Brown Pelican Society of Louisiana

NEW ORLEANS –The federal government is shutting down the dredging that was being done to create protective sand berms in the Gulf of Mexico.The berms are meant to protect the Louisiana coastline from oil. But the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Department has concerns about where the dredging is being done.Plaquemines Parish President Billy Nungesser, who was one of the most vocal advocates of the dredging plan, has sent a letter to President Barack Obama, pleading for the work to continue.Nungesser said the government has asked crews to move the dredging site two more miles farther off the coastline.”Once again, our government resource agencies, which are intended to protect us, are now leaving us vulnerable to the destruction of our coastline and marshes by the impending oil,” Nungesser wrote to Obama. “Furthermore, with the threat of hurricanes or tropical storms, we are being put at an increased risk for devastation to our area from the intrusion of oil.Nungesser has asked for the dredging to continue for the next seven days, the amount of time it would take to move the dredging operations two miles and out resume work.Work is scheduled to halt at midnight Wednesday.The California dredge located off the Chandelier Islands has pumped more than 50,000 cubic yards of material daily to create a sand berm, according to Plaquemines Parish officials.Nungesser’s letter includes an emotional plea to the president.”Please don’t let them shut this dredge down,” he wrote. “This requires your immediate attention!”

http://www.wdsu.com/news/23997498/detail.html

October 31, 2008 — Obama does not want to IMPROVE America, he wants to CHANGE it.
Barack Obama at the University of Missouri in Columbia on Thursday, October 30th, 5 days before the election.

By Henry Lamb, Renew America, June 20, 2010

Obama believes in the rule of law — his law. No other law is relevant. No other law matters. When Obama speaks, he expects the world to obey.

In his Tuesday night performance, he said “I will meet with the chairman of BP and inform him that he is to set aside whatever resources are required to compensate the workers and business…” “Inform him?” Where does Barack Hussein Obama get the authority to issue orders to the CEO of a private corporation? There is no such authority in the Constitution. There is no law that empowers the president to “inform” the CEO of any corporation how he will spend the corporation’s money. Obama couldn’t care less about the Constitution or the law.

There was no Constitutional authority for him to essentially take over General Motors and Chrysler, or the banks. Obama couldn’t care less about the law. When he speaks, he expects the world to obey.

There is no Constitutional authority for the federal government to require American citizens to purchase health insurance or any other product or service. It doesn’t matter. Obama spoke; his Congressional majority of comrades obeyed.

In 18 months, the man has demonstrated that he cares nothing about the system of government created by our founders and enshrined in the Constitution. He has demonstrated that he fully intends to “fundamentally transform” the United States of America — as he promised in his campaign. Now we are beginning to get a picture of the nation he intends to build. The picture is frightening.

Virtually everything Obama has done since taking office has expanded both the size and power of the federal government. The federal government our founders constructed is a government limited to the specific powers enumerated in the Constitution. Those powers not enumerated are expressly reserved to the states and to the people.

Obama can’t comprehend any limitations on his power. The moment Arizona enacted a law that empowered state law enforcement officers to check for citizenship, Obama bad-mouthed the state legislature and Governor — without even reading the law. There have been arrogant presidents before, but none that can compare to the sickening self-centered narcissism that exudes from this man.

Obama’s declaration that America must end its addiction to oil misses the point entirely. America is not addicted to oil at all; America is addicted to the life-style made possible by the most efficient, abundant energy source yet discovered. Americans would be delighted to move to any energy source that will provide the same or better life-style at less cost.

In a capitalist society such as America, government’s role in the market is limited to providing a level playing field for the entrepreneurs who risk their own assets to provide a product or service in hopes of making a profit. Only in totalitarian systems are markets managed by government.

The reason the nation has not switched to solar or wind, or other alternative energy sources has nothing to do with our addiction to oil; it has everything to do with cost and convenience.

Obama has decided that cost is irrelevant. He wants to wean America from oil and bond the nation to exotic alternatives, regardless of the cost. When Obama speaks, he expects people to obey. He is ready to artificially and unnecessarily increase the cost of carbon fuels in the form of taxes and fees, in order to fund subsidies for wind and solar energy sources. It doesn’t matter to Obama that the environmental disaster that will be created by the solar farms and wind farms is much greater than the Gulf oil spill.

