There’s really no other way to put this:
A quick reading of the measure that will go before San Francisco voters in November to decriminalize prostitution easily could leave you with the misimpression that the measure is an exercise in fairness that demands that prosecutors go after men who abuse prostitutes and implement policies “to reduce institutional violence and discrimination against prostitutes.” A careful reading of the initiative, “Enforcement of Laws Related to Prostitution and Sex Workers,” however, shows a measure that shields child prostitution and traffickers of human beings.
“If I had just heard from the proponents, I would probably vote for it myself,” said the Rev. Glenda Hope, whose San Francisco Network Ministries helped found the Tenderloin AIDS Resource, in the mistaken belief the measure is meant “to protect women.” But as the executive director of SafeHouse, a residential center that helps women get off the streets, Hope knows too much.
…the San Francisco ballot measure completely ignores the prostitution of children. The measure simply states, “Law enforcement agencies shall not allocate any resources for the investigation and prosecution of prostitutes for prostitution.” Astonishingly, there’s no exemption that encourages police to enforce the law for minors.
If the measure passes, the city is likely to become an international haven for pimps who peddle girls and boys, and perverts seeking sex with minors.
And where does that leave Bay Area youth? “They want new and young,” Jasmine, a former teen prostitute from Oakland who now volunteers for the nonprofit SAGE Project, which fights sexual exploitation, explained to me.
Thus the tail end of the sexual revolution - a ballot measure to allow men (and it will be almost exclusively men) to legally procure boys and girls for sexual gratification. When you de-couple sex from marriage and child-rearing, this is precisely what you get as was predicted back in the 60’s when the concepts underlying the sexual revolution first gained a mainstream foothold. This is absolutely no surprise at all - its digusting, but not a surprise. The piece goes on to note that some are expecting the ballot measure to pass rather handily as San Francisco is a “sex-positive” city - meaning, presumptively, that there is so much selfishness and demand for personal gratification that San Francisco may very well cut itself entirley off from civlization and descend to a level of depravity untouched since the worst of Nero.
You see, back when it was first seriously proposed that we de-stigmatize pre- and extra-marital sex and all manner of sexual deviation those who opposed it weren’t just a bunch of squares with sexual hang-ups who just didn’t want anyone having fun. Not, it wasn’t like that at all - the concept was opposed because it was already known what would come of it. It was known - not guessed-at, not theorised over; known. This is because, waaaay back when, Christianity was (among other things, of course) the cure for a society which had allowed sexual licentiousness to descend to such a level that child-bearing and -rearing was considered a burden and personal sexual gratification trumped all, no matter how sterile and un-fulfilling it steadily became. Christianity knew this in 60, 560, 1060, 1560, 1960 and will continue to know it in 2060 - sex is a powerful thing, and unless carefully contained within proper limits this great gift becomes a taskmaster and a means of self-destruction.
And now San Francisco proposes to legalise the worst of it - because people want it and want it now and exactly how they want it and everyone else can go to Hell as far as they are concerned, San Francisco may do this horrible thing. And then we’ll await the inevitible lawsuit, claiming that the right to privacy means that not only San Francisco, but the whole nation must turn a blind eye to the sexual exploitation of youth. How it will come out will remain to be seen - unless, of course, it turns out there is some remaining level of human decency in San Francisco and this terrible, anti-human initiative is defeated.
UPDATE: And the Democrats endorse.
Tags: child abuse, Christianity, Enforcement of Laws Related to Prostitution and Sex Wor, morality, San Francisco
August 17th, 2008
‘The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.’
-Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America
The Tenth Amendment, which is supposed to hold weight equal to the First, Second and every other Amendment to the United States Constitution, has in the last 80 years been regarded as “a nice idea” but optional. This has resulted in usurpation of powers from the States in everything from health care to education (and everything in between).
Far from being taken seriously, the Tenth Amendment has become the red-headed stepchild of the Constitution, and has been ignored with impunity by the Federal government.
