Disrespecting the Constitution

Author: R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D

I think we would all agree that the Constitution has served as the basis of the success we have had in making America the longest lasting and most successful representative republic in history. The Founding Fathers got it right. Unfortunately, many members of the Marxist-leaning Democrat Party are doing their best to undermine the Constitution; led, of course, by the Biden regime. The Constitution, like any other guiding document, can only set forth examples of essential principles that must be followed. It cannot specify every possible way in which those basic principles can be violated. For a constitutional republic to survive, citizens must believe and agree to follow the basic principles. Here are some ways in which the leaders of the Democrat party are showing their contempt for the Constitution and its basic principles.

Let’s start with free speech. It is clear that the Founding Fathers considered the ability to express one’s thoughts without government control to be the essence of a free society. The efforts of the Biden regime to block free speech on social media platforms by influencing what they define as “misinformation,” violates the very principle of free speech. The CCTA radio show experienced this recently when the safety of vaccinations was discussed and the show was canceled on You Tube. Labelling free speech as “hate” speech and or “misinformation” is another attack on the principle of free speech.

Another example is the Biden regime’s continuing attacks on the right of citizens to bear arms as guaranteed in the second amendment. Defining semi- automatic rifles as “assault weapons,” as well as limiting the capacity of gun magazines and buying ammunition, are examples of their lack of belief and support for the principle behind the second amendment.

The Founding Fathers were extremely concerned about the power of big government to restrict the freedom of citizens, which is the reason they severely limited the role of the federal government and supported the role of the state governments. The Biden regime is showing distain for this essential principle of our Constitution. They have grown the federal government to an unprecedented 25% of our overall GDP; including 85,000 additional IRS agents to come after you the taxpayer. Recently, Biden has instructed all federal agencies to begin registering people to vote. This includes paying college students with federal funds to register fellow students, as well as nonstudents, in the local communities. This is clearly a violation of the constitutional principle that the federal government will not use its power to influence elections.

And lastly, the Biden regime is ignoring the Supreme Court decision that the President does not have the power under the Constitution to forgive students loans. This terminology is typical of the lies of the Biden regime in that this is not “forgiving loans” but actually making other people pay for these student loans. The separation of government powers into three branches is the most critical control mechanism in the Constitution. Biden is showing his complete disregard of the Supreme Court.

The irony of course is the Biden regime’s claim that Donald Trump represents a threat to our democracy; whereas, it is they who are the greatest threat to our constitutional republic since its founding. Add this to the list of things to consider when deciding who to vote for in November.

When Good People Are Attacked

On April 1, The Blaze posted an article about John Eastman.

The article reports:

John Eastman is a patriot, a constitutional scholar, a lawyer, a husband, and a father. He is our friend, colleague, and fellow board member of the Claremont Institute, and he has spent his life defending the principles upon which this great nation was founded. After a 10-week travesty of a trial, a California Bar Court judge, seeking to criminalize disagreements in constitutional interpretation, recommended that John should lose his license to practice law in California.

The term “lawfare” has become part of the American vernacular in the past few years. It means the manipulation and corruption of the legal system to gain political advantage and attack and destroy one’s political opponents. The most famous example of lawfare is, of course, the shocking abuse of the U.S. Department of Justice, the attorney general’s office in the state of New York, and the district attorney’s office in Fulton County, Georgia, in an attempt to destroy the current Republican candidate for the presidency, Donald J. Trump. But the assault on Trump is just the most widely publicized example of this evil practice, which is destroying the rule of law in America.

A previous article on that site about John Eastman included a statement from his children:

Eastman has prepared his whole life to fight years of coordinated attacks and lawfare. His encyclopedic knowledge and understanding of the law are informed by years of study of political philosophy, which culminated in a Ph.D. in government at the once-famous Claremont Graduate School under giants such as Harry V. Jaffa. His law degree is from the University of Chicago, one of the top law schools in the country. He clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. He served as professor of constitutional law and dean of Chapman Law School for decades. He is the founder of the Center for Constitutional Jurisprudence at the Claremont Institute.

Our dad is well equipped for this battle, and while some individuals have lent their support to his efforts, too many have remained on the sidelines.

