Saturday, December 7, 2013
Turley Is Wrong, Imperial Presidency Exists And It Is Moving Toward Dictatorship.
Legal Scholar Turley: 'Imperial Presidency' Emerging
Friday, 06 Dec 2013 04:57 PM
"This administration's been very successful in blocking challenges to actions that were viewed as unconstitutional. We have to get over what's called the standing barrier where courts just refuse to hear challenges," Turley told "The Steve Malzberg Show" on Newsmax TV.
Republican lawmakers have complained that Obama's changes to the healthcare law, including delays and tweaks of certain parts of it that are causing problems, are unconstitutional because they must be passed through Congress.
"The Framers [of the U.S. Constitution] would have been appalled that you can have very clear violations of the Constitution, but literally no one can actually get a hearing to review them," Turley said.
"At a minimum, courts should recognize that members of Congress have standing to challenge these types of rules and policies. If they did, many of these things would be struck down.
"We have the emergence of what is often called an imperial presidency, something that we have resisted for generations."
© 2013 Newsmax. All rights reserved.
Obama Will Hurt Other Black Politicians. He Is Not Showing The Public That He Can Lead.
Economist Williams: Obama Incompetent, 'Beyond Learning'
Friday, 06 Dec 2013 06:03 PM
"He's beyond learning. He has another agenda and, firstly, I don't think Obama is his own man," Williams told "The Steve Malzberg Show" at Newsmax TV.
"He is a puppet of George Soros," he added, referring to the liberal billionaire businessman and philanthropist.
Williams believes Obama's presidency ultimately will be regarded along the lines of Jimmy Carter's "somewhat failed" administration.
He said it is unfortunate that America's first black president is "incompetent."
"Back in 1947 when Jackie Robinson came into the Major Leagues … he had to be that good. Blacks could not afford an incompetent baseball player," Williams said.
"And as a result of Jackie Robinson, [Roy] Campanella, and all these other guys, I can get out and play baseball, and basketball as well, and nobody watching my behavior can say, 'Well damn, those blacks can't play baseball or basketball..'
"That is, right now we can afford, black people can afford incompetent baseball players or basketball players or football players but they cannot afford an incompetent president. And it turns out that Barack Obama is an incompetent president and a part of the tragedy of it."
But he said that says more about Americans than about Obama.
"This is the first time in our history that a person could have been elected to the highest office in the land who had long-time associations with people who hate our country such as Rev. [Jeremiah] Wright, who said, well black people should not sing God Bless America but … Damn America," Williams said.
" He was a long-time associate with Willie Ayers, who bombed the building along with his wife and other shady characters and so this says something about the American people who would elect a person to office like that.
But maybe a whole lot of whites, maybe they had some of their guilt taken care of by saying, well gee, I voted for a black person."
When Workers Get $15 Per Hour, How Much Will Your Big Mac Cost? Why Should They Be Limited To $15, Why Not $345?
Drive-Thru Economics
UPI FILE
The Service Employees International Union and others believe fast food workers should earn $15 per hour.
It’s almost as if the left simply refuses to comprehend it, despite its simplicity. Americans will not pay more for the borderline-toxic trimmings and unidentifiable animal parts that we call “fast food.”
Liberals can kick up all the dust they want over the fast food industry’s average hourly wage of 8 bucks or so. They can demand every burger-flipper, fry-cooker and order-screwer-upper in the solar system be paid $45 per hour with full medical and dental benefits, two weeks paid vacation and stock options. They can even picket outside the Taco Bell from now until the Tex-Mex-ish chain offers a free-range chicken burrito with organically grown heirloom tomatoes and handmade guacamole. But they’re never going to convince anyone that a “McRib” should cost $14. Therefore, they will never convince anyone that assembling a McRib from whatever its actual contents might be is anything other than an entry-level job.
