Aug 25, 2014 | Constitution, Liberty Articles
Harold Pease, Ph. D
In yet another emerging scary scandal, not well publicized, the CIA recently acknowledged that it “had secretly searched Senate computer files related to an investigation of the agency’s Bush-era harsh interrogation program.” Searched Senate computer files!!! Good grief, that is our own government that they spied on!! Is there nobody safe from spying??? Their admission that they had lied for several months when accused of having done so and their apology to the senators to whom they had spied, does not make such acceptable. They readily placed the blame on three lower level technology staff members who, they said, “demonstrated a lack of candor” when doing so. Is there no punishment?
Left out of their “limp” apology is who directed them to spy on the Senate in the first place? Also minimized by existing coverage is the fact that this wasn’t just any group of U.S. Senators that the CIA decided to spy on, it was the Senate Intelligence Committee, charged with overseeing all spying sponsored by our government. In effect, the CIA was spying on its congressional boss.
The loudest complainant, and the one to take to the Senate floor to blast the unruly organization of lifting material from committee computers, was the Senate Intelligence Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein. Six months ago, Feinstein insisted that the CIA removed from committee computers information that cast the agency’s post-9/11 interrogation tactics in a harsh and negative light, this presumably to avoid embarrassment and legal entanglements. Meddling with the Oversight Committee’s findings effectively tramples on the constitutional separation of powers between the executive and legislative branches of government and, if not checked, destroys that balance.
What caused the CIA to spy on its own government was that the Senate was investigating them and about to release its incriminating findings. Despite CIA interference the Committee voted 11-3 to release a 431-page summary of its four-year 6,200 page, $40 million scathing indictment. Just why the complete document will remain classified, and thus secret, has not been disclosed but it can be assumed that the released version is the sanitized version. As a result the extent of the Bush-era CIA torture practice continues into the Obama-era and CIA misdeeds will not come to light fully until those responsible are safely out of danger of prosecution. With respect to the part that remains classified Committee Chairwoman Dianne Feinstein threatened, “If someone distributed any part of this classified report, they broke the law and should be prosecuted.” Perhaps she should be reminded that secrecy and free government are incompatible.
The part released concluded “that the CIA’s use of brutal interrogation measures did not produce valuable intelligence and that the agency repeatedly misled government officials about the severity and success of the program.” Feinstein called the torture practice shocking, “The report exposes brutality that stands in stark contrast to our values as a nation. It chronicles a stain on our history that must never again be allowed to happen,” she said. She was referring to the CIA’s use of waterboarding and other harsh tactics against dozens of terrorism suspects.
Maine Senator Angus King, an independent on the Committee, called the practice torture. “I don’t have any doubts on that fact. It’s a pretty hard read. It’s very disappointing.” But he was especially bothered by the amount of inaccurate statements emanating from the CIA that influenced the president and congress for years. He might have included the mainstream media and the falsehoods that will continue for decades in our history textbooks until everything is declassified and scrutinized by historians.
What appears clear is that the CIA used interrogation methods reportedly not approved by the Justice Department, that the agency evaded congressional oversight, and that the agency self-empowered itself as though independent and accountable to only itself. Also, clear is that the extent of its wrongdoing will remain hidden and classified so that no one is punished. This is the sanitized version.
But back to our original concern, apparently the CIA is so brazen that it spies on, and removes evidence from, the Senate Intelligence Committee charged with its oversight. Amazingly this to the point that they too, knowing more than any other organization the power and danger of the way-ward child, participated in keeping a part of the organizations wrong doings secret. One wonders if the U.S. Senate is that independent of the CIA, especially when this organization receives little more than a verbal retribution for spying and lifting evidence on it, an activity that should be criminal.
Aug 19, 2014 | Constitution, Liberty Articles
Harold Pease, Ph. D
Many may not realize that Congress had prayer today before they deliberated. In a typical workweek, Monday through Friday, prayer is said every morning in the U. S. Senate and in the U. S. House of Representatives. Each House invites and pays a Christian minister to pray each day for a week that they are in session. Ministers apply for this privilege and they come from every sector of the country. This has been so since the 1st Congress in 1789 some 225 years ago and will continue as long as we are a Christian nation. Such affirms our nation’s faith in God as Sovereign Lord of this nation. This honors the historic separation of Church and State as outlined in the 1st Amendment, but not the separation of God and State, which the Founders strongly opposed.