With the soul of our justice system at stake, it’s time for others to join the fight.

What has happened to the rule of law under the Biden administration is a serious threat to our Republic (we are not a democracy–we are a representative republic). Lawyers who were planning to represent President Trump have been threatened. People who were part of the Trump administration have been spied on illegally, and some have been put in jail. How long will it be before the rest of us who support equal justice under the law will be silenced?

 

The Stealing Begins

There are a lot of ways to steal an election–you can do it electronically, you can do it with mail-in ballots, you can do it with basic voter fraud, or you can be subtle and do it by going in to places that you know will vote the way you want them to and paying people to register those voters and get them to the polls. Right now, that is the preferred method.

On Saturday, The Federalist reported:

With a little over seven months until Election Day, “Bidenbucks” are ramping up where Team Biden’s sweeping taxpayer-funded get-out-the-vote order is most needed. Meanwhile, a federal judge has stopped a Bidenbucks complaint described as “the MOST important election integrity lawsuit in the country.”

The Michigan Department of State recently announced a signed Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the U.S. Small Business Administration “to promote civic engagement and voter registration in Michigan.” The agreement, according to Michigan Secretary of State Jocelyn Benson and SBA Administrator Isabel Casillas Guzman is a “first-of-its-kind collaboration” for the federal agency. It is expected to run through Jan. 1, 2036. That is, if legal challenges can’t stop the apparently unconstitutional “understanding.” 

“Small businesses are the lifeblood of our economy. Like voting, they play a direct role in improving people’s lives,” the swing state’s leftist secretary of state, who fancies herself as a defender of democracy, said in a press release. “I’m proud we are working with the Small Business Administration for this first-in-the-nation effort connecting Michigan’s small business community with the tools and information they need to play an even greater active role in our democracy.” 

First of all, we are a representative republic–not a democracy.

The article concludes:

“…Plaintiffs have alleged only an institutional injury resulting from ‘a general loss of legislative power,’” the judge wrote in her decision. “A vague, generalized allegation that elections, generally, will be undermined, is not the type of case or controversy that this court may rule on under Article III.” 

But there’s nothing vague or generalized about the effects of Biden’s voter registration executive order that serves as a federal government-funded GOTV campaign for Democrats. 

As the lawsuit notes, the executive fiat requires all federal agencies to “identify and partner with specified partisan third party organizations,” “distribute voter registration and vote-by-mail ballot application forms,” “assist applicants in completing voter registration and vote-by-mail ballot application forms,” and “solicit third-party organizations.” It also “directs state officials to provide voter registration services on agency premises.” 

All of it is being done without congressional approval or appropriation. Meanwhile, the Biden administration refuses to release records on the initiative, raising the question: What does Team Biden have to hide? 

There will be more of this activity as November approaches.

 

Destroying Democracy To “Save It”

First of all, America is not a democracy–it it a Representative Republic, and the people in Congress are supposed to be there to represent the voters and serve the people. Unfortunately, many in Congress have decided that their power and their will are more important than the will and the people. They know best, and if the people are going to vote ‘wrong’, they have to be overridden. On Saturday, The Gateway Pundit revealed the plan the uni-party has to keep President Trump from being President again.

The article reports:

RINO Representative Mike Gallagher (WI) will exit the House as early as next month.

Gallagher, who is currently serving as the chairman of the Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party, last month announced that he will not seek reelection.

Instead of serving out the rest of his term, Gallagher will retire early leaving the GOP with a one-vote majority!

But it’s worse than that.

Gallagher announced he will leave in mid-April. If Gallagher would have left before April 9th he would have triggered a special election in his district. Because he is leaving after April 9th but still in April, there will be no special election so the seat will remain empty.

This ensures that Republicans will lose another seat in Congress.

This is how the Uniparty works.

They do everything they can to screw their voters.

So what happens next? The plan is for one or two uni-party Republicans to leave before November. At that point the Democrats take control of the House. All investigations of the Biden crime family end. Evidence might mysteriously go missing. President Trump is charged with violating the 14th Amendment and prevented from taking office. At that point we  have lost our Republic.