Yet our liberal friends from such notable organizations as the Service Employees International Union have retaken their places on picket lines in front of thousands of fast food emporia across the fruited plain. Their demands haven’t changed, nor has their chosen method of shrieking at the top of their lungs. They want the government to mandate the fast food industry pay a minimum wage of $15 per hour. Should they win this battle — and their access to virtually unlimited resources from spigots like George Soros and even the Barack Obama Administration (your tax dollars at work) suggests they’ll certainly continue the fight — their victory will result in either fewer fast food workers or no fast food workers.
Raising entry-level salaries in the fast food industry will do more than just jack up the cost of the No. 2 Super Combo with a Coke. It will force a reciprocal wave of cost increases throughout the industry. If the lettuce guy gets $15 per hour, then the assistant day manager will immediately demand an increase in her salary. After all, she worked for her promotion. Of course, once she gets a raise, the day manager will be in the boss’s office and so on, up through the chain until the company is left choosing between raising prices, lowering labor costs or simply shuttering operations. Since profit margins for the average McDonald’s franchise hover somewhere between 6 percent and 8 percent, something’s gotta give; and I doubt it will be the percentage of actual chicken in Chicken McNuggets. It’s worth noting that more than 50 percent of the labor force of McDonald’s is drawn from minority groups, meaning big labor’s assault on Big Mac will send a disproportionate number of minorities to the curb.
Liberals operate under the mistaken presumption that if a business makes a profit, then its workers must suffer. In fact, the only causal relationship that exists between a fast food company’s profits and its workers’ wages is a positive one. Without fiscal successes, McDonald’s doesn’t expand to become the largest company in the industry and one of the most ubiquitous icons on the planet. Without that expansion, there are 14,000 or so empty commercial spaces providing taxable income to the Federal, State and local — not to mention global — economies. Without that expansion, there are 14,000 or so fewer entities providing jobs. Including the corporate staffers of McDonald’s, that’s just shy of a half-million more Americans cast onto the government dole — a dole that would supported by a half-million fewer Americans. And the 1.3 million McDonald’s employees outside the United States would be thrilled to learn the American big labor movement turned their jobs into collateral damage.
But there is good news for the fast food industry’s millions upon millions of customers. Should big labor manage to force a 100 percent increase in the minimum wage, thousands of fast food employees will be replaced by hundreds of automated order-takers and -makers, dramatically increasing the odds that you’ll actually get what you ordered.
Man Cheats, Fiance Sues And Wins Big.
GEORGIA MAN’S BROKEN PROMISE TO HIS FIANCEE ENDS UP COSTING HIM $50K
A Georgia man has reportedly been ordered by a court to pay his former fiancee $50,000 for allegedly breaking his promise to marry her.
shutterstock.com
According to court documents obtained by WSB-TV, Christopher Ned Kelley allegedly promised to marry his fiancee, Melissa Cooper, but then ruined their relationship by cheating on her twice.
Kelley reportedly gave Cooper a $10,000 engagement ring, lived with her for more than 10 years and had a child with her. Cooper says she then quit her job to raise their kid.
“But when Cooper found out that Kelley had cheated on her for at least the second time, she asked him to move out and sued him for fraud and a ‘breach of promise to marry,’” the reportstates.
The defense in the case reportedly argued that Kelley was merely paying Cooper for sex, practically likening the relationship to prostitution. He also claimed that he was never really planning on marrying his fiancee and that he never said the words, “will you marry me.”
“A trial court ruled in Cooper’s favor, awarding damages and attorneys’ fees totaling $50,000. Kelley’s appeal of that ruling was rejected by the appeals court in November,” WSB-TV notes.
Green Energy Wins--Eagles Lose. This Is The Way Things Are Done In Obama's World
OBAMA ADMIN. GIVES CERTAIN COMPANIES PERMISSION TO MAIM OR KILL ENDANGERED EAGLES
WASHINGTON (TheBlaze/AP) – The Obama administration announced Friday that it will allow certain companies to kill or main bald and golden eagles for up to 30 years without the fear of prosecution.
