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Public misunderstanding, ignorance and possibly contempt for liberty play into the hands of people who want to control our lives. Responses to my recent column "Compliant Americans" brought this home to me. In it, I argued that the anti-tobacco movement became the template and inspiration for other forms of government intrusion, such as bans on restaurants serving foie gras, McDonald's giving Happy Meals with toys, and confiscating a child's home-prepared lunch because it didn't meet Department of Agriculture guidelines. A few responses read like this: "Smoking is different because that actually affects other people. We should be living by the notion that you should be able to do whatever you want as long as you don't hurt other people. Smoking hurts other people."
If we banned or restricted all activities that affect, harm or have the possibility of harming other people, it wouldn't be a very nice life. Let's look at what can affect or harm other people. Non-obese people are harmed by obesity, as they have to pay more for health care, through either higher taxes or higher insurance premiums. That harm could be reduced by a national version of a measure introduced in the Mississippi Legislature in 2008 by state Rep. W.T. Mayhall that in part read, "An act to prohibit certain food establishments from serving food to any person who is obese, based on criteria prescribed by the state Department of Health." The measure would have revoked licenses of food establishments that violated the provisions of the act. Fortunately, the measure never passed, but there's always a next time.
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reported that in 2010, nearly 33,000 people were killed in auto crashes. That's a lot of harm that could be reduced by lowering the speed limit to 5 or 10 miles an hour. You say, "Williams, that's ridiculous!" What you really mean to say but don't have the courage to is that to save all of those lives by making the speed limit 5 or 10 miles per hour is not worth the inconvenience. Needless to say -- or almost so -- there are many activities we engage in that either cause harm to others or have the potential for doing so, but we don't ban all of these activities.
One of the least-understood functions of private property rights is that of determining who may harm whom in what ways. In a free society, it is presumed that the air in a person's house, restaurant, hotel, car or place of business is his property. That means that if you own a restaurant and don't want your air polluted by tobacco smoke, it is your right. Most would deem it tyranny if a bunch of smokers had the political power to get the city council to pass an ordinance forcing you to permit smoking. You'd probably deem it more respectful of liberty if those who wanted to smoke sought a restaurant owner who permitted smoking. The identical argument can be made about a restaurant owner who permits smoking in a city where nonsmokers have the political power. The issue is not whether smoking harms others. The issue is the rights associated with property ownership.
The emerging tragedy is our increased willingness to use the coercive powers of government, in the name of health or some other ruse, to forcibly impose our preferences upon others. In the whole scheme of things, the tobacco issue itself is trivial. Far more important is its template for massive government disrespect for private property.
John Adams said, "The moment the idea is admitted into society that property is not as sacred as the laws of God, and that there is not a force of law and public justice to protect it, anarchy and tyranny commence.
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2)Appeals Court Calls President's Bluff on Obamacare
By David A. Patten


President Barack Obama’s attack on the Supreme Court appeared to backfire Tuesday, when the 5th Circuit Court of Appeals issued an order giving the Justice Department until noon Thursday to state whether the administration truly believes courts lack the authority to strike down mandates that they determine are unconstitutional.

On Monday, Obama said that striking down his signature healthcare legislation would be an “unprecedented, extraordinary step” and would demonstrate a lack of “judicial restraint” by the Supreme Court.

He also pointed out that the nine Supreme Court justices are unelected, suggesting that it would therefore be undemocratic for them to overturn Obamacare, which narrowly eked through Congress by a seven vote margin in the House of Representatives.

“This is liberals in shock over watching their side being demolished in oral arguments,” Fox News commentator Charles Krauthammer said Tuesday, pointing out the courts have had the authority to strike down unconstitutional provisions for over 200 years. “And [they are] trying to bully the Supreme Court into ending up on their side in a case which they clearly had lost intellectually and logically.”

The order from the 5th Circuit for the Justice Department to clarify its position on judicial authority came during a separate challenge to Obamacare brought by physician-owned hospitals.

As a Justice Department lawyer began arguing the government’s case, Appeals Judge Jerry Smith interrupted the presentation to ask if the 5th Circuit Court had the legal authority to strike down a law it finds to be unconstitutional. CBS News reports that when the government lawyer answered affirmatively, the judge stated that it was not clear to “many of us” that the president agrees.

The three-judge panel then gave the Justice Department until noon Thursday to provide a three-page letter clarifying whether it believes courts have the authority to pass judgment on the constitutionality of laws.

