Voice For Liberty

Tag: Politics

  • Chemical security law goes beyond protection

    Congress is about to consider legislation that, on the surface, seems like it implements an important goal. Its name — Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards — suggests something that no one could oppose.

    The proposed legislation, however, would extend government control into another of our nation’s most important industries. It would require companies to change their manufacturing processes and substitute products in the name of safety. But the legislation may not produce its intended effect. As the letter below states: “Congressional testimony found that this could actually increase risk to the businesses that the bill intends to protect.”

    If you need to know just how bad this bill is, consider that the Center for American Progress, founded by Herbert M. Sandler and Marion O. Sandler, is squarely behind it.

    Radical environmentalists seek to destroy American industry any way they can. Using an unimpeachable issue — our national security and anti-terrorism — to advance their goals is just another of their tools.

    Following is a letter from a coalition of industry groups that explains some of the issues surrounding this legislation.

    Dear Member of Congress,

    We represent American businesses and local city services that provide millions of jobs and our national infrastructure. Protecting our communities and complying with federal security standards is a top priority for us.

    We support straightforward legislation to reauthorize the DHS chemical facility security standards enacted by Congress in 2006. We also support Congress enacting into statute the regulatory framework that the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) carefully established and is now enforcing, known as the “Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards.” Removing the sunset date and making the chemical security regulations permanent would provide the certainty needed to both protect our citizens and enable our economic recovery.

    However, we strongly urge you to oppose disrupting this security program by adding provisions that would mandate government-favored substitutions, weaken protection of sensitive information, impose stifling penalties for administrative errors, create conflicts with other security standards or move away from a performance (or risk-based) approach.

    For example, last year’s “Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Act” could have caused disruptions of new federal security standards and reduced jobs in the short term, and in the long term weakened infrastructure protection and economic stability.

    Our top concern is that legislation could go beyond security protections by creating a mandate to substitute products and processes with a government-selected technology. Congressional testimony found that this could actually increase risk to the businesses that the bill intends to protect. Such a standard is not measurable and would likely lead to confusion, loss of viable products, prohibitive legal liability, and business failures.

    We ask that you ensure that any security legislation avoid overlap and conflict with existing federal security requirements, such as the U.S. Coast Guard’s “Maritime Transportation Security Act.” Any proposal must also protect from release any sensitive security information on site vulnerability.

    Companies in thousands of communities are complying with the landmark new DHS chemical security standards while continuing to provide essential products and services for our daily lives. We believe that counter-productive adjustments to the current law would undermine security and endanger businesses in communities all around the country. Thank you for your consideration of our views.

    Update: Let your elected representatives in Washington know about this legislation. Send them a message by clicking here.

  • Harold Koh nomination threatens American law and sovereignty

    President Barack Obama has appointed Harold Koh to be Legal Advisor to the State Department. While a job with this title might seem to be relatively minor, it turns out that this position is quite influential and powerful. Koh’s views on the law indicate that he should not be confirmed by the Senate for this position.

    Harold Koh is a transnationalist. What does that mean?

    • International law and American law are not distinct
    • International law should be incorporated into American law
    • American courts should import international law, even when that law conflicts with American legal tradition and laws our elected representatives have passed

    According to M. Edward Whelan III of the Ethics and Public Policy Center:

    Transnationalists have three primary mechanisms for their revolution. First, they advocate a new understanding of “customary international law” (or CIL) in which they and other international elites, rather than state practice, generate the norms of new CIL and in which those norms supposedly are binding as federal common law. Second, they favor an extravagant reading of the treaty power in which treaties are presumptively self-executing (i.e., applicable as domestic law) and the treaty power is boundless in its scope (i.e., treaties can address the full range of domestic policymaking and thereby supplant — and even go beyond the scope of — congressional legislation). Third, they urge the Supreme Court to reinvent the meaning of constitutional provisions to reflect selected contemporary foreign and international practices. What transnationalism, at bottom, is all about is depriving American citizens of their powers of representative government by selectively imposing on them the favored policies of Europe’s leftist elites.

    The nomination of Harold Koh is dangerous for America. It holds the threat that American representative democracy will be subservient to world view. Our system of liberty and property rights is not respected all across the world. Transnationalism is a way for those who want to attack America to do so through law.

    A good source of information about Harold Koh and why his nomination should be opposed is The Coalition to Preserve American Sovereignty.

