U.S. Constitution: RIP?

And the hits just keep on coming: 

The U.S. House of Representatives on Wednesday approved legislation to curb "excessive" employee pay at financial firms that receive government bailout funds, a measure that could supplant an earlier effort to heavily tax executive bonuses.

The bill, which passed on a 247-171 vote, would give the U.S. Treasury broad powers to prohibit "unreasonable and excessive" compensation and bonuses that are not based on performance standards.

The light at the end of the hope and change tunnel is an oncoming train.  The conductor is not slowing down:

Over the past three months we have witnessed some truly amazing movements by the Obama administration. He has proposed more spending than all Presidents in history combined; he has trampled the Constitution by allowing the Treasury to take on a dictator style infringement on private companies, and now the democratically lead Congress has proposed the “Pay for Performance Act” which passed Thursday with even some Republican Congressman voted for it.

This bill essentially allows the Treasury to define “fair pay” for all employees, at any level.  Worse, the Treasury would like to be able to take over any company it deemed as important enough to take over regardless of whether or not it had accepted bailout funds. Worse still, the Serve Act proposes to make volunteering for the government mandatory (with pay, of course). Last time I looked, working for pay was called A JOB. 

The scariest part of the bill is that while you’re serving as a “volunteer,” you’re prohibited from participating in worship and church activities, political rallies and being involved in a union. In short, your essential freedoms are gone. I keep hearing about Obama being a socialist but, I have to disagree.  Based on these measures he appears to more like a person pursuing Communism or Fascism.

It's about power and control.  We have already ceded way too much power to Washington.  But we ain't seen nothing yet.

Obama wants to control the banks.  There's a reason he refuses to accept repayment of TARP money.  He's got the banks right where he wants them.  If he accepts the money he loses the control.  It's that simple.  But he is not finished.  He and his comrades in Congress have a grand scheme and the conditions are perfect.  Too many Americans are so caught up in "Hope and Change" they cannot feel the water getting hotter.  And it's getting hotter by the minute.

Should President Obama have the power to shut down domestic Internet traffic during a state of emergency?

Senators John Rockefeller (D-W. Va.) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) think so. On Wednesday they introduced a bill to establish the Office of the National Cybersecurity Advisor—an arm of the executive branch that would have vast power to monitor and control Internet traffic to protect against threats to critical cyber infrastructure. That broad power is rattling some civil libertarians.

That broad power should rattle every American.

The Cybersecurity Act of 2009 (PDF) gives the president the ability to "declare a cybersecurity emergency" and shut down or limit Internet traffic in any "critical" information network "in the interest of national security." The bill does not define a critical information network or a cybersecurity emergency. That definition would be left to the president.

The bill does not only add to the power of the president. It also grants the Secretary of Commerce "access to all relevant data concerning [critical] networks without regard to any provision of law, regulation, rule, or policy restricting such access." This means he or she can monitor or access any data on private or public networks without regard to privacy laws.

Sweet dreams, America:

While you were sleeping, Congress was hard at work…passing the $3.6 trillion budget spending your hard-earned money. A bunch of fiscal restraint amendments were adopted to create an aura of responsibility — with Democrat senators openly confessing they’ll just throw the amendments out during conference. And who knows what other chicanery will occur in the backrooms:

The House and Senate approved budgets of about $3.5 trillion for the government on Thursday with no Republican support, a sign of deep partisan tensions likely to color Congressional efforts to enact major policy initiatives sought by President Obama.

On the heels of House approval of its spending plan for 2010, the Senate voted 55 to 43 shortly before midnight to adopt a similar budget after a day spent laboring over politically tinged amendments that did little to change a fiscal blueprint generally in keeping with Mr. Obama’s ambitious agenda.

Obama's Ultimate Agenda:

Five minutes of explanation to James Madison, and he'll have a pretty good idea what a motorcar is (basically a steamboat on wheels; the internal combustion engine might take a few minutes more). Then try to explain to Madison how the Constitution he fathered allows the president to unilaterally guarantee the repair or replacement of every component of millions of such contraptions sold in the several states, and you will leave him slack-jawed.

...

...(Obama's) goal is to rewrite the American social compact, to recast the relationship between government and citizen. He wants government to narrow the nation's income and anxiety gaps. Soak the rich for reasons of revenue and justice. Nationalize health care and federalize education to grant all citizens of all classes the freedom from anxiety about health care and college that the rich enjoy. And fund this vast new social safety net through the cash cow of a disguised carbon tax.

Obama is a leveler. He has come to narrow the divide between rich and poor. For him the ultimate social value is fairness. Imposing it upon the American social order is his mission.

Obama's takeover of General Motors should send a loud and clear warning to the States who plan to accept stimulus dollars.  It is preposterous on its face.  The money Obama is offering, with all strings attached, came from the states in the first place.  It is already our money.  Yet some governors are more than willing to accept it (some are begging for it) and the strings that are attached. 

Be careful what you ask for.  You just might get it.

We the people:

It is up to the people of the United States to stand up for themselves. After all, the Ninth Amendment and 10th Amendment reserve and guarantee the people and their state governments all the powers that are not expressly granted to the federal government.

That's why people across the country, including most recently this weekend in Kalispell, have held Tea Parties to express their outrage over the federal government sticking its nose where it doesn't belong and putting its hand in your wallet and mine. Congress and the president apparently envision a country where they control every sector of the economy, and nearly every sector of our private lives. The stimulus bill and the proposed 10-year budget are in essence a federal down payment on ownership of our American soul. Is yours for sale?

Comments

[Don]

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. --That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn, that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security.”

[Julie]

Amen! Good post here.

Samuel Adams, one of the most influential (although less-widely talked about) “founding fathers” once addressed the concerns of his fellow revolutionaries, who were fearful of the lack of overall support in America for revolution. It was no secret that only about 40% of Americans were strongly in favor of throwing off the British government and establishing in its place an independent, self-sustaining and limited form of government. In a letter to his dubious colleagues, Adams simply replied:

“It does not take a majority to prevail… but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.”