There is a movement afoot in Oklahoma, however, to rectify the situation:
Oklahomans are trying to recover some of their lost state sovereignty by House Joint Resolution 1089, introduced by State Rep. Charles Key.
The resolution’s language, in part, reads: “Whereas, the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States reads as follows: ‘The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people.’; and Whereas, the Tenth Amendment defines the total scope of federal power as being that specifically granted by the Constitution of the United States and no more; and whereas, the scope of power defined by the Tenth Amendment means that the federal government was created by the states specifically to be an agent of the states; and Whereas, today, in 2008, the states are demonstrably treated as agents of the federal government. … Now, therefore, be it resolved by the House of Representatives and the Senate of the 2nd session of the 51st Oklahoma Legislature: that the State of Oklahoma hereby claims sovereignty under the Tenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States over all powers not otherwise enumerated and granted to the federal government by the Constitution of the United States. That this serve as Notice and Demand to the federal government, as our agent, to cease and desist, effective immediately, mandates that are beyond the scope of these constitutionally delegated powers.”
The measure passed overwhelmingly in the Oklahoma State House of Representatives, but was hung up in the State Senate (sound familiar?) However, Representative Charles Kay plans to re-introduce the measure when the Oklahoma State House reconvenes next year.
What would upholding the Tenth Amendment entail? Walter E. Williams writes,
Federal usurpation goes beyond anything the Constitution’s framers would have imagined. James Madison, explaining the constitution, in Federalist Paper 45, said, “The powers delegated … to the federal government are few and defined. Those which are to remain in the State governments are numerous and indefinite. The former will be exercised principally on external objects, [such] as war, peace, negotiation, and foreign commerce. … The powers reserved to the several States will extend to all the objects which, in the ordinary course of affairs, concern the lives, liberties, and properties of the people.” Thomas Jefferson emphasized that the states are not “subordinate” to the national government, but rather the two are “coordinate departments of one simple and integral whole. … The one is the domestic, the other the foreign branch of the same government.”
Of course, the eye of the needle through which the camel squeezed its head was the Fourteenth Amendment, which gave the Federal government the authority to regulate interstate commerce. All well and good; however, meaning of the term “commerce” has been twisted and manipulated to not only cover business transactions between residents of different states, but everything else under the sun:
These scholars interpret interstate commerce to mean “substantial interstate human relations” and find this consistent with the meaning of commerce at the time of the writing of the Constitution. They also argue that this expansive interpretation makes more sense for the foreign and Indian commerce clauses as one would expect Congress to be given authority to regulate non-economic relations with other nations and with Indian tribes.
This ‘liberal translation’ of the term, ‘commerce,’ of course, flies in the face of Jefferson’s writings; which is SOP for liberals, who true to their moniker often take great liberty in using the words of the Constitution as so much silly puddy to bend and shape their meaning to fit their cause d’jour. This led to the creation of FDR’s “New Deal,” which led to the notion that the government pretty much had the right to step in to any situation, for any reason, if there was any indication of interstate commerce whatsoever. While minor shifts toward state’s rights have occurred in between, the Federal Government still maintains overwhelming authority over areas of our lives in which they Constitutionally have no business to regulate.
This could be the start of a groundswell of opportunity to defeat Federal usurpation of power, and to once and for all defeat the federal imposition of liberalism and its even uglier cousin, socialism. I look forward to a Republican legislator from my home state of Minnesota to take up this mantle (I know it won’t be a democrat).
Tags: 14th Amendment, Constitution, State's Rights, Tenth Amendment
July 29th, 2008
Blogs for Victory offers its 100% endorsement of this Act:
February 6th, 2008 - Washington, D.C. - Today, U.S. Senators Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina), Saxby Chambliss (R-Georgia), Tom Coburn, M.D. (R-Oklahoma), John Cornyn (R-Texas), James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma), and David Vitter (R-Louisiana) introduced the Semper Fi Act of 2008. The bill would rescind over $2 million in hidden earmarks for Berkeley, California in the 2008 Omnibus Appropriations bill, and transfer the funds to the Marine Corps. U.S. Congressman John Campbell (R-California) is introducing a companion bill in the House of Representatives.
