The Imperial Presidency

[American Patriot]

Most of the following is pulled from several different sources. This is what we know. She's the top of the list as far as I can tell.

Obama’s Advisors:



Valerie Jarrett


Personal
Jarrett was born in Shiraz, Iran to American parents James E. Bowman and Barbara Taylor Bowman. Her father, a pathologist and geneticist, ran a hospital for children in Shiraz in 1950, as part of a program where American physicians and agricultural experts sought to help jump-start developing countries' health and farming efforts.
When she was five, the family moved to London for one year, later moving to Chicago in 1963.^[3]
In 1966 her mother was one of four child advocates that created the Erikson Institute. The Institute was established to provide advanced knowledge in child development for teachers and other professionals working with young children.^[4]
As a child she spoke Persian and French.^[5]
Jarrett graduated from Northfield Mount Hermon in 1974. She earned a B.A. in Psychology from Stanford University in 1978, and a Juris Doctor (J.D.) from the University of Michigan Law School in 1981.^[6]
In 1983 Jarrett married William Robert Jarrett, son of famed Chicago Sun-Times reporter Vernon Jarrett. She attributes her switch from a private to a public career to their daughter Laura's birth and her own desire to do something that would make the daughter proud.^[7]
To one reporter's e-mailed question about her divorce, she replied, "Married in 1983, separated in 1987, and divorced in 1988. Enough said."^[7] In a Vogue profile, she further explained "We grew up together. We were friends since childhood. In a sense, he was the boy next door. I married without really appreciating how hard divorce would be."^[7] William Jarrett died of a heart attack en route to the hospital November, 1993.^[8]


Obama advisors

The following individuals were listed as Advisors to Obama in the The Chicago Tribune article "Obama boasts a dedicated, high-powered inner circle" ^[1] and in The New York Sun article "Obama's Brain Trust Taking Shape" ^[2]

Energy/GW advisors

• Jack Darin : "energy policy advisor for Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama" Darin's Obama site blog^[3]
  
  • Sierra club director, Illinois state ^[4]
  • "chief lobbyist for the Sierra Club's Illinois Chapter" ^[5]

Domestic Policy advisors

• Cassandra Butts: Harvard Law classmate and former senior policy adviser to Dick Gephardt

Energy/GW advisors
Jack Darin : "energy policy advisor for Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama" Darin's Obama site blog^[3]

• • Sierra club director, Illinois state ^[4]
  • "chief lobbyist for the Sierra Club's Illinois Chapter" ^[5]
  
  

Foreign Policy Advisors

• Gregory Craig
  
  • director of policy planning, Clinton State department.
  • defense team for President Clinton's impeachment is a newcomer to foreign policy.

• Daniel Shapiro leads Middle East group.
  
  • former deputy chief of staff to Senator Bill Nelson, a Democrat from Florida. Mr. Shapiro, who leads the Middle East group, spearheaded efforts in Congress to designate al Manar, the satellite television channel for Hezbollah, as a foreign terrorist organization. He sends his children to the Jewish Primary Day School in Washington, D.C.^[6]
  
  
• Anthony Lake "one of the campaign's most senior advisers"^[7]
  
  • quotes in Sun article suggest interest in Middle East.
  
  
• Samantha Power a professor at Harvard University and an expert in genocide and international law "The campaign has called her a foreign policy adviser, though not an adviser specifically on the Middle East"

• Susan Rice
  
  • senior staff, President Clinton's national security council. served as assistant secretary of State for African affairs
  • outspoken foe of the Sudanese regime for the last ten years.
  • senior adviser for Senator Kerry's campaign.
  
  
• Ben Rhodes chief speechwriter on foreign policy.
  
  • lead staff writer for the Iraq Study Group recommendations
  • coauthor of Lee Hamilton's and Thomas Kean's memoir of the commission to investigate September 11.
  
  
• Denis McDonough "point guard" on foreign policy
  
  • formerly was legislative aide to Senator Daschle
  
  
• Richard Danzig one of Senator Obama's chief advisers on military affairs.
  
