In most movie depictions of Roman warriors riding around in chariots, there is a lot of armor, but precious little clothing.  I thought this was designed to show off the muscular physiques of the actors, like Brad Pitt, but now realize it may have just been historically accurate.  Scientist foolishly relying on real data have discovered that it was a lot hotter then.  It seems indisputable that the rapid industrialization of the world by the Romans must have caused global warming.  When you think about it, this makes a lot of sense.  It was certainly hot.  The Romans had a ton of chariots and they required horses to pull them at high speed.  Just think of what this was doing to our atmosphere.  In addition, Rome built all those roads and viaducts.  It is staggering to imagine the impact on our environment.  It is a miracle we survived.

http://news.investors.com/article/618004/201207121907/climate-warmer-in-roman-medieval-times.htm

If only the Romans could have enjoyed the brilliant political leadership of people like Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, Chuck Schumer, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi, the world could have been spared.  Restrictions would have been put on the number, size and weight of chariots.  Chariot drivers would have been required to limit the hours of operation for horses with mandatory rest periods and a healthy diet of oats and carrots.  Roman warriors would have been prohibited from riding in chariots, except in approved combat situations requiring prior written authorization from the Roman Senate.  This might even require approval directly from Caesar.  Armor would be closely regulated, reducing size and weight to lighten the load.  In a vigorous campaign against obesity, Roman warriors would have been limited to people weighing less than a healthy, for the time, 150 pounds.  In addition, 50% of Roman warriors would have been female.  Physical fitness and strength requirements would have been modified to prevent discrimination.

Of course this would have resulted in the death of a lot of Roman warriors, hastening the onset of the dark ages.  But, according to this report, it was at least cooler then.  Saving the global environment always requires some sacrifice.

TDM

Democrats, with the help of the main stream media, has been screaming loudly that Bush lied because we found no large quantities of chemical weapons in Iraq.  The reason Bush, along with virtually every senior Democrat in Congress, thought they were there is that it is undeniable that Hussein had them at one point.  The only real question is where did they go?

The liberal left has continually pretended that Saddam just secretly destroyed them without bothering to tell anyone.  Really?  That would be so like Saddam.   But other people gave reports of these WMD being moved to Syria.  Well shock of all shock.  It appears that there are large stockpiles of WMD in Syria, including a lot of the stuff we thought was in Iraq.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702303644004577523251596963194.html?mod=WSJUK_hpp_MIDDLESecondNews

I wonder if anyone in the main stream media will be interested in learning where Syria got all these cool toys.  Oh, I almost forgot.  That would be admiting that Bush just might have got it right after all and they could never ever risk that.

Suddenly, all those imaginary chemical weapons are all too real.  Imagine that!  Anyone recall the main stream media ever admitting there were large stockpiles of WMD that miraculously turned up in Syria after the Iraq war?   Me neither.

TDM

Mitt Romney went to the NAACP and gave the same speech he gives everywhere else.  He got booed.   The main stream media quickly reported this:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2172593/Mitt-Romney-deliberately-got-booed-NAACP-appeal-white-racists.html

The liberal left and liberal media tried to spin this as racism.  That is their standard assault on Republicans.  They immediately came up with a bizarre theory that Romney wanted to get booed, so that he could appeal to all those racism tea party members.

In reality, Romney did something remarkable, particularly for someone accused of flip flopping on issues.  He explains his reasoning:

‘I don’t give different speeches to different audiences, alright. I gave them the same speech. When I mentioned I am going to get rid of Obamacare they weren’t happy, I didn’t get the same response.”

By the way, Obama didn’t even bother to attend the NAACP convention, because of a scheduling conflict.  Big mistake!

TDM

The global warming crowd is thrilled to see the record high temperatures scorching the East this week.  The main stream media is reporting this as proof positive of global warming.  As always, this is nonsense.  The following chart says it all:

Record Highest Temperatures by State

Read more: Record Highest Temperatures by State — Infoplease.com http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0001416.html#ixzz1zuor84YG

Yes, it is hot.  That frequently happens this time of year.  Other than the global warming crowd, we refer to this as summer.  But, if you look at the chart, it was a lot hotter during the 1930s than now.  And guess what, that was before the industrial revolution started adding all that CO2 to the air.

