James 3
Taming the Tongue
1 Not many of you should become teachers, my fellow believers, because you know that we who teach will be judged more strictly. 2 We all stumble in many ways. Anyone who is never at fault in what they say is perfect, able to keep their whole body in check.
3 When we put bits into the mouths of horses to make them obey us, we can turn the whole animal. 4 Or take ships as an example. Although they are so large and are driven by strong winds, they are steered by a very small rudder wherever the pilot wants to go. 5 Likewise, the tongue is a small part of the body, but it makes great boasts. Consider what a great forest is set on fire by a small spark. 6 The tongue also is a fire, a world of evil among the parts of the body. It corrupts the whole body, sets the whole course of one’s life on fire, and is itself set on fire by hell.
7 All kinds of animals, birds, reptiles and sea creatures are being tamed and have been tamed by mankind, 8 but no human being can tame the tongue. It is a restless evil, full of deadly poison.
9 With the tongue we praise our Lord and Father, and with it we curse human beings, who have been made in God’s likeness.
“The sacred rights of mankind are not to be rummaged for, among old parchments, or musty records. They are written, as with a sun beam in the whole volume of human nature, by the hand of the divinity itself; and can never be erased or obscured by mortal power.”
Alexander Hamilton, 1775
Gingrich, Romney Spar Over Immigration, Money
by ARI SHAPIRO
SAME OLD POLITICAL SONG IN OPPOSITION TO THE CONSTITUTION
The four GOP debaters are arguing as Stefan Halper and Jonathan Clarke write in America Alone: The Neo-Conservatives and the Global Order (2004) that within the discourse of Neo-conservative prolific intellectuals are debates over whether man now suffers from spiritual chaos rather than an amalgam of institutional failures; whether one could understand the social conditions of the modern West while ignoring the central place that religion held in past societies; and how to achieve a successful balance between social control and individual freedom. They dissect the contradictions raised by the tenants of their own thinking: Can one support free market capitalism and accept a welfare state? Do we still advocate democratic freedom if we criminalize the institutional outlets used by the nation’s most dangerous enemies? Can society truly support free speech if it censors pornography? However, including Newt Gingrich, none intellectual ability of the original neo-conservatives founders.
As Gingrich, Romney, Santorum and Paul argue their positions on the role and independence of the President and what they would do in office it is evident that none has read the US Constitution. The President of the United States is in actuality at the mercy of the Congress and the Supreme Court. This is proof-proper in the presumed failure of the Obama Presidency argued by the rival GOP candidates.
All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States, which shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives.
12:01 am
January 27, 2012
January 27, 2012
Listen to the Story
Jack Abramoff in 2004. He's the one on the right.
Disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff has been making the rounds lately. He's out of prison. He has a new book. He's in a talkative mood. So I figured it was a good time to ask him about the business of lobbying — not about what he did that was illegal, but about the ordinary, legal stuff.
The firm he worked for was called Greenberg Traurig. I chose a year at random when Abramoff was working there, and picked a client I hoped would be fairly typical. I chose Tyco International, a multinational corporation that in 2003 gave Abramoff's firm $1.3 million.
"They were fighting to stay out of the tax bill that year, which would have retroactively taxed them to the tune of about $4 billion," Abramoff says.
At the time, Sen. Charles Grassley, a Republican from Iowa, had introduced a bill with a provision that targeted companies like Tyco, which maintained an off-shore tax status. The provision would have imposed new taxes on Tyco going back to 1997.
So Abramoff and his team targeted the sponsor, Grassley.
"What we did was we plied him with contributions," Abramoff says.
Abramoff got everyone he could to make donations to Grassley's re-election campaign. Abramoff himself made contributions, as did other people at his firm, as well as executives and employees at Tyco.
Section 7 - Revenue Bills, Legislative Process, Presidential Veto
All bills for raising Revenue shall originate in the House of Representatives; but the Senate may propose or concur with Amendments as on other Bills.
Section 8 - Powers of Congress
The Congress shall have Power To lay and collect Taxes, Duties, Imposts and Excises, to pay the Debts and provide for the common Defense and general Welfare of the United States; but all Duties, Imposts and Excises shall be uniform throughout the United States….
