We all remember after the Congress failed to pass cap and trade legislation that Barack Obama quipped, “there is more than one way to skin a cat.” Of course well all knew what that meant: he intended to use the EPA to implement through regulation what he could not get through the Congress.
We also remember when Barack Obama was running for President and he promised anyone who was listening that under his plan energy costs would “necessarily skyrocket.” Well today those skyrocketing prices came under attack when the Supreme Court ruled by a 5-4 margin that the EPA had to consider costs before implementing new climate change regulations. As part of this ruling the Supreme Court threw out new EPA regulations regarding mercury and other pollutants which has forced the closure of many coal-fired plants across the nation.
Here is more:
A new New Hampshire Democratic primary poll is out and a funny thing has happened to Hillary Clinton’s inevitability. It can be summed up in two words–Bernie Sanders.
This new poll shows Bernie Sanders within single digits of the former Secretary of State in the Granite State. Here is more:
Hillary Clinton’s once vast advantage over independent Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders has shrunk to single digits in New Hampshire, according to the latest CNN/WMUR Granite State Poll released Thursday evening.
Among likely Democratic primary voters in the state, 43 percent said they would vote for Clinton, with 35 percent going for Sanders.
In the same poll conducted last month — which notably included Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren (who is not running) — Clinton drew 51 percent, with Warren grabbing 20 percent and Sanders at just 13 percent.
Open thread for Sunday, June 28th: ‘Painkiller’
Here is the open thread for Sunday, June 28th. Please feel free to post links to interesting articles and to discuss whatever issues arise during the course of the day. Nothing is off-topic here.
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For this week’s musical selection I give you a band I have been getting into a little bit recently on Pandora; this is a band called Three Days Grace and the song is entitled “Painkiller.”
Enjoy, but be forewarned that there are a couple of F-Bombs in the introduction. (Also, is the singer sporting a Monster logo on the side of his head?)
Chris Christie to announce Presidential bid on Tuesday
Chris Christie is scheduled to make an announcement on Tuesday regarding his intentions on running for President in 2016 but if this is any indication he is going to be running.
If the trips to New Hampshire and leaked announcement invitations weren’t big enough clues, Chris Christie is in for 2016.
Like several other campaigns this cycle, Christie’s team went for a digital-first approach ahead of any formal announcement: The New Jersey governor launched a campaign website on Saturday, just three days before he’s expected to announce his White House bid from the gym of his high school alma mater in Livingston, N.J.
He signaled the site’s launch in a series of tweets Saturday morning.
This comes amid falling poll numbers both in his state and nationally so I really would not expect too much momentum to gather behind him but with people less than enthusiastic with the current field one never knows. How else can you explain the momentum (albeit most likely short-lived) that Donald Trump is currently enjoying?
Malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Could the Supreme Court’s gay marriage ruling set the stage to justify national concealed carry reciprocity?
When the Supreme Court ruled that all States must recognize same sex marriages which were conducted in other States the 14th Amendment’s Due Process Clause was used as justification for the decision. Brietbart has an interesting article about this decision and how it could possibly be used to justify national concealed carry reciprocity.
Here is more:
The SCOTUS legalized same sex marriage by finding a right which Justices Anthony Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg , Sonia Sotomayor, Stephen G. Breyer, and Elena Kagan ruled as beyond a state-by-state prerogative via the 14th Amendment.
Crucial in this ruling is the fact that same sex marriage–now recognized by the SCOTUS–is not the only right the 14th Amendment shields from state-by-state prerogative and/or recognition.
Consider this pertinent aspect of the court’s Majority Opinion, written by Justice Kennedy and printed by the LA Times:
Under the Due Process Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment, no State shall “deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law.” The fundamental liberties protected by this Clause include most of the rights enumerated in the Bill of Rights.
The use of the word most and not the word all is quite interesting, which amendment in the Bill of Rights would the Supreme Court believe is not covered under the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment? Could it be the Second Amendment?
The IRS is now claiming that some of its employees accidentally erased the backup tapes which likely contained thousands of Lois Lerner’s long sought after emails. Here is more:
Investigators are blaming mistakes by IRS employees — not a criminal conspiracy — for the loss of thousands of emails related to the tax agency’s tea party scandal.