“Clearly, Jerry Smith was upset by the president’s remarks and he has every right to demand clarification,” judicial expert Curt Levey of the Committee for Justice told Newsmax. “Obviously, he’s making a point as well as requesting clarification.

“But the president left himself open to that,” Levey added. “Of course the president doesn’t really believe the Supreme Court can’t strike down unconstitutional laws. But if the president’s going to say things like that to demagogue, then he is responsible for them.”

Many observers saw the president’s remarks as a clumsy attempt to “work the refs” and influence the court’s decision on his healthcare reforms. His challenge to the independent judiciary branch of government provoked widespread criticism from both sides of the aisle Tuesday.

“For the president to imply that the only explanation for a constitutional conclusion contrary to his own would be out-of-control conservative justices does the court a disservice,” wrote Washington Post correspondent Ruth Marcus, who has been a staunch defender of the president’s policies.

The Wall Street Journal, meanwhile, published a pointed editorial taking the president to task.

“Mr. Obama's remarks suggest he is joining others on the left in warning the justices that they will pay a political price if they dare to overturn even part of the law,” it stated. “As he runs for re-election, Mr. Obama's inner community organizer seems to be winning out over the law professor.”

By upping the ante, the 5th Circuit focuses more attention on a misstep that the administration would prefer go unnoticed. The president came under attack from the left and right Tuesday over what looked like a blatant attempt to intimidate the court and influence its verdict. He quickly backed off from his challenge to the judiciary, however.

“The point I was making is that the Supreme Court is the final say on our Constitution, and all of us have to respect it,” he said. “But it’s precisely because of that extraordinary power that the court has traditionally exercised significant restraint and deference to a duly elected legislature.”

Obama went on to assert that overturning congressional legislation was so extraordinary that the burden of proof would be on those who felt it could be unconstitutional.

That view, however, appeared to be at odds with the position of the key swing vote in the case, however: Associate Justice Anthony Kennedy.

“I understand that we must presume laws are constitutional,” Justice Kennedy said to U.S. Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli on the second day of oral arguments last week. “But, even so, when you are changing the relation of the individual to the government in this, what we can stipulate is, I think a unique way, do you not have a heavy burden of justification to show authorization under the Constitution?”

© 2012 Newsmax. All rights reserved

2a)Paul Ryan's Hunger Games
The President offers his vision for an uplifting second term.

If there's a Laffer Curve for Presidential invective—some point at which dishonest political abuse yields diminishing returns—the White House political team must not think their boss has hit it. Even in this hyperpartisan age, President Obama's speech to the Associated Press yesterday was a parody of the form. This was a diatribe that managed to invoke "Social Darwinism" and "a Trojan Horse" in the same paragraph, amid the other high crimes that Mr. Obama says Paul Ryan wants to commit.

The President's depiction of the wonkish and formerly obscure House Budget Chairman as some political monster is itself telling. Mr. Obama is conceding that he can't run on the economic recovery, the stimulus, health care, green energy or any of the other grand liberal ambitions that have dominated his time in office. All of those are unpopular or failures. He was elected on hope and change, but now his only hope is to change the subject to the ogres he claims are the disloyal opposition.

Did you hear about the GOP's red-in-tooth-and-claw plan for Medicare? Grandma and Gramps are going to be drafted for the Hunger Games.

Mr. Obama has been working Mediscare for the last year, but he is also debuting some new material, each layer thicker than the last. Modern Republicans are so radical that they oppose research and care for Alzheimer's, cancer, AIDS, autism and Down Syndrome, even as they want to deny education and food to children and their mothers. They want to pave over Yellowstone and backfill the Grand Canyon. But few tourists could get there anyway, because Republicans plan to shut down air traffic control too.

Because Republicans have criticized the Administration's torrent of costly new rules across the entire economy, therefore they favor returning to a state of regulatory nature, with no rules at all. Because Republicans oppose high-speed rail, therefore they would have opposed industrialization in the 19th century. They do plan to build a wayback machine to the Gilded Age, however, by handing a $150,000 check to every American millionaire, a million-dollar check to every billionaire, and a billion-dollar check to every trillionaire.

"This is not conjecture," Mr. Obama said. "I am not exaggerating. These are facts." Lest you think we exaggerate, read the transcript.

The list of untrue things that Mr. Obama wants Americans to believe is evidently so long that Mr. Obama associated himself with Republicans, albeit mostly dead Republicans like Lincoln and Eisenhower. For the first time we can recall, Mr. Obama even praised George W. Bush, of all people, because his predecessor created a new entitlement for prescription drugs. He also said Newt Gingrich showed how smart he was when he called Mr. Ryan's budget "radical" and "right-wing social engineering" last year.