Carolyn Lerner and the Office of Special Counsel
Federal employees who blow the whistle about waste, fraud and abuse don’t have many friends (or protections) in the federal government. But in June of 2011 they got a new ally in Carolyn Lerner, the new head of the Office of Special Counsel, tasked with protecting federal whistleblowers. Lerner talks to Brooke about the strengths and weaknesses of her new post.
Tom Devine on Whistleblower Protections
Tom Devine, legal director for the Government Accountability Project (who worked with us on the Blow the Whistle Project last year) updates Brooke on the state of whistleblowers and whistleblower protections.
The Durutti Column - Sketch for Summer
The executive Power shall be vested in a President of the United States of America.
Section 2 - Civilian Power over Military, Cabinet, Pardon Power, Appointments
The President shall be Commander in Chief of the Army and Navy of the United States, and of the Militia of the several States, when called into the actual Service of the United States; he may require the Opinion, in writing, of the principal Officer in each of the executive Departments, upon any subject relating to the Duties of their respective Offices, and he shall have Power to Grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offenses against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment.
The President shall have Power to fill up all Vacancies that may happen during the Recess of the Senate, by granting Commissions which shall expire at the End of their next Session.
The judicial Power of the United States shall be vested in one Supreme Court and in such inferior Courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The Judges, both of the supreme and inferior Courts, shall hold their Offices during good Behavior, and shall, at stated Times, receive for their Services a Compensation which shall not be diminished during their Continuance in Office.
The Trial of all Crimes, except in Cases of Impeachment, shall be by Jury; and such Trial shall be held in the State where the said Crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within any State, the Trial shall be at such Place or Places as the Congress may by Law have directed.
Section 3 - Treason Note
Treason against the United States shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.
The Congress shall have power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.
At every turn it is the Congress of the United States, followed by the Judiciary, which holds the real and final power, not the President of the United States. As citizens, you have an obligation to read and discuss the US Constitution if not for your own knowledge, but to protect the Blessings of Liberty and our Posterity for the body politic and your own progeny.
Gingrich Campaign Taps Into Voter Resentment
January 26, 2012
Republican presidential candidates Newt Gingrich, Ron Paul, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum are scrambling to tie up votes in Florida, which holds its winner-take-all primary next Tuesday. Steve Inskeep talks to conservative writer David Frum about the state of the GOP race.
FRUM: Well, I did a radio show the other day with a very Republican radio station, and the host was telling me, this country is on the edge of an apocalypse. You know, look, actually, the country's sort of climbing back from an apocalypse. An apocalypse is kind of strong and that kind of overwrought feeling that yeah, there's nothing ahead but decline and extinction for America. That's no way for a candidate to think, because it's not true.
INSKEEP: You were arguing that in order to express the anxiety that a lot of Americans feel, you can most easily do that by saying things that are just not factually true.
FRUM: Well, the great politicians, the great leaders are people who, at moments where the country has real reasons for fear and unease and resentment and anger, take those feelings and they re-channel them, redirect them in ways that can lead to solutions.
And at the end of that process, the people can look back and say that the leader - and the reason we admire these leaders is, yeah, we had a lot of feelings in 1933 or in 1981 that could have taken this country in an ugly direction. And you responded to the way we felt, and then you led us to a positive place, not to a negative place.
INSKEEP: When you said 1933 and 1981, you're talking about President Franklin Roosevelt, Present Ronald Reagan.
FRUM: That's right.
INSKEEP: And you're acknowledging that Mitt Romney just isn't there?
FRUM: Well, Mitt Romney has the answers. I mean, the challenge for Romney is he's not good at connecting with the feelings, but he would be very good at leading the country to a more positive space. But the reason that a lot of the Republican base is having trouble with him is he's not connecting with them. http://www.npr.org/2012/01/26/145885694/gingrich-accused-of-dishonestly-challenging-voter-resentment
Listen closely to each candidate’s sales pitch and you find that each man has his own particular vision for US governance: A dictatorship (Newt Gingrich); a theocracy (Rick Santorum); an oligarchy (Mitt Romney). None of these forms of governance are sanctioned as the original intent of the Founders in constructing and writing the Constitution as is evident in Article 6.
Article VI - Debts, Supremacy, Oaths
The Senators and Representatives before mentioned, and the Members of the several State Legislatures, and all executive and judicial Officers, both of the United States and of the several States, shall be bound by Oath or Affirmation, to support this Constitution; but no religious Test shall ever be required as a Qualification to any Office or public Trust under the United States.
