Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Fear the Tea Partiers

Opinion 1.0

Democrat pundits don't know what to do about those pesky tea partiers. This type of grassroots organizations are not like anything in their democrat playbook. Tea Partiers have transcended through ethnic, religious and political lines. They know we are not necessarily in the republican party. Many of us are independents waiting for real conservative leadership and core values. This is what is so confusing for the liberal left. They have never had an organization as strong and persistant asnd without one leader. As of late, many left wing anti-tea party groups are popping up on the grid. Theteapartyisover.org is a conglomerate of legal money laundering 527's basically ran by two left wing lawyers, Craig Varoga and George Rakis who conveniently use a mailing address in Washington, DC (with the other crooks) laundering millions of dollars from labor unions and other democrat leaning entities. AFSCME, SEIU, Teamsters, NEA, United Food & Commercial Workers Union have contributed gazillions. Here are some of the organizations derived  from these notorious liberals.
 The American Public Policy Committee
-Patriot Majority
-Citizens for Progress
-Oklahoma Freedom Fund
-Mid Atlantic Leadership Fund 
-Public Security Now
-Pioneer Majority
-Bluegrass Freedom Fund
You will be seeing commercials plotting against the Tea Partiers. This is our opportunity to exploit these legal, however, dishonest entities. Let's make Thomas Crafts, Samuel Cooper, George Hewes, David Kinnison, Thomas Melvill & Paul Revere happy a couple of hundred years later.

Tea Party Protest:
 

Extremists gone wild on 'green' energy bill



Former domestic terrorist, communist, socialist-party founder all contribute


Posted: February 09, 2010


9:17 pm Eastern


By Aaron Klein


© 2010 WorldNetDaily


Apollo Alliance co-founder Jeff Jones


The Apollo Alliance, whose board members include a slew of radicals, was instrumental in helping draft a "clean technology" bill being pushed by U.S. senators, WND has learned.


The Investments for Manufacturing Progress and Clean Technology Act of 2009, or IMPACT, was sponsored by Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, and is also being promoted by Sen. Debbie Stabenow, D-Mich. The act seeks to establish a $30 billion revolving loan fund to help small and mid-sized manufacturers retool their factories to produce "clean technologies" and become more energy efficient.


The Apollo Alliance has boasted in promotional material the act was based on the group's recently published "GreenMAP" or Green Manufacturing Action Plan, which laid out aggressive steps to scale up production of American-made clean energy systems and components while making U.S. factories more energy efficient.


When Brown formally introduced the act in June, he was reportedly joined by Apollo Alliance Chairman Phil Angelides and other notable business, labor and "clean energy" leaders.


"Global Warming or Global Governance? What the media refuse to tell you about so-called climate change"


"Without a program to support our own domestic manufacturers, policies that create new demand for clean energy will just lead to more imports," Angelides told reporters alongside Brown.


"It is critical that Congress enact legislation that provides direct and substantial investment in clean energy component manufacturing to ensure that jobs are created in the U.S.," Angelides said.


wn commented, "We can revive American manufacturing through investment in clean energy. This bill will help our manufacturers retool, put our auto suppliers back to work and produce clean energy technologies."


The Green Collar Association, a clearinghouse that supports green collar job growth through education and training, reported that shortly after Apollo's GreenMAP report was released in April 2009, Brown and Stabenow asked the Apollo Alliance to help them draft model clean energy manufacturing policies based on the report's recommendations.


The Apollo Alliance has been instrumental in helping draft key policies of the Obama administration. It was previously reported Apollo helped craft portions of the $787 billion "stimulus" bill signed into law by Obama.


Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said in mid-2009: "The Apollo Alliance has been an important factor in helping us [the U.S. Senate] develop and execute a strategy that makes great progress on these goals and in motivating the public to support them."


Discover the Networks notes that in July, Reid and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi appointed Apollo Alliance Chairman Angelides to serve as chairman of the newly created Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission.


Apollo Alliance claims it was founded in the aftermath of the 9/11 attacks "to catalyze a clean energy revolution in America."


Among its board members are a grouping of radicals, including:


Van Jones, President Obama's controversial former "green jobs czar" who resigned in September after it was exposed he founded a communist revolutionary organization and signed a statement that accused the Bush administration of possible involvement in the 9/11 attacks. Jones also called for "resistance" against the U.S.


Green For All, a group co-founded by Jones, is a formal backer of Brown's IMPACT Act.


Jones himself decried the Apollo Alliance mission as "sort of a grand unified field theory for progressive left causes."


Joel Rogers, a founder of the socialist New Party. WND reported evidence indicating Obama was a New Party member. In an interview with WND, New Party co-founder and Marxist activist Carl Davidson previously recounted Obama's participation with the New Party.


Jeff Jones, a founder of the Weather Underground domestic terrorist group who spent time on the run from law enforcement agencies while his group carried out a series of bombings of U.S. government buildings.


Jones joined the Students for a Democratic Society, or SDS, from which the Weathermen splintered in the fall of 1965. Two years later, he became the SDS' New York City regional director, a position in which he participated in nearly all of the group's major protests until 1969, including the 1968 Columbia University protests and the violent riots that same year at the Democratic National Convention.


In 1969, Jones founded the Weathermen with terrorists William Ayers and Mark Rudd when the three signed an infamous statement calling for a revolution against the American government inside and outside the country to fight and defeat what the group called U.S. imperialism. President Obama came under fire for his longtime, extensive association with Ayers.


Jones was a main leader and orchestrator of what became known as the Days of Rage, a series of violent riots in Chicago organized by the Weathermen. The culmination of the riots came when he gave a signal for rowdy protestors to target a hotel that was the home of a local judge presiding over a trial of anti-war activists.


Jones went underground after he failed to appear for a March 1970 court date to face charges of "crossing state lines to foment a riot and conspiring to do so." He moved to San Francisco with Ayers' wife, Bernardine Dohrn. That year, at least one bombing claimed by the Weathermen went off in Jones' locale at the Presidio Army base.


Jones' Weathermen took credit for multiple bombings of U.S. government buildings, including attacks against the U.S. Capitol March 1, 1971; the Pentagon May 19, 1972, and a 1975 bombing of the State Department building.


With research by Brenda J. Elliott


Quote du jour:
He who knows does not speak.

He who speaks does not know.
Lao-tzu, The Way of Lao-tzu

Writings of Our Founding Fathers
Federalist Papers




Federalist No. 17


The Same Subject Continued: The Insufficiency of the Present Confederation to Preserve the Union


For the Independent Journal.


Tuesday, December 4, 1787.


Author: Alexander Hamilton


To the People of the State of New York:


AN OBJECTION, of a nature different from that which has been stated and answered, in my last address, may perhaps be likewise urged against the principle of legislation for the individual citizens of America. It may be said that it would tend to render the government of the Union too powerful, and to enable it to absorb those residuary authorities, which it might be judged proper to leave with the States for local purposes. Allowing the utmost latitude to the love of power which any reasonable man can require, I confess I am at a loss to discover what temptation the persons intrusted with the administration of the general government could ever feel to divest the States of the authorities of that description. The regulation of the mere domestic police of a State appears to me to hold out slender allurements to ambition. Commerce, finance, negotiation, and war seem to comprehend all the objects which have charms for minds governed by that passion; and all the powers necessary to those objects ought, in the first instance, to be lodged in the national depository. The administration of private justice between the citizens of the same State, the supervision of agriculture and of other concerns of a similar nature, all those things, in short, which are proper to be provided for by local legislation, can never be desirable cares of a general jurisdiction. It is therefore improbable that there should exist a disposition in the federal councils to usurp the powers with which they are connected; because the attempt to exercise those powers would be as troublesome as it would be nugatory; and the possession of them, for that reason, would contribute nothing to the dignity, to the importance, or to the splendor of the national government.


