Tea Parties and the Bill of Rights.
Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-Ill.) blasted "tea party" protests yesterday, labeling the activities "despicable" and shameful."
"The ‘tea parties’ being held today by groups of right-wing activists, and fueled by FOX News Channel, are an effort to mislead the public about the Obama economic plan that cuts taxes for 95 percent of Americans and creates 3.5 million jobs," Schakowsky said in a statement.
What? I didn’t go to a tea party. I didn’t have the energy after working all day to pay my taxes. My son went to one in Birmingham and said there was a big crowd. Where does Rep. Schakowsky get off knocking this sort of thing? Here’s something I found:
Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.
It’s called the First Amendment. The Founding Fathers felt the need to spell this out explicitly because they were familiar with abuses of these freedoms. Many brave men and women have served their country defending these freedoms. So, Rep. Schakowsky can get together with her friends and say what she wants, but so can the rest of us. I can’t think of anything more American: baseball, apple pie, and getting together with others to complain out loud about the government. What a country.
Isn’t it interesting how career politicians always get nervous when there’s a groundswell of anti-government sentiment?
On Being President
I reviewed Article 2 of the Constitution. I think we should have a bivocational President. He could keep his regular job (assuming no conflict of interest.). I say this because I think I could do the job in about 2 hours a day.
Uphold and defend Constitution. 30 min
Commander in Chief (meet Joint Chiefs) 30 min
Report to Congress on State of Union (email) 15 min
Sign some treaties 15 min
Appoint a few (conservative) judges 15 min
Visit with foreign dignitaries 15 min
There, done by 10 am. If you can live on 400K a year, then you can just take the rest of the day off. Or go back to your regular job.
Piracy
I was saying just last week that I had the solution to the piracy problem. Shoot them. No lawyers or liberal judges or two decades on death row. Get some really big guns and simply shoot anyone trying to capture your boat. And how about this: pull up your ladders when you are going by Somalia. Thankfully, the US Navy and their SEAL team must have heard my speech. Way to go, guys.
Plus, the tea parties weren't really about taxes. They were largely protesting the deficit spending, irresponsible budgets, porky stimuli, and socialist bailouts. Taxation and spending do, however, have an inherent connection. All spending means taxes. Ron Paul hits the nail on the head when he says that governments have nothing and they can't create anything, either. All they can do is steal from one group and give to another "at the detriment to the principles of freedom."
ReplyDeleteOne thing I've never understood about these pirates is how they are getting on these huge ships. Do they have big ladders? Climb up the side of the ship?
ReplyDeleteShooting them is certainly the right answer. And congrats to Obama for giving the order to shoot the bad guys, even though his order seemed ambiguous enough to take credit for any success and pass the buck for any failure.