Of course you will never see this chart on CNN or NBC, or CBS, or ABC, or MSNBC, or FOX News.  Instead you will hear about all the record breaking temperatures as if Al Gore suddenly got it right.  But stay tuned.  The London Olympics are just around the corner and it is cold in London.  Like really cold.  If the weather forecasters are right, which is a big if, the Olympics will be known for cold, damp weather.  That is the way the world’s climate works.  It gets hot in one place and it gets colder in another.  That is real climate change.  It has been happening for as long as mankind walked on this planet.

Here’s a word to the wise:  the world has not been getting warmer, at least for the last decade.  If anything, it is cooling off a bit.  The Arctic Ice isn’t melting.  Did anyone watch Deadliest Catch this year?  Did you see the crab fleet trying to deal with all that imaginary ice?  The Antarctic Ice isn’t melting, either.  When someone really measured it, they found out the ice is actually increasing.  The simple truth is that 70% of our planet is water, and scientists don’t really know much about what is happening to our global climate.  They can’t even measure sea level.  In case you doubt that, please read the following article.  It is a sure cure for insomnia:

http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0012/001251/125129e.pdf

Oh!  They can measure what happened 10,000 years ago.  Measuring what is happening now?  Not so much. All these dire warnings are just speculation based on people with an agenda.  A huge percentage of the global warming hysteria is based on computer simulations that fail miserably when compared with real data.  That is why so many top scientists are backing off their previous global warming predictions.  They came, they saw and they realized they were wrong.  Now, if only we could get the main stream media to read the memo.

All that the current hot spell teaches us is that the most dangerous hot air comes from politicians, who will use any excuse to promote a political agenda.

It’s cool, man!

TDM

In 1969, Penny Chenery watched nervously for the results of a coin toss.  She had made a deal with Ogden Phipps .  There were three foals expected from  a champion race horse named Bold Ruler.  The person winning the toss got first choice between two foals to be born in 1969.  The loser got second choice, but as a consolation prize, also got the only foal to be born in 1970.  Ogden Phipps won the toss and made his choice.  No one remembers that horse.  But the horse born in 1970 was Secretariat, one of the greatest race horses in American history.   Ogden Phipps thought he had won the lottery.  Instead, he missed out on the chance of a life time.

Half the conservative pundits think John Roberts is brilliant, the other half think he is a RINO who caved to liberal pressure.  Liberal pundits started out celebrating, but haven’t said much lately.  Perhaps the following explains why:

The Republican base is beyond energized.  If Obama got any bounce from this decision it has long since disappeared.

Some Republican Governors have already started announcing plans to refuse the Medicaid expansion.  This will go one way or the other very fast.  If other states join in, as I expect, than Obamacare is doomed.  You can’t have national health care with half the nation refusing to participate.

Republicans are already talking about repealing the individual mandate tax through reconciliation.  Even Democrats agree that the Supreme Court decision makes that possible.  That only requires 51% of the vote in the Senate.  Of course Republicans have to win control of the Senate to do that.  Prior to this decision, no one thought repeal of Obamacare was possible.  

Republicans are going to use Obamacare to run against all those Democratic senators up for re-election and the Democrats are running very scared.  Money is pouring into Romney’s campaign, Obama is sending out e-mails from Air Force One begging for money.

I also gave some serious thought to what would have happened if Obamacare had been overturned by the court, on a 5-4 decision.  I was one of those people praying for that to happen.  Perhaps I should have given this more thought.  Following is what I think would have happened:

The main stream media would have gone ballistic about a hyper-partisan Supreme Court.  We would have been reminded of the terrible decision on Bush vs Gore.   This would have been painted as a uniquely partisan and activist court.  The Supreme Court would have suffered major damage to its credibility.  The main stream media would have been wrong, but that would not have slowed them down. 

The media would have also run non-stop sob stories about people losing their insurance because of the repeal of Obamacare.  This would be labeled as the death of the dream of universal health care for all.  We would have been reminded that the United States is the only industrialized nation in the world without universal health care.  There would be little or no coverage of the cost or the massive government regulations.  

Mitt Romney would be under heavy pressure to declare what, specifically, he would propose to take the place of Obamacare.  Odds are that he would cave into liberal pressure and offer compromise on the worst provisions.