The prayer giver this past week was Rev. Roger Spradlin, pastor of Valley Baptist Church in Bakersfield, California, representing a congregation of more than 8,000 followers. Prayers are similar requesting wisdom and courage. Spradlin prayed, “We acknowledge that our country is facing serious challenges, and that our world is in crisis. Give this body the courage that is necessary to lead” (Bakersfield Californian, August 1, 2014, p. 5).
The tradition of prayer in government assemblies is long standing. The first recorded national prayer was given by Reverend Jacob Duche,’ Rector of Christ Church of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in the First Continental Congress Sept. 7, 1774, even before the creation of the Articles of Confederation our first constitution and government. Notice the intensity of his appeal to God to help them obtain their freedom from British rule.
“O Lord our Heavenly Father, high and mighty King of kings, and Lord of lords, who dost from thy throne behold all the dwellers on earth and reignest with power supreme and uncontrolled over all the Kingdoms, Empires and Governments; look down in mercy, we beseech Thee, on these our American States, who have fled to Thee from the rod of the oppressor and thrown themselves on Thy gracious protection, desiring to be henceforth dependent only on Thee. To Thee have they appealed for the righteousness of their cause; to Thee do they now look up for that countenance and support, which Thou alone canst give. Take them, therefore, Heavenly Father, under Thy nurturing care; give them wisdom in Council and valor in the field; defeat the malicious designs of our cruel adversaries; convince them of the unrighteousness of their Cause and if they persist in their sanguinary purposes, of own unerring justice, sounding in their hearts, constrain them to drop the weapons of war from their unnerved hands in the day of battle!
“Be Thou present, O God of wisdom, and direct the councils of this honorable assembly; enable them to settle things on the best and surest foundation. That the scene of blood may be speedily closed; that order, harmony and peace may be effectually restored, and truth and justice, religion and piety, prevail and flourish amongst the people. Preserve the health of their bodies and vigor of their minds; shower down on them and the millions they here represent, such temporal blessings as Thou seest expedient for them in this world and crown them with everlasting glory in the world to come. All this we ask in the name and through the merits of Jesus Christ, Thy Son and our Savior. Amen.”
Even during the Constitutional Convention, prayer was referenced as a solution to the tension in the room on June 28,1787, when the patriarch of that assembly, Benjamin Franklin, stood and said, addressing the Chair: “I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth: that God Governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the ground without his notice, is it probable that an empire can rise without his aid?
“We have been assured, Sir, in the sacred writings, that ‘except the Lord build the House they labour in vain that build it.’ I firmly believe this; and I also believe that without his concurring aid we shall succeed in this political building no better, than the Builders of Babel . . . I therefore beg leave to move—that henceforth prayers imploring the assistance of Heaven, and its blessings on our deliberations, be held in this Assembly every morning before we proceed to business, and that one or more of the Clergy of this City be requested to officiate in that Service.”
Both House and Senate prayers are recorded daily in the Congressional Record. Some prayers give council and particulars, most are fairly generic and short. All ask for the assistance of Heaven.
So Congress asked God for help in their deliberations, this time through the prayer of Reverend Roger Spradin. Good! May we never forget to do so!! It is the essence of our strength!!
Aug 2, 2014 | Liberty Articles
By Harold Pease, Ph. D
The relentless missile attacks on Israel now exceed 2600 in the first 20 days of the Hamas/Israeli War. Fortunately only 43 Israeli soldiers have been killed because of Israel’s elaborate missile defense system. Return fire, however, has reportedly left 1,035 Palestinians dead in a war that appears to have no immediate end, despite President Barack Obama’s appeal for a cease-fire. At issue, and a major reason for the Israeli ground offensive in the Gaza Strip, are the million-dollar concrete-lined tunnels from the Strip into Israel designed to launch internal attacks inside heavily populated areas—28 discovered to date. All this is commonly known.
What isn’t—at least for those under age 35—and the need for this column, is the history behind the conflict. Those who rush in with traditional answers to such conflicts like cease-fires and peace plans have no hope of ending the hostilities. This is perhaps the single most complex area on the planet and Jerusalem is geographically the home of three of the world’s largest and competing religions: Judaism, Islam and Christianity; the most aggressive being Islam, which has a very low tolerance for any faith other than their own. Hostilities between they and Judaism reach back 4,000 years to Father Abraham and his sons Ishmael and Isaac, each the ethnic father of one of the religions. The “permanent feud” began when Ishmael and his mother Hagar were expelled from Abraham’s family.