  • secretary of the Navy for President Clinton
  • Education: Yale law, Rhodes scholar

Technology advisors

• Julius Genachowski: Harvard Law classmate, technology executive and former top aide to FCC chairman
  
  • Worked on Obama Tech & Innovation Plan ^[8]
  
  
• Alec Ross: Identified as an Obama "science advisor" ^[9]
  
  • senior vice president of the non-profit One Economy Corporation- focussed on Digital divide issue
  
  
• Reed Hundt^[10]
• Bill Kennard^[10]
• Daniel Weitzner^[10]
• Bill Kennard^[10]
• Eric Schmidt^[10]
• Craig Newmark^[10]
• Lawrence Lessig^[11]

Roles in policy to be identified further

• David Axelrod: Uber campaign strategist; journalist-turned-media consultant who knows how to turn a phrase and throw a punch
  
  • named Assistant to the President and Senior Advisor

• Michele Obama: Harvard-educated lawyer; South Side native grounds him in reality, her husband’s “true north”

• Bill Daley: Former Clinton Cabinet member and mayoral has quietly asked others for support

• Robert Gibbs: Veteran of several campaigns; a seasoned political spokesman with “Northern ruthlessness and Southern charm”

• Valerie Jarrett: Friend and confidant; lawyer and former deputy to Mayor Richard Daley who speaks her mind on politics and policy

• Peter Rouse: Former top aide to Tom Daschle. Cautious institutionalist known for discretion.

• Jim Reynolds: Chicago financial executive

• John Rogers: Mutual fund executive and major Chicago Democratic fundraiser

• David Plouffe: Level-headed and low-key, “one of the most well-rounded strategists.”

• Michael Froman: Harvard Law classmate, financial executive and former top aide to Bob Rubin

• Broderick Johnson: Former Clinton White House aide and telecom lobbyist

• Martin Nesbitt: Parking company president close to Pritzker family

Here's a separate list of people to look up:

• Ron Karenga was a founder of United Slaves, a violent nationalist rival to the Black Panthers. In 1971, Karenga was convicted of torturing two members of his own organization. One of the victims, Deborah Jones, testified that she and Gail Davis were whipped with an electrical cord…and that a hot soldering iron was placed in Miss Davis’ mouth, and that Karenga also put detergent in their mouths.
  Karenga is now professor of Black Studies at California State University, Long Beach.
• William Ayers put a bomb in the Pentagon and now teaches childhood education at the University of Illinois at Chicago.
• Ayer’s wife, Bernadine Ohrnstein/Dohrn, called for revolutionary war in the United States, praised the murderous Manson family, laughed about a paralyzed DA, said “Bring the Revolution home, kill your parents–that’s where it’s at,” and participated in the bombing of the Pentagon.
  She is professor at Northwestern University’s Children and Justice Center.
• Angela Davis, former Black Panther, was the legal owner of the guns the Panthers used to blow off the head of Marin County judge Harold Haley. This was done in an attempt to free Angela’s boyfriend, George Jackson.
  Today she is a professor at the University of California at Santa Cruz.
• Susan Rosenberg was a member of the Weather Underground, the Black Liberation Army, and The Family. She conspired to kill cops, blow up buildings, and rob a Brinks armored truck in Nanuet, New York. Sentenced to fifty-eight years in prison for (felony) murder and possession of 700 plus pounds of explosives, she was released from prison by President Clinton in his last day in office.
  Just a few days later, Rosenberg was offered a teaching position at Hamilton College, despite having absolutely no qualifications to teach. She did have a master’s degree in writing she got through a correspondence course in prison.

[MinutemanCO]

Whoa! There's a scary bunch of scumbags. Humanitarians all.

William Jarrett died of a heart attack en route to the hospital November, 1993.^[8]

I wonder if he really died of a heart attack or was thinking of opening his mouth and was silenced permanently?

[MinutemanCO]

I wonder how you or I can take this list of known operatives and expand on it? I don't think we have the resources as the opposition's bench appears to be pretty deep and dark.

[American Patriot]

Some of the information I posted came from Ann Coulter. She collected a lot on these people.

There's the point though. She's a respected author... at least by some. She's disrespected every chance the left gets.

Some of that came form Wikipedia, likely one of the most Leftist leaning political sources you will find... for something that's supposed to be unbiased. And yet, they tell you some stuff.

Some more of that came from random places I go from time to time.

The point is, the data is out there all ready to be used.

