Wednesday Chronicle: Another Victory Against ObamaCare

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Chronicle · February 2, 2011 The Foundation "If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself." --James Madison, Federalist No. 51 Editorial Exegesis U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson "Federal Judge Roger Vinson opens his decision declaring ObamaCare unconstitutional with that citation from Federalist No. 51, written by James Madison in 1788. His exhaustive and erudite opinion is an important moment for American liberty, and [Monday] may well stand as the moment the political branches were obliged to return to the government of limited and enumerated powers that the framers envisioned. As Judge Vinson took pains to emphasize, the case is not really about health care at all, or the wisdom -- we would argue the destructiveness -- of the newest entitlement. Rather, the Florida case goes to the core of the architecture of the American system, and whether there are any remaining limits on federal control. Judge Vinson's 78-page ruling in favor of 26 states and the National Federation of Independent Business, among others, is by far the best legal vindication to date of Constitutional principles that form the outer boundaries of federal power. At the heart of the states' lawsuit is the individual mandate, which requires everyone to purchase health insurance or be penalized for not doing so. 'Never before has Congress required that everyone buy a product from a private company (essentially for life) just for being alive and residing in the United States,' Judge Vinson writes. ... Unlike Judge Henry Hudson in Virginia, who also found ObamaCare to be unconstitutional, Judge Vinson addresses the Administration's fallback argument that the Constitution's Necessary and Proper Clause justifies the law even if the Commerce Clause doesn't. He writes that this clause 'is not an independent source of federal power' and 'would vitiate the enumerated powers principle.' In other words, the clause can't justify inherently unconstitutional actions. ... Judge Vinson's learned opinion has put down a Constitutional argument that will reverberate all the way to the Supreme Court." --The Wall Street Journal Insight "The only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over a member of a civilized community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant." --British philosopher John Stuart Mill (1806-1873) Upright "Regardless of how laudable its attempts may have been to accomplish these goals [of universal health care] in passing the [Affordable Care] Act, Congress must operate within the bounds established by the Constitution. ... [T]his case is not about whether the Act is wise or unwise legislation, or whether it will solve or exacerbate the myriad problems in our health care system. In fact, it is not really about our health care system at all. It is principally about our federalist system, and it raises very important issues regarding the Constitutional role of the federal government." --Reagan-appointed U.S. District Judge Roger Vinson in striking down ObamaCare in its entirety "This case involves a majority of the states (26), and the National Federation of Independent Business. If not completely unprecedented, the very fact that more than half the states marched into federal court on behalf of themselves and their citizens to challenge an unconstitutional federal program falls into the category of 'beyond any recent memory.' The sheer magnitude of the parties involved guarantees that the courts on appeal will pay particular attention to this case." --Heritage Foundation's Robert Alt "Disregard Barack Obama's rhetorical cotton candy about aspiring to be transformative. He is just another practitioner of reactionary liberalism and champion of a government unchastened by its multiplying failures. The word 'entitlements' was absent from his nearly 7,000-word State of the Union address -- a $183 million speech that meandered for 61 minutes as the nation's debt grew $3 million a minute." --columnist George Will "To this day, the [Muslim] Brotherhood's motto remains, 'Allah is our objective, the Prophet is our leader, the Koran is our law, Jihad is our way, and dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope. Allahu akbar!' Still, our see-no-Islamic-evil foreign-policy establishment blathers on about the Brotherhood's purported renunciation of violence — and never you mind that, with or without violence, its commitment is ... to 'conquer America' and 'conquer Europe.' It is necessary to whitewash the Ikhwan's brutal legacy and its tyrannical designs in order to fit it into the experts' paradigm: history for simpletons." --columnist Andrew McCarthy "No one can tell where this [the situation in Egypt] will all end, but it is already clear that President Obama, who was so eager to re-set America's relationships with the rest of the world is finding out that (a) it is tougher to be President than to run for President and (b) Bush's policies made more sense than Obama thought they did." --political analyst Rich Galen Dezinformatsia Constitutional ignorance: "Let's turn now to health care. Major court ruling. Federal judge down in Florida targeted individual