- The County Republican parties do exactly what you speak to - they provide rides, they use pone banks, they have neighborhood walkers - candidate coffees - but if like 2012 4 or 5 million just stay home we are toast . . look at the attitudes of many Libertarians, Paulistas, moderates and the religious right.It will take a change in thinking about single issue voters - just look at the Tea Party - divided all over the place they will stay home if a RINO is presented . .
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- HEY . . . do you need anymore reasons to repeal the 14th amendment and force the courts back under the limits of Article III of the Constitution.
http://www.utsandiego.com/news/2013/dec/12/mount-solidad-cross-cons...
Judge: Mt. Soledad cross must come downFederal judge ordered the cross removed within 90 days but then stayed that order for appeals.
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- See; http://recoveringfromchange.ning.com/forum/topics/for-those-who-fea... I believe we should have done this decades ago.
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The AP-Times Square New Year’s Eve Poll conducted by GfK surveyed 1,367 American adults this month to determine public attitudes about political issues, government, and the year as a whole.Despite the fact that President Obama called income inequality "the defining challenge of our time," less than 1 percent considered that issue the most important news story of 2013. Far more were concerned about the President's signature legislation, according to the poll:For comparison, the next-highest ranked issues were "The death of Nelson Mandela" and "The federal government’s budget troubles: sequestration, the fiscal cliff and the government shutdown" - tied at 8 percent each.The Benghazi attack and its investigation, on which Senator Lindsey Graham has lead the charge, was considered the most important news story of 2013 by only 2 percent of respondents.Despite the fact that most Americans believed Obamacare was the top issue overall, they felt the federal budget was more important to them personally. The topics, as well as the percentage of those who answered they were "Extremely/very important" to them personally, were:Political party membership has largely remained the same, currently standing at 29 percent Democrat, 28 percent Independent, and 23 percent Republican. However, attitudes about the Tea Party changed significantly. Between 2011 and 2013, respondents' opinions of the Tea Party became increasingly negative:A move from "conservative" to "moderate" in self-description is likely related. In 2012, 40 percent described themselves as "conservative," while only 32 percent preferred the word "moderate." Now, those numbers have reversed: only 35 percent described themselves as "conservative," while 42 percent preferred the word "moderate."Overall, Americans were optimistic. Although most believed 2013 was no better or worse than 2012, a plurality (49 percent) believed 2014 will be better than 2013.
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- "...the opinion which gives to the judges the right to decide what laws are constitutional and what not, not only for themselves in their own sphere of action but for the Legislature and Executive also in their spheres, would make the Judiciary a despotic branch."
-- Thomas Jefferson
- "...the opinion which gives to the judges the right to decide what laws are constitutional and what not, not only for themselves in their own sphere of action but for the Legislature and Executive also in their spheres, would make the Judiciary a despotic branch."
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OPINION
Schiff and MacDonald: The Endangered Species Act Turns 40—Hold the Applause
The badly administered law has had a limited effect on wildlife while inflicting great social and economic costs.
Dec. 27, 2013 6:21 p.m. ETForty years ago, on Dec. 28, 1973, the Endangered Species Act became law. If you want to celebrate, you'll need to close your eyes to hard truths.A law intended to conserve species and habitat has brought about the recovery of only a fraction—less than 2%—of the approximately 2,100 species listed as endangered or threatened since 1973. Meanwhile, the law has endangered the economic health of many communities—while creating a cottage industry of litigation that does more to enrich environmental activist groups than benefit the environment.How did things get so turned around? Blame the bureaucrats of the Endangered Species Act. They have administered the law poorly and flouted provisions designed to promote good science and good sense.A destructive milestone came in the late 1970s, when officials erased the practical distinction between different levels of endangered-species listings. Originally, it was only when an animal or plant was labeled "endangered"—on the verge of disappearing—that landowners were hit with heavy regulations, such as prohibitions on activities that could even indirectly "harm" or "harass" the species. But the Carter administration extended these restrictions to species that are "threatened"—in trouble but not facing extinction.The chilling effect on property owners and economic activity has been profound. Discovering a listed species on your property is no longer cause for pride in the land's environmental richness and your chance to exercise responsible stewardship. It's a liability that is to be avoided at all costs.The Utah prairie dog Associated PressAsk the people of Cedar City, in southwest Utah, where Endangered Species Act regulations have given the Utah prairie dog the run of the town since it was listed in 1973. The rabbit-size rodent is now listed as "threatened," even though there are 40,000 in the region. In most cases, residents can't take measures to control the burgeoning prairie-dog population; they can't even try to relocate the animals to federal property.The infestation means pockmarked yards for homeowners. Farmers' crops get dug up. Prairie-dog mounds and tunnels on airport property create hazards on runways and taxiways. At one airport in the Cedar City region, hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent to prevent damage from the prairie dogs. Shooting them in the interest of protecting human lives is out of the question.Small business owners in Cedar City like Bruce Hughes see their plans dashed. Eighteen years ago, he bought a 3.4-acre parcel to develop. "Then the prairie dogs moved in," he