The Illinois Senate... has adopted a set of rules for the impeachment trial of Gov. Rod Blagojevich that are so patently unfair that his lawyers’ characterization of the proceedings as a “kangaroo court” has more than a ring of truth.
simply because a government body has the power to do something, does not make it right or proper for it to do so?
...
the Illinois House and Senate have not shown the country the best the Land of Lincoln has to offer, but its seamier side.
Keeping in mind that the criminal complaint lodged against the two-term governor last month in Chicago consists of nothing more than allegations of wrongdoing recited by an FBI field agent, is it not a legitimate question raised by the governor and his lawyers that basing an article of impeachment on such untested and unproven evidence raises an issue of fundamental fairness?
Not only that, but the trial rules according to which the governor’s future will be determined expressly prohibit him from obtaining evidence regarding those charges if doing so “could compromise” the federal government’s investigation. Does this not render it virtually impossible for the governor to defend himself against those charges?
Not only that, but the Senate’s rules give that body the power to deny the governor —- by majority vote —- any particular information or witness he might seek to subpoena in his defense...
And what of the other underlying charges against the governor voted by the Illinois House? Many of the other charges are, by the explicit terms of the House report, based on evidence no stronger than newspaper stories...
Hello! If we began listing government officials in either Springfield, Ill., or Washington, D.C., who render decisions involving millions or even billions of our tax dollars without “understanding the procurement process,” the list would be far longer than the verbose impeachment report against Blagojevich...
The vast majority of FOIA requests filed against federal agencies are met by “a pattern of keeping basic government information from the public.” If that standard were now to constitute grounds for impeachment, every modern president, especially the immediate past president, should have been impeached.
The bottom line is, whether one likes, dislikes, loves or hates Rod Blagojevich, the process to which he is being subject in his home state is an embarrassment and should deeply offend all Americans who believe —- as did our Founding Fathers —- in fairness, due process and equal protections of our laws.
George W. Bush has declared Washington, D.C., a federal disaster area...
One reason why nobody's ever done that before is because a presidential inauguration is not... an "emergency." It's penciled in well in advance...
The proposition that a new federal administration is itself a federal emergency is almost too perfect an emblem of American government in the 21st century...
So a "federal emergency" is no longer a nuclear strike on Cleveland or even a Category Three hurricane, but now a snowfall in New England and an inaugural ball at the Mayflower Hotel. As Mister Incredible shrewdly observes to his kid in "The Incredibles," when everybody's special, nobody is. Likewise, when everything's an emergency, nothing is: We live in a permanent state of routine emergency...
If you'd suggested in the Seventies a new federal agency to cope with municipal snow removal in Connecticut, you'd have been laughed out the room. But, with government, mission creep isn't a bug but the defining feature...
The most basic of conservative principles is that if you reward bad behavior you get more of it. We now have a government offering trillion-dollar rewards for bad behavior to the financial system, to the housing market, to the auto unions and to individual voters. And the heirs to those Connecticut town meetings that Tocqueville regarded as the best form of government ever devised by man now underbudget their snow-removal costs, secure in the knowledge that the Feds will pick up the tab...
But, alas, Washington is one of those disaster relief cases, where they get the relief, and the rest of us get the disaster...
The many who are being led in ignorance are being led by a relatively few statists and this is what gives statism it's political power -- it's not the number of people who intellectually adhere to statism -- it's the number living under the illusion of freedom yet ignorantly accepting the statist lie, that more intervention is needed to save freedom. Statists are winning the battles, but as I said the other day, this last victory may be a Pyrrhic victory -- one more such victory and they may be ruined.
The reason is that the direction of statism is the way to ruin -- this has been proved so often throughout the history of nation-states, and other such tyrannies before that, it's truly odd that it's not commonly accepted. Only in a free society where spontaneous order provides flexibility will needs and wants be satisfied to the greatest degree...
The power of the internet is that it's a counterforce to this indoctrination, but people have to be prepared to receive the knowledge and sift through it -- to be able to critically think. The powers of indoctrination are way more organized with a message of dependence and submission...
Education first, though -- if there's a loud demand for private education and the end to the Department of Education, the transition from failed statism to limited government will be a lot easier.
[what] the exercise of social responsibility... amounts to is an assertion that those who favor the taxes and expenditures in question have failed to persuade a majority of their fellow citizens to be of like mind and that they are seeking to attain by undemocratic procedures what they cannot attain by democratic procedures...
precisely the same argument applies to the newer phenomenon of calling upon stockholders to require corporations to exercise social responsibility... In most of these cases, what is in effect involved is some stockholders trying to get other stockholders (or customers or employees) to contribute against their will to "social" causes favored by the activists. Insofar as they succeed, they are again imposing taxes and spending the proceeds...
