Is this fair?

Of course not!

This is reverse discrimination, plain and simple. People are being penalized because their skin is white (or they came from China or Japan, etc.). Such a policy fosters resentment from those who are discriminated against and exacerbates racial tensions and is counterproductive.

In the following editorial by Sen. James Webb of Virginia, a Democrat, he calls for the abolishment of this divisive, inequitable, morally wrong and unconstitutional (strictly speaking) policy. He states that:

“Nondiscrimination laws should be applied equally among all citizens, including those who happen to be white. The need for inclusiveness in our society is undeniable and irreversible, both in our markets and in our communities. Our government should be in the business of enabling opportunity for all, not in picking winners.”

We strongly agree.

Diversity and the Myth of White Privilege
America still owes a debt to its black citizens, but government programs to help all 'people of color' are unfair. They should end.
James Webb    July 22, 2010

The NAACP believes the tea party is racist. The tea party believes the NAACP is racist. And Pat Buchanan got into trouble recently by pointing out that if Elena Kagan is confirmed to the Supreme Court, there will not be a single Protestant Justice, although Protestants make up half the U.S. population and dominated the court for generations.

Forty years ago, as the United States experienced the civil rights movement, the supposed monolith of White Anglo-Saxon Protestant dominance served as the whipping post for almost every debate about power and status in America. After a full generation of such debate, WASP elites have fallen by the wayside and a plethora of government-enforced diversity policies have marginalized many white workers. The time has come to cease the false arguments and allow every American the benefit of a fair chance at the future.

I have dedicated my political career to bringing fairness to America's economic system and to our work force, regardless of what people look like or where they may worship. Unfortunately, present-day diversity programs work against that notion, having expanded so far beyond their original purpose that they now favor anyone who does not happen to be white.

In an odd historical twist that all Americans see but few can understand, many programs allow recently arrived immigrants to move ahead of similarly situated whites whose families have been in the country for generations. These programs have damaged racial harmony. And the more they have grown, the less they have actually helped African-Americans, the intended beneficiaries of affirmative action as it was originally conceived.

How so?

Lyndon Johnson's initial program for affirmative action was based on the 13th Amendment and on the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which authorized the federal government to take actions in order to eliminate "the badges of slavery." Affirmative action was designed to recognize the uniquely difficult journey of African-Americans. This policy was justifiable and understandable, even to those who came from white cultural groups that had also suffered in socio-economic terms from the Civil War and its aftermath.

The injustices endured by black Americans at the hands of their own government have no parallel in our history, not only during the period of slavery but also in the Jim Crow era that followed. But the extrapolation of this logic to all "people of color"—especially since 1965, when new immigration laws dramatically altered the demographic makeup of the U.S.—moved affirmative action away from remediation and toward discrimination, this time against whites. It has also lessened the focus on assisting African-Americans, who despite a veneer of successful people at the very top still experience high rates of poverty, drug abuse, incarceration and family breakup.

Those who came to this country in recent decades from Asia, Latin America and Africa did not suffer discrimination from our government, and in fact have frequently been the beneficiaries of special government programs. The same cannot be said of many hard-working white Americans, including those whose roots in America go back more than 200 years.

Contrary to assumptions in the law, white America is hardly a monolith. And the journey of white American cultures is so diverse (yes) that one strains to find the logic that could lump them together for the purpose of public policy.

The clearest example of today's misguided policies comes from examining the history of the American South.

The old South was a three-tiered society, with blacks and hard-put whites both dominated by white elites who manipulated racial tensions in order to retain power. At the height of slavery, in 1860, less than 5% of whites in the South owned slaves. The eminent black historian John Hope Franklin wrote that "fully three-fourths of the white people in the South had neither slaves nor an immediate economic interest in the maintenance of slavery."

The Civil War devastated the South, in human and economic terms. And from post-Civil War Reconstruction to the beginning of World War II, the region was a ravaged place, affecting black and white alike.

In 1938, President Franklin Roosevelt created a national commission to study what he termed "the long and ironic history of the despoiling of this truly American section." At that time, most industries in the South were owned by companies outside the region. Of the South's 1.8 million sharecroppers, 1.2 million were white (a mirror of the population, which was 71% white). The illiteracy rate was five times that of the North-Central states and more than twice that of New England and the Middle Atlantic (despite the waves of European immigrants then flowing to those regions). The total endowments of all the colleges and universities in the South were less than the endowments of Harvard and Yale alone. The average schoolchild in the South had $25 a year spent on his or her education, compared to $141 for children in New York.