All of this is a political fable carefully constructed to erase the record of the last three years and blame every current anxiety on a GOP House that has been in office for all of 14 months. The President claims to have "eliminated dozens of programs that weren't working," but the savings from these eliminations amount to less than 0.1% of the budget, or less than $100 million.

Meanwhile, the budget has grown by more than 20% since he has been President. After deficits of $1.412 trillion, $1.293 trillion, and $1.299 trillion over the last three years, and an estimated $1.326 trillion due for 2012, he still claims the deficits are all Mr. Bush's fault—except for the extra spending on Medicare, which he likes.

It is especially rich of Mr. Obama to accuse Republicans of breaking last summer's debt-limit deal—given that even the most sympathetic press accounts that are now emerging make it clear that the President blew up his "big deal" with John Boehner. The House Speaker was prepared to trade higher taxes for mostly notional changes to entitlements, but Mr. Obama thought he could roll him at the last minute for even greater tax increases.

Now he claims Mr. Ryan's reforms are "antithetical to our entire history as a land of opportunity and upward mobility." But it is more accurate to say that Mr. Obama is the one who is out of step with a bipartisan consensus that entitlement reform is essential to prevent a debt crisis.

Mr. Ryan's "premium support" reform for Medicare, for instance, has been endorsed by Oregon Democrat Ron Wyden. It was advanced in the 1990s by President Clinton's Medicare commission led by Democrat John Breaux. It mirrors the insurance system that lets millions of federal workers choose from a myriad of insurance plans with a government subsidy. It is the only reform with a prayer of salvaging Medicare without savage cuts in medical care down the road.

***
The last two days have revealed Mr. Obama at his least appealing—and least Presidential—first warning the Supreme Court not to dare overturn his health-care law, and now demonizing the motives of his political opposition. It is a long, long way from his "there's no red America, there's no blue America" stuff of 2004, much less the inspiration of 2008.

If nothing else, Americans are getting a preview of the rhetorical uplift, the bipartisan problem-solving, and the unifying national purpose that would attend another four years.
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3)Ex Parte Obama
The president worries the Supreme Court might overturn a law passed by Congress. The Founders were quite comfortable with the idea.


It's been a long time since we've heard a presidential demarche as outrageous as President Obama's warning to the Supreme Court not to overturn Obamacare. The president made the remarks at a press conference with the leaders of Mexico and Canada. It was an attack on the court's standing and even its integrity in a backhanded way that is typically Obamanian. For starters the president expressed confidence that the Court would "not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress."

Reuters's account noted that conservative leaders say the law was an overreach by Obama and the Congress. It characterized the president as having "sought to turn that argument around, calling a potential rejection by the court an overreach of its own." Quoth the president: "And I'd just remind conservative commentators that, for years, what we have heard is, the biggest problem on the bench was judicial activism, or a lack of judicial restraint, that an unelected group of people would somehow overturn a duly constituted and passed law."

It is outrageous enough that the president's protest was inaccurate. What in the world is he talking about when he asserts the law was passed by "a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress"? The Patient Protection and Affordable Health Care Act barely squeaked through the Congress. In the Senate it escaped a filibuster by but a hair. The vote was so tight in the house—219 to 212—that the leadership went through byzantine maneuvers to get the measure to the president's desk. No Republicans voted for it when it came up in the House, and the drive to repeal the measure began the day after Mr. Obama signed the measure.

It is the aspersions the President cast on the Supreme Court, though, that take the cake. We speak of the libel about the court being an "unelected group of people" who might "somehow overturn a duly constituted and passed law." This libel was dealt with more than two centuries ago in the newspaper column known as 78 Federalist and written by Alexander Hamilton. It is the essay in which Hamilton, a big proponent of federal power, famously described the Court as "the weakest of the three departments of power." It argued that the people could never be endangered by the court—so long as the judiciary "remains truly distinct from both the legislature and the Executive."