    Another source of information about Koh is Harold Koh’s Transnationalism , by M. Edward Whelan III of the Ethics and Public Policy Center.

  • The audacity of hopelessness

    The Audacity of Hopelessness
    Gregory L. Schneider

    President Barack Obama has had his way with business in his first hundred days in office. He is the only president in American history to fire a CEO of a private business, Rick Wagoner of General Motors. He called bondholders of Chrysler Corporation speculators after they refused a government-financed deal that would have paid them one-third or less of what they are owed; they would rather go through regular bankruptcy proceedings. Recently, out of fear of a nationalized health care system, private insurance trade associations and health care providers have pledged to the president that they will reduce $2 trillion in health care costs over the next decade. It might be the audacity of hope for President Obama, but it’s hopelessness for the private sector.

    The health providers, according to the Wall Street Journal, said they would reduce costs by simplifying administrative costs, making hospitals more efficient, reducing hospitalizations, and improving health care information technology. This last cost reduction goal plays to the president’s good graces, as it is a key component in what he believes will reduce health care costs. If the costs can be reduced then there may be no problem with the providers committing themselves to do so. But much depends on the other health care plan floating through Congress, the one that could force an end to private insurance — despite what supporters say — through the crowding out of the private market and its replacement with the public insurance Obama favors.

    Why is the health care industry, which vehemently opposed Hillary Clinton’s efforts to nationalize health coverage in 1993 and 1994, now supportive of the effort to do so? One thought is that it’s better to be a player on the inside negotiating the terms of surrender rather than one on the outside being dictated the terms. The conventional wisdom among conservatives is that this represents “a craven gesture of submission,” a kowtow to the American emperor as National Review editor Rich Lowry called it in his column.

    But look a little deeper as CATO Institute health care fellow Michael Cannon did on National Review Online (May 11, 2009) and there may be a different reason for why the health care industry caved and gave such promises to Obama. According to Cannon, “the basic math of universal coverage is this: it will cost a minimum of $120 billion per year to cover the uninsured. Over ten years, it can easily cost $2 trillion.” The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) has not recognized the assumed savings from health care reform which are a major component of the Obama argument — reform health care and costs will decrease.

    “So it may be,” Cannon continues, “that the industry’s overture is actually an effort to cook the books by ganging up on the CBO: “See, you silly number-crunchers? Even the industry believes these reforms will reduce spending. What’s in it for the industry? Universal coverage gives them a huge revenue boost in the short term — and then every lobbyist at the White House will fight for those spending reductions over the long term. The industry isn’t negotiating its surrender — they’re negotiating the surrender of even more of our money.”

    Every economic decision the Obama administration has made since it took office in January has resulted in the politicization of private business. Look at the auto companies; look at the banks and Wall Street firms. Want to get out of government managed programs, like the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP)? You have to prove your worthiness, jump through hoops and then the administration may let you out of the program. Or it may not. Better to enter bankruptcy and reject the federal dole than to suffer the full consequences of government bailouts.

    That is a lesson I hope business learns quickly and begins to resist the trend toward socialized medicine (i.e., higher taxes, rationed care and a weakened health care system) on top of nationalized banks, auto companies and whatever else this administration has in store. That truly is the audacity of hopelessness.

    Gregory L. Schneider is a Senior Fellow with the Kansas-based Flint Hills Center for Public Policy.  A complete bio on Dr. Schneider can be found at http://www.flinthills.org/content/view/24/39/, and he can be reached at greg.schneider@flinthills.org.

  • Government-run health care focus of May 24 demonstration

    Next Sunday, Wichita-area citizens will have an opportunity to let their fellow citizens and the Obama administration know of the dangers of government control of health care.

    The event will be on Sunday, May 24, 2009, from 11:00 am to 1:00 pm. The location is the pedestrian bridge over Kellogg (US 54/400 highway) at Pattie Street. Meet on the south side of Kellogg.

    You can click on a Google map of the location. There’s also a Facebook event page.

    This event is part of the America Protests Facebook group.

    Protest event organizers say this is your opportunity to wake up the public, to get people talking to each other about government control of health care, to watch these videos to become informed, and to spread information throughout the country.

    This is the line in the sand. We must prevent passage of the current “Health Care Reform” bill. The public has no idea why it’s irreversible. They have no idea of the consequences of this bill. As long as we remain willing to go about our daily lives without rising up and holding mass demonstrations the public will remain complacent.

