Category: Congress

Congress, Constitutional Law, Justice, Politics, Society, Uncategorized

Fed Up With the Fed

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Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)-Guest Blogger

In the past few weeks, I have written about how the FDIC along with the Bank of England had developed a plan to allow the Big banks to grab depositors funds  in order to bail out those very same big banks.  Since that article was written, I have reviewed just what role the Federal Reserve Bank plays and how can it be improved.  You may remember the role the Federal Reserve played in bailing out the Big Banks during the beginning of the Great Recession.

“As a result of the Government Accountability Office (GAO) audit of the Fed, Senate sponsor Bernie Sanders of Vermont said, “We now know that the Federal Reserve provided more than $16 trillion in total financial assistance to some of the largest financial institutions and corporations in the United States and throughout the world.” Among the investigation’s key findings was that the Fed unilaterally provided trillions of dollars in financial assistance to foreign banks and corporations from South Korea to Scotland. These decisions were all made without the public, media or elected officials’ knowledge, and they would have remained secret without an audit.” Bernie Sanders    Continue reading “Fed Up With the Fed” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, Criminal law, Politics, Society

Who is the Real Enemy of the State?
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Sen. Lindsey Graham, R – S.C.
The man who apparently thinks the Constitution
and our laws are optional.

or “You Might Be An Enemy Combatant If . . .”

by Gene Howington, Guest Blogger

UPDATED: You might be an enemy combatant if . . . Sen. Lindsey Graham (R – S.C.) says so.

This sounds like a bad joke, but it isn’t. The potential political misuse of the arbitrary “enemy combatant” status has been discussed here on many threads albeit usually in the form of using Executive abuse to illustrate that danger while Graham’s cavalier “suggestion” is clearly from the Legislative branch. In comments made by phone to the Washington Post’s Jennifer Rubin on Friday, April 19, Senator Graham said of the Boston bombers:

‘They were radicalized somewhere, somehow.’ Regardless of whether they are international or ‘homegrown,’ he said, ‘This is Exhibit A of why the homeland is the battlefield.’ Recalling Sen. Rand Paul’s filibuster, Graham noted that he took to the Senate floor specifically to object to Rand’s notion that ‘America is not the battlefield.’ Graham said to me, ‘It’s a battlefield because the terrorists think it is.’ Referring to Boston, he observed, ‘Here is what we’re up against,’ and added, ‘It sure would be nice to have a drone up there [to track the suspect.]’ He also slammed the president’s policy of ‘leading from behind and criminalizing war.’”

That was not the end of Graham’s disturbing posturing.

Continue reading “Who is the Real Enemy of the State?” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, Criminal law, International, Justice, Lawyering, Media, Military, Politics, Society, Supreme Court

SWAT: Is America Coming Under Martial Law, Redux

Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger

Dragnet_title_screenLike most of us I have been watching the developments in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon tragedy throughout the week. Because I’m retired I probably logged more hours of viewing it on TV than most people who are younger. The initial bombings on Monday and their aftermath made me terribly sad at the loss of innocent lives and the maiming of so many, which will have future pain and consequences for the entire lives of the victims. As a father and grandfather how could I not feel painful tears for the death of an 8 year old and the lifelong pain of his parents? Yet beyond that sadness, I also felt a sense of anxiety in my chest as I listened to the hour upon hour of cable news coverage and the analysis of “terrorism experts” aligned with prognosticators telling us what it all means.

My anxiety did not stem from fear of terrorism, because that fear is irrational. This is so not because terrorism is a chimera, but because this type of terrorism is an all too real fact of the lives of humanity and indeed while we in America have suffered it, so has the rest of the world to an even greater degree. Great Britain, Spain, Iraq, Israel, India, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Somalia etc. and so on and so forth. Life itself is always uncertain and unseen death lurks as a constant possibility for even the most protected of us. This has always been the human condition and the truth is that as the eons of human history have passed we are far safer now than our ancestors ever were. Yet it is also a human necessity to maintain the illusion of our own safety and indeed immortality. When horrors like the Boston Marathon bombings occur it tends to shake up our human illusions and engender fear. In the aftermath of these horrors though come the “explainers” whose attempts to soothe us only increase the fears. Following the “explainers” come those who would exploit the aroused fears for their personal gain or predilection. This happened in America from 9/11 and in its wake the false meme “This Changes Everything” was transformed into a reality of war, torture and the shredding of our Constitution. My anxiety was raised because as I watch this all unfold on TV I became fearful of how this new attention arousing horror would be used by those intent upon transforming this country into a Police State under the guise of saving it from terror. Continue reading “SWAT: Is America Coming Under Martial Law, Redux” →