Getty Images.
The new rule is designed to address environmental consequences that some say have hindered attempts to grow the “green” energy industry: the dozens of bald and golden eagles being killed each year by the giant, spinning blades of wind turbines.
The regulation, which was published Friday, was not subjected to a full environmental review because the administration classified it as an administrative change.
An investigation by The Associated Press earlier this year documented the illegal killing of eagles around wind farms, the Obama administration’s reluctance to prosecute such cases and its willingness to help keep the scope of the eagle deaths secret. President Barack Obama has enthusiastically backed the “green” energy, nearly doubling America’s wind power in his first term as a way to tackle so-called “global warming.”
But the White House seems to have finally realized that some “green” energy projects aren’t all that “green.”
The new rule will provide legal protection for the lifespan of wind farms and other projects if companies obtain permits and make efforts to avoid killing protected birds.
Companies would have to take additional measures if they killed or injured more eagles than they had estimated they would, or if new information suggested that eagle populations were being affected. The permits would be reviewed every five years, and companies would have to submit reports of how many eagles they killed. Now, such reporting is voluntary, and the Interior Department refuses to release the information.
Conservation groups, which have been aligned with the industry on other issues, said the decision by the Interior Department sanctions the killing of an American icon.
“Instead of balancing the need for conservation and renewable energy, Interior wrote the wind industry a blank check,” said Audubon President and CEO David Yarnold in a statement. The group said it would challenge the decision.
Wind farms are clusters of turbines as tall as 30-story buildings, with spinning rotors as wide as a passenger jet’s wingspan. Though the blades appear to move slowly, they can reach speeds of up to 170 mph at the tips, creating tornado-like vortexes.
Until now, no wind energy company has obtained permission authorizing the killing, injuring or harassment of eagles, although five-year permits have been available since 2009. That has put the companies at legal risk and has discouraged private investment in renewable energy.
It also hasn’t helped eagles since, without permits, companies are not required to take steps to reduce their impact on the birds or report when they are killed.
The new rule makes clear that revoking a permit — which could undermine investments and interest in wind power — is a last resort under the administration’s energy policy.
“We anticipate that implementing additional mitigation measures … will reduce the likelihood of amendments to, or revocation of, the permit,” the rule says.
The wind energy industry has said the change mirrors permits already in place for endangered species, which are more at risk than bald and golden eagles. Bald eagles were removed from the endangered species list in 2007 but are still protected under two federal laws.
Getty Images.
Last month, Duke Energy Corp. pleaded guilty to killing eagles and other birds at two wind farms in Wyoming, the first time a wind energy company had been prosecuted under a law protecting migratory birds.
A study by federal biologists in September found that wind farms since 2008 had killed at least 67 bald and golden eagles, a number that the researchers said was likely underestimated. That did not include deaths at Altamont Pass, an area in northern California where wind farms kill an estimated 60 eagles a year.
It’s unclear what toll, if any, wind energy companies are having on eagle populations locally or regionally. Gunshots, electrocutions and poisonings almost certainly kill more bald and golden eagles than wind farms. But the toll could grow along with the industry.
A recent assessment of the status of the golden eagle in the western U.S. showed that populations have been decreasing in some areas but rising in others.
Here’s a copy of the permitting rule:
The announcement comes on the heels of a recent Associated Press report that highlighted the environmental downsides to the Obama administrator’s pursuit of corn-based ethanol.
Should People Who Oppose Gay Marriage Be Required To Participate In Their Weddings? Is This The Same As African Americans? Is This A Freedom Of Religion Issue?
Colo. judge orders Christian baker to bake gay wedding cake. Will he say no?
A baker in Denver refuses to make a wedding cake for a same-sex couple. Is that within his religious rights, or does it amount to illegal discrimination.
Dave Mullins, right, with his husband Charlie Craig, in Denver. The gay couple is pursuing a discrimination complaint against a Colorado bakery, saying the business refused them a wedding cake for a family reception in Colorado after they were married in a Massachusetts ceremony.
