega-philanthropist Michael Steinhardt, co-founder of Birthright Israel, which has brought 500,000 young Jews to Israel, joined with our organization The World Values Network, in a full-page New York Times ad about Ambassador Samantha Power. In the ad Mr. Steinhardt reminded the Ambassador of her commitment at her Senate confirmation hearings, “I will stand up for Israel and work tirelessly to defend it” at the United Nations.

At the AIPAC Annual Policy Conference in Washington, DC, in March, Samantha avowed, “It is a false choice to tell Israel that it has to choose between peace on the one hand, and security on the other. The United Nations would not ask any other country to make that choice, and it should not ask it of Israel.”

Ambassador Power, of course, was correct – security is the foundation of any sustainable peace framework in the Middle East. To its credit, the United States has long stood for justice and served as an essential check against overreach, anti-Semitism, and double standards by Arab and European nations at the UN.

Yet statements in April by Ambassador Power refusing to rule out supporting UN resolutions that target Israel, added to recent claims by Palestinian Authority Prime Minister Rami Hamdallah, have raised serious questions about the specter of betrayal by the United States and Ambassador Power during the UN General Assembly in September. Reports have emerged that France plans to put forth a resolution before the UN Security Council that will call for an immediate resumption of peace talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority with a hard-cap of 18 months for a final deal. Under the French proposal, if no deal is reached in 18 months, the UN would recognize the Palestinian state, effectively granting legitimacy to an organization that has consistently proven incompetent, corrupt, hostile to democratic values, and openly supportive of terrorism. While the global Jewish community has come to expect little from France, Hamdallah said that France and the U.S. are “coordinating” together on the diplomatic catastrophe. There also exists the possibility that should Israel refuse to accept a UN Security Council Resolution authorizing a timetable for the unilateral creation of a Palestinian State, economic sanctions could be levied against the Jewish State.

For starters, the very notion of this process – which rewards the Palestinian Authority for failure – is patently absurd. In practice, if Israel doesn’t entirely capitulate to every demand of the Palestinian negotiators, the Palestinians are granted statehood. There is zero incentive for Palestinians to even pretend to negotiate in good faith. The mortifying results of the American discussions with Iran on nuclear weapons lowered the world’s estimation of the State Department’s ability to negotiate, but this framework would be a historic nadir. (Read more from “Will Samantha Power Be the First American UN Ambassador to Abandon Israel?” HERE)

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Trump Seems to Really be Running and, By the Way, What he Said About Mexicans Wasn’t All Inaccurate

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The shunning of Trump is in response to his uh, memorable presidential announcement that included comments about the alleged criminality of Mexican immigrants that were typically crude. . .

Although this isn’t anything new. The companies fleeing from Trump were happy to be in bed with him so long as it suited their business interests. Now, they are acting on what has become one of the foremost principles of American public life: It’s no longer enough to be offended, you must punish the offender.

I was skeptical Trump was really running, but now that the boats are burned behind him, watch out. He’s set to be Herman Cain squared — an early-nominating-season phenomenon with a massive media megaphone.

As for his instantly notorious Mexico comments, they did more to insult than to illuminate, yet there was a kernel in them that hit on an important truth that typical politicians either don’t know or simply fear to speak. “When Mexico sends its people,” Trump said, “they’re not sending their best.”

We aren’t raiding the top 1 percent of Mexicans and importing them to this country. (Read more from “Trump Seems to Really Be Running and, by the Way, What He Said About Mexicans Wasn’t All Inaccurate” HERE)

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