musing minds

Indefensible: 10 Ways The ACLU Is Destroying America
by Jay @ 11:56 pm. Filed under ACLU, 1st Amendment, War On Terror, News

I just finished reading Indefensible: 10 Ways The ACLU Is Destroying America by Sam Kastensmidt. I highly recommend it for everyone.

The book covers most of our own top ten reasons to stop the ACLU, however much more extensively. It covers everything the ACLU stands for. From the agenda of silencing the churches and abortion to the sexualization of children…the book covers it in excellent detail.

There have been many great books written on the ACLU. Most focus on the social and religious issues that are under attack. Alan Sears’ book, ACLU Vs. America, focused on mainly on these issues, however it did touch upon how the ACLU attacks our sovereignty. This book, Indefensible, also focuses on the social issues, but I was happy to see that it devoted an entire chapter on how the ACLU is Impeding America’s War On Terror. I’m going to share a few excerpts from sections within that particular chapter.

ACLU Fights Measure To Halt Terrorists’ Funding

Only weeks after the tragedy (911), Congress acted to dismantle the financial infrastructure supporting known terrorist organizations. On October 3, 2001, U.S. Rep. Michael Oxley (OH) introduced the “Financial Anti-Terrorism Act of 2001,” seeking to freeze all accounts directly linked to the “financing of terrorism.”

The need for such legislation was deemed so vital to national security that it passed the U.S. House on a vote of 421-1. Almost the entire Congress recognized that this legislation’s passage was imperative. Still, on the day before the vote was scheduled, the ACLU delivered letters of opposition to all members of Congress.

“We urge you to oppose the ‘Financial Anti-Terrorism Act of 2001,’” the letter began. Why? One portion of the bill made it a federal crime to conceal large amounts of “illegally obtained” cash (over $10,000) while traveling. In a desperate and shameful attempt to justify its stance, the ACLU played the race card. The letter argued, “This provision may impact, disproportionately, people of color and immigrants….[because] these groups of people often have a more difficult time getting access to sources of credit and bank accounts and so use cash transactions more frequently than others do.”

Under the ACLU’s reasoning, impoverished people would be discriminated against by this bill. The likelihood of impoverished minorities carrying around more than $10,000 in cash and concealing it was supposedly a grave concern for the ACLU. Thankfully the ACLU’s efforts to stop this were unsuccessful.

A little more from the book:

Later in the war, the ACLU actually volunteered its legal services to represent suspected terrorists!

In 2001, the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments from several alleged “illegal combatants,” including two cases involving U.S. citizens and one case involving 14 foreign “illegal enemy combatants.” The ACLU filed amicus briefs on behalf of the suspected terrorists in each case, arguing that ll “enemy combatants” captured during a time of war should have access to American courtrooms-regardless of their citizenship.

The Pentagon contended that “enemy combatants” should face military tribunals-the standard procedure in all previous international wars. U.S. Solicitor General Theodore Olson, whose wife, Barbara Olson, was killed on September 11, when Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon, reminded the Supreme Court Justices that the plaintiffs were requesting a “jurisdiction that is not authorized by Congress, does not arise from the Constitution, and has never been exercised by this Court.”

Though the U.S. Constitution does not extend rights to non-citizen enemy combatants, judicial restraint did not prevent the moder Court from creating this new right out of thin air.

Thankfully this decision was made moot by the passing of the Military Commission Act. However, the ACLU’s war on National Security continues, and giving habeas corpus to non-American citizens is on their New Year Resolution list. It is actually number one on the list, followed by destroying the NSA terrorist surveillance program, and destroying our ability to keep secrets.

Overall the book was well put together and very informative. I highly suggest checking it out.

This was a production of Stop The ACLU Blogburst. If you would like to join us, please email Jay at Jay@stoptheaclu.com or Gribbit at GribbitR@gmail.com. You will be added to our mailing list and blogroll. Over 200 blogs already on-board.

Kate received an email that said quite a few people were born in March, 1948 just 9 months after the sighting of a “weather balloon” over Roswell, New Mexico.

The list included Bill and Hillary Clinton, Nancy Pelosi, Barbara Boxer, Howard “AAARRGGGHHH!” Dean, Chuck Schumer, John Kerry, Dianne Feinstein, and Al Gore.

Remembering that Bill just celebrated his 60th birthday in August, it didn’t add up so I did a little research on the list.

Two on the list were born in March. Nancy Pelosi and Al Gore.

Two on the list were born in 1948. Howard “AAARRGGGHHH!” Dean and Al Gore.

Only one was born in March, 1948.

Al Gore.

Must be why he is so insistent on Global Warming as a Global Catastrophe! We’re all going to die. Last week. If we don’t do something NOW!

He’s really an alien Love Child…

Did petty crime stop for the hour of the Ed Sullivan show on February 9, 1964?