But it is ignored.

To be honest, no one cares. There are little groups like us. We care. We are scattered and somewhat disorganized (I'll grant we're less disorganized NOW than we were a year ago though) and who listens to us? Old White guys with Guns and Bibles? no one.

[MinutemanCO]

To be honest, no one cares. There are little groups like us. We care. We are scattered and somewhat disorganized (I'll grant we're less disorganized NOW than we were a year ago though) and who listens to us? Old White guys with Guns and Bibles? no one.

And therein lies the problem. Perhaps we are a captured operation. We and everyone like us have been marginalized from day one.

[American Patriot]

Benghazi, IRS and AP scandals reveal Obama's culture of corruption

By Peter Morici

Published May 14, 2013

FoxNews.com

News that the IRS targeted conservative groups for intense scrutiny is just one in a series of revelations pointing to a culture of expediency and intolerance in the Obama White House that corrupts this administration.

Consider the September slayings of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other U.S. diplomats in Benghazi. If the attack were revealed to be undertaken by terrorists, it posed a grave embarrassment to the president’s anti-terrorism strategy—eight weeks before the election.

On September 12, the Acting Assistant Secretary of State for Near Eastern Affairs wrote in an email, “The group that conducted the attacks, Ansar al-Sharia, is affiliated with Islamic terrorists.”

If your opponents are evil, anything goes.


Yet, just days later on the Sunday talk shows, UN Ambassador Susan Rice characterized the incident as the result of spontaneous street demonstrations inspired by an anti-Muhammad YouTube video.

Obama Care, having passed through the Senate on a slight-of-hand, has been contentious from the start, and the Congress has not appropriated as much funds as Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius would like to implement the law.

To do the work of HHS, she has sought large contributions from private health care companies to liberal non-profit groups. With health care so heavily regulated, it is hard to characterize these donations as voluntary.

No doubt, favors rendered will be returned, and it smacks of Chicago-style cronyism and corruption.

Now we learn the Justice Department misused subpoena powers to engage in sweeping fishing expeditions through Associated Press and personal phone records—clearly an effort to stifle investigative reporting that the American Civil Liberties Union quickly branded “an unacceptable abuse of power.”

In 2010 the IRS began targeting conservative political groups seeking non-profit status for intense scrutiny and harassment. Former IRS Commissioner Douglas Schulman and the White House would have us believe they were unaware of this targeting, and Mr. Schulman was adamant in denials at Congressional Hearings on March 22, 2012.

However, we now learn senior IRS officials were informed of inappropriate conduct two months later, but the Congress was not informed.

The White House can be expected to argue that the targeting was the work of overzealous underlings at the IRS inappropriately exercising discretion—much like the Nixon campaign thugs who broke into Watergate.

This fails to come to terms with the culture of contempt, cultivated by President Obama and other Democratic leaders, toward those who disagree with their progressive ideas.

President Obama’s appearance of boredom and disinterest toward Governor Romney during the first presidential debate, and Vice President Biden’s disrespectful grinning at Vice-Presidential candidate Paul Ryan, were an indication of something dangerously wrong with the Washington political culture. Many conservatives view Democrats, as not merely wrong but stupid, and many liberals view Republicans as not merely wrong but evil.

If your opponents are evil, anything goes.

Campaigns can get that way, but the conduct of the president requires a higher standard, and he should constrain his lieutenants’ more visceral instincts. Instead, President Obama cultivates a culture of anything goes to defeat opponents and advance his liberal agenda.

Underlings act accordingly—any good manger will tell you subordinates exercising discretion take their cues from the conduct of their boss and the messaging of the CEO.

The folks that committed the worst offenses at the IRS were civil servants and three levels below Commissioner; however, the IRS is not a public service that attracts advocates of limited government. You have to be a believer in government—lots of it—to make a career as a tax collector and to target political groups seeking to reduce taxes and spending, and criticizing how the country is being run.

The president’s contempt for political opponents and dissent, and expediency in delivering results, has corrupted the most basic functions of government, and emboldened those with personal agendas to threaten our liberties.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/...#ixzz2THvX5xbn

[American Patriot]

Some things fail to make the news for some reason.



