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OBAMA FLUNKS HIS FIRST CONSTITUTIONAL TEST BY APPOINTING HILLARY AS SECRETARY OF STATE.
December 1, 2008 -
December 8, 2008
The selection of Hillary Clinton as his choice for Secretary of State reveals that President-elect Barack Obama does not limit his lack of appreciation for the Constitution to just the First and Second Amendments. While there has been plenty of analysis focused on whether or not this is a good political decision or not, the choice may actually reveal more about Obama’s respect or disrespect for the Constitution than about his political judgment.
The Emoluments Clause in Article I, section 6 of the U.S. Constitution provides: "No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States, which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been encreased during such time." On January 4, 2008 President Bush issued Executive Order 13454 which "encreased" the "Emoluments" (salary) of the office of Secretary of State. Hillary Clinton, as an elected Senator from New York at the time and with a current term of office that runs through the end of 2010 would seem to fall clearly within the definition of a “Senator” under this clause.
Clinton's appointment to the civil Office of Secretary of State constitutes an appointment to an office for which "the Emoluments whereof shall have been encreased" during the time for which she was elected to serve as Senator. The plain language of the Emoluments Clause would thus appear to legally bar her appointment, assuming the Constitution matters to the new President.
Previous President’s have ignored this provision in the Constitution by engaging in the legal “fraud” of rolling back the pay scale for certain Senators who they wished to place in office despite the Constitutional ban on doing so. The clear wording of the provision makes Senators and Congressmen “ineligible,” something that cannot be cured by simply reducing their pay. The Constitution says that such Senators and Congressmen cannot be appointed, not that special accommodations must be made for their appointment.
Nevertheless, President Richard Nixon dodged the law and with a complicit Congress he selected Ohio Senator William Saxbe as his Attorney General. Saxbe was appointed following the “Saturday Night Massacre” that had led to the resignation of Attorney General Elliot Richardson during the scandal-ridden Watergate years.
President Jimmy Carter used the “salary rollback,” or “Saxbe fix,” to put
Senator Edmund Muskie in place as Secretary of State; and President Bill
Clinton utilized it to appoint Secretary of the Treasury Lloyd Bentsen.
President Ronald Reagan chose to stick to the plain language of the
Constitution in making his Cabinet and Supreme Court appointments. So did
President George W. Bush, and George Herbert Walker Bush.
In the past, Democrats in the Senate have opposed the use of the so-called
“Saxbe fix.” In the Saxbe case, ten Democrat Senators voted against the ploy on constitutional grounds. Sen. Robert C. Byrd (D-W.Va.), the only one of the ten who still remains in the Senate, said at the time that the Constitution was explicit on this issue and that "we should not delude the American people into thinking a way can be found around the Constitutional obstacle." Will he speak up again, or was his previous opposition to this un-Constitutional artifice base on partisanship rather than principle?
More importantly, is President Barack Obama showing himself willing to abandon his sworn oath to “preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States” before he even takes the oath?
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WHY AL-ZAWAHIRI WOULD BE A LOUSY TALK RADIO HOST. -
November 21, 2008 -
November 28, 2008
The number two guy in Al Queda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has just released a new video/audio attack on President-elect Barack Obama and America. The 11-minute 23-second video features the audio message by al-Zawahri, who appears only in a still image, along with other images, including one of Obama wearing a Jewish skullcap. Ayman may be a heck of a terrorist, but in terms of vitriol, creativity, insult and nuance he would be a lousy talk host.
First of all, a demo tape that runs nearly twelv... |
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ARE TENNESSEE REPUBLICANS SET TO CLEAN HOUSE ON THE HILL? -
November 11, 2008 -
November 19, 2008
The historic election of a 50-49 Republican majority in the Tennessee State House has left Republicans with several unexpected and difficult choices to make in the next few weeks. How they handle these organizational and political challenges may have a greater impact on whether they retain their slim majority in the next election than the legislative policies they will enact in the coming months.
Republican Minority Leader Jason Mumpower is poised to become the first Republican Speaker... |
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WILL AMERICA COME TOGETHER AFTER THE ELECTION? -
October 30, 2008 -
November 4, 2008
The 2008 Presidential election has been long and bitterly contested by both sides. The passions of the political season will not subside quickly for those who immerse both heart and soul into the effort as so many campaign volunteers and activists do each election cycle. That is not a bad thing; nor is it new. The insults and attacks that we see today are somewhat tame compared to the personal assaults that typified American politics in our first hundred years of campaigning.
In the not... |
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WHY VOTERS ARE FURIOUS ABOUT THE BAILOUT PACKAGE. -
October 5, 2008 -
October 11, 2008
For the past several weeks voters were told by the White House, the so-called leadership of the Democrats and Republicans in Congress, and numerous pundits on the airwaves that America faced utter economic collapse unless a $700 billion bailout plan conceived by Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson was approved immediately. Skeptics of both the “crisis” and the purported “fix” were denounced for not understanding the economic turmoil that would flow from delay of even a few more days.
Two... |
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BOGUS POLL INTENDED TO BOOST OBAMA. -
September 27, 2008 -
October 4, 2008
As we enter into the final month of the election, we will be bombarded with all sorts of information intended to sway our votes. We will, of course, be inundated with television commercials, direct mail pieces, radio ads, and automated phone calls. But we will also be subjected to numerous polls, many of which will be just as partisan as the political propaganda the candidates are relying upon.
A disturbing trend in recent elections has been the intentional use of skewed polling by the... |
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