It was precisely the separation of the courts from the other two branches, Hamilton argued, that gives the court its legitimacy. He asserted that "the natural feebleness of the judiciary" puts it in "continual jeopardy of being overpowered, awed, or influenced by its co-ordinate branches" and wrote it's "permanency in office"—meaning life tenure for judges—was "an indispensable ingredient in its constitution, and, in a great measure, as the citadel of the public justice and the public security." Continued he: "The complete independence of the courts of justice is peculiarly essential in a limited Constitution." Then the famous sentences:

"Some perplexity respecting the rights of the courts to pronounce legislative acts void, because contrary to the Constitution, has arisen from an imagination that the doctrine would imply a superiority of the judiciary to the legislative power. It is urged that the authority which can declare the acts of another void, must necessarily be superior to the one whose acts may be declared void. As this doctrine is of great importance inall the American constitutions, a brief discussion of the ground on which it rests cannot be unacceptable. There is no position which depends on clearer principles, than that every act of a delegated authority, contrary to the tenor of the commission under which it is exercised, is void. No legislative act, therefore, contrary to the Constitution, can be valid. . . .

"If it be said that the legislative body are themselves the constitutional judges of their own powers, and that the construction they put upon them is conclusive upon the other departments, it may be answered, that this cannot be the natural presumption, where it is not to be collected from any particular provisions in the Constitution. It is not otherwise to be supposed, that the Constitution could intend to enable the representatives of the people to substitute their will to that of their constituents. It is far more rational to suppose, that the courts were designed to be an intermediate body between the people and the legislature, in order, among other things, to keep the latter within the limits assigned to their authority."

Eventually the Supreme Court itself, in the case known as Marbury v. Madison, spelled out the logic of judicial review. We've always felt it was important to note that the Court's authority does not stem from the Court's own assertion of its own powers. It is deeper down, in the writings of the Founders themselves, and part of the American bedrock. It exists at the Federal level and in the constitutions of the states. The idea of separated powers was first put down in plain language in our laws in the constitution of Massachusetts, which noted that the aim was to have a government of laws rather than of men.

It is a mark of our cynical age that Mr. Obama would challenge these assumptions. One can attribute the error of judgment to the fear that once the Court gets its back up and decides to hold the Congress to the powers that are enumerated in the Constitution, it's not just Obamacare that is in danger but the whole regime of runaway power in Washington.


3a)Political word games
By Thomas Sowell

One of the highly developed talents of President Barack Obama is the ability to say things that are demonstrably false, and make them sound not only plausible but inspiring.

That talent was displayed just this week when he was asked whether he thought the Supreme Court would uphold ObamaCare as constitutional or strike it down as unconstitutional.

He replied: "I'm confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress."

But how unprecedented would it actually be if the Supreme Court declared a law unconstitutional if it was passed by "a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress"?

The Supreme Court has been doing precisely that for 209 years!

Nor is it likely that Barack Obama has never heard of it. He has a degree from the Harvard law school and taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago law school. In what must be one of the most famous Supreme Court cases in history -- Marbury v. Madison in 1803 -- Chief Justice John Marshall established the principle that the Supreme Court can declare acts of Congress null and void if these acts violate the Constitution.

They have been doing so for more than two centuries. It is the foundation of American constitutional law. There is no way that Barack Obama has never heard of it or really believes it to be "unprecedented" after two centuries of countless precedents.

In short, he is simply lying.

Now there are different kinds of liars. If we must have lying Presidents of the United States, I prefer that they be like Richard Nixon. You could just look at him and tell that he was lying.

But Obama is much smoother. On this and on many other issues, you would have to know what the facts are to know that he is lying. He is obviously counting on the fact that, in this era of dumbed-down education, many people have no clue as to what the facts are.

He is also counting on something else -- namely, that the pro-Obama media will not expose his lies.

One of the many ways of lying smoothly is to simply redefine words. Barack Obama is a master at that as well.

In the comment on the case pending before the Supreme Court, President Obama said that he wanted to remind "conservative commentators" that they have complained about "judicial activism" -- which he redefines as the idea that "an unelected group of people would somehow overturn a duly constituted and passed law."

First of all, every law that the Supreme Court has overturned for the past 209 years since Marbury v. Madison was "a duly constituted and passed law."

Second, the "judicial activism" that conservatives have complained about was judges making rulings based on how they felt personally about the issue at hand, rather than about what the Constitution of the United States said.

In recent years, great efforts have been made to redefine "judicial activism" in terms of judges declaring laws unconstitutional, instead of "deferring" to Congress or other government institutions.

But what is the Constitution's Bill of Rights supposed to protect the ordinary citizen from? Government institutions! If judges are to defer to the very institutions that the Bill of Rights tries to protect the citizen from, what is the point of having a Bill of Rights?