Court strikes blow against the Obama administration on union poster rule

By Karen Harned

Published May 07, 2013

FoxNews.com

From the beginning, the Obama administration has demonstrated a willingness to expand federal powers in unprecedented and highly controversial ways in order to serve its own political agenda.

But, in the past few months the administration has suffered two major set-backs—all because it has taken a bullish attitude in thumbing its nose at the Constitution.

First, a federal court of appeal held that President Obama violated the law in making appointments to the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) without consulting Congress as required by the Constitution. And now a federal court has struck down a pro-union rule that the Obama administration’s NLRB illegally adopted without Congressional authorization—in express violation of federal law.

America's courts are sending a clear message to the White House: You, Mr. President, are not above the law.

We have seen the Obama administration take increasingly cavalier legal positions on a whole host of regulatory issues over the past four years.

Remember that the administration pushed for enactment of the Affordable Care Act with a “vote first, ask questions later mentality.” And that nearly resulted in the Supreme Court striking down the entire health care law when the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) and 26 state attorney generals challenged his administration’s authority to enforce a constitutionally dubious mandate requiring individuals to buy health insurance.

The administration may have narrowly survived our challenge to the health care law, but NFIB is continuing to hold President Obama's feet to the fire—or to the original meaning of the Constitution as the case may be.

Even the New York Times recently noted “an increasingly deliberate pattern by the administration to circumvent lawmakers…” But now that NFIB and other industry groups are finding success in fighting the administration’s most brazen attempts to circumvent the Constitution, the president is going to have to begin operating within the letter of the law.

After all, the courts are sending him a clear message: You, Mr. President, are not above the law.
NFIB’s victory Tuesday is a perfect example.

Last year President Obama’s NLRB voted to adopt the so called “Poster Rule.” The Poster Rule would have required business owners to prominently display posters giving employees “notice” of their rights under federal labor law. But, NFIB obtained an injunction to prevent NLRB from enforcing the rule, and Tuesday succeeded in striking it down completely.

In court the NLRB defended its actions arguing that the Poster Rule was necessary because some employees do not know their rights. But, even if it were true that employees are ignorant of their rights—a premise we disputed all along, especially given the availability of information in the Internet age—our point has always been that President Obama and his NLRB cannot create a rule simply because it would be a convenient way to address a political issue. Moreover, as we successfully argued in striking down the Poster Rule, the Constitution prohibits federal agencies from creating rules in violation of federal statutes.

In the Poster Rule case the NLRB was acting without statutory authorization from Congress, and in express violation of federal statutes. And in the NLRB recess appointment cases, the President was acting beyond the powers authorized to him in the Constitution.

The bottom line is that our government cannot suspend or ignore constitutional rules—or lawfully enacted statutes—for expedient or pragmatic reasons. But, now President Obama and his NLRB advisors are learning this lesson the hard way. Of course, that’s what happens when you ignore the Constitution.

Karen R. Harned, esq. is executive director of the NFIB's Small Business Legal Center.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/opinion/2013/...#ixzz2TO165T46

[American Patriot]

July 1, 2013

Former Congressman Allen West: Time Draws Near To Teach This Usurper & Charlatan Obama The Lesson Our Forefathers Taught King George III

Filed under: Articles/Reports-Other — cfkerchner @ 11:21 am
Tags: Allen West, Obama a usurper

Click on image for more information about Obama the Usurper and Fraud

Former Congressman Allen West: Time Draws Near To Teach This Usurper & Charlatan Obama The Lesson Our Forefathers Taught King George III

Read about it here: http://obamareleaseyourrecords.blogs...ime-draws.html
and here: https://www.facebook.com/ElectAllenW...51992111776729
# # # #
Obama the Enigma: Click on the image to learn more about Obama he does not want you to know.

A warning from the past — some conspiracies are very real and are also large and well organized and in process for a long time. The target of the one we are currently faced with is to destroy our U.S. Constitution, our Republic, and our military. Remember this quote from history: “We must now face the harsh truth that the objectives of communism are being steadily advanced because many of us do not recognize the means used to advance them. … The individual is handicapped by coming face to face with a Conspiracy so monstrous he cannot believe it exists. The American mind simply has not come to a realization of the evil which has been introduced into our midst.” Quote by: J. Edgar Hoover former FBI director. Source: Elks Magazine (August 1956).
When will we return to the rule of law and enforce our identity theft protection laws and the U.S. Constitution in regards to Obama, the Usurper and Fraud-in-Chief residing in the White House? When will Congress take action!?