I hope that the above scenario is pure fiction. However, based on what we have seen during the past three years–SWAT raids on people who simply walked through the Capitol on January 6th, prisoners denied bail or hearings for four years (with no one defending their Constitutional rights), and the totally politicization of our justice system–I am not ruling anything out.

Unfortunately, The Government Spying On Americans Isn’t New

On Wednesday, Just the News posted an article about our government spying on Americans. According to a whistleblower, this is not anything new.

The article reports:

The public-private efforts to restrict and suppress purported “mis-, dis- and malinformation” across tech platforms started almost immediately after the surprise election of Donald Trump in 2016, ramped up a year before the COVID-19 pandemic, and included U.S. and U.K. military contractors and plans to cut off financial services to dissenters and sue them.

That’s according to a “highly credible whistleblower” who says they were recruited to participate in the Cyber Threat Intelligence League (CTIL) “through monthly cybersecurity meetings hosted by” the Department of Homeland Security, independent journalists who reviewed the Twitter Files at new owner Elon Musk’s invitation said Tuesday.

We are at a point that if an American says that two plus two equals four and the government wants it to equal five, the American is charged with spreading misinformation or disinformation. That is not a good place to be–particularly for a representative republic.

The article concludes:

Breuer (U.S. military contractor Pablo Breuer) told a podcast the duo’s work involved getting “nontraditional partners into one room,” such as social media companies, “special forces operators” and DHS employees, “to talk in a non-attribution, open environment in an unclassified way.”

He explained how the “in-group and out-group messaging have to be often different” when trying to sell Americans on a domestic version of the “Great Firewall of China.”

While Chinese citizens believe this censorship is to “protect the citizenry,” Americans “would absolutely lose our minds” if the feds “tried to sell that narrative,” Breuer reportedly said.

The reporting trio said they would present the underlying documents from the whistleblower to congressional investigators in the coming weeks and “make public all of the documents we can while also protecting the identity of the whistleblower and other individuals who are not senior leaders or public figures.”

The FBI declined to comment on the report to Just the News, and DHS and CISA did not respond to queries. Neither did Terp (U.K. defense researcher Sara-Jayne Terp) and Breuer.

The Washington swamp is a danger to all free Americans.

Those Who Ignore History Are Destined To Say Dumb Things

The Electoral College has come under fire in recent years. Those objecting to the Electoral College seem to have no idea why it was included in the founding of America. Small states were fearful of being shut out of the process of electing a President and wanted a way to insure that they would have a voice. Without the electoral college, no one would campaign in North Dakota, Idaho, Montana, Kansas, and many other states where the populations are not as dense as some of the coastal states. Without the Electoral College, America would be governed by New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, Houston, and Philadelphia. Is that really what you want? Evidently Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez thinks that would be a good idea.

The Washington Times posted an article today about Representative Ocasio-Cortez’s recent remarks about the Electoral College.

The article reports:

The Democratic congresswoman posted an Instagram story Monday that started with her driving along a deserted highway and joking about how many votes there are in rural America.

“We’re coming to you live from the Electoral College,” Ms. Ocasio-Cortez said, National Review reported. “Many votes here, as you can see. Very efficient way to choose leadership of the country. I mean I can’t think of any other way, can you?”

Ms. Ocasio-Cortez cited a March New York magazine article that said black, Hispanic and Asian-American voters are underrepresented by the Electoral College compared with white Americans.

“Due to severe racial disparities in certain states,” the congresswoman said in her video, “the Electoral College effectively weighs white voters over voters of color, as opposed to a ‘one person, one vote’ system where all our votes are counted equally.”

What Representative Ocasio-Cortez wants is a democracy. We are a representative republic. She needs to go back to school and study American history.

So Remind Me Why I Voted

We live in a representative republic. We elect people to represent us. Occasionally we actually vote on issues via referendums, ballot initiatives, etc. Those votes directly reflect the will of the voters.

In 2018, the General Assembly passed a law putting an item on the ballot that required voters to show identification in order to vote. Governor Cooper vetoed the legislation; the Senate overrode the veto. The measure was also challenged in court, but that challenge seems to have gone nowhere.