But let it be admitted, for argument's sake, that mere wantonness and lust of domination would be sufficient to beget that disposition; still it may be safely affirmed, that the sense of the constituent body of the national representatives, or, in other words, the people of the several States, would control the indulgence of so extravagant an appetite. It will always be far more easy for the State governments to encroach upon the national authorities than for the national government to encroach upon the State authorities. The proof of this proposition turns upon the greater degree of influence which the State governments if they administer their affairs with uprightness and prudence, will generally possess over the people; a circumstance which at the same time teaches us that there is an inherent and intrinsic weakness in all federal constitutions; and that too much pains cannot be taken in their organization, to give them all the force which is compatible with the principles of liberty.


The superiority of influence in favor of the particular governments would result partly from the diffusive construction of the national government, but chiefly from the nature of the objects to which the attention of the State administrations would be directed.


It is a known fact in human nature, that its affections are commonly weak in proportion to the distance or diffusiveness of the object. Upon the same principle that a man is more attached to his family than to his neighborhood, to his neighborhood than to the community at large, the people of each State would be apt to feel a stronger bias towards their local governments than towards the government of the Union; unless the force of that principle should be destroyed by a much better administration of the latter.


This strong propensity of the human heart would find powerful auxiliaries in the objects of State regulation.


The variety of more minute interests, which will necessarily fall under the superintendence of the local administrations, and which will form so many rivulets of influence, running through every part of the society, cannot be particularized, without involving a detail too tedious and uninteresting to compensate for the instruction it might afford.


There is one transcendant advantage belonging to the province of the State governments, which alone suffices to place the matter in a clear and satisfactory light,--I mean the ordinary administration of criminal and civil justice. This, of all others, is the most powerful, most universal, and most attractive source of popular obedience and attachment. It is that which, being the immediate and visible guardian of life and property, having its benefits and its terrors in constant activity before the public eye, regulating all those personal interests and familiar concerns to which the sensibility of individuals is more immediately awake, contributes, more than any other circumstance, to impressing upon the minds of the people, affection, esteem, and reverence towards the government. This great cement of society, which will diffuse itself almost wholly through the channels of the particular governments, independent of all other causes of influence, would insure them so decided an empire over their respective citizens as to render them at all times a complete counterpoise, and, not unfrequently, dangerous rivals to the power of the Union.


The operations of the national government, on the other hand, falling less immediately under the observation of the mass of the citizens, the benefits derived from it will chiefly be perceived and attended to by speculative men. Relating to more general interests, they will be less apt to come home to the feelings of the people; and, in proportion, less likely to inspire an habitual sense of obligation, and an active sentiment of attachment.


The reasoning on this head has been abundantly exemplified by the experience of all federal constitutions with which we are acquainted, and of all others which have borne the least analogy to them.


Though the ancient feudal systems were not, strictly speaking, confederacies, yet they partook of the nature of that species of association. There was a common head, chieftain, or sovereign, whose authority extended over the whole nation; and a number of subordinate vassals, or feudatories, who had large portions of land allotted to them, and numerous trains of INFERIOR vassals or retainers, who occupied and cultivated that land upon the tenure of fealty or obedience, to the persons of whom they held it. Each principal vassal was a kind of sovereign, within his particular demesnes. The consequences of this situation were a continual opposition to authority of the sovereign, and frequent wars between the great barons or chief feudatories themselves. The power of the head of the nation was commonly too weak, either to preserve the public peace, or to protect the people against the oppressions of their immediate lords. This period of European affairs is emphatically styled by historians, the times of feudal anarchy.


When the sovereign happened to be a man of vigorous and warlike temper and of superior abilities, he would acquire a personal weight and influence, which answered, for the time, the purpose of a more regular authority. But in general, the power of the barons triumphed over that of the prince; and in many instances his dominion was entirely thrown off, and the great fiefs were erected into independent principalities or States. In those instances in which the monarch finally prevailed over his vassals, his success was chiefly owing to the tyranny of those vassals over their dependents. The barons, or nobles, equally the enemies of the sovereign and the oppressors of the common people, were dreaded and detested by both; till mutual danger and mutual interest effected a union between them fatal to the power of the aristocracy. Had the nobles, by a conduct of clemency and justice, preserved the fidelity and devotion of their retainers and followers, the contests between them and the prince must almost always have ended in their favor, and in the abridgment or subversion of the royal authority.


This is not an assertion founded merely in speculation or conjecture. Among other illustrations of its truth which might be cited, Scotland will furnish a cogent example. The spirit of clanship which was, at an early day, introduced into that kingdom, uniting the nobles and their dependants by ties equivalent to those of kindred, rendered the aristocracy a constant overmatch for the power of the monarch, till the incorporation with England subdued its fierce and ungovernable spirit, and reduced it within those rules of subordination which a more rational and more energetic system of civil polity had previously established in the latter kingdom.


The separate governments in a confederacy may aptly be compared with the feudal baronies; with this advantage in their favor, that from the reasons already explained, they will generally possess the confidence and good-will of the people, and with so important a support, will be able effectually to oppose all encroachments of the national government. It will be well if they are not able to counteract its legitimate and necessary authority. The points of similitude consist in the rivalship of power, applicable to both, and in the CONCENTRATION of large portions of the strength of the community into particular DEPOSITS, in one case at the disposal of individuals, in the other case at the disposal of political bodies.


A concise review of the events that have attended confederate governments will further illustrate this important doctrine; an inattention to which has been the great source of our political mistakes, and has given our jealousy a direction to the wrong side. This review shall form the subject of some ensuing papers.


PUBLIUS.


References:
http://www.hotair.com/
http://www.wnd.com/
http://www.thehill.com/
http://www.newsmax.com/
http://www.drudgereport.com/
http://www.americanspectator.com/
http://www.youtube.com/
http://www.quotationspage.com/
Library of Congress/Federalist Papers
Aaron Klein

 

Tuesday, February 9, 2010

Why I live in Maryland?



Opinion 1.0

Needless to say, this has been one hell of a winter, so far. My neighbors and I shoveled for four days trying to burrow a rodent's hole off our street after receiving thirty inches of snowfall. Today, we are receiving anywhere from ten to twenty inches more to add insult to injury. The only reason we live here is JOBS. Otherwise, we would be living somewhere warm. Why am I complaining? Is it because I've been in opposition to Anthropogenic Global Warming  (AGW). I written many times about how I thought this whole climate change hoax was about wealth, taxes and money v. actual and viable climate issues. Now, our Lord and Savior is showing his (or her) might by sprinkling us with the white stuff. As I was driving home in the snow, I heard on the radio that President Obama is initiating a new "Climate Office" within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Peeing more taxpayer money away, just like Michelle's "War on Obesity" campaign. How much taxpayer funds will that cost us? She will need a seperate staff for this adventure. Will she still eat french fries? But I digressed. The Maryland State snow removal budget is a forgone conclusion, especially with this latest storm. We are not accustomed to heavy snow winters. I think it was 1996 since the last blizzard. As of Tuesday, President Obama has nominated a "Blizzard czar" who will assume the responsibilities of the "Rain czar" in the Spring. If there is a bright spot in this hellacious winter, the snow shuts down the federal government. That keeps them from screwing more important business. I hope I win the "Al Gore Snowman Contest." For now, I am headed out in the driveway, trying to get a jump on the snow, dreaming of the days I lived in the Carribbean.
My House:



The Fundamental Transformation of America...


By Matt Bruce
11/19/09
06:32 PM EDT

When Obama wrote a book and said he was mentored as a youth by Frank, (Frank Marshall Davis) an avowed Communist. People said it didn't matter...

