The Front Page Cover
~ Featuring ~
Shaking Things Up
by Tom McLaughlin
.
Reform America's Overbearing Federal Law Code
by Political Editors: The federal government’s over-regulation doesn’t just consume Americans’ money and time, it’s impacting our freedom as well. One issue that has slowly gained the attention of an increasing number of Americans and politicians is the need for criminal justice reforms. America’s high prison populations, along with a high number of repeat offenders, is pointed to by many as evidence suggesting that the nation’s penal system is seriously broken. In October, Senate Republicans introduced three bills designed to reform the criminal justice system. These bills are a step in the right direction, but they still overlook one major component of the problem rarely mentioned — the problem of over-criminalization. Put simply, there are way too many federal laws and regulations on the books. Experts who have studied the problem estimate that only about 5,000 of the more than 300,000 criminally enforceable federal laws have ever been directly voted on by Congress. That means that almost 99% of the federal criminal law code has been created by unelected bureaucrats working within executive branch agencies. In other words, there are no elected officials who the American public can hold accountable for these federal laws. This was not how the federal government was designed to work, as the job of the creating and voting on laws is supposed to be the responsibility of the legislative branch, not the executive. Basic American civics.
How did we end up here? Much of the initial blame falls on Franklin D. Roosevelt and his New Deal executive power grab. Since 1940, the number of civilians employed in the executive branch has tripled. Along with increasing the size and scope of the executive branch was the development of legal doctrine stipulating that courts are to defer to a federal agency’s own interpretations of the scope of its authority. Essentially, these federal agencies have been granted the power to make whatever rules they claim fit within their own defined authority. According to the Competitive Enterprise Institute, for every law Congress passes, federal agencies create 18 new regulations.
The greater number of criminal laws created, the greater the potential for more Americans to run afoul of those laws, intentionally so or not. More rules create more rule breakers. This power must return to Congress, where elected officials can be held directly responsible for the laws they vote on. No more of this handing off power and authority to unelected career bureaucrats.
~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/52190

.
CNN Caustic Acosta Says Trump Has World
Record For Politicizing Terrorist Attacks
{rickwells.us} ~ President Trump has, for a long time referred to Jim “Caustic” Acosta, CNN and the rest of the leftist media as fake news... Although they take that as an insult, he’s really being kind. Calling what they dispense news at all is a stretch and there are words, such as “smear,” that are more accurate than merely labeling them as fake. The argumentative anti-American, whose first name is actually Abilio, delivers his customary anti-Trump rant, as he’s assisted by and standing in the screenshot alongside the babbling Brooke. Babbling Brooke does the rant setup work, clearly an orchestrated CNN hit-piece, teeing up Acosta by pointing out that it’s been about 24 hours since the New York Terrorist attack “and the President is already pushing Congress for several major changes.”... https://rickwells.us/cnn-acosta-trump-politicizing-terrorist/.
.
.
Mistake in Manafort Indictment
Shows Case Was 'Cooked Up,' Russia Says
by ALAN KAYTUKOV AND ALEXANDER SMITH
{nbcnews.com} ~ Russia's foreign ministry has cited a factual error in the indictment against Paul Manafort as proof the allegations... are "cooked up" and not part of a "serious investigation." Manafort, President Donald Trump's former campaign manager, and his business associate, Rick Gates, are accused of charges including conspiracy against the U.S., money laundering, being an unregistered foreign agent and seven counts of failure to file reports of foreign bank and financial accounts. But the spokeswoman for Russia's foreign ministry, Maria Zakharova, pointed out that the 31-page indictment wrongly describes Yulia Tymoshenko as a former president of Ukraine... https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/amp/mistake-manafort-indictment-shows-case-was-cooked-russia-says-n815911.
Shaking Things Up
by Tom McLaughlin
My room circled in red
{tommclaughlin.blogspot.com} ~ Every so often the Creator lets me be shaken up. It’s probably a sign that I’m getting too complacent, that He wants to remind me of my mortality, and that He sustains me in existence just has He does everything else. Not everybody who has read this far believes as I do, but it’s both an enriching and a sobering awareness. Here at Maine Medical Center where I’ve been staying for a few days there is lots of time to reflect. I’ve been taken out of my element and confined in another to ponder what I was doing before I came in and what I’ll do after I go back into the world outside.It’s Monday morning and I won’t be getting out today. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe the day after that. I have little control and it’s blowing a gale out my third-floor window. There are few leaves left on the trees but some cling tenaciously while the branches are blown about violently. I’m right above the main entrance and I see the American and State of Maine flags on the pole out there are torn ragged and are tangled up with each other. Metaphoric? Perhaps the Creator has decided the whole region needs some shaking up.
Five thousand people work here in this complex. Doctors, nurses, maintenance, and housekeeping staff keep it all running — mostly nurses. They’re very good here and it’s a kind of sisterhood. Because two of my daughters are nurses and they’ve been in here advising me, they connected with the sisters on the ward. Come to think of it, “sisters” is what nurses were called in England back in the day. So now I’m connected. I’m “family” as they put it. Nice.Friends are watching the properties I’m responsible for in Lovell while this storm blows itself out. Messages and phone calls are coming in to my hospital bed and going out again. Down the hall, men in work clothes with hands accustomed to holding tools are on their cell phones instructing others to move generators around as they’re in here visiting family members.
I’ve always been busy, but thirty years ago I was even busier with a young family and all the goes with that. When my health problem flared up I’d be incapacitated for five or six weeks and discover again that the world could get along fine without me. It was humbling then and it still is. I’m not indispensable. I can be replaced. We all can. It happened five times in fifteen years and now I’m getting a reminder, but this time it’ll only be about a one week I think.
My mother turned 93 last month and five of her eight children helped her celebrate. All of us have taken care of her in one way or another for years whenever she’s needed it. We’re all glad to do it because she took care of us. Now my kids are pitching in for me when I need it. It’s a wonderful arrangement and it used to be the norm, but that’s changing. Visiting the Portland environs regularly the past five years, I’ve noticed far more people out and about with dogs instead of children. It’s a definite trend and a troubling one. Dogs are fine, but as substitutes for children?
Last May, France’s President Macron became the twelfth European Union leader who never had children. Others include Italy’s, Scotland’s, Germany’s, Luxembourg’s, Sweden’s, Holland’s, Latvia’s, Romania’s, Lithuania’s, and the EU President, Jean-Claude Juncker as well. I noticed the trend in my old profession. A fellow teacher leaned over at a contentious staff meeting and whispered: “Ever notice that the teachers who constantly profess to ‘care about the children’ the most never had any?” I looked around and realized he was right. It’s a definite trend and I don’t believe it’s a good thing.
Raising children can be expensive, time-consuming, heart-breaking, and tedious. It’s also rewarding, meaningful, heartening, fulfilling, wonderful, and sometimes you get grandchildren in the bargain. They’re terrific. All that experience changes us. Rising to the challenges of parenthood improves us and confers wisdom, and to completely deny ourselves is to diminish life. When parents and grandparents make plans, the needs of our offspring get major consideration that is personal as well as professional.The Maker of us all knows this and I suspect it’s part of His protocol for those who would lead us. Some politicians may not be childless by choice and parenthood isn’t a necessary precondition for wisdom, but it’s a plentiful source of it.
As we rural folks go without electricity and all its amenities for however long during this latest shakeup, we will appreciate them when they come back. Then let us remain in that state of mind as long as we can.
Comments