mandates, said that the President Obama health care reform is unconstitutional.... But, what he was talking about, specifically, was this requirement that people buy health insurance and you had exactly that same requirement in Massachusetts. Why is it right for a state to impose that kind of mandate and not the federal government?" --ABC's George Stephanopoulos, who apparently has never heard of 10th Amendment federalism Gun grabbers: "There's talk this week about a word that wasn't in the [SOTU] speech at all: guns. ... Given all the recent headlines and calls for better enforcement of laws to keep guns out of the wrong hands -- that missing word has generated a cloud of its own." --CBS's Katie Couric Blame global warming: "Energy insecurity and climate instability have now become key factors in food insecurity, which in turn has become a key factor in toppling governments. ... Those who think that the serious impacts of climate change -- and our inane energy policies -- on the world economy and U.S. national security are decades away are simply not paying attention." --MSNBC's Joe Romm Blame Bush: "Unrest in Egypt. Proving the Iraq war wasn't needed, these protests in Egypt, as well as in Yemen and Tunisia, are all aimed at dictators supported by the U.S. The demonstrations have not yet turned anti-American, but they could. These are the events the Bush administration hoped to encourage by lying about weapons of mass destruction and invading Iraq." --MSNBC's Chris Matthews Pot, meet kettle: "I think the effect of Fox News on American public life has been to create a level of cynicism about the news in general. It has contributed to the sense that they are all just out there with a political agenda, but Fox is just more overt about it. And I think that's unhealthy. ... But it is true that the national discourse is more polarized and strident than it has been in the past, and to some extent, I would lay that at the feet of Rupert Murdoch." --New York Times Executive Editor Bill Keller Newspulper Headlines: The Latest Installment in the 'Left Behind' Series: "Left Unprepared for ObamaCare Ruling" --Washington Post website Do as I Say, Not as I Do: "Obama: Future Egypt Gov't Must Respect the Will of the People" --Ha'aretz (Israel) He Wants to Find Out What Comes After Trillion: "Obama Turns Attention to Supercomputing" --ComputerWorld.com Would You Buy a Used Czar From This Man?: "Obama Tries to Sell Agenda, Presidency" --Roll Call Answers to Questions Nobody Is Asking: "Tweeters' Digest: What TV Celebs Tweeted During the State of the Union Speech" --Los Angeles Times website Bottom Stories of the Day: "As Deficits, Debt Soar, Obama, Congress Fail to Confront Them" --McClatchy Newspapers (Thanks to The Wall Street Journal's James Taranto) Click Here New! Ronald Reagan — How An Ordinary Man Became An Extraordinary Leader In this enlightening new look at one of our most successful, most popular, and least understood presidents, bestselling author and former Reagan aide Dinesh D'Souza shows how this "ordinary" man was able to transform the political landscape in a way that made a permanent impact on America and the world. Paperback, 292 pages The Demo-gogues Hyper hypocrisy: "Political opponents of the Affordable Care Act are intent on doing in the courts what they could not do in Congress by rolling back these important protections." --Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) ignoring that Leftists such as himself revere the courts when it suits his purposes Are you serious? "If everyone in America was very, very pleased with his or her health insurance and had no complaints and had access to quality, affordable health care in our country, it still would have been necessary for us to pass the health care reform bill, because we could not sustain the system." --House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) Profiles in courage: "I also call upon the Egyptian government to reverse the actions that they've taken to interfere with access to the Internet, to cell phone service, and to social networks that do so much to connect people in the 21st century." --Barack Obama, who is pushing for both net "neutrality" and the Internet "kill switch" bill Smoke and mirrors: "My legislation would provide a mechanism for the government to work with the private sector in the event of a true cyber emergency. It would give our nation the best tools available to swiftly respond to a significant threat." --Sen. Susan Collins (R-ME), author of the U.S. Internet "kill switch" bill Non Compos Mentis: "As I said, we will be out of Afghanistan by the end of this year. ... Combat operations in Afghanistan have ended." --Barack Obama twice confusing Afghanistan with Iraq Non Compos Mentis II: "You know, we have three branches of government. We have a House. We have a Senate. We have a president." --Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-NY), who needs a remedial civics class Village Idiots We can do whatever we want: "I'm not a lawyer, and I'm leaving those arguments to our legal team from the Department of Justice. But I think there are certainly lots of talented constitutional lawyers who feel that the Commerce Clause very much is broad enough to cover the interstate commerce of