As for Supreme Court justices being unelected, that has been true since the Constitution was created. That was done deliberately, so that they could render their judgments without fear of political repercussions. If unelected Supreme Court justices are to automatically defer to elected officials, that again raises the question of why they are there at all.

Why are the taxpayers paying their salaries and housing them in an expensive marble building -- just so that they can go along to get along?

It would be hard to become nostalgic about Richard Nixon, who was forced to resign in disgrace. But at least you could tell when he was lying. Obama's lies are just as big but not as visible, and the media that exposed Nixon is covering for Obama.
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4)Gary Shilling: 2012 Recession Still Coming
By Julie Crawshaw


Economist Gary Shilling says we're still headed for a recession this year despite the market's recent bullish behavior, the Globe and Mail reports.

"Despite the recent euphoria of investors over U.S. stocks, we believe the economy is likely to weaken as the year progresses, led by renewed consumer retrenchment," Shilling wrote in a note to investors.

Shilling points to a number of unusual indicators that suggest the U.S. economy may be weaker than most people believe.

For example, electricity generation is falling rapidly, which this may be because this winter was unusually mild but could also indicate declining economic activity.

Moreover, U.S. rail shipments and the number of containers coming into the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach, the main entry point for Asian trade in the United States, are both declining.

And while GDP growth has been accelerating recently, Shilling says much of the increase in economic output can be attributed to rising inventories, also not a good sign.

"Either we're dead wrong on the outlook or investors are ignoring reality as they emphasize risk on trades," he says.

Bloomberg reports that John Burbank, founder of $3.8 billion hedge fund Passport Capital LLC, also expects a U.S. economic recession this year or in early 2013.

“We see a recession in 2012 or early 2013 for the U.S. which will be difficult to avoid as Europe contracts and China moderates to 7 percent to 8 percent targeted growth,” Burbank wrote in a note to investors.

“The equity market is confused about true economic growth in the developed world — we believe it will be much lower than forecast.”
Editor's Note: You Deserve to Know What Obama and Bernanke Are Hiding From Americans


© 2012 Moneynews. All rights reserved.
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5)What Would Nixon Do?
By Ben Stein

About Iran, that is.

We face some extremely serious problems today in the foreign policy realm.
But now we face a uniquely serious threat from Islamic Iran. They are
belligerent. They sponsor terrorism and violent repression everywhere they
can, currently on display in the bloodbath in Syria. Far, far worse, they
seem to be getting close to having a nuclear bomb. They have promised to use
that bomb on Israel right away, and Israel cannot permit that. There can be
no second Holocaust. But Israel is restrained by the U.S.'s caution and by
the long distance to Iran from Israel.

I keep thinking in this context about my old boss and friend, Richard M.
Nixon. Obviously, he had serious problems on the domestic side. But in
foreign affairs, he was a wizard... got our prisoners back from North
Vietnam, ended the war there, opened relations with China that basically
encircled Russia and ended the Cold War, signed the first strategic arms
limitation treaty with the Soviet Union.

As he said he would do, he left us with "a generation of peace."
What would RN do about Iran? Well, he's been gone now for eight years, so
it's just an educated guess, but here it is.

Richard Nixon above all did not like to see America pushed around. He
responded strongly when he felt we were being pushed around -- with bombing,
especially. He also did not like to see our allies being pushed around.
That's why he sent a lot of highly advanced aid to Israel roughly 40 years
ago during the Yom Kippur War to save Israel when things were looking bad.
Then peace came between Israel and Egypt.

I think he would do the same now. He would say to Israel, "Look, you have an
existential threat. You are our closest ally on the planet. We will let you
use our refueling apparatus to get you to the nuclear bomb making sites in
Iran. We will let you use our super satellite imaging to find the right
spots to hit. We will lend you our superb anti-ground to air missile defense
systems. Not only that, but we will let the world know we are doing this.
The Europeans will complain, but they always complain. We won't be pushed
around by the Mullahs and we won't let you be destroyed. If show and tell
doesn't work, we'll be behind you in the UN after you do the bombing.
"Strength works. After strength, we'll use diplomacy. That's when diplomacy
works best."

And that might just do it. Richard Nixon made many mistakes, but he was a
superstar in war and peace. What would Richard Nixon do? What makes for
peace in the long run, which is sometimes action in the short run.
Or, I could be wrong.

About the Author
Ben Stein is a writer, actor, economist, and lawyer living in Beverly Hills
and Malibu. He writes "Ben Stein's Diary" for every issue of The American
Spectator.
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