The voters of North Carolina approved voter id by more than 50 percent. The Governor has called the law racist and unnecessary. If everyone is required to show identification, how is that racist? The law is necessary because we have a number of voters on our voter rolls that are over 110 years of age. I doubt that all of those people are still alive. There are also situations where fifty or more people are listed as having the same address–an address that does not have an inhabitable building. There have also been situations where people who voted were asked to serve on a jury and told the court they couldn’t because they were not American citizens. Wow.

Yes, voter id is necessary. Yes, the voters of North Carolina voted for it. Yes, Governor Cooper, you should be representing the will of the voters.

Putting The Rights Of Non-Citizens Before The Rights Of Citizens

America is a representative republic. We elect people to represent us. The number of Americans in a given state determines the number of representatives from that state and also impacts the electoral college. Therefore if the population of a state is overstated, it will have more representatives than it is entitled to. If California’s population of American citizens decreases, but its population of non-citizens increases, according to the Constitution, it should lose representatives. If the non-citizens are counted, it might gain representatives, thus acquiring representation that should rightly go to states that increased their number of citizens. That is the reason the citizen question on the census matters. Unfortunately, some of the justices of the Supreme Court do not understand that concept.

The Supreme Court ruled today that the citizenship question should not be included in the census.

The Gateway Pundit reported today:

“Seems totally ridiculous that our government, and indeed Country, cannot ask a basic question of Citizenship in a very expensive, detailed and important Census, in this case for 2020,” Trump said.

“I have asked the lawyers if they can delay the Census, no matter how long, until the United States Supreme Court is given additional information from which it can make a final and decisive decision on this very critical matter. Can anyone really believe that as a great Country, we are not able the ask whether or not someone is a Citizen. Only in America!” he said.

…Of course the Democrats and open borders zealots don’t want the citizenship question on the census because it gives illegal aliens representation in Congress — illegal aliens don’t even have to be given voting rights, as long as they are counted as citizens, they are given a US Representative who fights for their interests over the interests of taxpaying Americans — this is precisely why the Democrats are fighting like hell to stop the Trump admin from adding this question to the census.

The census is taken every 10 years and is used to allot seats to the US House of Representatives in addition to distributing almost $1 trillion in federal funds.

The Supreme Court’s decision is a sad one for our country. American citizens will no longer be correctly represented in Congress.

This Is Not Good News For Our Representative Republic

The Daily Caller is reporting today that New Mexico is the fourteenth state to join the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC). This is the group that says their states electoral college votes will go to the presidential candidate who gets the most popular votes. In other words, it really doesn’t matter how the residents of these states vote, this is where the electoral votes are going. In essence, that means that New York and California will determine who our next President is if this trend continues.

Just for reference, this is a picture of the 2016 election:

The article points out:

States that have passed similar legislation to join the NPVIC now represent 189 electoral votes. The compact could become official when that number hits 270, enough votes to elect the president of the United States.

That would change America from a Representative Republic to a Democracy.

I am reminded of the words of Benjamin Franklin after the Constitutional Convention of 1787:

A Mrs. Powel of Philadelphia asked Benjamin Franklin, “Well, Doctor, what have we got, a republic or a monarchy?” With no hesitation whatsoever, Franklin responded, “A republic, if you can keep it.”

Moving forward with the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact means that we will not keep it.

How To Disenfranchise The Voters In Your State

On March 8 the Associated Press posted an article about a change in the way that Delaware casts its electoral college votes.

The article reports:

The legislation, approved on a 14-7 vote, requires Delaware to cast its three electoral votes for the national popular vote winner, rather than the winner of the popular vote in Delaware. Two Republicans joined majority Democrats in voting for the bill, which now goes to the Democrat-led House.

Eleven Democratic-leaning states and the District of Columbia already have voted to enter the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. Democrat-controlled Colorado will soon join the list, giving the compact 181 of the 270 electoral college votes needed to elect the president.

So if I live in Delaware, why should I vote?

The problem here is that the lawmakers do not understand the reasoning behind the electoral college. The idea behind the electoral college was to make sure that the smaller states had a say in the election of a President. Without the electoral college, our President would be chosen by New York, California, and the large cities in America. Most of these areas are controlled by Democrats, and a casual observer will quickly realize that these are some of the most poorly managed areas of the country.