When it was discovered that his grandparents, were strong socialists, sent Obama's mother to a socialist school, introduced Frank Marshall Davis to young Obama, People said it didn't matter...

When people found out that he was enrolled as a Muslim child in school and his father and step father were both Muslims, People said it didn't matter...

When he wrote in another book he authored “I will stand with them (Muslims) should the political winds shift in an ugly direction". People said it didn't matter...

When he admittedly, in his book, said he chose Marxist friends and professors in college, People said it didn't matter...

When he traveled to Pakistan, after college on an unknown national passport, People said it didn't matter...

When he sought the endorsement of the Marxist party in 1996 as he ran for the Illinois Senate, People said it doesn't matter...

When he sat in a Chicago Church for twenty years and listened to a preacher spew hatred for America and preach black liberation theology, People said it didn't matter...

When an independent Washington organization, that tracks senate voting records, gave him the distinctive title as the "most liberal senator", People said it didn't matter...

When the Palestinians in Gaza, set up a fund raising telethon to raise money for his election campaign, People said it didn't matter...

When his voting record supported gun control, People said it didn't matter...

When he refused to disclose who donated money to his election campaign, as other candidates had done, People said it didn't matter...

When he received endorsements from people like Louis Farrakhan and Mummar Kaddafi and Hugo Chavez, People said it didn't matter...

When it was pointed out that he was a total, newcomer and had absolutely no experience at anything except community organizing, People said it didn't matter...

When he chose friends and acquaintances such as Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn who were revolutionary radicals, People said it didn't matter...

When his voting record in the Illinois senate and in the U.S. Senate came into question, People said it didn't matter...

When he refused to wear a flag, lapel pin and did so only after a public outcry, People said it didn't matter...

When people started treating him as a Messiah and children in schools were taught to sing his praises, People said it didn't matter...

When he stood with his hands over his groin area for the playing of the National Anthem and Pledge of Allegiance, People said it didn't matter...

When he surrounded himself in the White house with advisors who were pro gun control, pro abortion, pro homosexual marriage, anti-capitalism, anti-free markets, pro government control over everything and wanting to curtail freedom of speech to silence the opposition, People said it didn't matter...

When he aired his views on abortion, homosexuality and a host of other issues, People said it didn't matter...

When he said he favors sex education in Kindergarten, including homosexual indoctrination, People said it didn't matter...

When his background was either scrubbed or hidden and nothing could be found about him, People said it didn't matter...

When his first act as President, literally within 5 minutes of taking office, he signed executive order #13489 that sealed his own records, People said it didn’t matter...

When the place of his birth was called into question, and he refused to produce a birth certificate, and continues to spend millions in court to keep the material sealed, People said it didn't matter...

When he had an association in Chicago with Tony Rezco, a man of questionable character, who is now in prison and had helped Obama to a sweet deal on the purchase of his home, People said it didn't matter...

When it became known that George Soros, a multi-billionaire Marxist, spent a ton of money to get him elected, People said it didn't matter...

When he started appointing czars that were radicals, revolutionaries, and even avowed Marxist/Communist, People said it didn't matter...

When he stood before the nation and told us that his intentions were to "fundamentally transform this nation" into something else, People said it didn't matter...

When it became known that he had trained ACORN workers in Chicago and served as an attorney for ACORN, People said it didn't matter...

When he appointed a cabinet members and several advisors who were tax cheats and socialist, People said it didn't matter...

When he appointed a science czar, John Holdren, who believes in forced abortions, mass sterilizations and seizing babies from teen mothers, People said it didn't matter...

When he appointed Cass Sunstein as regulatory czar and he believes in "Explicit Consent", harvesting human organs without family consent, and to allow animals to be represented in court, while banning all hunting, People said it didn't matter...

When he appointed Kevin Jennings, an overt homosexual, and organizer of a group called gay, lesbian, straight, education network, as safe school czar and it became known that he had a history of bad advice to teenagers, People said it didn't matter...

When he appointed Mark Lloyd as diversity czar and he believed in curtailing free speech, taking from one and giving to another to spread the wealth and admires Hugo Chavez, People said it didn't matter...

When Valerie Jarrett was selected as Obama's senior White House advisor and she is an avowed Socialist, People said it didn't matter...

When Anita Dunn, White House Communications director said Mao Tse Tung was her favorite philosopher and the person she turned to most for inspiration, People said it didn't matter...

When he appointed Carol Browner as global warming czar, and she is a well known socialist working on Cap and trade as the nation’s largest tax hike in history, People said it doesn't matter...

When he appointed Van Jones, an ex-con and avowed Communist as green energy czar, who since had to resign when this was made known, People said it didn't matter...

When Tom Daschle, Obama's pick for health and human services secretary could not be confirmed, because he was a tax cheat, People said it didn't matter...

When as president of the United States, he bowed to the King of Saudi Arabia, People said it didn't matter...

When he traveled around the world criticizing America and never once talking of her greatness, People said it didn't matter...

When his actions concerning the middle-east seemed to support the Palestinians over Israel, our long time friend, People said it doesn't matter...

When he took American tax dollars to resettle thousands of Palestinians from Gaza to the United States , People said it doesn't matter...

When he upset our European allies by removing plans for a missile defense system against the Russians, People said it doesn't matter...

When he played politics in Afghanistan by not sending troops the Field Commanders said we had to have to win, People said it didn't matter...

When he started spending us into a debt that was so big we could not pay it off, People said it didn't matter...

When he took a huge spending bill under the guise of stimulus and used it to pay off organizations, unions and individuals that got him elected, People said it didn't matter...

When he forced the takeover of insurance companies, car companies, banks, etc, People said it didn't matter...

When he took away student loans from the banks and put it through the government, People said it didn't matter...

When he designed plans to take over the health care system and put it under government control, People said it didn't matter...

When he set into motion a plan to take over the control of all energy resources in the United States through Cap and Trade, People said it didn't matter...

When he announced he was returning the masterminds of 9-11 to New York City to stand trial as ordinary criminals -- not war criminals -- and thus allow them the benefits from our system of jurisprudence, The mainstream media loved it and the people said it didn't matter...(Oh really? Go ask an FDNY FF, NYPD Cop, NY EMS, NY Port Authority Cop or Transit Worker, or a 9/11 Families member who was at the World Trade Center 9/11/2001 and see if it matters...)

When he finally completed his transformation of America into a Socialist State, people finally woke up, but it was too late...

Any one of these things, in and of themselves does not really matter. But when you add them up one by one you get a phenomenal score that points to the fact that our Obama is determined to make America over into a Marxist/Socialist society. All of the items in the preceding paragraphs have been put into place. All can be documented very easily. Before you disavow this, do an internet search. The last paragraph alone is not yet cast in stone. You and I will write that paragraph. Will it read as above or will it be a more happy ending for most of America ? Personally, I like happy endings...

If you are an Obama Supporter, please recognize that you have elected a president who is a 'socialist'. There is simply no debate about these facts. But you need to seek the truth; you will be richer for it. Don't just belittle the opposition. Search for the truth. I did. Democrats, Republicans, Independents, Constitutionalist, Libertarians and what have you, we all need to pull together. We all must pull together or watch the demise of a society that we all love and cherish. If you are a religious person, pray for our nation...

Never before in the history of America have we been confronted with problems so huge that the very existence of our country is in jeopardy. Don't rely on most television news and what you read in the newspapers for the truth. Search the internet. Yes, there is a lot of bad information, lies and distortions there as well, but you are smart enough to spot the fallacies. Newspapers are a dying breed. They are currently seeking a bailout from the government. Do you really think they are about to print the truth? Obama praises all the television news networks except Fox who he is currently waging an open war against. There must be a reason. He does not call them down on any specifics, and he has failed to refute any facts presented – because it is all true. If they lie, he should call them out on it but he doesn't. Please, find the truth, it will set you free...

