Thanks to the state Senators that voted for freedom and against the police state yesterday.

Thank you to the seven state Senators on the Health and Human Services Committee that voted to protect individual freedom and against expanding the massively failed drug war yesterday.

On a 7-2 vote, the committee killed Senate Bill 196, which would have made it illegal to purchase Sudafed (and similar over the counter medicines) without a doctor's prescription. Law enforcement was the driving force behind the bill, saying it was necessary to combat meth-amphetamine production.

Socially conservative Senator Lundberg, before voting against the bill, nailed it: "I am troubled by the testimony in favor of the bill that there is no acknowledgment of the liberties and freedoms of citizens compromised by this." (See "Colorado Senate panel rejects more limits on meds used in meth.")

It is always good when senators from both parties recognize that looking to the government, and giving it more power over individuals, is not the answer.

Thank you. I encourage everyone to send an email to the seven senators that stood up for freedom. They are:

They are:

Linda Newell, Vice-Chair (D) linda.newell.senate@gmail.com

Kevin Lundberg (R) kevin@kevinlundberg.com

Ellen Roberts (R) ellen.roberts.senate@state.co.us

Morgan Carroll (D) morgan.carroll.senate@state.co.us

Shawn Mitchell (R)l shawnmitch@aol.com

Jean White (R) senatorwhite2@gmail.com

Joyce Foster (D) joyce.foster.senate@state.co.us

Medical Marijuana and the Tenth Amendment

The Colorado Independent has an article (that I found thanks to Complete Colorado) on Obama's Department of Justice potentially cracking down on the medical marijuana industry in states that have legalized it. (See "DOJ smack down of medical continues, raising questions in Colorado.")

This presents an excellent opportunity for those that believe in the United States Constitution: a chance to actually enforce it.

The Federal regulation of a plant grown in this state, harvested in this state, sold in this state and consumed in the state is a farce. None of the enumerated powers of Article, Section 8 gives the feds the authority to regulate this activity. Using the interstate commerce clause as a justification is nonsense, yet we countenance it because the US Supreme Court said we should. What sheep we are. The feds can not make the moon the sun by declaring it so. It is time we assert our sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment and stop the fed's unconstitutional usurpation of state power.

How many "conservative" Republicans would be willing to enforce the Tenth Amendment when the issue is marijuana? On the other hand, how many "progressive' Democrats want the feds to butt out of this issue, but want them involved in health care?

It is hypocrisy to pick and choose when the Constitution should be applied on a case-by-case basis depending on the issue. The enumerated powers and the Tenth Amendment always apply, even when you don't want them to.

An attempt to explain liberty to my statist friends.

Let me try to summarize, for my statist friends, why government "solutions" are immoral: The government can not accomplish any goal, no matter how well intentioned, without using force to make people act in a way they would otherwise not act.

Even if you completely disagree with libertarian thought, I hope you can at least understand from where we are coming. We are not heartless bastards that want to put grandma on the street. We understand that taking care of grandma is our job as feeling and caring individuals, not the job of a faceless, unfeeling and uncaring agent of the state - a bureaucrat.

The "good" of the collective, by necessity, always makes the interest of the individual subservient to that of the collective. When the individual is subservient to the collective, individuals are sacrificed when they disagree with the collective.

From Stalin's Soviet Union, to Hitler's Nazi Germany, to Mao's China to Mussolini's Fascist Italy - when the state is more important than individuals, individuals are killed. Always.

I am not comparing the United States with any of these regimes. I am pointing out the extremes so that we may stay as far away from the statist model as possible. For over a century, we have been moving closer to statism and farther away from liberty.

And that is a cause for concern.

The federal government isn't hurting for money. It's hurting because of bloat.

The wails of anguish from the D.C. political class that the federal leviathan doesn't have any money to provide basic services is bollocks. The federal government has too much money. It only needs more money to feed the bloat.