Last week, the City Council of Berkeley voted to oust Marine Corps recruiters from their downtown office, saying the Marines were “uninvited and unwelcome intruders.” Berkeley officials also voted to give the radical protest group Code Pink space outside the recruitment office and urged them to “impede, passively or actively” the work of Marine Corps recruiters.
One earmark provides $243,000 in taxpayer dollars for the organization Chez Panisse to create gourmet organic school lunches in the Berkeley School District. Chez Panisse is dedicated to “environmental harmony” and their menu features “Comté cheese soufflé with mâche salad,” “Meyer lemon éclairs with huckleberry coulis,” and “Chicory salad with creamy anchovy vinaigrette and olive toast.”
Another earmark would spend $975,000 in taxpayer dollars for the University of California in Berkeley Matsui Center for Politics and Public Service, to create a new endowment and cataloging the papers of Congressman Robert Matsui. U.C. Berkeley currently already has a $3.5 billion endowment.
Actions have consequences - Berkerely hoped they could get some typically cheap leftwing moralism, but what they have done is insulted each and every man or woman who has ever worn the uniform of the United States Armed forces, especially those of the United States Marine Corps (which includes my 81 year old father, who joined the Marines at 17 in 1944 to defend the freedom of the American people - a freedom the people of Berkeley have degraded into the gutter). Money is, of course, is the prime desire of the left, as it allows the left to buy power. This money, it goes without saying, is desired without the requirement of earning it. Addicted to government largesse, the best way to punish them for their unpatriotic insults is to cut them off from the federal teat.
Tags: Berkeley, US Military, USMC
February 8th, 2008
From the Wall Street Journal:
As every reformed addict knows, the road to recovery is long and hard. So it is for Republicans who became addicted to spending “earmarks” while running Congress, lost their majority in large part because of it, and are now struggling with mixed results to dry out.
Their latest halting effort in what appears to be at least a 12-step recovery plan will come tonight, when President Bush uses his State of the Union address to lay down his toughest anti-earmarking pledge to date. We’re told he will tell Congress that he will veto any fiscal 2009 spending bill that doesn’t cut earmarks in half from 2008 levels. He will also report that he is issuing a Presidential order informing executive departments that from now on they should refuse to fund earmarks that aren’t explicitly mentioned in statutory language.
Excellent - good government, excellent reform…and it jams Democrats up against a wall on this issue they pretended to care about in 2006 and 2007. They either have to go along with President Bush - and anger their narrow special interests - or oppose him, and anger everyone else. This is the sort of thing we’ll have to do all through 2008 - keep forcing Democrats to choose between the high-sounding rhetoric and their disgraceful reality.
Tags: Earmarks, government reform, government spending, State of the Union
January 28th, 2008
According to an independent study by CRA International:
Energy legislation pending in Congress likely would have significant adverse effects on the economy and consumers – including nearly 5 million lost jobs and $1 trillion in lost economic output, according to a report released today by API.
The study, prepared by CRA International and commissioned by API, found that the combined effect of seven legislative proposals would restrict the supply of energy available to the U.S. economy and would likely increase the cost of energy supplies to consumers and businesses.
“This legislation would put consumers in a squeeze,” said W. David Montgomery, a vice president and co-head of CRA’s energy and environmental practice. John Felmy, API’s chief economist, said: “This study points out the folly of energy legislation based on taxing the oil industry and raising the cost of energy to consumers.”
Higher energy costs likely would reduce total consumption, employment, investment and economic output, the study found. In addition, the study also found that by 2030: Economic output likely would decline 4 percent, or more than $1 trillion; non-farm job losses caused by higher energy costs likely would result in nearly 5 million lost jobs, and households likely would suffer about a $1,700 reduction in real income.
API is the industry’s national trade association that represents all aspects of America’s oil and natural gas industry. CRA is a worldwide leader in providing economic, financial and management consulting services.
A PDF of the Proposed Energy Bill Study Report is available here.
Tags: Energy Bill, jobs
November 14th, 2007