Obama would have been given a campaign issue that could transcend the pathetic economy.  It just might have given him his best chance at re-election.

Republicans are too busy whining about “losing” to consider the cost of winning.   So far, the fall out from this decision seems to have hurt Obama and helped Romney.  It would be small comfort to those opposed to Obamacare to see it overturned but then watch Obama get re-elected.  In retrospect, even if Roberts got it all wrong, it just might have saved Republicans from a self-inflicted disaster. 

On September 10, 2001, Steve Scheibner was supposed to fly American Airlines Flight 11 the following day.  He was bumped by a more senior pilot, who was killed on September 11, 2001.  Sometimes, you do win by losing.

 http://pastorron7.wordpress.com/2011/10/05/pilot-of-flight-11-bumped-on-910/

 TDM

It is obvious that John Roberts did some clever wordsmithing to reach the conclusion that the Individual Mandate was actually a tax, even though, under the law it was a penalty.  I wondered why he would do that.  Then I realized that the Roberts court decision is going to stop Obamacare in its tracks.  Democrats are too busy celebrating to even realize what happened.  What’s even more fun is that the White House has fallen completely into the fly trap. 

Here is what the court actually decided, that really matters:

The court up held the TAX part of the individual mandate.  They overruled the individual mandate under both the Commerce Clause and the Necessary and Proper Clause.

But the court also ruled that, although this was constitutional, as a tax, it was still treated under the law as a penalty.  That is significant.

Here is what everyone is missing.  As part of the ruling, all nine judges agreed that under the law this is a penalty, not a tax.  That means that it falls OUTSIDE the  Tax Anti-Injunction Act parameters:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tax_Anti-Injunction_Act

Impact

In the case of Department of Health and Human Services v. Florida , in which the the constitutionality of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act was at issue, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the mandate imposed under that law, and also determined the applicability of the Anti-Injunction Act to the litigation over the law. The Court held that the individual mandate in that statute (codified in Internal Revenue Code section 5000A as a “penalty”) does not fall under the Anti-Injunction Act, on the rationale that Congress specifically labeled consequences of the mandate as a “penalty” rather than a “tax” whereas other portions of the Act were labeled as a “tax”. The Court also ruled that the nature of the mandate does not preclude the federal courts from hearing the case before a prospective plaintiff has paid such a penalty to the Internal Revenue Service in the year 2015. The Supreme Court decision was rendered in this case in an opinion filed with the case of National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius in which the mandate was ultimately ruled to be constitutional as a tax.^[4]

That is a death blow for Obamacare.  One of the problems for people trying to stop the law was that under the Tax Anti-Injunction Act, lawsuits against the heath care law would have to be automatically set aside until the law is enforced and taxes are actually paid.  With this ruling, affirmed by all nine judges, lawsuits can be filed immediately asking for an injunction against implementing the law. 

 In 1783, John Jay negotiated the Treaty of Paris with England. 

 http://militaryhistory.about.com/od/militarystrategies/p/American-Revolution-Treaty-Of-Paris-1783.htm

 At the time, many people thought he had betrayed the American Revolution, since the treaty favored Britain over France.   France was our ally against Britain during the revolutionary war.  Keep in mind that this was only two years after the defeat of the British at Yorktown and only 7 years after the signing the Declaration of Independence.  People were outraged and if they could have caught him, they might have hanged him.  They thought this was the worst possible outcome and they felt betrayed.  But history shows us that John Jay probably saved the country.  We would not have survived during our early years without the protection of the British fleet.  We ended up going to war with Britain again, in 1812, but Jay had bought us 31 precious years.  Jay knew that in order for the country to survive, we could not depend on France, but we could depend on Britain.  Keep in mind that even if the trade laws were unfair, we still desperately needed that trade with Britain.

Today most historians view John Jay’s decision to negotiate that treaty as one of the bravest and smartest decisions in U.S. history.  Fortunately, for him, he was able to avoid the hanging long enough for calmer heads to prevail.

Right now Republicans are furious with John Roberts.  The real question is how will people feel about him five years from now?  In the meantime, those opposed to Obamacare will quickly discover the additional ammunition provided by this decision.  Those who support Obamacare are going to find themselves trying to pretend the biggest tax increase in American history isn’t really a tax increase after all.