The Gulf oil spill will eventually be capped and cleaned; once a solar farm is built to supply energy to a community, it will never go away; it will only expand. The biodiversity that once flourished where the solar farm now is will never be restored. The land area will be devoid of biodiversity.

Obama and his Congressional comrades absolutely refuse to consider allowing the development of oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. Of the entire 19-million acre area, only 2,000 acres would be disturbed, an area of 3.125 square miles. But they have no problem condemning 25,700 square miles of America to be paved over with solar panels. This is the area required to replace electricity use with solar energy. This is an area roughly equal to the states of Vermont, New Jersey, Connecticut, Delaware and Rhode Island. To replace the carbon energy used by transportation with electricity, at least Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina would need to be added to the land area forever lost to agriculture, housing, or biodiversity.

Nevertheless, Obama has spoken. He expects people to obey.

What’s most dangerous about this man is his restructuring the government to be operated by a collection of appointed czars, who are not accountable to Congress, who can exercise powers not granted to the government to achieve nearly dictatorial authority over the citizens of the United States.

This is a limited look at only a few areas of domestic policy; his vision for the rest of the world is even more frightening. That’s for another day.

http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/lamb/100620

Mark Shea, Catholic Exchange, June 23, 2010

June 23, 2010
Wednesday of the Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time
Father Edward McIlmail, LC

Matthew 7:15-20
Jesus said to his disciples: “Beware of false prophets, who come to you in sheep´s clothing, but underneath are ravenous wolves. By their fruits you will know them. Do people pick grapes from thorn bushes, or figs from thistles? Just so, every good tree bears good fruit, and a rotten tree bears bad fruit. A good tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor can a rotten tree bear good fruit. Every tree that does not bear good fruit will be cut down and thrown into the fire. So by their fruits you will know them.”

Introductory Prayer: Lord, before I can produce anything lasting in my life, I need to be united to you in prayer. Aware of my weakness and inclination to sin, I trust all the more in your forgiveness and mercy. I believe in your presence in the Eucharist. It gives me the assurances that you really are with your Church until the end of time.

Petition: Lord, help me to see more easily the goodness in people around me.

1. Wolves in Sheepskins Today we abound with information, but are short on guidance. The media tell us that abortion is OK, that stem-cell research on human embryos is compassionate, that same-sex marriage equals tolerance. Wayward faithful ignore or insult papal teachings. “The time will come when people will not tolerate sound doctrine but, following their own desires and insatiable curiosity, will accumulate teachers and will stop listening to the truth and will be diverted to myths” (2 Timothy 4:3-4). How do I judge what I hear day by day? How do I gauge what the media tell me? Do I absorb everything I hear like a sponge? Or do I try to find out what the Church says on issues? Am I aware of how much the media can steal my interior peace? That it can leave me thinking in a very worldly way?

2. See The Fruits Our Lord gives us a good criterion for gauging the work of other people: We are to look at what they produce. The people we see daily on television — do their lives seem peaceful and happy? Are their families stable? Often, the most stable among us are those who live low-key lives. God often chooses to work outside of the spotlight. He works in those families that quietly raise their children in the faith. What lasting fruits am I producing for God? If married, have I been open to new life? If single, do I dedicate a fair amount of time to serving others? Do I help my friends learn about Christ? Do I help worthwhile charities?

3. Misjudging The problem of judging can go the other direction. We might think that someone isn´t a good person, or that he isn´t very talented. Yet we are surprised, sometimes years later, to find that same person living in a near-perfect marriage, raising a happy family, or producing a thriving work of charity. Was our initial judgment faulty? If so, why? Do we recognize and appreciate virtue in others? Or are we fixated on the externals: Their looks? Their wealth? Their bubbly personality? What does that say about my hierarchy of values?

Conversation with Christ: Lord, I am surrounded by views of the world — so many opinions, so much information. I sometimes feel overwhelmed. Let me see in your vicar on earth, the Pope, the safe and sure path to follow in the midst of confusion.

