TheFrontPageCover
~ Featuring ~
Judge Napolitano on 'Fox & Friends': Would proposed 'red flag' gun laws be constitutional?
By David Montanaro
.
Karen Armstrong and the Islamists
by Anne-Christine Hoff
.
Here’s Why Elizabeth dinky-Warren’s Wealth
Tax Is Completely Unconstitutional
By Kyle Sammin
{ thefederalist.com } ~ If any trait characterizes the far left in 21st-century America, it is plans. They have plans for the country, plans for you, plans for your kids, plans for your house, and plans for your workplace... And your property? You know they’ve got plans for that. In the 19th-century quasi-socialist movement once made up of farmers and laborers who wanted to build, harvest, and create, planning was a piece — but only a piece — of the agenda. Democratic socialism or whatever guise the hard left puts on these days is the realm of people who build nothing, but they have plans upon plans for things others have built. The leading presidential candidate of the planners is the senior senator from Massachusetts, Elizabeth dinky-Warren. She has made a slogan about having a plan for this and that, and her plan likely to do the most damage to America and the rule of law is her ill-considered, demagogic plan for a wealth tax. The plan appeals to a certain envious segment of the mob, but a few minutes’ thought reveals its manifold flaws. As her opponent and former Rep. John Delaney said in the last Democratic presidential debate, the wealth tax is both a violation of the Constitution and a crime against good sense. The main problem with dinky-Warren’s plan is that it violates the Constitution. Understanding why requires understanding the difference between direct taxes and indirect taxes. dinky-Warren, a Harvard law professor, surely gets this, but she’s counting on voters to not to pay attention. dinky-Warren calls her plan the “ultra-millionaire tax,” and that certainly has a pleasant ring to it for many people. Look! There’s even a graph! She makes a lot of graphs. Can the super rich afford to pay a little more in taxes? Sure, they won’t starve. Do people think the top income tax rates should be higher? Polls from earlier this year show a majority of voters would be happy to raise that rate quite a bit. But that is not what dinky-Warren is calling for here. When we say “tax the rich,” we typically mean “increase the top marginal rate of the federal income tax.” Maybe we even mean “impose a sales tax on the kind of luxury items rich people buy,” or “eliminate the favorable tax treatment for capital gains and deferred income.” These are all permissible, if not necessarily smart. Yet dinky-Warren’s tax is a wealth tax, a direct federal impost on people’s property, and that presents a huge constitutional problem... .
It's Time to Restore Our Judicial Branch
By Lathan Watts
{ americanthinker.com } ~ If you ask most Americans if they want judges who are presently serving on state or federal courts to act like politicians, you’d likely get a resounding “No.”... Take, for example, a 2016 Marist poll in which 52 percent of Americans say they want the Court to interpret the Constitution “as it was originally written.” Sadly, many judges in America act like policymakers instead of working as impartial arbiters of our nation’s laws. The result is an unnecessary politicization of the judicial branch. This trend needs to stop. Too many Americans from all points along the political spectrum view the judicial branch as a mini legislature to bypass lawmakers in the states and on Capitol Hill. Too many judges have accepted or advanced this expansion of authority. Consequently, we now see unelected judges deciding which laws to enforce or worse, issuing their own edicts from the bench. Nothing could be further from the way our Founders wanted the judicial branch to operate. That federal judges are appointed for life should make it easier for them to resist arbitrary rulings influenced by the fleeting political whims of the electorate. Their role is to declare what the law is, not what they think it should be. Likewise, when assessing the constitutionality of a law, judges should let the Constitution guide them. Their proper role is to evaluate in light of what the Constitution says, not what the desired policy should be or the political popularity of matter in question. For example, the U.S. Supreme Court in a rhetorically and logically contorted opinion National Federation of Independent Business v. Sebelius -- retooled and saved the unconstitutional Affordable Care Act. Ironically, the author of that opinion also delivered a stern dissent in Obergefell v. Hodges, “It is not about whether, in my judgment, the institution of marriage should be changed to include same-sex couples,” says Chief Justice John Roberts: “It is instead about whether, in our democratic republic, that decision should rest with the people acting through their elected representatives, or with five lawyers who happen to hold commissions authorizing them to resolve legal disputes under the law.”... https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/08/its_time_to_restore_our_judicial_branch.html .