    Please sign up to attend the protests. May 24 and June 6 are the two days planned. You can click on the Facebook event page for more information. The guest list for the first protest on May 24 is private; your name or picture will not be displayed when you choose to attend.

    Please notify everyone you can of this protest. We want people to line the street with free information, brochures, and flyers to inform the public and get the alarm sounded across the country.

    Please send an email to students@cox.net for more information on the protest event, to ask your questions, and to volunteer to hand out literature, send emails, etc.

    What are the dangers of government-run health care? Indian (native American) health care is totally funded and run by the United States Government. This is what health care for everyone else will look like if we don’t speak up to prevent it.

    It took 10 years to get one bill to the floor in Congress for debate — just one bill to try to make improvements in Indian health care. If you think nationalized health care will be run any better you’re fooling yourself.

    Dick Morris described the irreversible nature of implementing Obama’s “Health Care Reform:” “The other radical changes Obama is bringing about in our nation can always be reversed. New taxes can be repealed or lowered. That which was nationalized can be privatized. Government which has grown can be cut. But once the health care system is extended to cover everyone, with no commensurate increase in the resources available, the change will be forever. The vicious cycle of cuts in medical resources and in the number of doctors and nurses will doom health care in this country. This wanton destruction will not be reversible by any bill or program. A crucial part of our quality of life — the best health care in the world — will be gone forever.”

    This is a very important video explaining why government-run health care is irreversible:

  • Activist training to be held in Wichita

    Next Monday (May 18, 2009), American Majority will be holding activist training in Wichita. This group does a great job teaching activists and candidates how to be effective.

    Topics include:

    • Building Coalitions, Reaching Your Community, and Organizing Meaningful Events
    • Holding Your Elected Officials Accountable
    • Getting Involved in State and Local Political Campaigns
    • New Media: Op-Eds, Blogs, Wiki Projects and more

    I’ll even be there myself to help out a little bit.

    The cost for this event is only $20, and includes dinner. It’s from 3:00 to 8:00. The poster below has all you need to know.

    American Majority Activist Training Wichita May 18, 2009

  • Future of the tea party protests

    The Washington Times ponders the future of the tea party protest movement in Anti-tax crusade to storm Capitol.

    One promising sign: “In some areas we’ve noticed tea party activists are getting involved in local government in school boards [and] town councils.”

    When I speak to groups and talk about the size of local government, people are astonished to learn that the school district is often the biggest spender. Locally, in round numbers, the budget of Sedgwick Count is $400 million, of the City of Wichita, $500 million, and of the Wichita School District, $600 million. (Except that the school district and the government school spending lobby won’t admit that figure.)

    So are these tea parties just a wing of the Republican Party? Here’s more from the article: “Republicans, however, have been just as unsuccessful in tapping into this group of voters Mr. Steinhauser describes as ‘sort of a mixture of libertarians, independent-minded people who lean conservative and even Democrats who are leery of all this spending in Congress.’”

  • I’ll help you with technology

    I hate to see activists struggle with technology. Whether it’s creating and managing a blog, using Facebook or Twitter, or just using computers and the Internet effectively, I’d like to help.

    Crossloop is a tool that lets people work together remotely. By using it, you’ll be able to see my computer screen, and I — with your permission — can see yours. Working together this way, we can resolve many problems quickly.

    If you’re a center-right or libertarian activist and need help, contact me. It’s free. You’ll have to do an easy download of some software, but you don’t have to create an account or supply any personal information.

    Click on www.crossloop.com/BobWeeks to get started.

  • Wichita tea party covered in East Wichita News

    Cathy Feemster, Managing Editor of East Wichita News, has some great coverage of the Wichita tea party protest on tax day. Click on 2,000 ‘Tea Party’ at Grass Roots Protest for the story.

  • Stephen Moore: Tea party like “sonic boom”

    Speaking at a recent event held by the Sam Adams Alliance, Wall Street Journal editorial board member and economist Stephen Moore told tea party protesters that “the message that you all delivered was heard like a sonic boom in Washington. We’ve never seen anything like it.”

    He said that the tea party protesters are angry about the outrageous bailouts and the unbelievable amount of debt the country is taking on.

    He told the audience that an article in the Wall Street Journal estimated that if we go forward with the Obama plan, it will cost the average American family $100,000 over its lifetime. So when a CNN reporter asked why the tea party protesters aren’t appreciative of a $400 rebate, what’s that compared to $100,000?