Columns, Congress, Constitutional Law, Criminal law, Justice, Politics, Society

Pavlovian Politics: Leaders Line Up To Call For Increased Surveillance In Aftermath of Boston Bombing

220px-2013_Boston_Marathon_aftermath_peopleBelow is my column today in USA Today on the Boston bombing and the call for new security laws and expanded surveillance. I have been doing interviews trying to caution against these calls for immediate action — a mantra that we hear after every attack no matter the cause. I am in Chicago today and was struck by how quickly Chicago Mayor Rahm Emmanuel called for more surveillance cameras in a city with one of the largest surveillance systems in the United States.

Continue reading “Pavlovian Politics: Leaders Line Up To Call For Increased Surveillance In Aftermath of Boston Bombing” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, Criminal law, Justice, Politics, Religion, Society

Drug Testing Welfare Recipients to Prevent Abuse

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Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)-Guest Blogger

I have seen the suggestion before that Welfare recipients need to be drug tested to make sure that taxpayers are not paying for the drug habits of those evil poor people.  I have even seen relatives allude to it in messages on social media sites and I have witnessed friends championing the idea in personal emails.  I always wondered why some people think that the poor must be abusing the state and federal aid programs and therefore must have drug tests to insure that the taxpayers money is not being wasted.  While I agree that taxpayers money should not be wasted, I have not seen any benefit from forcing people to be drug tested before they receive their aid payments.

The State of Florida tried this from 1999 to 2001 and reintroduced it in 2011.  The Florida plan was subsequently struck down by the courts because there was no evidence that poor people abused drugs more often than their wealthier counterparts.  “The state of Florida passed an almost identical testing procedure that ran from 1999 to 2001 and was reintroduced in July of 2011 that was struck down by the 11th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Atlanta the following month, citing the fact:  ‘ “there is nothing inherent to the condition of being impoverished that supports the conclusion that there is a `concrete danger’ that impoverished individuals are prone to drug use.” ‘  Crooks and Liars   Does it surprise you that it took the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals before this expensive and intrusive process was ended in Florida?  Continue reading “Drug Testing Welfare Recipients to Prevent Abuse” →

Academia, Columns, Congress, Constitutional Law, Criminal law, Politics, Science, Supreme Court

From Creator To Object: The Supreme Court To Consider Patent Claim To Human Genes

The U.S. Supreme Court
The U.S. Supreme Court
DNA_orbit_animated_static_thumbBelow is my column this week in USA Today (the print version will run Wednesday while the web-version ran today). We have been following the increasingly draconian copyright and trademark laws used against citizens and companies — laws secured by an army of lobbyists, lawyers, and an obedient Congress and White House. The impetus of the piece is the Myriad case to be heard on Monday, where the Supreme Court will have to decide whether a company can patent human genes. The company argues that it took considerable research to isolate the genes associated with breast cancer and that patent protection gives companies like Myriad to do such extensive research and development. For many others, the patent claim represents a virtual franchising of the human body – giving companies claim to something that exists in nature. It also gives these companies a critical gatekeeper control on research into key components of cancer, Alzheimer’s disease, asthma, and other health threats. While this column deals with statutory expansions of private property claims over genes, common phrases and images, there is an equal expansion occurring in the common law, including the “misappropriation of name or likeness.” Perhaps the most infamous such authority can be found in the case of White v. Samsung. In this case, Vanna White sued Samsung over a commercial that showed a robot with a blonde wig turning cards in a game show. It was an obvious parody but the federal court found the image of a blonde who did nothing but smile and turn large cards belongs exclusively to White.