Of course we should assist where possible in solving the feud but the reality is, no other powers on earth has been able to do so for 4,000 years and there will be an Israeli/Islamic conflict decades to come. It, as in the past, will be resolved by “might is right” and today, try as they might, the Arabic countries cannot liquidate their unwanted neighbor.
History basically left the Israelis without a homeland during the Middle Ages and they were scattered largely throughout Europe mostly because of Islamic intolerance. England came to dominate the Middle East after World War I and they clearly favored the creation of a Jewish homeland in Palestine. A constant trickle of Jews flowed into Palestine joining those who had never left. World sympathy for the scattered Jews was amplified during and after World War II when Adolph Hitler annihilated at least 6 million of them and the trickle to Palestine turned into a river.
After the war, in 1947, the United Nations created the State of Israel. The plan was to divide the Holy Land between the Israelis and the Palestinians; each having its own homeland but the plan was rejected by the Palestinians and all Arabic countries, who denied Israel’s right to even exist. So much so that the League of Arab States formed in 1945 (consisting of the six surrounding countries) attacked Israel after it was recognized as a country by the United States. In the resultant war Israel retained its right to exist but the rest of the Palestine area was divided between competing Arabic states: Jordan had the West Bank and Egypt the Gaza Strip. Now, because of their refusal to allow the Jews a homeland, the Palestinians were without one. Arabic states again attacked Israel in 1967, vowing to destroy them, and were soundly defeated in a six-day war.
By this time the West had little interest in the original plan of providing the Palestinians a homeland and as a result of the wars encouraged by them, and the Arabic countries surrounding them, Israel had come to possess most of the land that would have made up a Palestinian state. Moreover, they were building settlements on it. The Palestinians longed to remove the Jews from “their” land and during the 1980’s initiated six years of uprisings and again in 2004 under Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat. The most contended Palestinian land included the West Bank, next to Jerusalem, and the Gaza Strip on the coast. Israel has been receptive to removing their settlements in these areas but the Arabic community still denies Israel’s right to exist, thus peace is unlikely to come to the region for some time.
Enter Hamas, which began as a Palestinian political party winning a majority of seats in the Palestinian Authority Parliament in 2006. It divided the Palestinian people into moderates and extremists (even terrorists) quite willing to use terroristic tactics such as human shields and suicide bombs to achieve their objectives. Hamas seized the Gaza Strip from the Palestinian Authority, which controlled the West Bank. It is this faction of the Palestinian people that have attacked Israel and that are responsible for the invasive tunnels into Israel. Of course, money for the costly tunnels and the missiles almost entirely comes from the Islamic states around the Holy Land.
Hopefully this historical overview will be helpful as we view the horrors of war from this part of the world. Meanwhile the missiles and death will continue.
Jul 29, 2014 | Constitution, Economy, Globalism, Immigration, Liberty Articles
Harold Pease, Ph. D
Clearly our borders are not protected when children can cross, reportedly unaided: if children, then anyone. If anyone then we cease to be a country. Historically borders define a country, when they cease to exist, or to have meaning or respect, the country soon also ceases to exist.
The first sentence of the Constitution, the Preamble, charges the federal government with the responsibility of providing for the common defense. All common defense powers (except the Commander and Chief component) are then listed as powers of Congress in Article I, Section 8. Protecting the border is clearly the responsibility of the Congress—who makes all the law. The executive branch enforces the law as written and understood by the Congress.
Clearly there exist laws forbidding illegal entry and clearly the executive branch has not, and is not, protecting the border. But such can be said of all presidents since before Ronald Reagan, although failure is more blatant now. I have told my students for 25 years that there would never be an effective southern border because neither political party really wanted one. I repeat this prediction today. The argument that our borders are too long to protect is easily dismissed when we reflect that the Chinese successfully kept barbarians out of China for hundreds of years by building the Great Wall without the aid of cranes, giant earth-moving trucks or any other technological marvels. Today, if we really wished to restrict entry, motion detectors, electric fences and drones could stop most, if not all the traffic.
I have consistently argued that The Council on Foreign Relations—-the most powerful special interest group in the United States– with vast influence in both parties and also in the establishment media, would not endorse any candidate for president pushing for a real border. A border where both countries had real security aimed at preventing passage. They have another plan called the North American Union patterned after the European Union.
This plan calls for the amalgamation of Mexico, the United States and Canada into first an economic union through NAFTA, the North American Free Trade Agreement, ushered in during the Clinton Administration, followed eventually by a political union. Canada and the United States are already near economic equals but Mexico, and Central America, added later under the Central American Free Trade Agreement, or CAFTA, is not.