Generations of such deficiencies do not disappear overnight, and they affect the momentum of a culture. In 1974, a National Opinion Research Center (NORC) study of white ethnic groups showed that white Baptists nationwide averaged only 10.7 years of education, a level almost identical to blacks' average of 10.6 years, and well below that of most other white groups. A recent NORC Social Survey of white adults born after World War II showed that in the years 1980-2000, only 18.4% of white Baptists and 21.8% of Irish Protestants—the principal ethnic group that settled the South—had obtained college degrees, compared to a national average of 30.1%, a Jewish average of 73.3%, and an average among those of Chinese and Indian descent of 61.9%.

Policy makers ignored such disparities within America's white cultures when, in advancing minority diversity programs, they treated whites as a fungible monolith. Also lost on these policy makers were the differences in economic and educational attainment among nonwhite cultures. Thus nonwhite groups received special consideration in a wide variety of areas including business startups, academic admissions, job promotions and lucrative government contracts.

Where should we go from here? Beyond our continuing obligation to assist those African-Americans still in need, government-directed diversity programs should end.

Nondiscrimination laws should be applied equally among all citizens, including those who happen to be white. The need for inclusiveness in our society is undeniable and irreversible, both in our markets and in our communities. Our government should be in the business of enabling opportunity for all, not in picking winners. It can do so by ensuring that artificial distinctions such as race do not determine outcomes.

Memo to my fellow politicians: Drop the Procrustean policies and allow harmony to invade the public mindset. Fairness will happen, and bitterness will fade away.

Mr. Webb, a Democrat, is a U.S. senator from Virginia.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703724104575379630952309408.html

This sanctioned and enforced racism of blacks over whites is something that all Americans need to be aware of and react and respond to aggressively. If not, our rights will continue to progressively erode and we will find ourselves in a racially very hostile country that may be balkanized.

Everything else about her pales in comparison including no judicial experience, few cases argued, a long standing far left agenda, and unwavering support for socialism and big government.

She is a political appointee who hasn’t even reached the level of a judicial lightweight, never mind, having the wherewithal to become a Supreme Court justice.

We're Speechless
Investors Business Daily 05/12/2010

Supreme Court: Elena Kagan's thin paper trail was supposed to be an asset. But the confirmation of Obama's nominee may focus on one position it's clear she holds: that banning political speech can be constitutional.

'The government's answer has changed." That was how Solicitor General Kagan began her frantic damage control during a second round of oral arguments last September in the Citizens United case, which Kagan and the U.S. government ultimately lost and the First Amendment won.

Her deputy, Malcolm Stewart, in March of last year said the government had constitutional powers extending to banning books to limit corporate political influence.

As a result, the justices ordered a second round of arguments last fall to get into broader free speech questions.
For that, Kagan stepped into the fray herself, telling the justices that the government had reconsidered its position and conceding that banning books would elicit a strong court challenge.

So Chief Justice John Roberts asked her, "If you say that you are not going to apply it to a book, what about a pamphlet?"

"I think a pamphlet would be different," Kagan responded. "A pamphlet is pretty classic electioneering," and so the government could restrict such political speech.

Who you are should determine how much you can say — that is the admitted philosophy held by this high-court nominee.
According to the president, alluding to Kagan's role in the Citizens United case as he announced her as his Supreme Court choice on Monday, "powerful interests must not be allowed to drown out the voices of ordinary citizens."

But who decides who those powerful interests are and how much they can say?

The most powerful interest of all does: the government.

In a 1996 University of Chicago Law School Journal article titled "Private Speech, Public Purpose: the Role of Governmental Motive in First Amendment Doctrine," which gets raves from left-leaning legal academics, Kagan contended that "the application of First Amendment law is best understood and most readily explained as a kind of motive-hunting."

If the motive is compelling enough, in other words, the government can regulate speech in the name of the public good.
The view that "the government may never subject particular ideas to disadvantage" is mistaken, Kagan wrote. "The government indeed may do so, if acting upon neutral, harm-based reasons."

Again, it is the government that decides if, say, a talk radio host or Tea Partyer is doing "harm" by engaging in political speech that allegedly incites some wacko to violence.

Columnist Jacob Sullum hit the bull's-eye on this when he wrote:

"While the government may constitutionally restrict speech based on 'neutrally conceived harms,' Kagan says, it may not restrict speech based on 'hostility toward ideas.'But as she herself more or less acknowledges, this distinction ultimately collapses because people are hostile to ideas they consider harmful."

In last month's 8-to-1 U.S. v. Stevens court decision regarding depictions of animal cruelty, Kagan contended that First Amendment protection "depends upon a categorical balancing of the value of the speech against its societal costs," a claim Roberts called "startling and dangerous" in ruling against Kagan.

At only 50 years of age, Elena Kagan, a "speech redistributionist," could be on the high court for three decades.

Her upcoming confirmation hearings could be a First Amendment battle royal.

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=533863

We strongly feel that such is the case. There has been an epidemic of anti-American posturing, actions and rulings in the state particularly in the San Francisco area (banning JROTC and other anti-military issues).