CDR Charles Kerchner, P.E. (Retired)
Lehigh Valley PA USA
http://cdrkerchner.wordpress.com/
http://www.protectourliberty.org/
http://www.scribd.com/protectourliberty/collections/
P.S. Also read this essay regarding the legal term of art “natural born Citizen” and basic logic, i.e., trees are plants but not all plants are trees. Natural born Citizens are a subset of “born Citizens (citizens at birth)” but not all “born Citizens (citizens at birth)” are “natural born Citizens”: http://cdrkerchner.wordpress.com/201...t-not-all-cab/… AND … http://www.art2superpac.com/issues.html

[American Patriot]

While suturing a cut on the hand of a 75 year old rancher, the doctor struck up a conversation with the old man.


Eventually the topic got around to Obama and his role as our president.



The old rancher said, ‘Well, ya know, Obama is a ‘Post Turtle”.








Not being familiar with the term, the doctor asked him, what a ‘post turtle’ was.








The old rancher said, ‘When you’re driving down a country road and you come across a fence post with a turtle balanced on top, that’s a ‘post turtle’.

The old rancher saw the puzzled look on the doctor’s face so he continued to explain. “You know he didn’t get up there by himself, he doesn’t belong up there, he doesn’t know what to do while he’s up there, he’s elevated beyond his ability to function, and you just wonder what kind of dumb ass put him up there to begin with.”









Best explanation I’ve heard yet.

[American Patriot]

Home > Uncategorized > EXCERPT: Natural Born Citizen – A Place to Ask Questions and Get the Right Answers: Is Barack Hussein Obama II Really Bâri′ M. Shabazz, Born October 28, 1959 in New York City?…”Ms. Trowbridge says that Bâri′ discovered that he was the son of Malcolm X. He then wanted to complete what his father had started in the political world. But he realized that he could not do it if the world…”
EXCERPT: Natural Born Citizen – A Place to Ask Questions and Get the Right Answers: Is Barack Hussein Obama II Really Bâri′ M. Shabazz, Born October 28, 1959 in New York City?…”Ms. Trowbridge says that Bâri′ discovered that he was the son of Malcolm X. He then wanted to complete what his father had started in the political world. But he realized that he could not do it if the world…”

July 18, 2013 Gunny G Leave a comment Go to comments
By Mario Apuzzo, Esq.

November 2, 2011

Is Barack Hussein Obama II, a/k/a Barack Obama Jr., really Bâri′ M. Shabazz? See the breaking story, entitled, Bâri′, Barry, Barack, by Martha Trowbridge, at http://terribletruth.wordpress.com/2...-barry-barack/.

In her article, Ms. Trowbridge contends that putative President Obama’s real name is Bâri′ M. Shabazz.

English: Barack Obama delivers a speech at the University of Southern California (Video of the speech) (Photo credit: Wikipedia)




She also tells us that this past Friday, October 28, 2011, was Bâri′’s birthday.

She says that the person who presents himself as Barack Hussein Obama II was born on October 28, 1959, in New York City. She adds that he was born with the name Bâri′ M. Shabazz.

What is also really interesting is that according to Ms. Trowbridge, the names Bâri′, Malik, and Shabazz are “sacred to Malcolm X.” Go to Ms. Trowbridge’s story to see what these names mean.




Ms. Trowbridge says that Bâri′ discovered that he was the son of Malcolm X. He then wanted to complete what his father had started in the political world. But he realized that he could not do it if the world knew that he was the illegitimate son of Malcolm X, a Muslim revolutionary. Hence, he had to change his birth identity and take on a new one.

She also explains that “father” Barack Obama was Malcolm X’s Kenyan friend.

We have heard so much about social security numbers. Here is what Ms. Trowbridge says……………

EXCERPT !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

via Natural Born Citizen – A Place to Ask Questions and Get the Right Answers: Is Barack Hussein Obama II Really Bâri′ M. Shabazz, Born October 28, 1959 in New York City?.