health care." --Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, who also likened purchasing insurance to buying a TV To the contrary: "Judge Vinson's decision is radical judicial activism run amok, and it will undoubtedly be reversed on appeal. The decision flies in the face of three other decisions, contradicts decades of legal precedent, and could jeopardize families' health care security." --Ron Pollack, Executive Director of Families USA Classes begin soon: "It is an education problem. I think we have to educate them." --John Holdren, Obama's top science adviser, on climate change skeptics Shut up, she explained: "'Let's Move' has never been about the government telling people what to do." --Michelle Obama, who's initiatives are only about telling people what to do The BIG Lie: "The Muslim brotherhood has stayed out of it." --Jimmy Carter claiming that the protests in Egypt are not "orchestrated by extremist Muslims" Click Here Patriot Puzzles and Games Check out our great selection of patriotic puzzles and games for gifts and fun. Choose from patriotic-themed traditional jigsaw and heirloom wooden puzzles, and a variety of playing cards. All sales proceeds at The Patriot Shop support our Mission of Service to America's Armed Forces. Short Cuts "In it's current configuration, the Republicans -- as both the minority party and the party nominally in favor of balanced budgets and a leaner, meaner welfare state -- think that if they can only educate the American people; if they can only, in [Speaker John] Boehner's words, make them 'understand how big the problem is,' then we get serious about reform. But anyone even marginally plugged into the political discourse in this country realizes that a dearth of entitlement doom-saying is not the problem -- pervasive NIMRODism (entitlement reform is great and necessary, as long as it does Not Impact My Retirement Options, Dude) -- is." --National Review's Daniel Foster "I missed the middle section of Obama's State of the Union address when I took a break to read 'War and Peace,' but I gather he never got around to what I was hoping he'd say, which is: 'What was I thinking?'" --columnist Ann Coulter "Congress is proposing a bill that would give President Obama a kill switch that he could use to freeze all activity on the Internet if there were a national emergency. The kill switch goes by the top-secret name Microsoft Windows." --comedian Conan O'Brien "If Egypt falls -- immediately, or ultimately -- to the Muslim Brotherhood, it will embolden other fanatical revolutions throughout the region and world. Then they'll come after the big prizes: Europe, which is almost gone, and America, which still has time to save itself, if it will climb out of denial which, as the joke goes, is not just a river in Egypt." --columnist Cal Thomas "Vice President Joe Biden has suggested to people out of work to just 'hang in there.' What a difference two years makes: Remember 'hope and change'? Now it's 'hang in there.'" --comedian Jay Leno (To submit reader comments click here.) Opinion Terence Jeffrey: Obama Should Be Careful What He Wishes for in Egypt Austin Bay: Islamist Mensheviks Versus Islamist Bolsheviks -- Egypt's Next Crisis? Ben Shapiro: Why America Always Gets Revolutions Wrong L. Brent Bozell: The Media Never Loved Reagan Michelle Malkin: A Christian Business in the Left's Crosshairs Tony Blankley: Support Mubarak: Down the Revolution, Up Orderly Progress! Lawrence Kudlow: Bernanke and Ethanol Sink Egypt Jacob Sullum: No Military Immunity: America's Bloated Defense Budget Is Ripe for Cutting John Stossel: I Can Balance the Budget Jonah Goldberg: Hope Amid the Chaos in Cairo Walter E. Williams: Black Education Ken Blackwell: Bowing and Kowtowing Debra Saunders: A Spending Problem and a Debt Problem William Murchison: How Far Can Congress Really Go? Rebecca Hagelin: Culture Challenge of the Week: Child Pornography on TV More Opinion Headlines Senate to Vote on Health-Law Repeal Republicans Offer Bill to Allow States to Opt-Out of ObamaCare Senators Propose Rigid Spending Cap Inouye Reluctantly Announces Senate Earmark Moratorium Obama Snubs Issa on First Major Document Deadline Clashes After Egypt's Army Calls for End to Protests Was WikiLeaks Right? Did Union Organizers and the U.S. State Dept Help Plan Egypt's Uprising? WikiLeaks: al-Qaeda 'Is Planning a Dirty Bomb' Not One Afghan Army Unit Was Able to Operate Independent of U.S.-Led Coalition Forces as of Sept. 2010, GAO Says 'Jihad Jane' Terror Suspect Pleads Guilty in Pennsylvania Number of Illegal Immigrants in U.S. Steady at 11.2M Dow Over 12,000 as Remarkable Bull Market Rolls On More Headlines Reader Commentary ObamaCare: Charity or Theft? Harry Reid, Over the Edge SARTRE More Reader Commentary Policy The Heritage Foundation The Cato Institute Hoover Institution National Rifle Association Ludwig von Mises Institute National Center for Policy Analysis The Heartland Institute (Please pray for our Armed Forces standing in harm's way around the world, and for their families -- especially families of those fallen Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen, who granted their lives in defense of American liberty.) Follow The Patriot Post:

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