The extremely large Mexican population there which has been fed by illegal immigration compounds an already problematic situation and creates the quintessential contrast and irony. The nearby San Francisco area as well as Los Angeles and to a lesser extent San Diego have been vociferous in their attacks on Arizona which is trying to protect its citizens and financial and social integrity. These California areas are seeking to legislate boycotts of Arizona and its products. So in this state, they are punishing those who are patriotic, American born and descended from legal Americans while preferentially defending or supporting the “rights” of those who are not.

Conversely, Arizona is protecting the rights of all its citizens, abiding by the Constitution and proud to be part of America.
So as an American, under which legal and social conditions would you rather live in: Arizona’s or Cali-Mexico’s?  Arizona enforcing the rights of Americans over illegals or California that seems to accord more rights to illegals than Americans.

We thought so!

California Students Sent Home for Wearing U.S. Flags on Cinco de Mayo
Joshua Rhett Miller    FOXNews.com   May 06, 2010

Administrators at a California high school sent five students home on Wednesday after they refused to remove their American flag T-shirts and bandannas -- garments the school officials deemed "incendiary" on Cinco de Mayo.

The five teens were sitting at a table outside Live Oak High School in Morgan Hill, Calif., on Wednesday morning when Assistant Principal Miguel Rodriguez asked two of them to remove their American flag bandannas, one of their parents told FoxNews.com. The boys complied, but were asked to accompany Rodriguez to the principal's office.

The five students -- Daniel Galli, Austin Carvalho, Matt Dariano, Dominic Maciel and Clayton Howard -- were then told they must turn their T-shirts inside-out or be sent home, though it would not be considered a suspension. Rodriguez told the students he did not want any fights to break out between Mexican-American students celebrating their heritage and those wearing American flags.

Dariano's mother, Diana, told FoxNews.com she and parents of the other four students are now demanding an apology from officials and are considering a lawsuit.

"We want an apology," Diana Dariano said Thursday. "Who in the United States of America would have an issue with that? It's a sad, sad day."

Dariano said her son has at least four T-shirts with American flags that he wears often and did not try to cause any conflict at school.

"I'm more hurt than anything," she said. "It is so hurtful and disrespectful the way this has turned. These are American kids."

The boys told Rodriguez and Principal Nick Boden that turning their shirts inside-out was disrespectful, so their parents decided to take them home.

"I just couldn't believe it," Julie Fagerstrom, Maciel's mother, told the Morgan Hill Times. "I'm an open-minded parent, but it's got to be on both sides. It can't be five kids singled out."

Galli told NBC Bay Area, "They said we could wear it on any other day, but today is sensitive to Mexican-Americans because it's supposed to be their holiday so we were not allowed to wear it."

In a statement released Thursday, Morgan Hill Unified School District Superintendent Wesley Smith characterized the incident as "extremely unfortunate" and said the matter is under investigation.

"The Morgan Hill Unified School District does not prohibit nor do we discourage wearing patriotic clothing," Smith's statement read. "The incident on May 5 at Live Oak High School is extremely unfortunate. While campus safety is our primary concern and administrators made decisions yesterday in an attempt to ensure campus safety, students should not, and will not, be disciplined for wearing patriotic clothing. This matter is under investigation and appropriate action will be taken."

Officials at Live Oak High School did not return several messages seeking comment on Thursday. A secretary told the Morgan Hill Times that Boden and Rodriguez were unavailable for comment on Wednesday.

According to its website, Live Oak High School is a 1,300-student institution in the southern part of Santa Clara County, with most students residing in the nearby cities of Morgan Hill and San Jose.

"The student population reflects the rich ethnic and socioeconomic diversity of the community," the website reads.
More than 100 students were spotted wearing the colors of the Mexican flag -- red, white and green -- as they left school, including some who had the flag painted on their faces or arms, the Morgan Hill times reported.

While bandannas of any color are banned at the school, its dress code policy does not contain references to American flags.

"However, any clothing or decoration which detracts from the learning environment is prohibited," the policy reads. "The school has the right to request that any student dressing inappropriately for school will change into other clothes, be sent home to change, and/or be subject to disciplinary action."

Freshman Laura Ponce, who had a Mexican flag painted on her face and chest, told the Morgan Hill Times that Cinco de Mayo is the "only day" Mexican-American students can show their national pride.

"There was a lot of drama going on today," Ponce told the newspaper.

Some other Mexican-American students reportedly said their flags were taken away or asked to be put away, but no other students were sent home on Wednesday.

Eugene Volokh, a professor of law at the University of California-Los Angeles, said the students are protected under California Education Code 48950, which prohibits schools from enforcing a rule subjecting a high school student to disciplinary sanctions solely on the basis of conduct, that when engaged outside of campus, is protected by the First Amendment.