This column is meant to show that there is a broader problem in the rush to claim common material, images, and terms. Perhaps it was inevitable that with the ever expanding patent, copyright, and trademark laws, mankind itself would become a form of property: the ultimate evolution from creator to object.
Continue reading “From Creator To Object: The Supreme Court To Consider Patent Claim To Human Genes” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, International, Media, Military, Politics, Society

America’s Next War: Coming Soon

Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger

798px-Tomb_of_the_Unknowns_crackOur nation has become a military empire analogous to ancient Rome, another Republic that lost its bearings because it became the mightiest fighting force of its time. That we owe this to having spectacularly won what could be called “The Last Just War”, World War II, merely ironically underlines our descent into become the World’s most bellicose nation. This bellicosity has been masked by propaganda that makes us out to be the one nation responsible for ensuring “freedom and safety”. In this strife torn Earth, that idea cannot be supported since the truth is that we are the chief threat to peace in the world today. Now in truth, the use of the United States military to intervene in this Nation and other Nation’s affairs is not simply a phenomenon that began with World War II as you can see from this timeline linked here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_United_States_military_operations . What World War II marked though was the absolute dominant position in world military power which our country attained during our participation in that war. Given the magnitude of its scope it is easy to forget that for the United States World War II lasted only a brief four years. However, the incredible mobilization of troops and the supporting materiel of war were accomplished via a total mobilization that in the end fully turned the vision of Corporate America towards the great profits and benefits to be derived by American military dominance. Indeed, for generations to come there was a fluidity of personnel between leading corporate entities and the Department of Defense.

 Since 2001 our Armed Forces have been totally engaged in two major, unjustified wars and various minor “peace actions”. A child born in 1990 in the U.S. grew up in a world where there has been constant warfare and warfare’s necessary companion glorification of military service. The admixture of America’s warlike behavior and the faux glorification of the nobility of our military has become a constant in that young persons mind, only to better make them future cannon fodder for our dominant Corporate/Military Industrial Complex. Sadly, the less educated that young person is the more they are gullible to the siren call of that propaganda of military glorification. As the Great U.S. General Smedley Butler said so long ago: “War is a racket”. Continue reading “America’s Next War: Coming Soon” →

Congress, Justice, Politics, Society, Uncategorized

Bi-Partisan Support for Bill to Mandate a Higher Capital Requirement for Too Big to Fail Banks

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Respectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty (rafflaw)- Guest Blogger

Last week I wrote about a disturbing joint FDIC and Bank of England plan that could allow big banks to grab depositors funds in order to balance their books.  FDIC-BOE  As a follow-up to that discussion, I saw an article discussing a proposed Senate bill that would require our biggest banks to support a higher capital requirement than their smaller counterparts.  The bill in question is co-sponsored by Democratic Senator Sherrod Brown and Republican Senator David Vitter.  I thought it was especially interesting when one of this proposed legislation’s critics seemed to indicate that this legislation is unnecessary because it disregards the role the FDIC plays in protecting depositors accounts.

‘ “I view it as a radical view of how American banks should be restructured that seems to disregard the role of the FDIC coverage, prudential regulation and the totally different structure of the 2013 economy,” Petrou said in an interview.” ‘  Bloomberg   I guess Ms. Petrou didn’t read my article or the various articles before and after mine that discussed the plan that the FDIC made with the Bank of England to completely avoid the FDIC coverage and allow bankers to take depositors funds and replace those funds with stock shares in order to keep the bank afloat.  Or then maybe she did? Continue reading “Bi-Partisan Support for Bill to Mandate a Higher Capital Requirement for Too Big to Fail Banks” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, Criminal law, International, Justice, Media, Military, Politics, Society, Testimony

None Dare Call it Treason

Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger

220px-Richard_NixonIn 1964, during Barry Goldwater’s race for the White House, a book became a runaway best seller and it was titled “None Dare Call It Treason”. Its’ premise, typical of the thinking of many of that time, was that the United States was being sold out to Communism by its “liberal elites” who were pro-communist and thus wanted the USSR to win the “Cold War”. As the title clearly illustrates the book’s author, John A. Stormer, believed that the “elite” were traitors, liberal of course, who were so powerful that their “treasonous actions” couldn’t be challenged. I remember the popularity of the book at that time and how many who supported Barry Goldwater were believers in the books veracity. Goldwater himself seemed to be echoing Stormer’s theme of rooting out pro Communists in his Convention speech which produced the memorable phrase: “I would remind you that extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And let me remind you also that moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue.” It is thus a meme that in many different ways has been played and re-played through our Country’s history by those of a more Conservative persuasion. That meme is that the true American patriots are those who are of Right Wing political persuasion. Continue reading “None Dare Call it Treason” →

Congress, Politics, Society

Forever Young: Alaskan Member Apologizes After Discussing How His Family Used To Have “Wetbacks” To Do Their Work

220px-Don_Young,_official_photo_portrait,_color,_2006On the very heels of the GOP pledging to reach out to hispanics and repair the damage of the last election after an array of anti-women and anti-hispanic comments, Alaska Rep. Don Young stepped forward to show that such a face lift is not likely to occur with party leaders speaking from the eighteenth century. Young has long been a liability for the GOP with a long line of allegations of unethical and corrupt practices.