This is the county map of the 2016 Presidential Election:

The new law in Delaware essentially says to its citizens, “We don’t care who you voted for, your votes are going with the majority. If the majority consists of New York, California, and the major cities, they are going to be the people who elect the President.”

So if you live in Delaware, why should you vote for President?

If you want evidence that the Democrats are attempting to fix the next Presidential election, the article provides it:

Eleven Democratic-leaning states and the District of Columbia already have voted to enter the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact. Democrat-controlled Colorado will soon join the list, giving the compact 181 of the 270 electoral college votes needed to elect the president.

This is a map of the states that have signed on to the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact:

This could end our representative republic.

Should A Representative Republic Represent Its Citizens?

Hot Air posted an article yesterday about a recent vote in the House of Representatives.

The article reports:

In the Democrats’ rush to pass HR1, a serious snag emerged for Nancy Pelosi and the rest of her party’s leadership. Republicans were able to force a vote on adding language to the supposed voting rights bill condemning the idea of illegal aliens voting in any elections. It simply read, “allowing illegal immigrants the right to vote devalues the franchise and diminishes the voting power of United States citizens.”

Sounds fairly basic, right? It’s already against the law for illegal aliens to vote in federal elections, though a few liberal municipalities have moved to allow them to cast ballots on the local level, such as in school board elections. Surely this is one area where we can generate some bipartisan consensus, yes? Apparently not. Out of the Democrats’ significant majority in the House, they only managed to find six people who were willing to support the measure and it went down in flames.

There are a few basic facts here that seem to have been overlooked. Illegal aliens are guests of America. They may have broken into the country, but they are guests. Do you let your household guests make decisions about how you run your household? Isn’t the running of the household left up to the permanent residents in charge? The fact that this amendment to HR1 did not pass tells you what HR1 is actually about.

I have written about H.R. 1 before (here, here, and here). If you are not familiar with the bill, please take a look at it. The bill is unconstitutional–Article 1 Section 4 of the U.S. Constitution gives the states power over elections. H.R. 1 would give the federal government control of elections. Federalizing elections would also make it much easier to tamper with the results–because elections in states are not linked together, undermining them takes a much more widespread effort and is generally not worth it.

If you truly care about preserving our republic for our children, you need to vote all the Democrats who voted not to prohibit illegal aliens from voting out of office. People who are not here legally should not have a say in how our country is run. An illegal voter cancels out the vote of an American citizen. That is simply not right.

The article concludes:

I realize this theme gets beaten to death in the early days of any primary, as the numerous candidates race to shore up their support with the base, but just how far left can they go? Opposing the idea of allowing non-citizens, particularly those in the country illegally, to cast votes in American elections is not a fringe or even particularly right-wing idea. It’s baked into the fabric of the national consciousness. Even beyond the folks who will eventually wind up running for president, each of these Democratic House members is going to have to answer for this vote when they come up for reelection themselves. (And particularly in the more purple districts, you can rest assured that their Republican opponents will make sure they do.)

Tack on their votes in favor of infanticide recently and you’ve got a large chunk of the party – not just their POTUS hopefuls – who are veering so far to the left that the GOP may end up having a much better season than anyone is anticipating. What’s up next for the donkey party? Shutting down all Christian churces as “hate groups?”

H R 1

The Democrats in the House of Representatives are planning to start the new year off with a bang. Hopefully it will turn out to be more of a whimper. H.R. 1 is called the “For the People Act of 2019.” It is actually only for some people who want to make sure that the Democrats win all future elections. It was introduced into the House on January 3rd.

Breitbart posted an article about the bill today. In their article is a link to the Conservative Action Project which is opposing the bill.

The Conservative Action Project lists some problems with the bill:

H.R. 1 undermines the First Amendment. H.R. 1 undoes key Supreme Court cases that protect elections as fundamental to free speech. It would allow the Federal Election Commission to track and catalogue more of what Americans are saying, register even very small political donations, and make public those who donate to different charitable and nonprofit organizations. The legislation will subject private citizens to intimidation and harassment for their private and political beliefs, far broader than what was done in the IRS targeting scandal in 2013.