Our biggest enemy is not China, Russia or Iran; no, our biggest enemy is the current contingent of politicians in Washington DC led by the Progressive Left Liberals who support the previously mentioned things...

Wake Up America! There's still time in 2010 to take back America and send a message LOUD and CLEAR to those who think 'it doesn't matter'...

I happen to think 'it does matter'...

God Bless America!

Matt Bruce

An American Independent Conservative Who Thinks 'It Matters'...

Thanks,


'Matt'

Matt Bruce
Host Of:
"The Captain's AMERICA Radio Show" - Weekday Mornings 6-9 AM ET On 1220 WSRQ Radio...
Heard On AM 1220 & FM 106.9 WSRQ Radio In Sarasota, FL...
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Check Out: News Sarasota.com, Net Talk World.com, The Captain's AMERICA.com, Troop Talk.Talkspot.com & WSRQ Radio.com websites ...
God Bless America & All Those Who Defend Us Keeping All of Us FREE & SAFE"...

Daft Statement of the day:
"Stop whining"
Arizona Senator John Kyl to President Obama

Green Piece:

The Ruse Unravels



Posted 02/03/2010 06:15 PM ET


Climate Change: Not long ago, we were pestered almost daily with another global warming scare. But the weather has changed. Now, it seems, each sunrise comes with fresh evidence that the scare is a fraud.


The latest setback for global warm-mongers is a probe conducted by the British Guardian newspaper, which discovered a prominent climate scientist "sought to hide problems in key temperature data on which some of his work was based."


The Guardian, which has a history of pumping the global warming scare, looked over the leaked e-mail exchanges from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia and "found evidence that a series of measurements from Chinese weather stations were seriously flawed and that documents relating to them could not be produced."


At the center is the familiar Phil Jones, the CRU director who's been temporarily relieved of his duties. He and the University at Albany's Wei-Chyung Wang, named as a collaborator by the Guardian, are accused of making "apparent attempts to cover up problems with temperature data from the Chinese weather stations."


These data, the Guardian reported Monday, "provide the first link between the e-mail scandal and the U.N.'s embattled climate science body, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, as a paper based on the measurements was used to bolster IPCC statements about rapid global warming in recent decades."


Researchers apparently failed to provide as a matter of public record the location history of 49 of the 84 Chinese weather stations used to generate the data. Jones and Wang are also thought to have neglected to consider the movement of Chinese weather stations. They failed as well to adjust for the heat-island effect in stations that had been in rural regions but are now in urban areas.


"The story has a startling postscript," says the Guardian. "In 2008, Jones prepared a paper for the Journal of Geophysical Research re-examining temperatures in eastern China. It found that, far from being negligible, the urban heat phenomenon was responsible for 40% of the warming seen in eastern China between 1951 and 2004."


A day later, the Guardian continued the serial reporting of its e-mail probe, this time focusing on the researchers' efforts to suppress the work of skeptics and critics. Again, Jones plays a central role.


Fred Pearce wrote in Tuesday's edition that Jones "was regularly asked to review papers and he sometimes wrote critical reviews that may have had the effect of blackballing papers (criticizing) his work." Jones also vowed to keep skeptical papers out of "the next IPCC report ... even if we have to redefine what the peer review literature is!"


Polls we can live by:
27% Strongly approve of Obama's job performance
40% Strongly disapprove
-13%
47% Somewhat approve
53% Somewhat disapprove
75% Are angry at Government's current policies (Duh!)
General Ballot: Republicans 44% Democrats 36% (Change you can believe in)


Quote du jour:
"All human situations have their inconveniences. We feel those of the present but neither see nor feel those of the future; and hence we often make troublesome changes without amendment, and frequently for the worse."

Benjamin Franklin


Writings of Our Founding Fathers
Federalist Papers



Federalist No. 16


The Same Subject Continued: The Insufficiency of the Present Confederation to Preserve the Union


From the New York Packet.


Tuesday, December 4, 1787.


Author: Alexander Hamilton


To the People of the State of New York:


THE tendency of the principle of legislation for States, or communities, in their political capacities, as it has been exemplified by the experiment we have made of it, is equally attested by the events which have befallen all other governments of the confederate kind, of which we have any account, in exact proportion to its prevalence in those systems. The confirmations of this fact will be worthy of a distinct and particular examination. I shall content myself with barely observing here, that of all the confederacies of antiquity, which history has handed down to us, the Lycian and Achaean leagues, as far as there remain vestiges of them, appear to have been most free from the fetters of that mistaken principle, and were accordingly those which have best deserved, and have most liberally received, the applauding suffrages of political writers.


This exceptionable principle may, as truly as emphatically, be styled the parent of anarchy: It has been seen that delinquencies in the members of the Union are its natural and necessary offspring; and that whenever they happen, the only constitutional remedy is force, and the immediate effect of the use of it, civil war.


It remains to inquire how far so odious an engine of government, in its application to us, would even be capable of answering its end. If there should not be a large army constantly at the disposal of the national government it would either not be able to employ force at all, or, when this could be done, it would amount to a war between parts of the Confederacy concerning the infractions of a league, in which the strongest combination would be most likely to prevail, whether it consisted of those who supported or of those who resisted the general authority. It would rarely happen that the delinquency to be redressed would be confined to a single member, and if there were more than one who had neglected their duty, similarity of situation would induce them to unite for common defense. Independent of this motive of sympathy, if a large and influential State should happen to be the aggressing member, it would commonly have weight enough with its neighbors to win over some of them as associates to its cause. Specious arguments of danger to the common liberty could easily be contrived; plausible excuses for the deficiencies of the party could, without difficulty, be invented to alarm the apprehensions, inflame the passions, and conciliate the good-will, even of those States which were not chargeable with any violation or omission of duty. This would be the more likely to take place, as the delinquencies of the larger members might be expected sometimes to proceed from an ambitious premeditation in their rulers, with a view to getting rid of all external control upon their designs of personal aggrandizement; the better to effect which it is presumable they would tamper beforehand with leading individuals in the adjacent States. If associates could not be found at home, recourse would be had to the aid of foreign powers, who would seldom be disinclined to encouraging the dissensions of a Confederacy, from the firm union of which they had so much to fear. When the sword is once drawn, the passions of men observe no bounds of moderation. The suggestions of wounded pride, the instigations of irritated resentment, would be apt to carry the States against which the arms of the Union were exerted, to any extremes necessary to avenge the affront or to avoid the disgrace of submission. The first war of this kind would probably terminate in a dissolution of the Union.


This may be considered as the violent death of the Confederacy. Its more natural death is what we now seem to be on the point of experiencing, if the federal system be not speedily renovated in a more substantial form. It is not probable, considering the genius of this country, that the complying States would often be inclined to support the authority of the Union by engaging in a war against the non-complying States. They would always be more ready to pursue the milder course of putting themselves upon an equal footing with the delinquent members by an imitation of their example. And the guilt of all would thus become the security of all. Our past experience has exhibited the operation of this spirit in its full light. There would, in fact, be an insuperable difficulty in ascertaining when force could with propriety be employed. In the article of pecuniary contribution, which would be the most usual source of delinquency, it would often be impossible to decide whether it had proceeded from disinclination or inability. The pretense of the latter would always be at hand. And the case must be very flagrant in which its fallacy could be detected with sufficient certainty to justify the harsh expedient of compulsion. It is easy to see that this problem alone, as often as it should occur, would open a wide field for the exercise of factious views, of partiality, and of oppression, in the majority that happened to prevail in the national council.