If the school could point to previous incidents sparked by students who wore garments with American flags, they could argue that the flag is likely to lead to "substantial disruption," Volokh said.

"If, for example, there had been fights over similar things at past events, if there had been specific threats made," he said. "But if [school officials] just say, 'Well, we think it might be offensive to people,' that's generally speaking not enough."

Volokh said the students and their parents likely have a winning case on their hands if they decide to take the matter to court.

"Oh yes, it's almost open and shut," he said.

Lis Wiehl, a former federal prosecutor and a Fox News legal analyst, said the incident appears to a "blatant" violation of the students' First Amendment right to free speech. She noted that inciting violence is an exception to a First Amendment legal defense, but Wiehl said she saw no indications that the students provoked anyone.

"Unless I'm missing something, this seems like a blatant violation of the First Amendment," said Wiehl, adding that uniforms are not required at the public school. "And they're wearing, of all horrific things, the American flag."

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2010/05/06/california-students-sent-home-wearing-flags-cinco-mayo/

Despicable!

The level of hatred and intolerance which Grayson exhibits regarding this situation (as well as many others in the past) shows him to be emotionally and rationally challenged and not fit for his job as Representative. He should be investigated and censured as well as removed from office by those in his district.

As we unequivocally stated on April 3rd in Orlando Physician Expresses Sentiments Regarding Obama and Obamacare, this urologist was entirely within his legal, ethical and moral rights in our Democracy to post that comment.

Any attempt to silence this free speech is an attack on us all. Furthermore, we must prevent the government from using bullying, heavy handed or legal tactics to challenge our rights of expression and freedoms in general. By the way, where are all those demagogue Democrats who speciously claim that there is unwarranted vitriol in American discourse yet won't rein in one of their own? (They won't because they would level the same charges!)

As for you, Alan Grayson, we have an open question indirectly related to this case:

How can you reconcile the fact that 95% of all blacks voted for Obama and yet not charge that this constitutes racism?

There can be no other rational explanation for this yet we have not heard one word about this from any Democrat regarding this racist vote.

What if 95% of whites had voted for McCain? We are sure that you would vehemently consider that to be egregious racism!

Grayson: Doctor shooing away Obama backers will deny treatment to blacks
By Jordan Fabian - 04/03/10 11:28 AM ET

A doctor who posted a sign at his practice asking Obama supporters to seek care "elsewhere" will end up denying service to many African Americans, Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Fla.) said Friday.

Dr. Jack Cassell, an opponent of the healthcare law President Barack Obama signed last month, put up the sign at his office in Grayson's district.

"Well, in fact, where he lives, in Mount Dora, which is in my district, many, many of the Democrats who live in Mount Dora happen to be African-Americans," Grayson said on CNN. "So, by saying that he will not treat somebody who supported Obama, he's saying that he's not going to treat a large number of African-Americans in the community."

Grayson, a freshman who represents a Republican-leaning district, gained national attention during the healthcare debate last year when he said the GOP's healthcare plan was for seniors to "die quickly."

Cassell has said that he is not violating medical ethics rules.

"I'm not turning anybody away — that would be unethical," Cassell, 56, told the Orlando Sentinel on Thursday. "But if they read the sign and turn the other way, so be it."

But Grayson said that he was violating the rules and that he will probably be disciplined by medical licensing authorities.

"How many people walked in -- walked up to his front door, saw the sign, and turned away?" he asked. "How many people referred from other physicians in the community, including primary care physicians, how many patients saw that sign and walked away?"

Asked what kind of punishment Cassell should receive, Grayson said "Well, whatever the medical authorities think he should get. But it is a clear violation of ethics, and it's a particularly ugly one. Why is it that the right wing is so preoccupied with denying people health? Why is that?"

http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/90467-rep-grayson-anti-obama-doctor-will-deny-treatment-to-blacks

The CNN Interview Video:

Why should Congress regularly pass legislation that all Americans are mandated to follow but it is exempt from, most notably but not limited to Obamacare? What about the generous perks that they vote for themselves such as regular raises in salary and munificent retirement packages? Wouldn’t it be wonderful if the average American could also say” I deserve a pay increase this year so I am going to give it to myself”- and they then do.

This corruption, greed and lack of accountability must be extinguished. Elections alone are not the answer.

Now may just may be the perfect storm for these monumentally important changes to be made.

Will Gov't Health Takeover Bring Constitutional 'Hope And Change'?
By Larry Elder    03/25/2010

We live in a fundamentally different country from that which existed only days ago. The government now requires every American to buy health insurance. The Constitution has been attacked, interpreted in a way beyond its original intent.
Therefore, we must change it.

Ignoring the will of the majority of Americans, the discouraging experiences of countries with socialized medicine, and the already staggering amount of entitlement debt, President Barack Obama and congressional Democrats "reformed" health care.