[American Patriot]

GOP lawmaker: The Obamas use Air Force One as 'personal toy'

By Pete Kasperowicz - 07/18/13 10:40 AM ET


Rep. Howard Coble (R-N.C.) said Thursday morning that President Obama and first lady Michelle Obama are using Air Force One and other official aircraft as their "personal toys."








"I'm not suggesting ... that we compromise safety or security," Coble said on the House floor. "But the first family, it seems to me, treats Air Force One and related aircraft as their personal toys — a very expensive toy, I might add."

Coble's comments drew a warning from presiding officer Rep. Doug LaMalfa (R-Calif.) not to make improper references to the President.


"I will admit ... that Air Force One belongs to President Obama and his wife, but Air Force One also belongs to you and me, and to every taxpayer in America," Coble continued.

"I simply ask the president and his wife to exercise more prudence and discipline regarding their aircraft activities.

"When the wheels of Air Force One are up, the meter is on, and I'm talking about a heap of taxpayer dollars."

Coble said the latest estimates put the operation of Air Force One at $179,000 per hour, and said recent overseas trips by the Obamas have involved other costs, like backup planes, motor transport, security, various staffers, hotel charges and advance security teams.

Coble said Obama was the second most-traveled president of all time during his first term, and that in 2009, Obama traveled more than any other president.

"The plague of the soaring debt continues to bother us, and I respectfully request that President Obama and his wife direct more attention to our soaring debt and deficit and less time on Air Force One," he said.

Coble has complained before about the Obama's travel habits. In February, he said on the House floor that Obama and his wife use Air Force one "very casually," and said taxpayers would be "appreciative" if they reduced their travel.


Thursday morning, Coble also noted criticism of Obama for playing golf with Tiger Woods, but said, "the president's golfing is none of my business."


Read more: http://thehill.com/video/house/31196...#ixzz2ZPwB536d
Follow us: @thehill on Twitter | TheHill on Facebook

[American Patriot]

Bow down...

Boss is in the house.

[American Patriot]

WTF!?

“Barry Soetoro” Has Registered to Vote at White House Address


by
J. Christian Adams
Bio



July 19, 2013 - 6:32 am


Tweet



“Barry Soetoro” is a registered voter in the District of Columbia with a White House address according to the D.C. Board of Elections.

According to a search at the D.C. Board of elections using the search terms Barry Soetoro, President Obama’s date of birth and the zip code of 20500, a registered voter of that name is registered to vote at the White House for D.C. elections. Barry Soetoro is a name that President Obama has used in the past.


Did President Obama submit this registration, or is it a fraud? Who knows? Obtaining the actual registration forms (or on-line) submitted to the D.C. election’s board might answer the question. In my view, it is worse if it is a fraud because it illustrates the ease at which one can trick the system. Or perhaps, President Obama wants out of crime-infested Chicago after his term is up and registered using his old name. I’ll go with option 1, the fraud.

[Phil Fiord]

That is a fraudulent voter reg. Anyone can put any info they wish to on the form. It is signed as being true and correct, but who actually respects an honorary system. Only those who try their best to follow the law.

I can say that if you shop at a Safeway or any of their other company holdings, the main Whit House switchboard number (there are at least three I am told) is registered for their club card program.

[American Patriot]

Actually, I used to use the WH number for things when I didn't want to give MY number. In those days it was WHCA's Switch number, which was 202-395-2000, but that is not the number any more

[Phil Fiord]

Then the WH got marketing calls from that, LOL

[American Patriot]

Things Obama Wants You Worried About

• George Zimmerman is going to come shoot you
• The NRA is going to come shoot you
• Affordable energy is going to kill you
• Snowden is telling people how to kill you
• Rising sea level is going to kill you
• The fiscal cliff is going to kill you
• The banking crisis is going to kill you
• The health care crisis is going to kill you
• Climate deniers are going to kill you
• Republican driven superstorms are going to kill you
• Republican driven tornadoes are going to kill you
• Defending yourself is going to kill you

Hope and change!

[American Patriot]

Breaking: Holder Tries to Re-grab Texas, Announces Nationwide Attack on Election Integrity


by
J. Christian Adams





July 25, 2013 - 7:10 am








Two important developments this morning. First: Attorney General Eric Holder will announce that the Justice Department will initiate broad nationwide attacks on election integrity measures like Voter ID using the remaining portions of the Voting Rights Act. Last month, the Supreme Court struck down the 1965 triggers that forced 15 states to submit election law changes to Washington D.C. for federal approval.