Resolution: I will compliment someone for the hidden, but lasting, work they are doing for the Kingdom.

http://www.regnumchristi.org/english/articulos/articulo.phtml?se=363&ca=975&te=735&id=20302

CATHOLIC NEWS AGENCY, JUNE 23, 2010

Blessed Basil Hopko is considered one of the many priests and religious martyred by Communism. He was born in Slovakia to poor parents. His father died when he was a year old and his mother left for the United States when he was four in seach of work.

He remained in Europe and was an excellent student. He wanted to join his mother in the United States and pursue his vocation to the priesthood there, but his poor health did not permit him to travel.

He was ordained in 1929 and served as a parish priest in Prague, with a spcial mission to the poor, the unemployed and students. In 1947, he was named auxiliary bishop of Prjashev. Three years later, he was arrested by Communist officials and tortured.

He was given a trial and sentenced to 15 years for “subversive activity.” His health failed as he was continually tortured. In 1964, he was transferred to a home for seniors. There, he was kept under guard but managed to minister to a group of 120 nuns who had been imprisoned in the home as well.

Though his eparchy was restored in 1968, officials did not permit him to resume his leadership. A Slovak bishop was appointed in his place. He never recovered from his health and died in 1976. He was beatified by Pope John Paul II in 2003 in the Slovak Republic.

Bishops who live in glass cathedrals shouldn’t throw stones.

This program is from RealCatholicTV.com

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WHERE’S THE HEALTHCARE?

Obama to announce new ‘benefits’…

Insurance Premiums Jump…

Obama’s Two Dads

In the 100 years of Father’s Days, not one President had ever used the occasion to push a political agenda. Until now. In what has been a traditionally non-newsworthy event, the White House issued a proclamation yesterday honoring U.S. dads. Proving that nothing is sacred–not even fatherhood–the President couldn’t resist a shout-out to his homosexual base, marring what should have been a powerful acknowledgement of the family’s importance in American life. Recognizing that “nurturing families come in many forms,” President Obama intentionally included “two fathers” in that list, an obvious overture to the rich homosexual donors who have been driving much of his legislative agenda lately. This is not only a departure from the societies norm, but a radical shift even from the White House’s 2009 statement, which singled out “surrogate fathers” who help “raise, mentor, or care for someone else’s child.” In an age when 24 million children are growing up without a father at home, the President’s focus should be on the relationship of fathers to their children, not to their partners. This detour to promote homosexuality injects division into an issue that demands the attention of every community and political party. If there’s to be any relief from this rising trend of absentee dads, the promotion of fatherhood will have to come before the promotion of the President’s extreme social agenda. Instead, this administration is chipping away at the family with laser-like precision. It made the same overture to homosexuals last month on Mother’s Day, but no one picked up on the President’s nod in all of the media frenzy over Elena Kagan’s nomination. Sadly, the real victims of his agenda are the children, who, social science shows, do best with a married mother and father. Kids need the influence of both genders, and no two people–however loving they may be–can fill the void that’s created when you intentionally deprive them of a mom or dad. Unfortunately, there’s a vacuum in our culture that’s allowing the President to push this agenda. The breakdown of the family has created an opening for the Left to barge in and seize on those weaknesses. That’s why it’s so important for America–and churches, in particular–to renew their commitment to strengthening and upholding marriage. This kind of change isn’t up to Congress or the White House. It’s up to each one of us to take responsibility for our families.

Kagan Lacks Wisdom of Solomon

Last week Senate Judiciary Chairman Pat Leahy (D-Vt.) took to the Senate floor to defend President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee Elena Kagan’s role in kicking military recruiters off of Harvard’s campus while she was the law school dean. He might have wanted to wait to read the new documents released this weekend that show that not only was Elena Kagan key in kicking military recruiters off campus, directly violating U.S. law, she did so more or less independently–not even consulting the dean of Harvard University, Lawrence Summers. The law she violated was the Solomon amendment that insists that if your university accepts federal funds it should also accept military recruiters. She called the current policy of “Don’t Ask Don’t Tell,” which was created by her future boss President Bill Clinton and supported by the Democratic Congress at the time, “a moral injustice of the first order.” She was so outraged that she did not work with the Pentagon to find a solution, instead leaving that work to others, which was fine to Military leaders at the time who found her hostility to them prevalent. If Ms. Kagan has such disdain for passed legislation she disagrees with that she is willing to violate the law instead of seeking a solution, does she really have the temperament to have a permanent seat on the U.S. Supreme Court?