Once a nation under a Constitution that restricted government intrusion, we now want government to provide for our "needs" by calling them "rights."

We now ask government to prop up failing businesses, make student loans, guarantee mortgages, build and maintain public housing, financially support state education from preschool though graduate school, fund private research, provide disaster relief and aid, pay "volunteers" and on and on.

Many in our nation happily submit to this bargain. They consider the Big Three entitlements — Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid — "rights," their absence unimaginable in a modern "caring" society. It is out of the question to expect people, families and communities to plan for retirement.

It's beyond reason to expect medical care, like any other commodity, to follow the laws of supply and demand — for prices and choices to allocate resources and competition to drive down prices and improve quality. It's too much to expect the compassion, morality and spirituality of humankind to aid those unable to care for themselves.

We ignore history's examples of how good intentions produce bad results. Almost 50 years ago, another "transformative" president launched a War on Poverty. But for many welfare recipients and their families, poverty became "structural."
People became dependent on government.

After the government finally placed some restrictions on welfare, dependency declined. Much to the surprise of those who denounced welfare reform as cruel, people changed their behavior.

We ignore the experience of price controls. Government can dictate prices, but cannot dictate costs. Price controls result in rationing, drive producers out of business and cause lower quality and less innovation. America, because its citizens enjoyed greater economic freedom, built a superior health care system — which ObamaCare now threatens to dismantle.

Communism collapsed under the romantic but bankrupt notion of "from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs." Taking from the productive and giving to the unproductive does damage to the incentive of both parties.

European countries — "social justice" democracies — produce comparatively few private-sector jobs. Europe suffers from high taxes, choking union deals that make it virtually impossible to fire workers, and government policies that mandate paid vacations and other job-killing benefits.

Into this statist abyss we willingly jump.

Former Democratic presidential candidate George McGovern left the Senate after 18 years and bought a small business. It went under. He wrote: "(I) wish I had known more firsthand about the concerns and problems of American businesspeople while I was a U.S. senator and later a presidential nominee. ... Legislators and government regulators must more carefully consider the economic and management burdens we have been imposing on U.S. businesses. ... Many businesses ... simply can't pass such costs on to their customers and remain competitive or profitable."

President Obama, like many in Congress, has little experience in or understanding of the private free-market economy.

Obama never started a business, ran one or struggled to meet a payroll. He shows little respect for the hard, long hours people put in to build successful businesses that hire people. He believes unequal outcomes are unjust and government exists to right this wrong by "spreading the wealth."

If this means telling doctors how to practice, so what? If this means people will be less likely to improve themselves through education and training to get "good" jobs with benefits, so what? If this means we make employers less likely to hire for fear of fines should they fail to offer health insurance, so what? And if the "wealthy" invest less and create fewer jobs because of higher taxes and expensive regulations, so what?

Now what? As many as 39 state legislatures have taken or will take action to block the mandate. Thirteen state attorneys general immediately filed suit, arguing, among other things, that ObamaCare's insurance mandate violates the Constitution's commerce clause. Expect more states to sue.

Unfortunately, the Supreme Court broadly interprets the commerce clause — wildly beyond the intent of the Founders — to allow just about anything.

So, the Constitution must be changed. It must be amended to make what was once clear absolutely, positively, unavoidably clear.

Two-thirds of the states can call for a constitutional convention, where an amendment can be proposed to prohibit the forced purchase of health insurance. Three-fourths of the states could then ratify it.

Implausible? So was ObamaCare.

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=528448

TUCSON, Ariz. (970 WFLA) - The Association of American Physicians and Surgeons (AAPS) became the first medical society to sue to overturn the newly enacted health care bill, the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA). AAPS sued Friday in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia (AAPS v. Sebelius et al.).

“If the PPACA goes unchallenged, then it spells the end of freedom in medicine as we know it,” observed Jane Orient, M.D., the Executive Director of AAPS. “Courts should not allow this massive intrusion into the practice of medicine and the rights of patients.”

“There will be a dire shortage of physicians if the PPACA becomes effective and is not overturned by the courts.”

The PPACA requires most Americans to buy government-approved insurance starting in 2014, or face stiff penalties. Insurance company executives will be enriched by this requirement, but the AAPS says it violates the Fifth Amendment protection against the government forcing one person to pay cash to another. AAPS is the first to assert this important constitutional claim.

The PPACA also violates the Tenth Amendment, the Commerce Clause, and the provisions authorizing taxation, the AAPS says. The Taxing and Spending power cannot be invoked, as the premiums go to private insurance companies. The traditional sovereignty of the States over the practice of medicine is destroyed by the PPACA.

AAPS notes that in scoring the proposal the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) was bound by assumptions imposed by Congress, including the ability to “save” $500 billion in Medicare, and to redirect $50 billion from Social Security. HHS Secretary Sebelius stated that PPACA would reduce the federal deficit, knowing the opposite to be true if these assumptions are unrealistic.