Second: despite the Supreme Court’s ruling, the Justice Department announced it will try to recapture Texas under Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act by showing the state continues to act with a racially discriminatory intent when passing voting laws.

Some of Holder’s reaction is because dozens of highly paid federal employees are now idled. James Buchanan won the Nobel Prize in economics by explaining Holder’s actions as public choice theory — bureaucrats announce policies to help bureaucrats, even if disguised as an act inspired by a public purpose.


For the last few weeks, Voting Section employees have taken extended coffee breaks, and even more extended lunches. But there was hope — outgoing Assistant Attorney General Tom Perez referred to the state of Louisiana as the “full employment for Voting Section lawyers state.”


That means Governor Bobby Jindal can expect more targeting by the DOJ Voting Section.


But this announcement is all about the midterm elections. Obama wants the House back, and the Justice Department is again being turned into a political weapon using the cloak of civil rights. This has become the new civil rights model. Because Democratic interests are so perfectly aligned with the civil rights establishment — in no small measure because of extreme bloc voting by American blacks — the DOJ is now an arm of the DNC.


Will states have the competence and ability to withstand Holder’s attack? There are ways. Whether they will use them remains to be seen.

[American Patriot]

This has become a complete circus, this country and it's government that is.

Look at this... the Supreme Court has ruled. Eric Holder, or should be call him "Minister of Lies" wants to forget about it....

Justice Department wants renewed authority over Texas voting laws






By David Ingram and Dave Warner
WASHINGTON/PHILADELPHIA | Thu Jul 25, 2013 11:51am EDT

(Reuters) - The U.S. Department of Justice will ask a federal court to reinstate its authority over Texas voting laws, part of a new Obama administration strategy to challenge state and local election laws it says discriminate by race, Attorney General Eric Holder said on Thursday.

"This is the Department's first action to protect voting rights following the Shelby County decision, but it will not be our last," Holder said to a standing ovation at the annual conference of the National Urban League, a civil rights organization, which is meeting in Philadelphia.

The Texas action was expected to be the first in a nationwide roll-out of voting rights cases aimed at counteracting the U.S. Supreme Court ruling in June that invalidated a key part of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

The Obama administration has been searching for new ways to oppose voting discrimination since a 5-4 conservative majority on the high court ruled that a formula used to determine which states and localities were subject to extra federal scrutiny was outdated.

"Based on the evidence of intentional racial discrimination that was presented last year in the redistricting case, Texas v. Holder ... we believe that the State of Texas should be required to go through a preclearance process whenever it changes its voting laws and practices," Holder, the first black U.S. attorney general, told the group.

The ruling freed Texas and select other jurisdictions from having to submit their voting laws to the Justice Department before they could take effect.

The covered jurisdictions were mostly in the South, a region where officials had a history of denying minorities the right to vote. Chief Justice John Roberts wrote in the high court's ruling that the South had changed dramatically.

Holder's Justice Department had used the process known as "preclearance" to block, among other laws, a new plan for congressional district lines in Texas drawn after the 2010 U.S. Census. Government lawyers and civil rights groups convinced a court that the map would have too few black and Hispanic districts.

Texas Attorney General Greg Abbott, a Republican who has since announced he is running for governor, said after the Supreme Court ruling that the redistricting plan could then go into effect immediately.

State lawmakers ultimately approved a map that was deemed friendlier to minority populations, though state Democrats still criticize it.
Holder's announcement was cheered by Texas Democrats and opposed by Republicans.

"I'll fight #Obama's effort to control our elections & I'll fight against cheating at the ballot box," Abbott wrote on Twitter.

"It is 100 percent appropriate and a good thing that the Department of Justice is going to pursue every angle to protect the voting rights for Texans who have historically been disenfranchised," said Jeff Rotkoff, a Democratic consultant in Austin, Texas.

As a first step in its new strategy, the Justice Department plans to make clear it supports a pending lawsuit that racial minorities brought against the redistricting plan in federal court in Texas.