Result
The President is more of a servant of the State, an Overseer, whose Job is to see to the smooth Running of the State and not a dictator to the Congress as the GOP candidates and his critics on the Left and Right would like the body politic believe. Then you may ask, “Why seek office?”
David Rothkopf
David Rothkopf, in Superclass: The Global Power Elite and the World They Are Making (2008), writes that the answer to this question is very simple: Power. He posits that clearly the richest would not be drawn to politics if politics did not offer them additional power above and beyond that which they had already acquired through financial or other professional success. Winning (or seizing) political office, or having the ability to influence political decisions, or having a base of political support directly empowers individuals.
The source of the power is multifold. It is the power of the intuitions that one has leadership within. It is the power of allocating the resources and setting the agenda for those institutions. It is the power to influence the creation of new laws and regulations, which offer the ability actually to institutionalize key ideas. It is the power of the history and national identity associated with those institutions.
It is the power that comes from having quantifiable support among the people of a country or region. Government service is seen as legitimizing, as service to the community, with high posts also seen as the capstone of a career (although they often provide additional access and networks that can offer further opportunities for profit post-government). This leads directly to many top business leaders taking massive pay cuts to work in government. (85)
Was the Stimulus Package 'Money Well Spent'?
Michael Grabell [33 min 42 sec]
Was The Stimulus Package 'Money Well Spent'?
January 26, 2012
No issue will be more important in the upcoming presidential election than President Obama's handling of the nation's economy. Critical to that debate is an assessment of the Obama administration's economic stimulus program. Republicans claim it was a costly failure. Supporters maintain it saved the U.S. from a depression.
On Thursday's Fresh Air, Grabell explains why the stimulus plan became what he calls "one of the most reviled pieces of legislation in recent memory." Grabell also offers his own assessment of President Obama's $825 billion stimulus plan, which was designed to jump-start the ailing economy. It remains the largest recovery plan in American history.
"You look at all these major programs in history — the moon race, the Manhattan Project, the WPA [Works Progress Administration] — the stimulus was bigger than all of these things," he tells Fresh Air's Dave Davies. "And so it begs the question: What did we accomplish with all of this money?"
On the New Deal Programs being larger than the stimulus, relative to the size of the government at the time
"When you look at the size of the federal government back in the 1930s, it was much smaller than [it is] today. Now the government is constantly involved in health care, in supporting a defense manufacturing industry, supporting education in a way they weren't previously. When you compare, relative to the size of the federal budget, the WPA was really many times what the federal budget was at the time. And we look at the stimulus and it was about 25 percent of the whole federal budget when you include Social Security and health care. So when people think of the New Deal, they think of, 'Wow, we really went from 0 to 60.' And when you think of the stimulus, a lot of people didn't notice it. It was really like we were going from 35 mph to 50 mph."
On why the Obama administration didn't make the stimulus plan bigger
"They didn't seek a bigger stimulus plan mainly because of politics. There was definitely the feeling that Congress would not stomach a package over $1 trillion. And if they went in with a number like that, they would have been seen as this new liberal administration where spending was out of control. So they were looking at a smaller package."
"In almost every recession and economic downturn that we have had in this country, some stimulus effort in some way was tried. And the idea is the government has the ability that maybe the private sector doesn't have: to borrow money and stimulate the economy. You spend money on food stamps and infrastructure projects, and that will pay off because people now have money in their pockets that they can spend somewhere else. So you get this multiplier effect, that one dollar creates more economic output."
http://www.npr.org/2012/01/26/145650753/was-the-stimulus-package-money-well-spent
Honesty with the People
Sen. John McCain, right, as he endorsed Mitt Romney's bid for the presidency earlier this month.
President Obama has made the case that his administration spoke out forcefully when Iran's government used deadly force to suppress protests in the spring of 2009.
"As soon as violence broke out — in fact, in anticipation of potential violence — we were very clear in saying that violence was unacceptable, that that was not how governments operate with respect to their people," he told reporters at the time.Obama's opponent in the 2008 presidential election reaches a very different conclusion."History will judge this president incredibly harshly, with disdain and scorn for his failure to come to the moral assistance of the 1.5 million Iranians that were demonstrating in the streets of Tehran," Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., told Morning Edition host Steve Inskeep today. Those demonstrators, McCain said, were "crying out ... literally crying out ... 'Obama, Obama, are you with us?' ... If we had given them some moral support, it might have made some difference."