It seems to require no pains to prove that the States ought not to prefer a national Constitution which could only be kept in motion by the instrumentality of a large army continually on foot to execute the ordinary requisitions or decrees of the government. And yet this is the plain alternative involved by those who wish to deny it the power of extending its operations to individuals. Such a scheme, if practicable at all, would instantly degenerate into a military despotism; but it will be found in every light impracticable. The resources of the Union would not be equal to the maintenance of an army considerable enough to confine the larger States within the limits of their duty; nor would the means ever be furnished of forming such an army in the first instance. Whoever considers the populousness and strength of several of these States singly at the present juncture, and looks forward to what they will become, even at the distance of half a century, will at once dismiss as idle and visionary any scheme which aims at regulating their movements by laws to operate upon them in their collective capacities, and to be executed by a coercion applicable to them in the same capacities. A project of this kind is little less romantic than the monster-taming spirit which is attributed to the fabulous heroes and demi-gods of antiquity.


Even in those confederacies which have been composed of members smaller than many of our counties, the principle of legislation for sovereign States, supported by military coercion, has never been found effectual. It has rarely been attempted to be employed, but against the weaker members; and in most instances attempts to coerce the refractory and disobedient have been the signals of bloody wars, in which one half of the confederacy has displayed its banners against the other half.


The result of these observations to an intelligent mind must be clearly this, that if it be possible at any rate to construct a federal government capable of regulating the common concerns and preserving the general tranquillity, it must be founded, as to the objects committed to its care, upon the reverse of the principle contended for by the opponents of the proposed Constitution. It must carry its agency to the persons of the citizens. It must stand in need of no intermediate legislations; but must itself be empowered to employ the arm of the ordinary magistrate to execute its own resolutions. The majesty of the national authority must be manifested through the medium of the courts of justice. The government of the Union, like that of each State, must be able to address itself immediately to the hopes and fears of individuals; and to attract to its support those passions which have the strongest influence upon the human heart. It must, in short, possess all the means, and have aright to resort to all the methods, of executing the powers with which it is intrusted, that are possessed and exercised by the government of the particular States.


To this reasoning it may perhaps be objected, that if any State should be disaffected to the authority of the Union, it could at any time obstruct the execution of its laws, and bring the matter to the same issue of force, with the necessity of which the opposite scheme is reproached.


The pausibility of this objection will vanish the moment we advert to the essential difference between a mere NON-COMPLIANCE and a DIRECT and ACTIVE RESISTANCE. If the interposition of the State legislatures be necessary to give effect to a measure of the Union, they have only NOT TO ACT, or to ACT EVASIVELY, and the measure is defeated. This neglect of duty may be disguised under affected but unsubstantial provisions, so as not to appear, and of course not to excite any alarm in the people for the safety of the Constitution. The State leaders may even make a merit of their surreptitious invasions of it on the ground of some temporary convenience, exemption, or advantage.


But if the execution of the laws of the national government should not require the intervention of the State legislatures, if they were to pass into immediate operation upon the citizens themselves, the particular governments could not interrupt their progress without an open and violent exertion of an unconstitutional power. No omissions nor evasions would answer the end. They would be obliged to act, and in such a manner as would leave no doubt that they had encroached on the national rights. An experiment of this nature would always be hazardous in the face of a constitution in any degree competent to its own defense, and of a people enlightened enough to distinguish between a legal exercise and an illegal usurpation of authority. The success of it would require not merely a factious majority in the legislature, but the concurrence of the courts of justice and of the body of the people. If the judges were not embarked in a conspiracy with the legislature, they would pronounce the resolutions of such a majority to be contrary to the supreme law of the land, unconstitutional, and void. If the people were not tainted with the spirit of their State representatives, they, as the natural guardians of the Constitution, would throw their weight into the national scale and give it a decided preponderancy in the contest. Attempts of this kind would not often be made with levity or rashness, because they could seldom be made without danger to the authors, unless in cases of a tyrannical exercise of the federal authority.


If opposition to the national government should arise from the disorderly conduct of refractory or seditious individuals, it could be overcome by the same means which are daily employed against the same evil under the State governments. The magistracy, being equally the ministers of the law of the land, from whatever source it might emanate, would doubtless be as ready to guard the national as the local regulations from the inroads of private licentiousness. As to those partial commotions and insurrections, which sometimes disquiet society, from the intrigues of an inconsiderable faction, or from sudden or occasional illhumors that do not infect the great body of the community the general government could command more extensive resources for the suppression of disturbances of that kind than would be in the power of any single member. And as to those mortal feuds which, in certain conjunctures, spread a conflagration through a whole nation, or through a very large proportion of it, proceeding either from weighty causes of discontent given by the government or from the contagion of some violent popular paroxysm, they do not fall within any ordinary rules of calculation. When they happen, they commonly amount to revolutions and dismemberments of empire. No form of government can always either avoid or control them. It is in vain to hope to guard against events too mighty for human foresight or precaution, and it would be idle to object to a government because it could not perform impossibilities.


PUBLIUS.

References:
http://www.ibd.com/
http://www.hotair.com/
http://www.wnd.com/
http://www.redstate.com/
http://www.newsbusters.com/
http://www.youtube.com/
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/
Matt Bruce
http://www.climatedepot.com/
http://www.quotationspage.com/
Library of Congress/Federalist Papers

Monday, February 8, 2010

I'll meet you halfway, it's better than no way

Opinion 1.0

Simply put, Obama and his administration are looking for a scapegoat, someone to take the heat when Obamacare finally dies by the hand of the death panel. A recent Maris poll claims 44% approve and 47% disapprove of Obama's performance. Obama wants to meet with the republicans as much as I want to meet Obama. I feel this is nothing more than a photo op for Obama, so he can gloat to the press and give Robert (Peter Griffin) Gibbs something to talk about. Since Scott Brown won in Massachusetts, the democrats have been walking on egg shells. Even Pelosi has kept her cake hole shut. John Boehner and Eric Cantor Sent Rahm "Twinkle Toes" Emanuel a letter stating conditions before they meet. Three important points are starting over on healthcare reform, not using reconciliation and inviting lawmakers and officials from the states to participate in the discussions. Another story I read about was how Hugh Hewitt advised Boehner and McConnell a gameplan on the approach how to preface the meetings. Number one point was Tort reform, secondly was interstate marketing of insurance and thirdly, by enacting Congressman Paul Ryan's Roadmap to bring back our economy. Otherwise, do not meet with Obama or his conditions. It will turn out to be another lecture from the "anointed one" like a couple of weeks ago.  We are working towards the midterms and many of the democrats are getting rather nervous. I am stunned how Obama will not give up the doomed policies he tried to enact. Even Clinton got the message in 1994. Even if this comes to fruition, it will amount to nothing more than the Super Bowl of Political Theater. I don't think even the republicans believe Obamessiah is sincere by any means. I don't think he will give up anything. It's like his pathetic TV interviews, he just didn't explain clear enough. Right. With over 100 speeches on healthcare, I think we understand and we don't want government run healthcare. As I've said in many posts, I don't trust Reid/Pelosi (synonomous with Cloward/Piven?) Mr. Obama, less showmanship and more leadership. You are the President of the United States. Stop running a campaign.

Republicans after meeting Obama:


Obama Jedi Mind trick:


Daft Statement of the day:
'Government wants to be your one and only god'
Tea Party Patriots

Green Piece:

Saturday, February 06, 2010



House of Peers
Mark Steyn

As Jonah and I have written here previously, "climate change" is not only a scientific scandal but also a massive journalistic failure. While the "Canadian Journalism Project" continues to insist that dissenting from the orthodoxy is "irresponsible journalism," Matt Ridley at the Spectator acknowledges the reality:


Journalists are wont to moan that the slow death of newspapers will mean a disastrous loss of investigative reporting. The web is all very well, they say, but who will pay for the tenacious sniffing newshounds to flush out the real story? ‘Climategate’ proves the opposite to be true. It was amateur bloggers who scented the exaggerations, distortions and corruptions in the climate establishment; whereas newspaper reporters, even after the scandal broke, played poodle to their sources.