Obama’s Selective Hearing on Military Concerns

Defense Secretary Robert Gates had an interesting take on what is wrong with the Defense Authorization over the weekend. He reiterated a veto threat of the legislation over a dispute on funding for some jet engines that the military is saying they don’t want, but members of Congress are funding anyway. Citizens Against Government Waste Tom Schatz has highlighted the problems with the spending on the jet engines, “Two presidents, two secretaries of defense, a phalanx of top military officials, and a majority of the Senate have all agreed that this program should be terminated.” I agree with Tom and the President that if the military doesn’t want the engines, there is no reason that taxpayers should be funding them; however, it is curious how the President seems to pick and choose when he listens to what our fighting men and women are saying. Also included in the House and Senate versions of the Defense Authorizations is language that would change the current policy on not allowing homosexuals to serve openly in the military, despite the top four of the service chiefs asking Congress to wait till they have completed their review and gotten feedback from the troops. Additionally the Senate version includes language that would effectively turn our military hospitals into abortion facilities, which in the past was opposed by a majority of military doctors and nurses. The President rightfully doesn’t believe that the military should be used as a cash cow by Congress however he has no problem using them as lab rats for his social agenda.

http://www.frc.org/get.cfm?i=WU10F16&f=PG07J01

….It looks like American women may soon have another way to kill their unborn children…..

Susan B. Anthony, 18 Jun 2010

It looks like American women may soon have another way to kill their unborn children. Yesterday  Reuters reported that the FDA Advisory Board unanimously approved uripristal acetate, to be marketed in the US as “Ella” by Watson Pharmaceuticals, as a safe and effective “emergency contraceptive.” Ella is being billed as a pumped up morning after pill that can “prevent pregnancy” up to 5 days after intercourse, 2 full days longer than the traditional morning after pill (Plan B). Lifenews reported on a study published by the Lancet which compared the two drugs, that for the group that took the drug between 3-5 days after having sex, only women taking the traditional morning after pill became pregnant.

The reality is that Ella is more than contraception, and does more than “preventing pregnancies.” Like Plan B, one of the ways in which the drug works is by interfering with the lining in the uterus.  Ella blocks the hormone progesterone, making implantation of the embryo impossible. Since the drug is meant to be taken up to five days after intercourse, it is likely that conception has already taken place and that the use of Ella will effectively cause abortion. Ella goes even further than Plan B though, because it is more chemically similar to RU-486, the abortion pill.

According to the American Association of Pro-Life Obstetricians and Gynecologists (AAPLOG), the medical literature has established that Ella “has the ability to destroy established pregnancies as well as prevent implantation.” The drug’s effects on the uterine lining threaten the ability of the embryo to survive if already implanted. Because of the drug’s abortifacient properties and similarity to RU-486, AAPLOG has recommended that it have the highest black box warning, a type of warning that appears on the package insert for prescription drugs that may cause serious adverse effects, if approved for sale.

Besides causing abortions, there is also a concern with the effects of Ella on women and on babies who survive the drug. As AAPLOG pointed out to the FDA, “ulipristal’s potential effects on women who used the drug off-label (with an unapproved purpose, dosage, etc.) and upon ongoing pregnancies are essentially unexamined and untested.” There is also little information on the effects of the drug on women who take it multiple times, and The European Medicines Agency’s Committee for Medicinal Products for Human Use studied the drug and admits there is not much known about how the drug would affect a woman who did get pregnant. The adverse events reported during clinical trials of the drug are also similar to those of mifepristone (RU-486), such as increased infections, ovarian pain, ovarian cyst formation and bleeding disturbances. The approval of Ella in the US would essentially be taking the next generation of RU-486, which is known to present health risks for women (13 women have died from taking the drug), and making it even more accessible.

Ella is currently marketed in Europe under the brand name ellaOne by prescription, and if the drug makes it through the final stages of FDA approval it will be available by prescription in the US. However, since Plan B also started out as a prescription only drug and is now available over the counter, there is a scary possibility that it could be approved for over the counter sales sometime in the future.