Killing Free Speech in France,
Germany and on the Internet
by Judith Bergman
{ gatestoneinstitute.org } ~ In May, France called for increasing government oversight over Facebook. Now Facebook has agreed to hand over to French judges the identification data of French users... suspected of hate speech on its platform, according to France's Secretary of State for the Digital Sector, Cédric O. Previously, according to a Reuters report, "Facebook had refrained from handing over identification data of people suspected of hate speech because it was not compelled to do so under U.S.-French legal conventions and because it was worried countries without an independent judiciary could abuse it". Until now, Reuters noted, Facebook had only cooperated with the French judiciary on matters related to terrorist attacks and violent acts by transferring the IP addresses and other identification data of suspected individuals to French judges who formally demanded it. Now, however, "hate speech" -- as speech that fails to comply with current political orthodoxy is conveniently labelled -- appears to have become comparable to terrorism and violent crime. How autocratic, yet Cédric O apparently loves it: "This is huge news, it means that the judicial process will be able to run normally". It is highly probable that other countries will want to have a similar agreement with Facebook; it also appears likely that Facebook would comply. In May, for instance, as France was debating legislation that would give a new "independent regulator" the power to fine tech companies up to 4% of their global revenue if they do not do enough to remove "hateful content" from their network, Facebook's CEO Mark Zuckerberg commented: "I am hopeful that it the French proposal can become a model that can be used across the EU". France is the first and so far only country to have entered into such an agreement with Facebook. The new agreement could signal the de-facto end of free speech on Facebook for French citizens. Self-censorship in Europe is already widespread: a recent survey in Germany showed that two thirds of Germans are "very careful" about what topics they discuss in public -- Islam and migrants being the most taboo. Knowing that a mere Facebook post could end you up in front of a judge in court is very likely to put a decisive damper on anyone's desire to speak freely....
FBI Rescues over a Hundred Missing Kids
.
.
Judge Napolitano on 'Fox & Friends': Would proposed 'red flag' gun laws be constitutional?
{foxnews.com} ~ Fox News senior judicial analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano weighed in Tuesday on "Fox & Friends" on the constitutionality of proposed "red flag" laws in the wake of two mass shootings over the weekend in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio.
The debate centered around the 24-year-old Dayton shooter, who reportedly was suspended during high school for compiling a “hit list” of those he wanted to kill, and a “rape list” of girls he wanted to sexually assault.
Host Ainsley Earhardt asked whether preventing him from purchasing a firearm would have been "common sense," arguing that there were true "red flags" in this case.
Napolitano said the behavior was "reprehensible," but any legislative change must adhere to the Constitution. He said since the shooter was not charged with a crime, the incidents did not show up on gun databases when he purchased weapons.
"Honest, decent, law-abiding people should not lose their rights because some judge thinks they might do something in the future. That's the Soviet Union model, not the American," he responded.
Sens. Lindsey Graham and Richard Blumenthal announced Monday a bipartisan bill that would create a federal grant program to assist states in adopting “red flag” laws, in response to the mass shootings in El Paso, Texas, and Dayton, Ohio over the weekend.
Graham, R-S.C., who also serves as the chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, announced the plan for bipartisan legislation. The bill will “assist and encourage” states to adopt Red Flag Protection Order laws to “timely intervene in situations where there is an imminent threat of violence.”
Graham said that he spoke with President Trump about the legislation on Monday morning and said “he seems very supportive.”
“Many of these shootings involved individuals who showed signs of violent behavior that are either ignored or not followed up. State Red Flag laws will provide the tools for law enforcement to do something about many of these situations before it’s too late,” Graham said, adding that he hopes that “Republican and Democratic colleagues will join us to finally move forward in the effort to keep guns out of the hands of dangerous people.”
Napolitano said any law that deters future crimes is a positive step, but the Constitution must be protected. He said the federal government cannot order the states to enact such laws but can encourage the laws and "pay the states to do it."
"The theory of the Constitution is we don't punish people or take their rights away from them because of what they might do, what they could do, because of what we fear they'll do, but only because of what they have done," he said, arguing Trump is in a "real bind" on how to curb gun violence without infringing on the Second Amendment.
VIDEO: https://video.foxnews.com/v/6068516943001/#sp=show-clips
https://www.foxnews.com/media/judge-napolitano-red-flag-gun-laws-constitution
Comments