AAPS asks the Court to enjoin the government from promulgating or enforcing insurance mandates and require HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and Social Security Commissioner Michael Astrue to provide the Court with an accounting of Medicare and Social Security solvency.

Congress recognized that PPACA cannot be funded without the insurance mandates, and will become unenforceable without them.

Court action is necessary “to preserve individual liberty” and “to prevent PPACA from bankrupting the United States generally and Medicare and Social Security specifically,” AAPS stated.

http://970wfla.com/cc-common/news/sections/newsarticle.html?feed=124415&article=6928168

When was the last time a liberal speaker at a University had their speech cancelled by out of control conservatives? Can’t think of any.

If one unkind word is spoken against a far-left adherent, the media is in an uncontrollable frenzy. The reverse does not occur in that the media and our present government actually encourage wanton vicious attacks against the right.

There are several important lessons in all of this. First, we must stand up and protect and fight for our rights. We must not allow our conservative points of view to be officially suppressed, threatened or punished whether it is by our government or a public institution. If we back down and don’t fight back, the consequences will be further erosion of our rights and freedoms. This is what has happened even in Canada and, of course, elsewhere. Let’s not let it happen here in America. There are already proposals to do just this such as the "Fairness Doctrine" and Obama's information czar who suggested controlling, correcting or deleting information on the internet that the government may deem "inaccurate" or "inappropriate".

We also must not be apologetic for our points of view or for non-violent means to express them. The left has done this very well. We need to be more verbally aggressive, loud and persistent.

Oh, Canada!
by Ann Coulter   03/24/2010

Since arriving in Canada I've been accused of thought crimes, threatened with criminal prosecution for speeches I hadn't yet given and denounced on the floor of the Parliament (which was nice because that one was on my "bucket list").

Posters advertising my speech have been officially banned, while posters denouncing me are plastered all over the University of Ottawa campus. Elected officials have been prohibited from attending my speeches. Also, the local clothing stores are fresh out of brown shirts.

Welcome to Canada!

The provost of the University of Ottawa, average student IQ: 0, wrote to me—widely disseminating his letter to at least a half-dozen intermediaries before it reached me—in advance of my visit in order to recommend that I familiarize myself with Canada's criminal laws regarding hate speech.

This marks the first time I've ever gotten hate mail for something I might do in the future.

Apparently Canadian law forbids "promoting hatred against any identifiable group," which the provost, Francois A. Houle advised me, "would not only be considered inappropriate, but could in fact lead to criminal charges."

I was given no specific examples of what words and phrases I couldn't use, but I take it I'm not supposed to say, "F----you, Francois."

While it was a relief to know that it is still permissible in Canada to promote hatred against unidentifiable groups, upon reading Francois' letter, I suddenly realized that I had just been the victim of a hate crime! And it was committed by Francois A. Houle (French for "Frank A. Hole").

What other speakers get a warning not to promote hatred? Did Francois A. Houle send a similarly worded letter to Israel-hater Omar Barghouti before he spoke last year at U of Ottawa? ("Ottawa": Indian for "Land of the Bed-Wetters.")

How about Angela Davis, Communist Party member and former Black Panther who spoke at the University of Zero just last month?

Or do only conservatives get letters admonishing them to be civil? Or—my suspicion—is it only conservative women who fuel Francois' rage?

How about sending a letter to all Muslim speakers advising them to please bathe once a week while in Canada? Would that constitute a hate crime?

I'm sure Canada's Human Rights Commission will get to the bottom of Francois' strange warning to me, inasmuch as I will be filing a complaint with that august body, so I expect they will be reviewing every letter the university has sent to other speakers prior to their speeches to see if any of them were threatened with criminal prosecution.

Both writer Mark Steyn and editor Ezra Levant have been investigated by the Human Rights Commission for promoting hatred toward Muslims.

Levant's alleged crime was to reprint the cartoons of Mohammed originally published in a Danish newspaper, leading practitioners of the Religion of Peace to engage in murderous violence across the globe. Steyn's alleged crime was to publish an excerpt of his book, America Alone in Maclean's magazine, in which he jauntily described Muslims as "hot for jihad."

Both of them also flew jet airliners full of passengers into skyscrapers in lower Manhattan, resulting in thousands of deaths. No, wait—that was somebody else.

Curiously, however, there was no evidence that either the cartoons or the column did, in fact, incite hatred toward Muslims—nor was there the remotest possibility that they would.

By contrast, conservative speakers are regularly subjected to violent attacks on college campuses. Bill Kristol, Pat Buchanan, David Horowitz and I have all been the targets of infamous campus attacks.

That's why the Clare Boothe Luce Policy Institute (a sponsor of my Canada speeches) and the Young America's Foundation (a sponsor of many of my college speeches) don't send conservatives to college campuses without a bodyguard.