But the doctrine of "social responsibility" taken seriously would extend the scope of the political mechanism to every human activity. It does not differ in philosophy from the most explicitly collectivist doctrine. It differs only by professing to believe that collectivist ends can be attained without collectivist means. That is why, in my book Capitalism and Freedom, I have called it a "fundamentally subversive doctrine" in a free society, and have said that in such a society, "there is one and only one social responsibility of business–to use it resources and engage in activities designed to increase its profits so long as it stays within the rules of the game, which is to say, engages in open and free competition without deception or fraud."
However, whatever ‘devastating’ consequences these banks are dreaming up and pushing on Capitol Hill regarding their own collapse will be nothing compared to the collapse of our currency if we keep debasing it through these foolish bailouts...
The world will not come to an end without this or that bank...
Government is a monumental drag on this economy...
Yet in spite of government’s failures, it flourishes and grows, thanks to the continual bailouts from the unwitting taxpayer.
Big government has been tried and has failed miserably. What we need now is small government, and freedom. We need the freedom to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps again, as we traditionally do in this country. But try to start a business or charity today, and you will understand how little economic freedom we really have left.
Freedom, not government, made this the land of opportunity. Freedom laid the foundation that catapulted us to becoming the strongest economic power in the world. The American people are strong and capable. We can pull ourselves out of this mess. All we need is for the nanny-state to get out of the way and allow us to do it. Freedom is our strength, government is our weakness. Only by recognizing this and unleashing our strengths will we solve the problems we face today
The Austrian school of economics teaches that only a free market economy, unencumbered by onerous government controls, creates long-term prosperity. Politicians, however, tend to be notoriously short-sighted.
I am left with these questions – who is going to be left standing, to tax in the private sector, to pay for all these public sector make-work jobs? Is Washington really to be considered some sort of savior for creating unproductive jobs in place of the productive jobs they eliminated?
We are at an economic dead-end and those in power are in denial. The truth is our economic problems are due to loose monetary policy, central economic planning, and the parasitic expenses of government. Unless we assess these problems honestly, we unfortunately have a long way to go until, like the junkie, we hit rock bottom.
We have seen that government expansion of the money supply rearranges resources in society and interferes with the market’s natural tendency to serve consumers according to their own priorities. Thus inflation would be objectionable even if it did not cause malinvestment and seed the ground for a subsequent depression, that is, even if it did not spawn the trade cycle.
It is incumbent on the inflationists–specifically, the incoming government officials–to explain why income distribution is a proper function of government.
Our problems are ours to solve, and we need to give other countries that respect as well. Instead, we have been turning alleged, phantom threats into real, actual threats.
We should follow the foreign policy advice of the Founders – friendship and commerce with all nations. One positive step would be to end our destructive embargo of Cuba, which deprives our farmers of a market just 90 miles from US shores while strengthening the Communist regime...
Other countries should decide how to govern themselves. Even if we don't necessarily approve, it's none of our business. If other people foolishly choose to live under statist experimental regimes, they need to fail in their own right, and not have us as a scapegoat. We need to focus on our own affairs.
However, the pressures exerted on our leadership from the military industrial complex and big business is not in favor of peace or freedom, or especially nonintervention. Intervention is big business...
We need to rein in our overseas empire, as quickly as possible. We need to bring our troops home, and get our economy back into the business of production, not destruction...
If the new administration can take a closer look at real free trade and no entangling alliances, we would be much better off for it. Economically – we could save hundreds of billions of dollars each year! The new leadership has the opportunity and the political capital to do this. But unfortunately, it is not likely to happen.
Of course, the Liberal argument here is that we have to use public policy to protect the public from potential harm.
Unfortunately, this equates with taking away rights from those who have not done, or even contemplated doing, anything wrong rather than emphasizing the implementation of consequences for those who actually behave in a criminal manner...
I see more advantage in arresting and charging people for crimes they have actually committed than in making simple, everyday activities illegal on the grounds that they might conceivably hurt somebody someday...
All of these restrictions were presented and approved as sensible restrictions on things that could be easily misused, but in reality served specific ideological ends that involving eliminating the rights of certain groups of American citizens...
The absence of guns is also--sad to say, even in America--a potential pre-condition for exploitation, abuse, and tyranny...
I will govern myself; the government does not govern me.
The Bill of Rights does not give rights. It restricts the federal government from governing on those rights...
If humans are capable of running our own government and do not need a king to tell us what to do, then we are capable of making our own safety decisions. You can advocate for a position, like “buckle up” but do not mandate it. That is when the government gets tyrannical...
So a good way to judge a law is whether the law punishes good decent folk or the criminals. Gun control is all about control. The gun is the excuse.