Mr. Ridley credits various British, Canadian, and American bloggers, and then makes this observation:


Notice that all of these sceptic bloggers are self-employed businessmen. Their strengths are networks and feedback: mistakes get quickly corrected; new leads are opened up; expertise is shared; links are made.


The correcting mechanisms of competitive businesses are largely alien to America's unreadable monodailies, which is why they'll be extinct long before the polar bear. As an example of what Matt Ridley's talking about, consider this piece designed to prop up the increasingly discredited IPCC from ABC Australia's Margot O'Neill. It's a simulacrum of reporting rather than the real thing. It has quotes from impressive sounding experts, but, as Mr. Ridley put it above, she is playing "poodle to her sources":


Here is how Queensland University's Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg, a world expert on coral reefs and climate change, describes what happened when he contributed a small slice of the 2007 IPCC report:


"The IPCC has one of the most rigorous review processes I have ever experienced. There are various stages of review. The first round involves the working groups picking over the text (hundreds of eyes and qualified expert opinions). If you have been involved in this process, it is a quite an experience which takes months and years - involving a lot of pedantic haggling over detail - but always using the peer-reviewed literature as the base . . ."


And on he yaks, in great detail. Like all the poodles of the environmental beat, Margot O'Neill repeats those magic words "peer review" every couple of paragraphs like a talisman to ward off evil deniers. But, in the course of invoking the phrase "peer review," she never bothers to look at whether the IPCC actually does it. By contrast, without benefit of the resources of a national TV news operation plus salary and benefits, lone blogger Donna Laframboise did a couple of text searches on the IPCC report and discovered multiple predictions of doom — on Himalayan glacier melt and much else — resting not on peer-reviewed science but merely on activist groups such as the World Wildlife Fund and Greenpeace. Miss Laframboise writes:


Nothing prevented Ms. O'Neil from taking a firsthand look at the IPCC report herself. She, like me, could have typed "WWF" (which stands for the activist group, the World Wildlife Fund) into a search box and found the 16 distinct WWF citations in the IPCC's 2007 report. Within a few minutes she could also have found the eight Greenpeace papers listed. . . .


Instead, Ms. O'Neill — who has 25 years experience as a journalist — was utterly bamboozled by the PR machine which is the IPCC. She fell for their slick mirage. And then she passed it along to her viewers and readers.


For good measure, Miss Laframboise points out that Margot O'Neill was either suckered by or consciously misrepresented her expert witness:


In the process she might have noticed that one of her scientific experts — Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg (whom she quoted as saying: "I don't think you could have a more rigorous process") — is a co-author of one of those non-peer-reviewed Greenpeace papers.


The poodles are heading for the endangered species list, and deservedly so.

Hilarious Headline:
NOAA: Blizzard Rearranges Climate Change Announcement
(That's good stuff)


Bomb, Bomb, Bomb... Bomb, Bomb Iran:

Iran moves closer to nuke warhead capacity


Feb 8, 6:31 PM (ET)

By GEORGE JAHN

VIENNA (AP) - Iran pressed ahead Monday with plans that will increase its ability to make nuclear weapons as it formally informed the U.N. nuclear agency of its intention to enrich uranium to higher levels.

Alarmed world powers questioned the rationale behind the move and warned the country it could face more U.N. sanctions if it made good on its intentions.

Iran maintains its nuclear activities are peaceful, and an envoy insisted the move was meant only to provide fuel for Tehran's research reactor. But world powers fearing that Iran's enrichment program might be a cover for a weapons program were critical.

Britain said the Islamic Republic's reason for further enrichment made no sense because it is not technically advanced enough to turn the resulting material into the fuel rods needed for the reactor.

France and the U.S. said the latest Iranian move left no choice but to push harder for a fourth set of U.N. Security Council sanctions to punish Iran's nuclear defiance.

Even a senior parliamentarian from Russia, which traditionally opposes Western ambitions for new U.N. sanctions, suggested the time had now come for such additional punishment

Konstantin Kosachev, head of the international affairs committee of the State Duma - the lower house of parliament - told the Interfax news agency that the international community should "react to this step with serious measures, including making the regime of economic sanctions more severe."

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had already announced Sunday that his country would significantly enrich at least some of the country's stockpile of uranium to 20 percent. Still, Monday's formal notification was significant, particularly because of Iran's waffling in recent months on the issue.

Western powers blame Iran for rejecting an internationally endorsed plan to take Iranian low enriched uranium, further enriching it and return it in the form of fuel rods for the reactor - and in broader terms for turning down other overtures meant to diminish concerns about its nuclear agenda.

Telling The Associated Press that his country now had formally told the International Atomic Energy Agency of its intentions, Iranian envoy Ali Asghar Soltanieh said that IAEA inspectors now overseeing enrichment to low levels would be able to stay on site to monitor the process.

He suggested world powers had pushed Iran into the decision, asserting that it was their fault that the plan that foresaw Russian and French involvement in supplying fuel from enriched uranium for the Tehran research reactor had failed.

"Until now, we have not received any response to our positive logical and technical proposal," he said. "We cannot leave hospitals and patients desperately waiting for radio isotopes" being produced at the Tehran reactor and used in cancer treatment, he added.

The IAEA confirmed receiving formal notification in a restricted note to the agency's 35-nation board made available to The Associated Press.

Iran's atomic energy organization informed the agency that "production of less than 20 percent enriched uranium is being foreseen," said the note.

"Less than 20 percent" means enrichment to a tiny fraction below that level - in effect 20 percent but formally just below threshold for high enriched uranium.

At the same time, the note indicated that Iran was keeping the agency in the dark about specifics, saying the IAEA "is in the process of seeking clarifications from Iran regarding the starting date of the process for the production of such material and other technical details."

On Sunday, Iranian officials said higher enrichment would start on Tuesday.

At a news conference with French Defense Minister Herve Morin, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates praised President Barack Obama's attempts to engage the Islamic Republic diplomatically and chided Tehran for not reciprocating.

"No U.S. president has reached out more sincerely, and frankly taken more political risk, in an effort to try to create an opening for engagement for Iran," he said. "All these initiatives have been rejected."

Morin said France and the U.S. agreed that there was no choice but "to work for new measures within the framework of the Security Council" - a stance echoed by Israel, Iran's most implacable foe.

Tehran's enrichment plans are "additional proof of the fact that Iran is ridiculing the entire world," said Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak. "The right response is to impose decisive and permanent sanctions on Iran."

Although material for the fissile core of a nuclear warhead must be enriched to a level of 90 percent or more, just getting its stockpile to the 20 percent mark would be a major step for Iran's nuclear program. While enriching to 20 percent would take about one year, using up to 2,000 centrifuges at Tehran's underground Natanz facility, any next step - moving from 20 to 90 percent - would take only half a year and between 500-1,000 centrifuges.

Achieving the 20-percent level "would be going most of the rest of the way to weapon-grade uranium," said David Albright, whose Washington-based Institute for Science and International Security tracks suspected proliferators.

Soltanieh declined to say how much of Iran's stockpile - now estimated at 1.8 tons - would be enriched. Nor did he say when the process would begin. Albright said enriching to higher levels could begin within a day - or only in several months, depending on how far technical preparations had progressed.

Apparent technical problems could also slow the process, he said.

Iran's enrichment program "should be like a Christmas tree in full light," he said. "In fact, the lights are flickering."

While Iran would be able to enrich up to 20 percent, a senior U.S official told the AP that the research reactor would run out of fuel before enough material was produced. He asked for anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the issue.