Halper and Clarke note that modern neo-conservatism focuses narrowly. It pays scant attention to the world beyond defense budgets and select areas of the world where its ideology is applicable. Today’s children of the early neo-conservatives (in many instances this is literally the case) demonstrate little desire for the sort of interpretive framework that their intellectual fore-fathers sought in order to explain the world around them. Indeed, for the sake of advancing their foreign policy beliefs, they have entered marriages of convenience with populist conservative elements far removed from the intellectual rigor espoused by the neo-conservative founding generation and with whom they had bitter disputes on social issues throughout the Reagan administration. (43) As a result we have Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum, Mitt Romney, and Ron Paul as jocking for position in the debates to win the GOP slot for President in 2012.
Zbigniew Brzezinski: "Strategic Vision: America and the Crisis of Global Power"
Zbigniew Brezezinski arrives on Capitol Hill in Washington, Thursday, March 5, 2009, prior to testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing on U.S. strategy in Iran.
(AP Photo/Harry Hamburg)
Former National Security Adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski offers his views on how the U.S. can best navigate the challenges of the 21st century.
Zbigniew Brzezinski has had a hand in U.S. foreign policy for four decades. He served as national security adviser to President Jimmy Carter from 1977-1981. Since then he has counseled presidents and members of Congress. And he has written and lectured extensively on America's role in the world. In a new book Brzezinksi argues U.S. leaders need a better strategic vision to navigate the challenges of the 21st century. He offers his insights on China's meteoric rise, a turbulent Middle East and the likely consequences of a decline in American power.
Guests
counselor and trustee at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, professor of American Foreign Policy at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University and former National Security Advisor in the Carter administration.
Related Items
WHAT WE MISSED WHILE GAZING AT OUR POLITICAL NAVELS ~ DAVOS
David Rothkopf writes that over the three and half decades of its existence, this mountain top gathering clearly had done more than merely transform Davos from sleepy ski town to cosmopolitan hub. More than a meeting place for international business, government, media, and cultural leaders, it now was a symbol for the knitting together of the world, literally and figuratively a summit of summits. The concept of what the political scientist Samuel Huntington called “Davos man”—the global citizen, the leader for whom borders were increasingly irrelevant—described a new leadership class for our era.
When founded in 1971 by Klaus Schwab, the organization that would become known as the World Economic Forum had a narrower mission. It was focused on convening European business leaders for a discussion of that continent’s rather uncertain economic fortunes.
DAVOS ECONOMIC FORUM IN REVIEW
BBC WORD SERVICE
http://www.bbc.co.uk/search/?q=davos
Editor's Choice
-
NewsKeep up to date with the latest news and features about the annual World Economic Forum meeting in Davos, Switzerland
-
NewsFind out what the World Economic Forum is, how it works and what it hopes to achieve
-
NewsEconomics editor Stephanie Flanders considers the lessons of this year's World Economic Forum
News941 results>
-
Business / NEW 47 minutes ago… to bilateral trade agreements. However World Trade Organisation (WTO) chief Pascal Lamy told a Davos meeting that said bilateral agreements could…
-
Business / NEW 3 hours agoDavos is used to bluster from political leaders. But when usually quietly spoken company bosses from all corners of the earth warn of "not a crisis,…
-
Business / NEW 8 hours ago… to the eurozone debt crisis has been a major debate at World Economic Forum in Davos. "We are not suggesting there should be fiscal consolidation…
Blogs77 results>
- Verity Murphy - Newsnight: From the web team / 27 January 2012
… approved, and why. And as the great and the good of politics, economics and business meet in the stunning Swiss mountains, has Davos come up…
iPlayer7 results>
-
BBC World Service / 27 January 2012Tanya Beckett presents Business Daily from the snowy mountains of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. She speaks to economist Carmen…
-
BBC World Service / 27 January 2012… point? Nik Gowing chairs a panel of global decision makers at the World Economic Forum in Davos, featuring live questions from around the world…
OCCUPY DAVOS
TIP:
Enter the amount, and click "Tip" to submit!
David Biddle
jmac1949
Snowden
libbyliberalnyc
skypixie0
Jimmy Zuma
Salon.com
Comments