A tax, by any other name, may be constitutional, but it doesn’t prevent injunctions.  Brilliant!

TDM

Some people, mostly constitutional lawyers, have already figured it out.  In this Supreme Court ruling the court did not actually uphold Obamacare.  What they did was rule on two specific challenges to Obamacare.  If you think about it, everyone was focused on winning based on the individual mandate being unconstitutional because they felt there was little chance to win on either the Commerce Clause or the Necessary and Proper cause.  This is why so many where shocked and disappointed when it appeared that the individual mandate was upheld.  But the reality is that the court was not asked to review the constitutionality of the entire law, just two specific provisions of the law.  The court could not opine on things not even challenged.  The Supreme Court can only rule in response to questions raised in actual lawsuits.   For example the Supreme Court couldn’t on its own just review this law and issue an opinion as to whether it was a good idea or even whether it was constitutional.  It had to wait until a lawsuit reached the court and then rule on the issues in that lawsuit.

Putting that in perspective, the Supreme Court actually struck down the individual mandate in both the Commerce Clause and the Necessary and Proper Clause.  They only upheld the tax provision of the individual mandate.  The only thing they upheld was the authority of congress to pass a tax.  They specifically ruled that congress cannot force anyone to buy anything.  This will turn out to be a landmark Supreme Court decision reversing decades of abuse of the Commerce Clause by the federal government.  It is a huge States Rights victory.

Second, the Supreme Court gave all those states who argued against having to implement expensive Medicaid expansions that are not funded.  Instead of funding them, the federal government threatened to cut off existing funding, which is inadequate, to force the states to implement new programs, which are not funded at all.  The bottom line is that the Supreme Court ruled that the federal government cannot force the states to adopt entitlement programs for which it has provided no funding.  I expect bright constitutional attorneys to start challenging a lot of other federal laws based on this decision.

For decades, the Supreme Court has allowed the government more and more intrusion into our laws based on an absurd reading of the Commerce Clause.  The Roberts decision reversed all of that.  The new standard is that the Federal Government can only regulate interstate Commerce that already exists.   Here is why that really matters, even with regard to health care.  There is already legislation that restricts regulation of insurance to states.  Insurance is not sold across state lines.  This was done specifically to avoid an abusive federal government from dominating our lives by making federal regulations of insurance.  This is the reason I cringe when Republicans propose allowing people to buy insurance across state lines.  That, in my opinion, would do more damage than Obamacare because it would ultimately result in the federal government regulating all insurance.

When Republicans and conservatives take a breath and they start listening to people who actually understand constitutional law, they are going to realize that Justice Roberts gave us our constitution back.  The following article from American Thinker confirms my own obviously shallow, and admittedly amatheur, interpretation of this ruling:

http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/06/the_chief_justice_done_good.html

Good Morning.

TDM

The Obama administration is celebrating the ‘Supreme Court decision to uphold the individual mandate.  The Obama administration is estatic at what they consider to be a huge victory.  But upon closer reading of the decision, it may actually doom Obama care.

First, Roberts said that the individual mandate was upheld because it was a tax.  It was not upheld under the commerce clause.  That matters for a lot of reasons.  One was that Obamacare was sold on the basis that it wasn’t a tax.  It is.  Another was that if congress can pass a tax, they can repeal a tax.  If the tax is repealed, Obama care is gone.

Second, the ruling says the individual mandate wasn’t constitutional under the Commerce clause.  It also said the federal government cannot require states to take on huge new federally mandated entitlement programs for which there is no funding. That will kill more than Obamacare.  It will kill a ton of unpopular federal mandates, including benefits states are required to provide illegal aliens.  This decision will have a major impact on these programs.   Ultimately, this probably gives the states the right to withdraw from Obamacare.  Keep in mind that 26 states have already filed lawsuits against Obama care.  They actually won.  The court ruled that the government cannot do this under the commerce clause.  I predict that states will begin immediately withdrawing from Obamacare. 