Britain's Foreign Office said the "enriched uranium could not be used for the Tehran Research Reactor as Iran does not have the technology to manufacture it into fuel rods."

Legal constraints could tie Iran's hands as well. A senior official from one of the IAEA's 35 board member nations senior official said he believed Tehran was obligated to notify the agency 60 days in advance of starting to enrich to higher levels.

The official asked for anonymity because he was not authorized to comment on the issue.

The Iranian move came just days after Ahmadinejad appeared to move close to endorsing the original deal, which foresaw Tehran exporting the bulk of its low-enriched uranium to Russia for further enrichment and then conversion for fuel rods for the research reactor.

That plan was welcomed internationally because it would have delayed Iran's ability to make a nuclear weapons by shipping out about 70 percent of its low-enriched uranium stockpile, thereby leaving it with not enough to make a bomb. Tehran denies nuclear weapons ambitions, insisting it needs to enrich to create fuel for an envisioned nuclear reactor network.

The proposal was endorsed by the U.S., Russia, China, Britain, France and Germany - the six powers that originally elicited a tentative approval from Iran in landmark talks last fall. Since then, however, mixed messages from Tehran have infuriated the U.S. and its European allies, who claim Iran is only stalling for time as it attempts to build a nuclear weapon.

Iran has defied five U.N. Security Council resolutions - and three sets of U.N. sanctions - aimed at pressuring it to freeze enrichment, and has instead steadily expanded its program.

------

Associated Press writers Danica Kirka and David Stringer in London, Anne Flaherty in Paris, Matthew Lee in Washington, James Heintz in Moscow and Geir Moulson in Berlin contributed to this report

Quote du jour:
Europe will never be like America. Europe is a product of history. America is a product of philosophy.

Margaret Thatcher


Writings of Our Founding Fathers
Federalist Papers



Federalist No. 15


The Insufficiency of the Present Confederation to Preserve the Union


For the Independent Journal.


Author: Alexander Hamilton


To the People of the State of New York:


IN THE course of the preceding papers, I have endeavored, my fellow-citizens, to place before you, in a clear and convincing light, the importance of Union to your political safety and happiness. I have unfolded to you a complication of dangers to which you would be exposed, should you permit that sacred knot which binds the people of America together be severed or dissolved by ambition or by avarice, by jealousy or by misrepresentation. In the sequel of the inquiry through which I propose to accompany you, the truths intended to be inculcated will receive further confirmation from facts and arguments hitherto unnoticed. If the road over which you will still have to pass should in some places appear to you tedious or irksome, you will recollect that you are in quest of information on a subject the most momentous which can engage the attention of a free people, that the field through which you have to travel is in itself spacious, and that the difficulties of the journey have been unnecessarily increased by the mazes with which sophistry has beset the way. It will be my aim to remove the obstacles from your progress in as compendious a manner as it can be done, without sacrificing utility to despatch.


In pursuance of the plan which I have laid down for the discussion of the subject, the point next in order to be examined is the "insufficiency of the present Confederation to the preservation of the Union." It may perhaps be asked what need there is of reasoning or proof to illustrate a position which is not either controverted or doubted, to which the understandings and feelings of all classes of men assent, and which in substance is admitted by the opponents as well as by the friends of the new Constitution. It must in truth be acknowledged that, however these may differ in other respects, they in general appear to harmonize in this sentiment, at least, that there are material imperfections in our national system, and that something is necessary to be done to rescue us from impending anarchy. The facts that support this opinion are no longer objects of speculation. They have forced themselves upon the sensibility of the people at large, and have at length extorted from those, whose mistaken policy has had the principal share in precipitating the extremity at which we are arrived, a reluctant confession of the reality of those defects in the scheme of our federal government, which have been long pointed out and regretted by the intelligent friends of the Union.


We may indeed with propriety be said to have reached almost the last stage of national humiliation. There is scarcely anything that can wound the pride or degrade the character of an independent nation which we do not experience. Are there engagements to the performance of which we are held by every tie respectable among men? These are the subjects of constant and unblushing violation. Do we owe debts to foreigners and to our own citizens contracted in a time of imminent peril for the preservation of our political existence? These remain without any proper or satisfactory provision for their discharge. Have we valuable territories and important posts in the possession of a foreign power which, by express stipulations, ought long since to have been surrendered? These are still retained, to the prejudice of our interests, not less than of our rights. Are we in a condition to resent or to repel the aggression? We have neither troops, nor treasury, nor government. [1] Are we even in a condition to remonstrate with dignity? The just imputations on our own faith, in respect to the same treaty, ought first to be removed. Are we entitled by nature and compact to a free participation in the navigation of the Mississippi? Spain excludes us from it. Is public credit an indispensable resource in time of public danger? We seem to have abandoned its cause as desperate and irretrievable. Is commerce of importance to national wealth? Ours is at the lowest point of declension. Is respectability in the eyes of foreign powers a safeguard against foreign encroachments? The imbecility of our government even forbids them to treat with us. Our ambassadors abroad are the mere pageants of mimic sovereignty. Is a violent and unnatural decrease in the value of land a symptom of national distress? The price of improved land in most parts of the country is much lower than can be accounted for by the quantity of waste land at market, and can only be fully explained by that want of private and public confidence, which are so alarmingly prevalent among all ranks, and which have a direct tendency to depreciate property of every kind. Is private credit the friend and patron of industry? That most useful kind which relates to borrowing and lending is reduced within the narrowest limits, and this still more from an opinion of insecurity than from the scarcity of money. To shorten an enumeration of particulars which can afford neither pleasure nor instruction, it may in general be demanded, what indication is there of national disorder, poverty, and insignificance that could befall a community so peculiarly blessed with natural advantages as we are, which does not form a part of the dark catalogue of our public misfortunes?


This is the melancholy situation to which we have been brought by those very maxims and councils which would now deter us from adopting the proposed Constitution; and which, not content with having conducted us to the brink of a precipice, seem resolved to plunge us into the abyss that awaits us below. Here, my countrymen, impelled by every motive that ought to influence an enlightened people, let us make a firm stand for our safety, our tranquillity, our dignity, our reputation. Let us at last break the fatal charm which has too long seduced us from the paths of felicity and prosperity.


It is true, as has been before observed that facts, too stubborn to be resisted, have produced a species of general assent to the abstract proposition that there exist material defects in our national system; but the usefulness of the concession, on the part of the old adversaries of federal measures, is destroyed by a strenuous opposition to a remedy, upon the only principles that can give it a chance of success. While they admit that the government of the United States is destitute of energy, they contend against conferring upon it those powers which are requisite to supply that energy. They seem still to aim at things repugnant and irreconcilable; at an augmentation of federal authority, without a diminution of State authority; at sovereignty in the Union, and complete independence in the members. They still, in fine, seem to cherish with blind devotion the political monster of an imperium in imperio. This renders a full display of the principal defects of the Confederation necessary, in order to show that the evils we experience do not proceed from minute or partial imperfections, but from fundamental errors in the structure of the building, which cannot be amended otherwise than by an alteration in the first principles and main pillars of the fabric.


The great and radical vice in the construction of the existing Confederation is in the principle of LEGISLATION for STATES or GOVERNMENTS, in their CORPORATE or COLLECTIVE CAPACITIES, and as contradistinguished from the INDIVIDUALS of which they consist. Though this principle does not run through all the powers delegated to the Union, yet it pervades and governs those on which the efficacy of the rest depends. Except as to the rule of appointment, the United States has an indefinite discretion to make requisitions for men and money; but they have no authority to raise either, by regulations extending to the individual citizens of America. The consequence of this is, that though in theory their resolutions concerning those objects are laws, constitutionally binding on the members of the Union, yet in practice they are mere recommendations which the States observe or disregard at their option.