H.R. 1 yanks election authority away from the states. H.R. 1 reasserts the ability of the federal government to micromanage state elections through a process known as “preclearance.” Preclearance, which was previously overturned by the Supreme Court, requires states to get permission from the federal government for changes as small as modifying the hours of an election office, or moving a voting location from a school gym to the library. Critically, none of these practices would undo any fraud or corruption. Rather, these same practices result in incorrect registrations and inaccurate voter data, while failing to address actual corrupt practices like ballot harvesting. Moreover, they are all designed to eliminate the federalism that keeps elections transparent, local, and fair.

H.R. 1 attacks individual voter integrity. America was founded on the principle of “one person, one vote.” H.R. 1 turns this on its head by weaponizing every aspect of the political regulatory system. The Federal Election Commission, which is currently a neutral body, would be given a 3-2 makeup, guaranteeing a partisan outcome with little accountability toward the actual votes which are cast. H.R. 1 also includes a 600 percent government match for political donations, and authorizes even more public dollars to campaigns. The bill also wants to make Election Day a new paid holiday for government workers, with additional paid vacation given to bureaucrats to oversee the polls. All of these changes are designed to distance the outcome of the election from those casting their votes.

H.R. 1 would also implement the following changes:

• Forces states to implement mandatory voter registration, removing civic participation as a voluntary choice, and increasing chances for error.
• Mandates that states allow all felons to vote.
• Forces states to extend periods of early voting, which has shown to have no effect on turnout.
• Mandates same-day voter registration, which encourages voter fraud.
• Limits the ability of states to cooperate to see who is registered in multiple states at the same time.
• Prohibits election observers from cooperating with election officials to file formal challenges to suspicious voter registrations.
• Criminalizes protected political speech by making it a crime to “discourage” someone from voting
• Bars states from making their own laws about voting by mail.
• Prohibits chief election officials in each state from participating in federal election campaigns.
• Mandates free mailing of absentee ballots.
• Mandates that states adopt new redistricting commissions.

H.R. 1 would cause sweeping and irrevocable damage to the free speech, privacy, and integrity that are central components to free and fair elections in America. We oppose H.R.

Our new House of Representatives has obviously decided to throw out our Constitution wherever possible. This bill is representative of that. It opens the door to massive voter fraud and nationalizes state elections, which is unconstitutional. Nationalizing all elections also greatly increases the vulnerability to hacking. The bill needs to fail miserably or we will be in serious danger of losing our representative republic.

Why We Need Informed, Educated Voters

David Limbaugh posted an article today at Townhall.com about President Obama’s continuing claim that the Republicans want to impeach him. Speaker of the House John Boehner has clearly stated that he is not interested in impeaching President Obama, so what is this about? A large part of it is about fund raising for the Democrat party.

On July 28, the Washington Post reported the following:

The Democrats’ congressional campaign arm pulled in $2.1 million in online donations over the weekend — the best four-day haul of the current election cycle — largely propelled by fundraising pitches tied to speculation that House Republicans could pursue the impeachment of President Obama.

That’s part of the story. Another part of the story involves the blatant flaunting of unconstitutional actions in an attempt to goad the Republicans into impeachment. Why impeachment? Because it energizes the far left of the Democrat party base.

David Limbaugh concludes:

So he is not only ratcheting up his rhetoric to accuse Republicans of a plot to impeach him, though House Speaker John Boehner has clearly indicated that is not in the cards, but also trying to force their hand into actually impeaching him. To this end, he is planning on upping the ante by issuing a far-reaching unilateral order granting amnesty to millions.

That’s right. The leader of the Free World is trying to provoke Republicans into impeaching him or otherwise stirring a constitutional crisis.

This is stunningly unprecedented. But more and more people are wising up to his serial abuses of power and his partisan agitation.

I don’t have a great track record as a prognosticator of elections, but I am strongly sensing his party, as a direct result of his policies and lawlessness and its shameless refusal to rein him in, is going to get a titanic comeuppance in November.

America is either going to be a representative republic or a banana republic. Voters in November will make that choice.