If the court agrees the plan was racially discriminatory, then the Justice Department will ask the court to place Texas back in the preclearance process for an undetermined period of time, according to Holder's prepared speech.

The Supreme Court in its June ruling left in place the preclearance process and most other parts of the Voting Rights Act, invalidating only the formula for states and localities to be subjected automatically to extra scrutiny.

Some members of Congress have discussed passing a new formula that would comply with the Supreme Court's ruling, but they have not done so.

(Additional reporting by Karen Brooks; Editing by Scott Malone, Barbara Goldberg and Maureen Bavdek)

[Toad]

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2013/07/22/supreme-court-losses-column/2576625/When the White House loses cases 9-0, the president is going too far.
Ilya Somin 11:46 a.m. EDT July 23, 2013

Those of us who follow Supreme Court decisions spend most of our time debating the contentious issues that divide justices 5-4 along predictable ideological lines. Often, that's where the loudest public debates are as well. Just consider the recent rulings on gay marriage.

But we might do well to pay more attention where the court rules unanimously, particularly when they go against the White House.

When a president pursues policies that require such expansive federal power that he can't get a single justice to agree, something is probably amiss.
Such overreach, though, has become a part of our political culture. Administrations of both parties are often unwilling to accept constitutional limits on their authority.


Obama's losses
In Horne v. Department of Agriculture, a decision issued in June, the justices unanimously rejected the Obama administration's argument that raisin farmers did not have the right to go to court to contest the seizure of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of raisins. The Fifth Amendment states that the government must pay "just compensation" whenever the government takes private property for "public use." But the administration claimed that farmers could not even raise the takings issue in court without first enduring lengthy delays and paying a $483,000 fine.

Horne was the administration's third unanimous defeat in a property rights case in 18 months. In Sackett v. Environmental Protection Agency, it claimed that a couple had no right to go to court to seek compensation after the EPA blocked construction of their "dream house."

In Arkansas Game & Fish Commission v. United States, it unsuccessfully argued that the Fifth Amendment doesn't require compensation when the federal government repeatedly and deliberately floods property owners' land. Even liberal justices normally skeptical of property rights claims, including one of President Obama's appointees, found these arguments too much to swallow.

The Obama administration has also suffered unanimous defeats in several other important cases.

Last year, the justices rejected the administration's position that the religious freedom guaranteed by the First Amendment does not apply to churches' decisons to hire and fire employees with religious duties, such as teaching theology. Obama appointee Justice Elena Kagan called the administration's position "amazing."
In United States v. Jones, another 2012 case, the justices unanimously rejected the administration's claim that the Fourth Amendment does not restrict the government's authority to attach a GPS tracking device to a car.

War on terror
Obama isn't the first president to promote dubious theories of federal power. George W. Bush's administration, among others, did so as well.

All but one Supreme Court justice rejected its claims of nearly unlimited authority to detain U.S. citizens determined to be "combatants" in the war on terror.
Bush and Obama exemplify a political culture where presidents routinely push the limits of federal power with little regard for constitutional restrictions. Too often, executives act as if their role is not to protect constitutional rights but rather to see how far they can bend them before courts step in.

It is understandable that presidents chafe at constitutional constraints on their power. Such restrictions sometimes impede cherished policy goals, from regulating land use to fighting terrorists. Voters rarely punish this kind of overreaching, and journalists often seem to regard it as a normal part of the political process.


Our responsibility
But constitutional restrictions on federal authority exist for good reason: They protect our lives, liberty and property against overwhelming government power. When presidents routinely claim sweeping powers that every Supreme Court justice rejects, something is wrong.

The fault lies not only with the offending politicians, but also with the voters and political elites who too often excuse or ignore their unconstitutional actions.
Sometimes, the courts can protect us against overreaching administrations. But many abuses of power cannot or will not be litigated. If we want to enforce constitutional limits on government, we cannot rely on judges to do the job alone.

Ilya Somin is a law professor at George Mason University and author of the forthcoming Democracy and Political Ignorance.



Toad~ Interesting way to look at it. With the SCOTUS typically a 5-4 ideological split, usually you can't read too much into a ruling. But when it's 9-0 against you, that's pretty damning. You're clearly in the wrong. Even the judges "on your side" believe you are in the wrong. All of them.