Ella is not the next great emergency contraception option, as heralded by pro-abortion feminists, but rather the next scarily convenient abortion option. In some ways the pro-abortion reaction to the drug is ironic. The arrival of Ella has pro-aborts suddenly clamoring about the insufficiencies of current contraception options. According to Dr. Christiane Northrup of the Huffington Post, “contraceptive failures happen even in ideal users. That means that there will always be a role for the morning-after pill. Ella does this job particularly well.”

This is strange for those who are used to pro-aborts generally glorifying the effectiveness of contraception, to the point of claiming that contraception reduces the need for abortion. A pro-lifer who does not advocate increased contraception, for whatever reason (and there are good ones), will often run into criticism saying that they are not helping their own cause. The fact is, contraception does not always work. And when it doesn’t work, women who think they have acted responsibly, women who have done everything society has told them to do to avoid pregnancy, think that they do not deserve to be pregnant and turn to abortion. According to Planned Parenthood’s own research arm, the Guttmacher institute, typical use of the Pill has an 8.7% failure rate, and 54% of the women who have abortions have used contraception the month they became pregnant. Far from contraception preventing abortion, in their efforts to create perfect contraception, pro-abortion feminists have conflated abortion and contraception in Ella.

http://www.suzyb.org/blog/_archives/2010/6/18/4556394.html

Kyl Says Obama Said No Border Security for Political Reasons

June 19, 2010 — On June 18, 2010, Arizona Republican Senator Jon Kyl told the audience at a North Tempe Tea Party town hall meeting that during a private, one-on-one meeting with President Obama in the Oval Office, the President told him, regarding securing the southern border with Mexico, “The problem is, . . . if we secure the border, then you all won’t have any reason to support ‘comprehensive immigration reform.’” [Audible gasps were heard throughout the audience.] Sen. Kyl continued, “In other words, they’re holding it hostage. They don’t want to secure the border unless and until it is combined with ‘comprehensive immigration reform.’”

Sen. Kyl also said he reminded President Obama that the President and the Congress has an obligation, a duty, to secure the border.

http://www.redstate.com/coldwarrior/2…

Read more:  http://www.americansforprosperity.org/061810-americans-prosperity-slams-fcc%e2%80%99s-internet-takeover-attempt#ixzz0raDw8Wdi

SOURCE:  Jill Stanek, June 21, 2010

By Demi Bardsley, Concerned Women for America, June 2010

Over $320 million of state, local, and federal funding goes to Planned Parenthood every year (almost a third of its income).  However, thanks to its lucrative abortion services, this “non-profit” reported a net income of approximately $106,000,000 from July 2008-July 2009.

Abby Johnson, a former Planned Parenthood director who had a change of heart and is now pro-life, says, “Every meeting that we had was, ‘We don’t have enough money, we don’t have enough money — we’ve got to keep these abortions coming.’” Johnson told a reporter for Foxnews.com, “It’s a very lucrative business, and that’s why they want to increase numbers.”

My own mother is one of the millions of women who have been lied to and hurt by abortion clinic greed over the years.  Below is just part of her story:

I married very young and got divorced a couple years after — started partying all the time, had a warped body image, and figured my looks were all that mattered in life.  When I was at my best and most promiscuous, eventually the result of my lifestyle was a pregnancy.  I lived a mile away from the local clinic.  Easy way out?  Abortion.  So many of my friends had them all the time.  And I didn’t need to tell the guy, after all.  The night I met him at a club, I really just wanted to be with him out of loneliness, and I was feeling horrendously guilty over that mistake as it was.

Obtaining my first abortion was as easy as buying burgers and fries at your local McDonalds!  Make the appointment, bring your cash, and it’s over.  The burden would be lifted.  No weight gain, no responsibility, etc.  Yes, that was my reason.  Easy birth control method — that’s why most women do it.

Pregnant again — for a second time! Easy — abortion clinic, get ‘em in, get ‘em out.  No problem.  Line up in the chairs along the wall like cattle.  It was attractively decorated in there.  I remember this guy with white hair who walked around in there every time who looked sorta like Thomas Dolby.  They tried to keep the girls’ spirits up by complimenting us on various things.  One time I got props for having high iron levels.  Hooray!

And then … I got pregnant a third time.  What to do?  This time, I put more thought into it.  What would others think if they found out I had a third abortion?