You'd have to be a real A-Houle not to anticipate that accusing a conservative of "promoting hatred" prior to her arrival on a college campus would in actuality—not in liberal fantasies of terrified Muslims cowering in terror of Mark Steyn readers—incite real-world violence toward the conservative.

The university itself acknowledged that Francois' letter was likely to provoke violence against me by demanding—long after my speech was scheduled, but immediately after Francois disseminated his letter—that my sponsors pony up more than $1,200 for extra security.

Also following Francois' letter, the Ottawa University Student Federation met for 7 1/2 hours to hammer out a series of resolutions denouncing me. The resolutions included:

"Whereas Ann Coulter is a hateful woman;
"Whereas she has made hateful comments against GLBTQ, Muslims, Jews and women;
"Whereas she violates an unwritten code of 'positive-space';
"Be it resolved that the SFUO express its disapproval of having Ann Coulter speak at the University of Ottawa."

At least the students didn't waste 7 1/2 hours on something silly, like their studies.

At the risk of violating anyone's positive space, what happened to Canada? How did the country that gave us Jim Carrey, Mike Myers, Martin Short, Dan Aykroyd and Catherine O'Hara suddenly become a bunch of whining crybabies?

After Tuesday night, the hatred incited by Francois' letter is no longer theoretical. The police called off my speech when the auditorium was surrounded by thousands of rioting liberals—screaming, blocking the entrance, throwing tables, demanding that my books be burned, and finally setting off the fire alarm.

Sadly, I missed the book-burning because I never made it to the building.

But, reportedly, a Canadian crowd hasn't been this excited since they opened a new Tim Hortons. Local reporters couldn't make out what the crowd was chanting, but it was something about "Molson" and a "sled dog."

I've given more than 100 college speeches, and not once has one of my speeches been shut down at any point. Even the pie-throwing incident at the University of Arizona didn't break up the event. I said, "Get them!" and the college Republicans got them, and then I continued with my rambling, hate-filled diatribe—I mean, my speech.

So we've run this experiment more than 100 times.

Only one college speech was ever met with so much mob violence that the police were forced to cancel it: The one that was preceded by a letter from the university provost accusing me of hate speech.

(To add insult to injury, Francois didn't even plan to attend my speech because Tuesday is his bikini wax night.)

If a university official's letter accusing a speaker of having a proclivity to commit speech crimes before she's given the speech—which then leads to Facebook postings demanding that Ann Coulter be hurt, a massive riot and a police-ordered cancellation of the speech—is not hate speech, then there is no such thing as hate speech.

Either Francois goes to jail or the Human Rights Commission is a hoax and a fraud.

Given our financially dire present situation and an angry America as evidenced by the ascendancy of the Tea Party, it may just stand a chance.

Tea Party Amendment
Investors Business Daily   03/03/2010

Fiscal Crisis: Tea Partyers have made it clear they don't trust politicians — Democrat or Republican. Their historic uprising may now have a surefire way to stop politicians from spending us into the abyss.

In what promises to be a consequential election year, Republican leaders are eager to get the masses who make up the Tea Party movement on their side. But Tea Partyers remember that the GOP Congress and GOP president themselves spent way too much — even expanding the fiscally doomed Medicare entitlement program. Some Tea Party leaders even accuse Republican spendthrifts of practicing socialism.

GOP Reps. Jeb Hensarling of Texas, Mike Pence of Indiana and John Campbell of California may have just hit on a way of focusing the energy of a movement that's been accused by Democrats such as former Senate aide and Forbes columnist Dan Gerstein of being "incoherent, indiscriminate" and "all over the place" in its complaints.

The three have proposed a Spending Limit Amendment to the Constitution that would restrain the federal government to the average expenditures of the post-World War II era — 20% of the U.S. economy. It would take a declaration of war or a two-thirds vote by Congress to waive the spending constraints.

Tea Partyers will no doubt be impressed by the fact that the idea comes from no less than Thomas Jefferson. In 1798, the Declaration's author wrote: "I wish it were possible to obtain a single amendment to our Constitution. I would be willing to depend on that alone for the reduction of the administration of our government."

There really is no credible argument against the idea. In common-sense fashion, the constraint would be suspended during a declared war, and any other real emergency would surely be recognized as such by two-thirds of lawmakers.

Other attempts to save Americans from the drunken sailors they send to Washington have failed. The automatic cuts of the Gramm-Rudman "sequester" of the 1980s worked, but the Supreme Court judged much of the law to be an unconstitutional restriction on presidential powers, and Congress defanged it. Gramm-Rudman's successor, Paygo, didn't use fixed targets, and expired in 2002. The line-item veto was famously ruled unconstitutional by the high court.