notes, making it impossible for him to use the property productively. "If I killed even one, it would be a $10,000 fine and five years in federal prison. I could rob a convenience market and get off easier."One reason the Endangered Species Act has spun out of control is that the federal agencies that decide whether to list a species—the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service—no longer base decisions on what the law calls for: data. Instead, they invent squishy standards like "best professional judgment."In eastern Colorado and southeastern Wyoming, the controversy over a rodent called the Preble's meadow jumping mouse shows how a regulatory mountain can rise from an evidentiary molehill. Federal officials listed the mouse as "threatened" in 1998, claiming that it was biologically separate from similar mice elsewhere. But they relied on a 1954 study that examined the skulls of just three Preble's mice.This was "an extremely weak inference by today's standards," Rob Roy Ramey, then-curator at the Denver Museum of Nature and Science, said in 2004. His team's DNA research over the next three years concluded that the mouse wasn't a "distinct subspecies"—and, after seeing the new findings, the 1954 study's author agreed. But the feds won't budge, even after University of New Mexico scholars echoed Dr. Ramey's findings in the September 2013 journal Molecular Biology.The cost of the Preble's "threatened" listing for landowners and local jurisdictions is $17 million yearly, according to estimates from the Fish and Wildlife Service. Developers have to set aside a portion of their property for Preble's habitat. Ranchers must limit weeding in irrigation canals. Infrastructure projects, from reservoirs to road-widenings, have been slowed or had their costs driven up. "It has been a wonderful tool for environmentalists to try to stop things," said Kent Holsinger, a Denver attorney who represents landowners and water providers.Some of the most damaging Endangered Species regulations stem from federal "biological opinions" issued by U.S. Fish and Wildlife or NOAA staff. In recent years, for instance, irrigation has been dramatically reduced in the San Joaquin Valley, California's agricultural heartland, because a "biop" claimed that irrigation harmed a tiny fish, the delta smelt.To protect the smelt, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service ordered severe restriction on water deliveries by government water projects. In 2009, at the height of the resulting man-made drought, hundreds of thousands of acres went fallow, and unemployment in some communities touched 40%. Eventually, federal judge Oliver Wagner found that the government had acted in bad faith in developing an "arbitrary" and "capricious" plan. Even so, farmers still receive only a fraction of their water allocation, with no consequence for the federal agency.How to get the Endangered Species Act back on track? A couple of straightforward reforms would have a big impact, and they could be implemented by the administration through regulatory change, without the need for legislation. First, reinstate the difference between regulations for threatened and endangered species, so that discovery of the former is welcome news of an opportunity to engage in creative environmental protection but not a threat to a landowner's livelihood.Second, require that each biological opinion and listing determination comes with a data chart that scientifically documents the threats and the consequences for the species of not being listed. Unbelievably, most of the data that were supposed to have informed past decisions are unavailable. In some cases, the information was never even gathered before a ruling was issued. In other cases it unaccountably vanished, e.g., the computer files alleged to hold it were said to be corrupted.Shoddy listing determinations naturally result in wasted conservation resources and the issuing of misguided biological opinions that ultimately destroy jobs and undermine communities. After four decades of this, Washington would do well to update the Endangered Species Act before the public clamors for its extinction.Mr. Schiff is a principal attorney with Pacific Legal Foundation. Ms. MacDonald is a former deputy assistant secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks at the U.S. Interior Department
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NUMBER OF STATE LEGISLATORS AND LENGTH OF TERMS (IN YEARS)
A-L | M-S | T-W (as of March 2013)
* Note: In order for all terms to be completed within the 10-year apportionment cycle, a combination of two 4-year terms and one 2-year term may be used.
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- A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear. The traitor is the plague.Marcus Tillius Cicero
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- Great piece on Law of Doctrine . .
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- "The most sensible and jealous people are so little attentive to government that there are no instances of resistance until repeated, multiplied oppressions have placed it beyond a doubt that their rulers have formed settled plans to deprive them of their liberties; not to oppress an individual or a few, but to break down the fences of a free constitution, and deprive the people at large of all share in the government, and all the checks by which it is limited."--John Adams
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- "For having lived long, I have experienced many instances of being obliged, by better information or fuller consideration, to change opinions, even on important subjects, which I once thought right but found to be otherwise."
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- " We can't depend on Congress to discipline itself, we must rely on the states to force Congress to act on our amendment. Fortunately, our Nation's Founders gave us the means (Article V Convention of States) to amend the Constitution through the action of state legislatures.That is the only strategy that will work. Unless we act and act quickly, the people in the White House and those running Congress will bankrupt America. The good, honest productive people of America are frightened -- and angry. They must get behind you in this effort. Our opportunity has never been greater. As I have said before: If not now, when? If not us, who?" Sincerely, Ronald Reagan end quote"
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