The North American Union plan, which has never been denied by the CFR, the powerful wall-street special interest group, is to give Mexico and south to Panama, thirty to forty years of near open border status to gain what they call “economic commonality” with their northern neighbors before political assimilation. (For those who may not understand, political assimilation is the end of the United States, the Constitution, and Bill of Rights, as we know them). Southern foreigners would invade the United States taking the jobs Americans did not want and send some of their new wealth back home to elevate their families and the economies of their homelands. Many would retire to their place of origin with pensions and other amenities acquired from the United States—perhaps even Social Security and Medicare. Their children would seek the middle and higher-level jobs and being bilingual would have advantage over their American peers.
Although most of us are not ready to talk of the late, great America and believe that just getting back to the Constitution will always keep America great, the present foreign child invasion of the United States does demonstrate a non-existent border and such is a serious threat to independence and sovereignty. Apparently, the signal has been sent to prepare us for an open dialogue on actually combining the three large countries into a single, North American Union. Two notables proponents of assimilating the countries, who “have woven” this theme into their recent public speeches, are House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, and former U.S. military commander and former head of the CIA, David Petraeus.
In The Margaret Thatcher Conference on Liberty, June 18, of this year in a panel discussion entitled “After America, What?” General Petraeus answered, “There is North America.” He went on to proclaim “the coming of the ‘North American decade,’ a vision he explained was founded on the idea of putting together the economies of the United States, Canada and Mexico, some 20 years after the creation of North American Free Trade Agreement, or NAFTA” (Jerome Corsi, “What Comes ‘After America’?,” July 7, 2014).
If the children of foreign lands can cross our borders unaided, as contended, it is difficult to argue that we have a border. Look for the internationalist, who do not understand or value our sovereignty, to come out of the closet arguing that it is now time to open the borders to all who wish to come. Such are enemies of the republic and will destroy the United States, as we know it.
Jul 21, 2014 | Immigration, Liberty Articles
By Harold Pease, Ph. D
Sometimes the gullibility of Americans is beyond description. When the story broke last month that thousands of children, reportedly up from 6,000 in 2011 to 54,000 so far in 2014, have crossed killer deserts, cartel infested drug territories, and in most instances more than one country, I knew a con game was in the making. I could not get my kids, of which I had seven, to clean their bedrooms. Had my pre-teens been begged, beaten, or bribed with a million dollars to leave their home and walk to Guatemala it would have never happened. It is most unlikely that they would have known which direction to go and would have been lost three hours out.
Nor would 99% of parents allow their children to do so. Most parents would run in front of a car to save their child, not hand them over to the dangers of hostile environments or potential sexual perverts to get them to America. This definitely did not and does not pass the smell test. There is much more to this story.
There must exist massive organization and funding behind the scenes. Herding children is an abusive activity, ask any elementary school teacher, and drug cartels could not possibly be up to the task of changing diapers on the trail. Actually crossing the high border fences confronted with scary gun toting border guards and flashing twirling lights, without serious adult assistance is not kids’ play either. I was shocked at how many news organizations took this invasion at face value. There is an American organization or at least American money conspiring somewhere to bring this on in a deliberate attempt to weaken our southern border. It would not just happen naturally in a thousand years. It is not just that gangs roam the streets of Central America making kids want to run to America, nor is it likely that President Barack Obama alone convinced so many to flood our border, there is much more to this story. So newsmakers do not be so gullible, please get the story behind the story.
I am not alone in my gut feelings that kids could not do this by themselves; the National Association of Former Border Patrol Officers recently released a statement decrying this “child invasion” as a humanitarian crisis. They wrote: “It is a predictable, orchestrated and contrived assault on the compassionate side of Americans by her political leaders that knowingly puts minor Illegal Alien children at risk for purely political purposes.” They then blamed the government for aiding and abating the crisis. “Certainly, we are not gullible enough to believe that thousands of unaccompanied minor Central American children came to America without the encouragement, aid and assistance of the United States Government.” Moreover, they continued, “Anyone that has taken two six to seven year old children to an amusement park can only imagine the problems associated with bringing thousands of unaccompanied children that age up through Mexico and into the United States.” They doubted that, “even the Cartels would undertake that chore at any price (Former Border Patrol Agents: Illegal Immigration Crisis Contrived, The New American, July 7, 2014, p. 7).” No, there has to be collusion between at least the Mexican and American governments, they reasoned.