To wit, the United States government has seventeen separate intelligence agencies:

1. Central Intelligence Agency
2. Department of Energy, Office of Intelligence and Counterintelligence
3. Department of Homeland Security, Intelligence and Analysis
4. Department of State, Intelligence and Research
5. Department of Treasury, Office of Intelligence and Analysis
6. Defense Intelligence Agency
7. Drug Enforcement Administration
8. Federal Bureau of Investigation
9. National Geospatial Intelligence Agency
10. National Reconnaissance Office
11. National Security Agency
12. Office of the Director of National Intelligence
13. U.S. Air Force, Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance
14. U.S. Army, Army Military Intelligence
15. U.S. Coast Guard, Coast Guard Intelligence
16. U.S. Marine Corps, Marine Corps Intelligence Activity
17. U.S. Navy, Office of Naval Intelligence

This list is laughable. Even if one allows for separate agencies for international intelligence, domestic intelligence and military intelligence, this group of 17 should be, at most three.

Dispose of the rest.

Kristof's "Raise my taxes!" is shameless demagoguery and Newspeak.

In his April 14, 2011 New York Times column, Nicholas Kristof proudly proclaims, exclamation point and all, "raise my taxes!"

He, and others, use this tactic to show how magnanimous and selfless they are. Of course, it is complete and utter nonsense. It is pure demagoguery and absolutely dishonest. It is the height of disingenuousness.

If Mr. Kristof wants to pay more taxes, no government action is required. The Treasury Department accepts donations. Kristof knows this.

What he really means is that he wants the government to raise YOUR taxes.

Of course, this is yet another example of the language of statists, Newspeak: Say something that you do not mean to achieve a hidden purpose. War is peace, night is day. Your money is my money.

Time to enforce the Tenth Amendment

Trust Obama? - Reason Magazine

As explained in the Reason Magazine story linked above, President Obama has not even made a cursory attempt to abide by either the Constitution or the War Powers Act in his decision to bomb Libya.

Likewise, neither Obama nor the last Congress gave any deference to the Constitutional limitations of Article I, Section 8 - or the Tenth Amendment - when Obamacare was passed.

The Constitution is being ignored by the federal government.

It matters not that the Supreme Court has declared that the interstate Commerce Clause applies to matters that are neither interstate nor commerce (See Wickard v. Filburn). If the Supreme Court said that the moon were actually the sun, it would not make it so.

What are we, mere subjects, to do? One option is to insist that state legislators start standing up for our Tenth Amendment rights. Colorado needs to tell the feds "Hell, no! Just because you, the legislature and executive branch of the federal government, tell us to do something, and then you, the court system of the federal government reinforce your original usurpation of power, does not make the usurpation legitimate."

The U.S. Supreme Court has failed in its duty to be a check on the executive and legislative branches. This should be of no real surprise. It is akin to asking the third of three brothers if what the first two did was legitimate. Likewise, asking the federal courts to call fouls on the executive and legislative branch is akin to asking the Lakers guards to call the fouls committed by the Lakers forwards. Don't be surprised when the fouls aren't called fouls.

It is time for the States to simply hold the federal government to its legitimate powers as enumerated in the Constitution. When the feds overstep those limits, they must be told "no, you can not impose your unfettered will upon us. We will not recognize your usurped power. The Tenth Amendment means what it says."

This is not as radical as it sounds. Thomas Jefferson and James Madison believed in the concept and wrote about it in regards to the Alien & Sedition Acts. The acts were clear violations of the First Amendment, and Jefferson and Madison did not care that the federal legislature said otherwise. They declared the Acts void. Kentucky and Virginia both passed resolutions to that effect in 1798.

Likewise, Wisconsin refused to enforce the Fugitive Slave Act. Even right now, many states have refused to enforce the Real ID Act. Several states have declared that any federal firearm legislation is void within their boundaries as they apply to firearms made within that state - because there is no interstate commerce that applies.

If we continue, as a state, to lay down for the federal usurpation of power, we will continue to get rolled over. And that is unAmerican.