THE FOUNDATION
"In questions of power, then, let no more be heard of confidence in man, but bind him down from mischief by the chains of the Constitution." --Thomas Jefferson, fair copy of the drafts of the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798TOP 5 RIGHT HOOKS
Executive Immigration Action
House Speaker John Boehner made clear last week that major immigration reform was dead this year in the House. Therefore, Barack Obama had no choice but to do as he always does anyway -- begin "a new effort to fix as much of our immigration system as I can on my own, without Congress." The president insisted he "would love nothing more" than to avoid unilateral action and instead sign legislation from Congress. "I don't prefer taking administrative action," he added. "I would greatly prefer Congress actually do something. I take executive action only when we have a serious problem, a serious issue, and Congress chooses to do nothing." He concluded, "The failure of the House Republicans to pass a darn bill is bad for our security, it's bad for our economy, and it's bad for or future." Obama will continue to blame Republicans, but his strategy is to create a crisis by undermining Rule of Law. More...Comment | Share
Obama's Return to Iraq
In a letter to Congress, Barack Obama said he was sending 200 more troops to Iraq, bringing the total of American boots in the country to 775. "This force is deploying for the purpose of protecting U.S. citizens and property, if necessary, and is equipped for combat. This force will remain in Iraq until the security situation becomes such that it is no longer needed," Obama wrote. Currently, most troops are there to protect the embassy. Three hundred are there to "train and assist Iraqi forces," whatever that means in politi-speak. In June, Obama told Congress he did not need congressional approval to move troops to Iraq, though he didn't evoke the 2001 or 2002 Authorization of Use Military Force. Obama arguably has a case, but he's trying to have it both ways, picking and choosing how he follows the Constitution. More...Comment | Share
Another GM Recall
General Motors has issued yet another recall, this time of 8.45 million vehicles, pushing their total this year to 28 million worldwide. The affected models date back to 1997, and the primary defect is the infamous ignition switch. The latest recall will cost $500 million, on top of the $700 million the world's largest automaker already spent on recalls in the second quarter. The scandal here is GM knew about the faulty switches years before taxpayers were forced to bail them out, all while doing little to correct the problem. The National Highway Transportation Safety Administration (NHTSA) learned of the defect during the bailout, and the Treasury Department conveniently sold off the last of its GM stock in December -- before the recalls began. We suppose it's fortunate taxpayers weren't on the hook for the cost of the recall too, but that's insider trading at its finest and a perfect example of why government should not have an ownership stake in a company.Comment | Share
July 1936 Hottest Again
The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has long been accused of fabricating temperature data to comport with the agency's promulgations on man-made global warming. But NOAA's latest change is probably not what you would expect. Veteran meteorologist Anthony Watts observes, "Two years ago during the scorching summer of 2012, July 1936 lost its place on the leaderboard and July 2012 became the hottest month on record in the United States. Now, as if by magic, and according to NOAA's own data, July 1936 is now the hottest month on record again. The past, present, and future all seems to be 'adjustable' in NOAA's world." Wait, we thought the science was settled! "You can't get any clearer proof of NOAA adjusting past temperatures," Watts surmises. "This isn't just some issue with gridding, or anomalies, or method, it is about NOAA not being able to present historical climate information of the United States accurately." Either that, or, more likely, they're choosing not to. More...Comment | Share
Two Black Communities
Let this be a lesson to the Republican Party. Mississippi Senator Thad Cochran won his run-off primary by touting his ability to rake in pork barrel spending, targeting black, liberal voters. That strategy came with some strings. Politico reports, "Thad Cochran won a primary runoff by turning out the black vote. Now they are asking -- what are you going to do for us? Already the members of the Congressional Black Caucus are talking about what they want Cochran to do. The wish list is filling up with ideas like maintaining funding for food stamps, beefing up programs that help poor blacks in Mississippi and even supporting the Voting Rights Act. 'Absolutely we have expectations,' Rep Marcia Fudge (D-Ohio) said in an interview." Cochran's strategy pulled him further left, but as commentator Star Parker pointed out, Chris McDaniel could have countered with the same strategy, stressing the message of Liberty to the state's black community. "In Mississippi's huge black population are many conservative black pastors who want freedom for their flocks," Parker wrote. More...Comment | Share
For more, visit Right Hooks.
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Don't Miss Patriot Humor
Here's yesterday's edition, Credit.If you'd like to receive Patriot Humor by email, update your subscription here.
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RIGHT ANALYSIS
Hobby Lobby Truth and Fiction
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At issue was the fact that certain elements of the Department of Health and Human Services contraceptive coverage mandate conflicted with the company owners' religious beliefs. The elements in question focused not on all contraceptive devices that prevent conception, but on abortifacients -- devices and medications that destroy an embryo in the earliest stages of conception. Hobby Lobby maintained their religious beliefs against abortion were infringed by HHS coercion.
The majority of justices agreed with this assessment, noting that the HHS provision ran against the 1993 Religious Freedom Restoration Act (RFRA) -- introduced by Chuck Schumer and signed by Bill Clinton, by the way -- which says the government may not "substantially burden a person's exercise of religion" without a compelling justification that it has used "the least restrictive means" available. Justice Samuel Alito wrote the majority opinion, saying, "The government has failed to satisfy RFRA's least-restrictive-means standard. HHS has not shown that it lacks other means of achieving its desired goal without imposing a substantial burden on the exercise of religion."