This operation is way too big for children to plan and execute and the establishment media should be all over those who are. Let’s begin with, most come from El Salvador and Honduras. Their migration to the United States would require their exiting their countries border and entering and exiting both Guatemala and Mexico before entering the United States—potentially six check points. When a child appears without an escort adults’ notice and everyone teams up to return him to his place. Why did not the governments of these countries stop, detain, and return these children long before they got to this country? There has to exist organized collusion on the part of these governments—they do not just allow anyone to cross their borders.
The nightly news now speaks of children who died making the 1500-mile excursion or failed in their effort to cross the Rio Grande River. Our hearts are heavy. This is mega child abuse, as is gang child rape along the way, and American perpetrators should be flushed out, convicted, and serve prison time. Those who surrender to border patrol agents speak of the belief spread in their countries that America welcomes children. Congress must have hearings on this most unlikely child invasion of the United States. Americans who may have intentionally perpetrated this falsehood, with the intent to weaken border security, should also be identified and prosecuted. Then too, those holding high office found to have intentionally encouraged this myth by not enforcing existing law must be turned out of office even if it is a president of the United States.
Jul 16, 2014 | Constitution, Immigration, Liberty Articles
Harold Pease, Ph. D
In light of the recent White House Press Secretary’s threat, “We’re not just going to sit around and wait interminably for Congress. We’ve been waiting a year already.” Reportedly, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson has been tasked with finding ways to change immigration law by executive order, thus bypassing Congress. The threat is not idle as President Barack Obama did this once before and promised to do so again in his most recent State of the Union Address.
There is nothing more clear nor basic in the Constitution than the separation of federal power into three branches, one to legislate, another to execute that law, and a third to adjudicate possible violations, when contested, of that law—a division of power held “sacred” until the last few decades. The Constitution reads: “All legislative powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives”(Article I, Sec. I).
The executive branch has NO authority to make law—any law!!!! Executive Orders are constitutional only when they cite a single, recently passed law of Congress, where that law needs a statement of implementation by the executive branch. Originally they were but interdepartmental directives.
For years some in Congress have been working on what is called the Dream Act that would extend amnesty and place illegal immigrants on a course toward full citizenship. Lacking popularity, twice it has failed to get the majority vote of both Houses of Congress required by the Constitution (once, between 2008-2010, when the President’s party controlled everything except the Judicial branch), thus leaving existing immigration law unchanged. A president can only suggest a need for new law in his State of the Union Address, and either sign or veto a law passed by Congress, which then, if vetoed, must be overridden by a vote of 2/3rds of both houses to become law. That is it. This is the law of the land and the Constitutional procedure violated by President Barack Obama June 16, 2012, when, failing to get a favorable vote from Congress, openly defied Congress and the Constitution by ordering a like measure to that defeated, implemented anyway.
This was the most open case of contempt for Congress and the Constitution and the President knew it. Prior to it on March 28, 2011, he said, with respect to the idea of nullifying Congress on the deportation issue. “The notion that I can just suspend deportations just through executive order, that’s just not the case, because there are laws on the books that Congress has passed.”
So why would he “flip-flop” and knowingly violate the Constitution? Obama sees an inept Congress that has not placed any restraint on his previous unconstitutional executive orders. He brilliantly also sees a way to “buy” the Hispanic vote. If the Republicans resist he has a powerful campaign issue.
I warned at the time that if not challenged by Congress his alterations would become existing law by practice without the consent of the peoples’ representatives, voiding the role of Congress, and that he, upon finding a weak Congress, would repeat the practice of making law by decree. He has, and some have used the word dictatorial to describe the practice. Moreover, his alteration of existing law sent the message to Central America that new children would have a similar free pass to citizenship once in the United States; this encouraged the massive child illegal immigration that we now have. He alone is responsible for this national crisis.
To protect the separation of powers and end this crisis Congress must publically renounce his directive of June 16, 2012, and move to impeachment if he processes any other executive orders that conflict with existing law. They must immediately pass a law that the children be returned to their country of origin and direct the President to do so within 30 days. This would show his message of an open border for children to be false.
Democrats too should reign in their president. If they do not they, in effect, give permission to the next Republican president to defy Congress on something Democrats had previously established as law, like national healthcare for instance, and by a simple directive he too could not enforce that law. Democrats must see that their failure to insist on a retraction of the directive forever weakens the sole power of Congress to make all law and places us on the road of government by decree or edict of one man. We must choose the Constitution over party. How does a president’s defiance of Congress differ from what a king or dictator does? It doesn’t. The Constitution is there to protect all parties and all citizens from arbitrary and caprices rule. Please let it work.