Laura Lee from The Wide Awake Cafe tagged me with this meme. Almost everyone I would have tagged with it has been tagged already. The Anchoress did hers here. I think Sissy Willis was tagged twice. I don’t think Lady Jane‘s been tagged yet so I’ll tag her.

1. Laura Lee spoke of her high school drama experience so I’ll speak of mine. I had the same drama teacher as Gary Sinise (he graduated three years before I got there – now you can figure out how old I am…~). Mrs. Barbara Patterson was a terrific drama teacher. She was short, blonde, and stood in first postion (ballet) most of the time. She wore black a lot.

2. For a friend’s directing class (Mrs. Patterson taught that too) I did Linda Loman’s speech to Willy’s grave from Death of a Salesman.

3. I was one of 100 students chosen to apply and one of 12 students chosen to participate for a new program in high school called Experience Based Education. As a result, my senior year first semester classes were dance, drawing and family living 2nd semester classes were dance, drawing and painting. My afternoons were spent interning at different businesses in the area. I worked at a graphic design firm, a company that made videos and slideshows, a local radio station, a pre-school, and a public school with a deaf education program. My senior year of high school was great.

4. I love to cook. I make stuff up all the time. When I joined the Army, my test scores revealed that I could do anything but Combat Arms (not a man) and cook. I believe it is because my test scores revealed that I wouldn’t follow the recipes to the letter. I mostly use recipes as a guideline.

5. I will be going for an MBA once I receive my bachelor’s in business, eBusiness in the spring.

Zombie was there and has more pictures.

I guess that the many stencils spray painted all over San Francisco last summer just weren’t enough.

h/t: Hot Air

Betsy has a quite a bit to say about Nancy Pelosi’s rise to Speaker of the House and I agree with what she has said. Betsy quotes from a Washington Times article about Nancy’s Wednesday evening festivities:

She expanded on that with her actual acceptance speech.

I must say that I really don’t think that “we” have been waiting 200 years for a female Speaker. The 19^th Amendment to the Constitution was adopted in 1920 even though some states had already given women the right to vote. That’s less than 100 years ago if you do the math. Point of fact, the first woman elected to the House of Representatives (Jeannette Rankin, R-MT) served from 1917 to 1919 – before the Constitution was amended. She was elected in 1916 – 90 years ago.

Since then, more women have decided to run for office and more have been elected to serve in both the House and the Senate. A woman being elected to any leadership post in the House or Senate was just a matter of time. Nancy accomplished this when she was elected minority leader. She is now Speaker mainly because her party gained a slim majority for the 110^th Congress.

“For our daughters and granddaughters, the sky is the limit, anything is possible for them.” Only just now? Only the sky? Women have been elected Head of State in other countries (as Betsy reminds us of Margaret Thatcher). Women have headed up major corporations. Women have gone into space (a bit further than the sky…)

Listening yesterday to speech I was hoping for the theme music to queue up like at the Academy Awards® telling the winner to stop thanking people…

Betsy says

She’s sooo excited about being Speaker of the House and yet I don’t hear her, or her supporters, talking about the women around the world who aren’t free. Those who can’t even leave the house without a male escort. Those that still don’t have the right to vote. Women who can be beaten and killed for wearing the wrong clothing items.

Oh yeah, it’s their “culture”. We have to respect their “culture”.

Rusty has video of 4 American hostages being held by a Shi’ite outfit calling itself the “Mujahideen of Jerusalem Company”.

This outfit is calling for the release of prisoners in American and British jails.

Please keep John Young of Kansas City, Missouri, John Cote of Buffalo, New York, Paul Johnson Reuben of Buffalo, Minnesota, Josh Munz of Redding, California, and Bert Nussbaumer from Austria in your prayers.

Wishing everyone a happy, healthy, and prosperous new year.

Slobodan Milosevic was representing himself at his international tribunal. He had a fool for a client but there may have been just a hint of method to his madness. He did expire before the trial did. He wasn’t convicted and he wasn’t executed.

Saddam Hussein, on the other hand, had plenty of representation, was convicted, and sentenced to death by hanging. The sentence was appealed and the appeal was denied. His day of reckoning has arrived.

Two genocidal dictators. One didn’t outlast his trial. The other didn’t outlast the second trial. Neither one is walking this earth anymore.

May God have mercy on their souls.

With faith in Jesus Christ we receive the body of our brother Gerald for burial. Let us pray with confidence to God, the giver of life, that He will raise him to perfection in the company of the saints. Deliver your servant Gerald O sovereign Lord Christ from all evil. Set him free from every bond that he may rest with all your saints in the eternal habitations where with the Father and the Holy Spirit you live and reign, one God, forever and ever. Amen.

Let us also pray for all who mourn, that they may cast their care on God and know the consolation of His love. Almighty God, look with pity upon the sorrows of your servants for whom we pray. Remember them, Lord, with mercy, nourish them with patience, comfort them with a sense of Your goodness, lift up Your countenance upon them and give them peace through Jesus Christ, our Lord. Amen.