Continue reading “Forever Young: Alaskan Member Apologizes After Discussing How His Family Used To Have “Wetbacks” To Do Their Work” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, International, Justice, Uncategorized

Could the Banksters Grab Your Bank Deposits?

200px-FDIC_2500_sign_by_Matthew_BisanzRespectfully submitted by Lawrence E. Rafferty- Guest Blogger

The recent news about Cyprus banks confiscating depositor’s funds sent chills throughout the financial world here and abroad.  I couldn’t believe that the plan in Cyprus hinged on the idea that the bank could just steal customer’s funds to balance the bank’s books.  I muttered to myself when I read the story that something as crazy as that couldn’t possible happen here in the United States.  Unfortunately, I learned that the plan to pull a Cyprus type grab here was already in the works.  Continue reading “Could the Banksters Grab Your Bank Deposits?” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, Criminal law, Environment, Justice, Lawyering, Media, Military, Politics, Supreme Court

The Myth of Black Freedom in the U.S.

Submitted by: Mike Spindell, guest blogger

417px-Frederick_Douglass_portraitTo some of us the transition from slave to citizenship by those Africans brought in chains to these shores for economic exploitation and horrific abuse ended with the “Emancipation Proclamation”. To others its’ end might have been marked by “Brown v. Board of Education”, or by the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Those of somewhat more insightful bent may have said that the true emancipation occurred when Barack Obama was elected President in 2008. In my view, as much of an impact as all those milestones (and more such as Jackie Robinson i.e.) made to American consciousness, Black people in the United States clearly still lack the benefits and rewards of citizenship. I would go further and say that in the United States, at this time; most Black people still suffer the degradation and challenges brought about by both institutional and emotional racism. This is not to say that in our country other groups, such as Latino’s and Native Americans are free of oppressive prejudice, but to assert that given their history in this country Black people are slotted into the bottom of the economic and social ladder and are still struggling to obtain even those most minimal of rights that most Americans see as their birthright. Continue reading “The Myth of Black Freedom in the U.S.” →

Congress, Constitutional Law, Courts, Politics, Society, Supreme Court

Supreme Court Takes Up The Defense Of Marriage Act
The U.S. Supreme Court
gay-pride-flagThe U.S. Supreme Court

Today, the Supreme Court will take up the Defense Of Marriage Act (DOMA), the law signed by Bill Clinton that denied benefits and equal treatment to same-sex couples. This follows yesterday’s interesting, and at times heated, debate over Proposition 8 in the Hollingsworth case. I will be on MSNBC today discussing the case with NPR’s Here and Now at 12 and then Martin Bashir at 4 p.m.

Continue reading “Supreme Court Takes Up The Defense Of Marriage Act” →

Columns, Congress, Constitutional Law, Criminal law, Justice, Politics, Society

How Nixon Won Watergate

220px-Richard_NixonPresObamaBelow is today’s column in USA Today. It is a follow up to my speech at the National Press Club on the 4oth anniversary of Watergate. The event included a number of Watergate figures from Daniel Ellsberg to Liz Holtzman to Alexander Butterfield and others. It was an extraordinary event organized by Common Cause.

Continue reading “How Nixon Won Watergate” →

Congress, Politics, Society

New Jersey Democrat Accused Of Using Campaign Funds For Trip To Scotland And Celebrating Daughter’s Graduation

2005-05-13_015-DCThe New Jersey delegation clearly likes to travel . . . on someone else’s tab. Sen. Bob Menendez (D., N.J.) is reportedly under grand jury investigation for those trips to the Dominican Republic. WIth or without prostitutes, as we discussed earlier, the trips are highly problematic. Now, there is an ethics investigation of Rep. Robert Andrews (D-N.J.) who once vowed to “drain the swamp” of corruption in the House. It appears that Andrews needed to get out of the swamp for expensive trips that were allegedly paid for by campaign funds.

Continue reading “New Jersey Democrat Accused Of Using Campaign Funds For Trip To Scotland And Celebrating Daughter’s Graduation” →