The Hensarling-Pence-Campbell Spending Limit Amendment is actually preferable to the line-item veto because it doesn't discriminate between big-spending Congresses and profligate presidents. It snaps the public purse closed on every Washington politician's fingers.

The SLA couldn't come at a more opportune time. The president and Congress want to add to our current $12 trillion in national debt a $2-trillion-plus big government health overhaul. Medicare, in the meantime, is less than a decade from bankruptcy, Social Security less than three decades away. As the plan points out, "if the SLA is not adopted, all of these programs are doomed on their current auto-pilot glide path as these three entitlement programs alone — Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid — are set to consume the entirety of the federal budget by 2036."

Investor's Business Daily on Wednesday asked Hensarling and Pence about the difficulties of getting three-quarters of the states to approve an amendment when so many amendment attempts by both sides of the aisle — from equal rights for women to abortion to flag desecration — have failed in recent decades.

"We're not naive," Hensarling said, noting that of about 5,000 proposed amendments only 27 have been ratified. But both men said that based on attending town halls and other venues, they have never seen the American people so incensed about runaway spending. The SLA "might be one of those simple ideas," Pence said, whose time has finally come.

If the Tea Party movement embraces this simple idea, with Thomas Jefferson as the SLA's avatar, there's no telling how big the political tsunami to strike Washington could end up becoming.

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=522845

Our freedoms can be ephemeral – they can be taken away in a flash. The “progressives” and the far-left in our country are relentlessly attacking our innate rights and freedoms, often in incremental and stealth ways. The Second Amendment not only allows us to protect ourselves from others who aim to harm us but as Thomas Jefferson noted, it also is what can protect us from a tyrannical, overreaching government.

We must be ever vigilant in protecting and defending these rights and freedoms.

'Right To Bear Arms' Means Just That
Investors Business Daily   03/03/2010

Gun Rights: Otis McDonald, 76, an Army vet who lives in a high-crime area of Chicago, thinks the Constitution gives him the right to bear arms to protect himself and his wife as he protected his country. We think so too.

On Tuesday, the Supreme Court heard arguments on behalf of four Chicago residents led by homeowner McDonald, the Second Amendment Foundation and the Illinois State Rifle Association to overturn Chicago's three-decade-old ban on owning handguns.

In a 5-4 decision in 2008, Heller v. District of Columbia, written by Justice Antonin Scalia, the Supreme Court overturned the District of Columbia's draconian, 32-year-old ban on the private ownership of handguns. Scalia wrote that an individual right to bear arms is supported by "the historical narrative" before and after the Second Amendment was adopted.

The joy of Second Amendment defenders was short-lived. A three-judge panel of the 7th Circuit Court of Appeals, led by Judge Frank Easterbrook, rejected subsequent suits brought by the National Rifle Association against the city of Chicago and its suburb of Oak Park, Ill.

According to Easterbrook, the Revolution was fought and independence won so that the Founding Fathers could write a Constitution with a Bill of Rights that applied only to the District of Columbia.

"Heller dealt with a law enacted under the authority of the national government," he wrote, "while Chicago and Oak Park are subordinate bodies of a state."

We're all for federalism, but the U.S. Constitution is the U.S. Constitution. Surely he can't be serious.

Alan Gura, the Alexandria, Va., lawyer who won the Heller case, has expanded the argument to include the 14th Amendment, adopted in 1868 to prevent infringement on constitutional rights by states and others concerned about newly freed slaves owning firearms.

Introducing the 14th Amendment to Congress, Sen. Jacob Howard of Michigan referred to "personal rights" such as "the right to keep and bear arms, " explaining that his amendment would compel the states "to respect these great fundamental guarantees."

In 2008, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott filed an amicus brief on behalf of 32 states that also challenged the constitutionality of the D.C. ban. Now he represents a group of 38 states fighting the Chicago ban. "The Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms is a critical liberty interest, essential to preserving individual security and the right to self-defense," Abbott explained.

Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass wrote in 2008 that in Chicago only two classes of people can possess firearms: "The criminals and the politicians."

City politicians, he noted, used their influence to "become deputized peace officers so they can carry" or "often go around surrounded by armed bodyguards on the city payroll."

Otis McDonald wants the same right to defend himself and his family. To deny him that right, city officials argue that repealing the ban will bring carnage in the streets. Yet in the forthcoming third edition of "More Guns, Less Crime," John Lott points out that the Windy City's murder rate fell relative to America's other 50 largest cities before the ban and rose afterward.

In an essay Monday for FoxNews.com, Lott noted that after the D.C. gun ban was ruled unconstitutional, murders in Washington plummeted 25% from 2008 to 2009. D.C.'s murder rate, he reports, is down to 23.5 per 100,000 people, its lowest since 1967.

More guns do seem to mean less crime. And as Mr. McDonald insists, those who gave us liberty gave us the means and the right to defend it.

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=522844