IRS workers erased 422 computer backup tapes that “most likely” contained as many as 24,000 emails to and from former IRS official Lois Lerner, who has emerged as a central figure in congressional investigations, according to IRS’s inspector general.
The workers erased the tapes a month after IRS officials discovered that an untold number of Lerner’s emails were lost. The IG says the workers were unaware of a year-old directive not to destroy email backup tapes.
Of course this was an accident and not part of a cover up, right? It is just another remarkable coincidence that these tapes were erased just one month after it was learned the emails were lost.
This reminds me of the movie The Big Easy, has anyone seen it? Remy is a crooked cop who is being investigated by the Feds. At one point in the movie they have video evidence of him taking a bribe so he goes out one night and throws a magnet through the window of a business. The magnet is taken in as evidence of a break in and another cop just happens to place the magnet next to the video, which destroys it and the charges are dropped.
Sounds eerily similar does it not…
Malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Republican establishment reinstates conservative punished for voting against Obamatrade
How about a little feel good story today after the Supreme Court’s Obamacare Federal Exchange decision?
Earlier this week selective Constitutionalist establishment Republican Jason Chaffetz removed Mark Meadows from his subcommittee chair for having the unmitigated audacity to vote his conscience (and the will of his constituents) on Obamatrade rather than blindly toe the establishment Republican agenda.
After facing an onslaught from the people as well as from House conservatives who began to plan retribution against the establishment Jason Chaffetz announced today that he is reinstating Mark Meadows. Here is more:
The Supreme Court upholds Obamacare Federal Exchange
Today the Supreme Court issued its long-awaited ruling on the Obamacare Federal Exchange and by a 6-3 vote upheld it. After the individual mandate was upheld by the same court this is the outcome I expected, however I was curious as to how the Supreme Court would reach its decision.
In order to uphold the individual mandate Chief Justice Roberts redefined the “shared responsibility fee” as a tax even though the Federal Government was arguing it was not a tax and today he released a statement which I found to be stunning!
Here is what he said that I still cannot get over:
Ann Coulter calls Nikki Haley an ‘immigrant’ who ‘does not understand American history’
Regular readers of America’s Watchtower know how I feel about Ann Coulter: she is a hypocrite, a fraud, and an opportunist who lost all the credibility she might have had when after claiming Mitt Romney had to be stopped from becoming President at all costs quickly reversed course and declared he was the only hope to save America after her first choice, Chris Christie, decided not to run for the Presidency in 2012.
But her hypocrisy does not stop there: after the election she released a book entitled Never Trust a Liberal Over 3–Especially a Republican. In order to promote this book she appeared on Boston talk radio several times and during the course of these interviews she repeatedly berated the Tea Party for putting up primary opponents to run against RINO establishment candidates claiming it was time to stop fighting each other and to rally around the establishment candidates. That position seems to be at odds with the title of her book to say the least. I repeatedly sent texts to the host of the radio show asking him to stop having this fraud on the air and listed both of these examples but needless to say I never got a response…
But now Ann Coulter has gone beyond hypocrisy and has entered into the realm of stupidity when during an interview about the Confederate Flag she claimed that Nikki Haley was “an immigrant and does not understand America’s history.”
Here is the clip:
Today the Senate passed a stand-alone TPA bill and sent it to the President’s desk for his signature. This bill will give Barack Obama fast-track authority on the Trans-Pacific Partnership trade deal he has been negotiating in private, as well as other future trade deals according to what I have read. This means that once his super secret trade deal is complete the Congress can only vote on the treaty as submitted and will not be able to offer any amendments thereto.
What this basically does is remove just another little piece of the separation of powers provided for in the Constitution and it gives Barack Obama more power when it comes to negotiating trade deals. This power was given to the President by some of the very same Republicans who ran in 2012 on the promise of checking a President who they claimed was usurping powers not granted to him in the Constitution and this power was given to him by some of the very same Republicans who claimed Barack Obama was doing an end run around the Congress to pass legislation through Executive Action which he was unable to get through the Congress. Now they have helped him to do both by willingly handing him more power.
This is why we call these Republicans selective Constitutionalists here are America’s Watchtower: they talk a good game when it comes to the Constitution when they are in the midst of an election but when push comes to shove all they really care about is their big government agenda. The end justifies the means and they are nothing but frauds, hypocrites, and liars.
Malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
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