 Is a singular instance of the capriciousness of the human mind, that after all the admonitions we have had from experience on this head, there should still be found men who object to the new Constitution, for deviating from a principle which has been found the bane of the old, and which is in itself evidently incompatible with the idea of GOVERNMENT; a principle, in short, which, if it is to be executed at all, must substitute the violent and sanguinary agency of the sword to the mild influence of the magistracy.


There is nothing absurd or impracticable in the idea of a league or alliance between independent nations for certain defined purposes precisely stated in a treaty regulating all the details of time, place, circumstance, and quantity; leaving nothing to future discretion; and depending for its execution on the good faith of the parties. Compacts of this kind exist among all civilized nations, subject to the usual vicissitudes of peace and war, of observance and non-observance, as the interests or passions of the contracting powers dictate. In the early part of the present century there was an epidemical rage in Europe for this species of compacts, from which the politicians of the times fondly hoped for benefits which were never realized. With a view to establishing the equilibrium of power and the peace of that part of the world, all the resources of negotiation were exhausted, and triple and quadruple alliances were formed; but they were scarcely formed before they were broken, giving an instructive but afflicting lesson to mankind, how little dependence is to be placed on treaties which have no other sanction than the obligations of good faith, and which oppose general considerations of peace and justice to the impulse of any immediate interest or passion.


If the particular States in this country are disposed to stand in a similar relation to each other, and to drop the project of a general DISCRETIONARY SUPERINTENDENCE, the scheme would indeed be pernicious, and would entail upon us all the mischiefs which have been enumerated under the first head; but it would have the merit of being, at least, consistent and practicable Abandoning all views towards a confederate government, this would bring us to a simple alliance offensive and defensive; and would place us in a situation to be alternate friends and enemies of each other, as our mutual jealousies and rivalships, nourished by the intrigues of foreign nations, should prescribe to us.


But if we are unwilling to be placed in this perilous situation; if we still will adhere to the design of a national government, or, which is the same thing, of a superintending power, under the direction of a common council, we must resolve to incorporate into our plan those ingredients which may be considered as forming the characteristic difference between a league and a government; we must extend the authority of the Union to the persons of the citizens, --the only proper objects of government.


Government implies the power of making laws. It is essential to the idea of a law, that it be attended with a sanction; or, in other words, a penalty or punishment for disobedience. If there be no penalty annexed to disobedience, the resolutions or commands which pretend to be laws will, in fact, amount to nothing more than advice or recommendation. This penalty, whatever it may be, can only be inflicted in two ways: by the agency of the courts and ministers of justice, or by military force; by the COERCION of the magistracy, or by the COERCION of arms. The first kind can evidently apply only to men; the last kind must of necessity, be employed against bodies politic, or communities, or States. It is evident that there is no process of a court by which the observance of the laws can, in the last resort, be enforced. Sentences may be denounced against them for violations of their duty; but these sentences can only be carried into execution by the sword. In an association where the general authority is confined to the collective bodies of the communities, that compose it, every breach of the laws must involve a state of war; and military execution must become the only instrument of civil obedience. Such a state of things can certainly not deserve the name of government, nor would any prudent man choose to commit his happiness to it.


There was a time when we were told that breaches, by the States, of the regulations of the federal authority were not to be expected; that a sense of common interest would preside over the conduct of the respective members, and would beget a full compliance with all the constitutional requisitions of the Union. This language, at the present day, would appear as wild as a great part of what we now hear from the same quarter will be thought, when we shall have received further lessons from that best oracle of wisdom, experience. It at all times betrayed an ignorance of the true springs by which human conduct is actuated, and belied the original inducements to the establishment of civil power. Why has government been instituted at all? Because the passions of men will not conform to the dictates of reason and justice, without constraint. Has it been found that bodies of men act with more rectitude or greater disinterestedness than individuals? The contrary of this has been inferred by all accurate observers of the conduct of mankind; and the inference is founded upon obvious reasons. Regard to reputation has a less active influence, when the infamy of a bad action is to be divided among a number than when it is to fall singly upon one. A spirit of faction, which is apt to mingle its poison in the deliberations of all bodies of men, will often hurry the persons of whom they are composed into improprieties and excesses, for which they would blush in a private capacity.


In addition to all this, there is, in the nature of sovereign power, an impatience of control, that disposes those who are invested with the exercise of it, to look with an evil eye upon all external attempts to restrain or direct its operations. From this spirit it happens, that in every political association which is formed upon the principle of uniting in a common interest a number of lesser sovereignties, there will be found a kind of eccentric tendency in the subordinate or inferior orbs, by the operation of which there will be a perpetual effort in each to fly off from the common centre. This tendency is not difficult to be accounted for. It has its origin in the love of power. Power controlled or abridged is almost always the rival and enemy of that power by which it is controlled or abridged. This simple proposition will teach us how little reason there is to expect, that the persons intrusted with the administration of the affairs of the particular members of a confederacy will at all times be ready, with perfect good-humor, and an unbiased regard to the public weal, to execute the resolutions or decrees of the general authority. The reverse of this results from the constitution of human nature.


If, therefore, the measures of the Confederacy cannot be executed without the intervention of the particular administrations, there will be little prospect of their being executed at all. The rulers of the respective members, whether they have a constitutional right to do it or not, will undertake to judge of the propriety of the measures themselves. They will consider the conformity of the thing proposed or required to their immediate interests or aims; the momentary conveniences or inconveniences that would attend its adoption. All this will be done; and in a spirit of interested and suspicious scrutiny, without that knowledge of national circumstances and reasons of state, which is essential to a right judgment, and with that strong predilection in favor of local objects, which can hardly fail to mislead the decision. The same process must be repeated in every member of which the body is constituted; and the execution of the plans, framed by the councils of the whole, will always fluctuate on the discretion of the ill-informed and prejudiced opinion of every part. Those who have been conversant in the proceedings of popular assemblies; who have seen how difficult it often is, where there is no exterior pressure of circumstances, to bring them to harmonious resolutions on important points, will readily conceive how impossible it must be to induce a number of such assemblies, deliberating at a distance from each other, at different times, and under different impressions, long to co-operate in the same views and pursuits.


In our case, the concurrence of thirteen distinct sovereign wills is requisite, under the Confederation, to the complete execution of every important measure that proceeds from the Union. It has happened as was to have been foreseen. The measures of the Union have not been executed; the delinquencies of the States have, step by step, matured themselves to an extreme, which has, at length, arrested all the wheels of the national government, and brought them to an awful stand. Congress at this time scarcely possess the means of keeping up the forms of administration, till the States can have time to agree upon a more substantial substitute for the present shadow of a federal government. Things did not come to this desperate extremity at once. The causes which have been specified produced at first only unequal and disproportionate degrees of compliance with the requisitions of the Union. The greater deficiencies of some States furnished the pretext of example and the temptation of interest to the complying, or to the least delinquent States. Why should we do more in proportion than those who are embarked with us in the same political voyage? Why should we consent to bear more than our proper share of the common burden? These were suggestions which human selfishness could not withstand, and which even speculative men, who looked forward to remote consequences, could not, without hesitation, combat. Each State, yielding to the persuasive voice of immediate interest or convenience, has successively withdrawn its support, till the frail and tottering edifice seems ready to fall upon our heads, and to crush us beneath its ruins.


PUBLIUS.

References:
http://www.hotair.com/
http://www.wnd.com/
http://www.weeklystandard.com/
http://www.nro.com/
http://www.newmyway.com/
http://www.drudgereport.com/
http://www.thehill.com/
http://www.breitbart.com/
http://www.quotationspage.com/
http://www.youtube.com/
George Jahn
Mark Steyn
http://www.wsj.com/
Library of Congress/Federalist Papers