Brennan Linsley/AP
Business owners have the right to decide with whom they want to do business, correct? Not in the case of the Denver baker who refused to bake a wedding cake for a gay couple.
In Pictures Same sex marriage
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On Friday, Denver administrative law judge Robert Spencer told Jack Phillips, the owner of Masterpiece Cakeshop, that he discriminated against Charlie Craig and David Mullins, a legally married couple from Massachusetts, when he told them in 2012 he wouldn’t bake them a wedding cake, because doing so would violate his Christian belief that homosexuality is a sin.
The judge didn’t assign any damages, but told Phillips he cannot refuse gay couples in the future. Phillips has said he’d rather close his shop than bake cakes for gay marriages.
"I am a follower of Jesus Christ," Phillips said in July. "So you could say it’s a religious belief. I believe the Bible teaches [same-sex marriage is] not an OK thing."
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The growing legal acceptance of gay marriages across the country suggests that marriage equality is becoming established under the law, but the extent to which Christian businesses have to abide by such marriages is still being tested across the country.
Indeed, the ruling is at the vanguard of a Constitutional dilemma. To wit: in cases where personal and religious values and beliefs are in play, where does the freedom to practice religion end and equal treatment under the law begin?
Lawyers have also argued that, at least in the case of baking cakes, the First Amendment also comes into play, raising the question of whether an artist or craftsman can be compelled by the government to create objects against his or her wishes.
In just the past few years, a Mennonite bistro in Iowa, a Kentucky art gallery, and a New Mexicophotography shop have faced civil and legal complaints from gays who say their rights were violated when the business owners refused to serve them.
Business owners, for their part, continue to argue that the government can’t compel Christians to “express ideas and messages they decline to support,” according to Jordan Lorence, a senior counsel with the Alliance Defending Freedom, who added in an interview with The New American that “America was founded on the fundamental freedom of every citizen to live and work according to their beliefs.”
So far, civil rights agencies and courts have issued similar rulings to the one in Denver on Friday. Earlier this year, the New Mexico Supreme Court weighed in on a seven-year-old case where a lesbian couple argued that Elaine and Jonathan Huguenin, both Christians, discriminated against them when they refused to take pictures at their same-sex ceremony.
The Supreme Court agreed with the lesbians, writing that “a commercial photography business that offers its services to the public, thereby increasing its visibility to potential clients, is subject to the anti-discrimination provisions of the [New Mexico Human Rights Act] and must serve same-sex couples on the same basis that it serves opposite-sex couples.”
The legal battle has also drawn comparisons to civil rights struggles by blacks, where some arbitrators have concluded that refusing to serve gay couples is the same as lunch counters refusing to serve blacks in the Jim Crow era.
"Being denied service by Masterpiece Cakeshop was offensive and dehumanizing especially in the midst of arranging what should be a joyful family celebration,” Mr. Mullins said on Denver’s KDVR TV Friday. "We are grateful to have the support of our community and our state, and we hope that today’s decision will help ensure that no one else will experience this kind of discrimination again inColorado."
Gay marriages are banned in Colorado, but civil unions are okay. Under law, businesses are not afforded special religious protections.
"At first blush, it may seem reasonable that a private business should be able to refuse service to anyone it chooses," Judge Spencer wrote on Friday. "This view, however, fails to take into account the cost to society and the hurt caused to persons who are denied service simply because of who they are."
Legal experts believe the US Supreme Court may have to ultimately adjudicate the argument. If the high court does, it may hear evidence compiled by the American Civil Liberties Union in a series of stings on Christian wedding businesses.
In January, according to the ACLU, a woman called Phillips and asked if he’d bake a cake for a wedding between two dogs named Buffy and Roscoe. Phillips agreed. For his part, Phillips has said he doesn’t mind gay people, but can’t in good conscience bake cakes for ceremonies that, in his view, undermine his beliefs.
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