The Old Dog Barks

Senator John Kerry is once more being attacked by members of the “Radical Right” for nautical maneuvers performed while in his nations service. Won’t they ever learn? Just get over it!!!

After all with a net worth estimated at a quarter of a billion dollars he is only the 5th richest member of congress, not poor mind you and he is not looking for your pity, but small potatoes in the larger scheme of things. And it was not a scheme to dock his newly purchased yacht in Rhode Island rather than Massachusetts in order to save $500,000 in taxes, merely an easily correctable oversight. Senator Kerry spends so much of his time looking after the public’s affairs he has little left to handle his own.

This “Swift Boat” thing didn’t work last time and is worse than pathetic now. Why just Tuesday The Massachusetts Department of Revenue said it had not launched an investigation into the matter. If they are so unconcerned and so willing to give Kerry a pass on this shouldn’t the nutters on the “Right”? But then that’s why we call them Nutters.

Why it seems logical to me that no matter what Senator Kerry may or may not of intended, the state of Massachusetts, as shown in the recent U.S. vs Arizona case, has no rights whatsoever to enact taxing policies on the High Seas whether they duplicate or are at variance with established Federal law.

Doesn’t the Constitution give authority for law at sea to the Federal Government? Aren’t you “Right Wing Nutters” supposed to be in favor of the Constitution? Give it a break and crawl back into your holes. You lose again!

Day 555:

The Wall Street Journal reveals “Sen. Jon Kyl (R., Ariz.) has said the president told him in a closed-door meeting that he would not move to secure the border with Mexico unless and until Congress reached a breakthrough on comprehensive immigration reform. That’s another indication Mr. Obama is willing to continue to play politics with hot-button issues.

Add in the lawsuit against the Arizona immigration law and it’s clear the Obama administration is willing to run the risk of dividing the American people along racial and ethnic lines to mobilize its supporters—particularly Hispanic voters, whose backing it needs in the fall midterm elections and beyond.

As the Washington Post reported last week, two top White House strategists, speaking on condition of anonymity, have indicated that “the White House plans to use the immigration debate to punish the GOP and aggressively seek the Latino vote in 2012.”

To the post below: NRO’s Mark Kirkorian reports:

Nice Town You Got There, Shame If Anything Happened to It

The other local immigration law that was set to go into effect tomorrow is in the town of Fremont, Nebraska. The ordinance was approved by voters last month and would have prohibited the hiring of, or renting to, illegal aliens.

But the town council there voted last night to suspend the measure because of the prohibitive costs of fighting the ACLU and MALDEF in court:

Fremont appears to be leaning away from a court fight for cost reasons – officials have estimated that implementing the ordinance, including legal fees, would average $1 million per year.

Legal experts say that sets a bad precedent.

“City Councils should not suspend ordinances just because they might be expensive,” says Jessica Levinson, adjunct professor of law at Loyola Law School. “The voters have spoken, and passed this ordinance. Regardless of the merits (or constitutionality) of this particular ordinance, it would set a bad trend if elected bodies start to fail to implement newly passed initiatives,” she says.

Robert Stern, preside of the Center for Governmental studies, agrees. “I have problems with this action by the council since the ordinance was adopted as an initiative measure by the voters,” he says. “The council should have opposed the measure when it was on the ballot,” he says.

So the Liberals or the Lawyers, or both win. Another Win, Win, situation with the rest of us losing. I think the town council is doing a spelunking act by caving too easily. But then again that may have been a part of the plan.

No— Make that America Loses. AZCentral reports:

Key parts of Senate Bill 1070 that will not go into effect Thursday:

• The portion of the law that requires an officer make a reasonable attempt to determine the immigration status of a person stopped, detained or arrested if there’s reasonable suspicion they’re in the country illegally.

• The portion that creates a crime of failure to apply for or carry “alien-registration papers.”

• The portion that makes it a crime for illegal immigrants to solicit, apply for or perform work. (This does not include the section on day laborers.)

• The portion that allows for a warrantless arrest of a person where there is probable cause to believe they have committed a public offense that makes them removable from the United States.

The ruling says that law enforcement still must enforce federal immigration laws to the fullest extent of the law when SB 1070 goes into effect at 12:01 a.m. Thursday. Individuals will still be able to sue an agency if they adopt a policy that restricts such enforcement.

The full PDF ruling goes on to say:

Applying the proper legal standards based upon well-established precedent, the Court finds that the United States is likely to succeed on the merits in showing that the following Sections of S.B. 1070 are preempted by federal law:

Portion of Section 2 of S.B. 1070
A.R.S. § 11-1051(B): requiring that an officer make a reasonable attempt to determine the immigration status of a person stopped, detained or arrested if there is a reasonable suspicion that the person is unlawfully present in the United States, and requiring verification of the immigration status of any person arrested prior to releasing that person.

Section 3 of S.B. 1070
A.R.S. § 13-1509: creating a crime for the failure to apply for or carry alien registration papers.

Portion of Section 5 of S.B. 1070
A.R.S. § 13-2928(C): creating a crime for an unauthorized alien to solicit, apply for, or perform work.

Section 6 of S.B. 1070
A.R.S. § 13-3883(A)(5): authorizing the warrantless arrest of a person where there is probable cause to believe the person has committed a
public offense that makes the person removable from the United States. The Court also finds that the United States is likely to suffer irreparable harm if the Court does not preliminarily enjoin enforcement of these Sections of S.B. 1070 and that the balance of equities tips in the United States’ favor considering the public interest.

And later on:

If enforcement of the portions of S.B. 1070 for which the Court finds a likelihood of preemption is not enjoined, the United States is likely to suffer irreparable harm. This is so because the federal government’s ability to enforce its policies and achieve its objectives will be undermined by the state’s enforcement of statutes that interfere with federal law, even if the Court were to conclude that the state statutes have substantially the same goals as federal law.

The court may find the United States is likely to suffer irreparable harm. I find in more likely that the court may find whatever it wishes to find, and does. We call this rule of Law.