Third.  This will energize the Republican base even more than it was before.  This law does not have majority support and the campaign, in addition to being about the economy, will be about repealing Obamacare.  That will help Republicans.  The Democrat euphoria is likely to be quickly replaced with dispair when they realize they have been given the ultimate poison pill.

Fourth.  If States withdraw from Obamacare, as I predict, the only thing left will be the individual tax.  In other words they will get all the pain and none of the promise.

If you’re a supporter of Obamacare, you might rethink your celebration.  If you are opposed, there may be real joy in the morning and the morning may come sooner than you think.  Nothing will dismantle Obamacare faster than to have a majtority of states withdraw.

TDM

I think children are born with an instinctive ability to push their parent’s buttons.  They are gifted from birth to say or do just the right thing designed to create maximum frustration.  As a grandfather, watching from a safe distance, this can be fun to watch.  It is seldom as amusing when your own buttons are being pushed.

President Obama is pushing all the buttons guaranteed to infuriate large voting blocs.  This is either incredible stupid or unbelievably brilliant.  This will either win him the election or it will result in the worst thumping in a Presidential election in our nation’s history. 

This President is at war with the American people on subjects where liberals have had zero success at the polls.  Thanks to recent developments showing that a fetus is far more than just a lump of inert tissue, more and more Americans are moving away from the pro-choice position.  Gay marriage has never been approved by voters anywhere at any time.  We have gay marriage only because of activist judges and tone deaf legislatures.  Voter ID laws have strong bi-partisan support.  The vast majority of people want our immigration laws enforced.  That is why so many states passed legislation very similar to that passed by Arizona.  Finally, it is becoming increasingly clear that the administration is trying to cover-up something big with regard to “Fast & Furious.”

So, either Obama knows more about what the average American thinks than anyone else, or he is making huge mistakes.  There is no middle ground here.  Key Democrats are deserting him in droves.  The money is drying up so fast that the Obama campaign is now suggesting people forego wedding gifts so guests can donate to his re-election campaign instead.  The latest rumor is that Democrats are even having trouble raising money for the Democratic National Convention.  When people won’t spring for a party, the Party is obviously in serious trouble.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2012-06-26/democrats-may-drop-speedway-event-at-charlotte-convention.html

We should have predicted this.  The most naïve, radical and inexperienced man to ever run for President would be extremely unlikely to miraculously morph into a brilliant skilled executive while in office.  Obama never was a brilliant campaigner; he won because of the campaign run on his behalf by CNN, ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC and to some extent Fox News.  It was the main stream media that facilitated the myth of brilliance and leadership.  Obama himself has nothing to say.  All of his speeches are just replays of Democratic talking points.  This is so bad that even Democrats are bored.  The only real question is why did anyone expect anything different?

TDM

The Obama adminstration sued the State of Arizona to try and stop Arizona from enforcing federal immmigration laws.  The provision that really mattered was whether Arizona could stop people and ask for documentation.  The court upheld that portion of the law.  That was the whole point.  The Arizona law had other provisions, such as one making it illegal for illegals to seek employment.  I think the courts struck that down because it is absurd.  It wouldn’t be necessary for Arizona to have its own immigration laws if the Federal Government just enforced existing law.  By definition, it is already illegal to be illegal under federal law.  The problem is not the law, it is the failure of the Federal government to enforce the law.

Obama doubled down on disaster when in a desperate bid to maintain the coveted hispanic vote he announced that the Federal Government would stop deporting certain students.  The truth is that this did nothing.  No one was enforcing emmigration laws on students before.  When is the last time you heard about a raid on a high school campus or a college campus where students were herded off on the path to deportation.  Right!  It wasn’t happening. 

So in reality, all those illegal students got nothing.  But Obama is on the public record as deliberately refusing to enforce federal law.  There is a huge difference between the Federal Government choosing how to spent its time and resources and adopting  a policy of deliberately refusing to enforce the law.  Obama swore an oath to enforce the law.  He cannot arbitrarily decide which law is legitimate and which is not.

The Supreme Court just gave Obama a very public rebuke.  This was a UNANIMOUS decision.  The Obama administration cannot dismiss this as a partisan Supreme Court decision.  Ultimately the Supreme Court of the United States reminded everyone that is it congress, not Obama, who writes the laws and it is still illegal to be illegal.

TDM