The Court shut down HHS's ability to force private companies to adopt its broad contraceptive mandate, but the ruling also left the door open for Congress or HHS to shift the burden for contraception coverage to all taxpayers rather than private employers. Not exactly good news. Sure, the Hyde Amendment prevents federal funding for abortion, but there is no such restriction on individual states. Seventeen states currently fund abortions under their Medicaid programs, and Medicaid-funded abortions have increased consistently over the last five years. Angry that you may be called upon to pay for abortion? Well, if you live in New York, California or 15 other states spread across the country, then you probably already do.
There is no shortage of misleading reporting claiming the Supreme Court ruling denies access to contraception coverage for women. Nothing could be further from the truth. In fact, Burwell v. Hobby Lobby may even lead to legislation or another executive diktat from Barack Obama that would provide free and total contraception and abortifacient coverage for women seeking such services but denied by their employer-provided insurance. Such an action could set up more legal challenges down the road. The bottom line is, one way or another, leftists want taxpayers to shoulder the burden for their social engineering, and they'll do whatever they deem necessary to make that happen.
While the Hobby Lobby ruling made big news, it hasn't fundamentally changed the culture war battlefield. Only closely held companies -- those at least 50% owned by five or fewer people -- can take advantage of the Supreme Court's ruling. This does encompass more than 90% of American companies, though.
Predictably, leftists are spewing outrage. House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) called the decision "a gross violation of workers' religious rights." And her blathering is a gross misrepresentation of the case. She added, "SCOTUS took an outrageous step against women’s rights, setting a dangerous precedent that permits corporations to choose which laws to obey." Wrong. It's the Obama administration that picks and chooses which laws to obey.
Hillary Clinton lamented that "employers can impose their religious beliefs on their employees," something she called a "slippery slope." Again, the Supreme Court relied in part on the law her husband signed. But worse, Clinton compared the ruling to abuse of women occurring in countries that are "unstable, anti-democratic and, frankly, prone to extremism." In other words, employing a woman but asking her to pay for what happens in her own bedroom is just like female genital mutilation or subjugation in the Third World. War on Women™.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) claimed big corporations will "deny women access to basic care based on vague moral objections." First, the moral objection isn't "vague," it's specific to paying for taking the life of an unborn child. Second, no one is denying women access to basic care because access was never at issue.
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) cried, "It's time that five men on the Supreme Court stop deciding what happens to women." Well, HHS was the entity that arbitrarily decided to make that call. The contraception mandate wasn't even part of the original ObamaCare law.
Oh, and by the way, Hobby Lobby covers 16 different kinds of contraception.
In part to rebut all this nonsense, Hobby Lobby attorney Lori Windham said, "Hobby Lobby would love to stay out of this, and leave this decision to a woman and her doctor. It's the federal government that told them that they had to be involved and cover these things." Indeed, when the federal government takes over one-sixth of the U.S. economy and starts arbitrarily defining what happens in that sector, there is bound to be infringement on many liberties. While the Supreme Court utterly failed in its duty to stop the law as a whole two years ago, at least they got this one right.
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Home Caregivers Don't Owe Public Union Dues
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Read the rest here.
For more, visit Right Analysis.
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TOP 5 RIGHT OPINION COLUMNS
- Mona Charen: Scope for Conscience
- Thomas Sowell: America's Birthday
- Stephen Moore: Why Not Boost Teen Employment With a Training Wage?
- Burt Prelutsky: The Cesspool at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
- Dennis Prager: Why the Left's Preoccupation With the Redskins?
OPINION IN BRIEF
Syndicated columnist Charley Reese (1937-2013): "Gun control by definition affects only honest people. When a politician tells you he wants to forbid you from owning a firearm or force you to get a license, he is telling you he doesn’t trust you. That’s an insult. ... Gun control is not about guns or crime. It is about an elite that fears and despises the common people."Columnist Mona Charen: "Hobby Lobby provided coverage for 18 different methods of birth control. What both the Greens and the Hahns objected to were the regulations promulgated by the Department of Health and Human Services that would have required them, on pain of severe fines, to cover four more methods, including the morning after pill, that the litigants (and not just they) consider abortifacients. No matter how many times the press calls this a case about contraception, the truth is that it was about abortion. ... The HHS regulations exempted some corporations from the regulations, including churches, some nonprofits and the 'exclusively religious activities of any religious order.' Religion, the government essentially argued, was something that people do on Sunday mornings or in specifically religious organizations like Catholic Charities. But a for-profit corporation, the government argued, could not possibly 'exercise religion.' ... Hobby Lobby, for example, would have incurred fines of up to $475 million per year."
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Economist Thomas Sowell: "All that matters to people like Nancy Pelosi is the symbolism of welcoming the oppressed, especially if they represent more votes for Democrats, who will shower the taxpayers' money on them. As if to make clear the elite's contempt for ordinary Americans' intelligence, President Obama tells us that the people crossing the border 'love' America. How could he possibly know that, any more than he could know how to 'invest' the taxpayers' money in 'the industries of the future,' which have in fact gone bankrupt? What is involved are not just bad policy choices. What is involved are policies imposed unilaterally by the president, in defiance of Congress' authority to legislate and in contempt of the Constitution's separation of powers -- on which all our freedoms ultimately depend."
Fred Thompson: "Asked to name the best perk of being White House Press Secretary, Josh Earnest says 'probably the parking spot.' Conveniently located right next to the bus Obama will one day throw him under."
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
Nate Jackson for The Patriot Post Editorial Team
Join us in daily prayer for our Patriots in uniform -- Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen -- standing in harm's way in defense of Liberty, and for their families.
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