I had a job in a doctor’s office working along side other Christians who were sharing Christ with me, and I started to have a conscience, but no one talked me out of it.  My selfish desires ruled.  I couldn’t bear to get fat.  Besides, the thing inside of me was just a blob of cells — or so they said.  As I walked into the clinic for the third time, I felt a tug to walk out, I noticed the old ladies praying for me on the sidewalk, and the clinic workers yelling at them.  I walked in.  I asked the intake person if it was normal for a girl to come in a third time.  She said, “Absolutely, don’t worry.  You’re just Fertile Myrtle.”  Well, phew.  I felt a lot better.

My mom’s story is just one of many.  She now suffers from numerous physical problems that are a result of the three procedures she went through at this clinic and every day deals with not only that but the emotional consequences of abortion.  Her two pregnancies afterward were wrought with complications and bed rest.

Women put their trust in Planned Parenthood to care for and guide them.  They should be regarded as more than just a commodity and an opportunity for profit.

In the “Who We Are” section of its website, Planned Parenthood states that it is “America’s most trusted provider of reproductive health care.”  But have Planned Parenthood and the abortion industry earned that kind of trust?

Besides violating women’s trust on a personal level, Planned Parenthood has legal trouble to deal with as a result of not reporting statutory rape or abuse cases with which they’ve been presented in their clinics.

Their website also claims that “one in four American women has chosen Planned Parenthood for health care at least once in her life.”  This is an astounding statistic.  If it is indeed true that 25 percent of American women have received services from this organization, shouldn’t they be held to the highest standards possible?

Take Action: As noted in the June 17 Concerned Women Blog posting, Rep. Mike Pence (R-Indiana) has introduced the Title X Abortion Provider Prohibition Act, H.R. 614, which would stop government funding of abortion providers.  While it doesn’t reduce the money available for genuine family planning services, it does prohibit government funds from going to abortion providers.  Some of our good friends and heroes support this bill, like Reps. Joseph Pitts (R-Pennsylvania), Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Washington), and Trent Franks (R-Arizona).   Please call your Representatives and ask them to support H.R. 614 to defund Planned Parenthood!

By Steve Kelley

By  Michael Ramirez

Andrew C. McCarthy, National Review, June 22, 2010

For a dozen years, leftist organizations styling themselves as proponents of international humanitarian law have campaigned to undermine the laws prohibiting material support to terrorism. On Monday, the U.S. Supreme Court finally swept aside this challenge, forcefully upholding one of our nation’s most crucial counterterrorism tools.

The principle operating here is that terrorism is barbaric, contravening both international law’s imperative to protect civilians and the civilized international norms that promote resolution of political disputes by negotiation, not assassination. Therefore, al-Qaeda, Hezbollah, Hamas, and the two terrorist organizations at issue in the epic Humanitarian Law litigation, the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE) and the Kurdistan Workers Party (Partiya Karkeran Kurdistan, or PKK), must be treated as pariahs, ostracized and suffocated until they either are annihilated or convincingly abandon terrorism as a method.

This would seem to be common sense. Yet transnational progressives, under the auspices of “humanitarian law,” have hitched their wagons to the terrorists’ stars. Their aim is to promote their post-sovereign agenda, the subordination of national-security concerns to the “engagement” of terrorists in multilateral processes. The Humanitarian Law Project contended that the material-support laws’ ban on providing training, expert advice, services, or personnel to FTOs stymied their desire to, example, train terrorists “to use humanitarian and international law to peacefully resolve disputes,” to teach them “how to petition various representative bodies such as the United Nations for relief,” to conduct political advocacy on the terrorists’ behalf, to offer their legal expertise to help the terrorists negotiate peace agreements, to show the Tamil Tigers how to “present claims for tsunami relief to mediators and international bodies,” and so on.
Continue reading →

With President Obama’s out-of-control spending, now is the time for a balanced-budget amendment.

By Sen. Jim DeMint, Human Events, 06/22/2010

Death by debt isn’t only a Greek tragedy, it’s downright common. Powerful nations all the way from Rome to Russia have killed their economies by spending more than they had. And, if the American people don’t stage an intervention soon, the United States may do the same.

The federal government will soon be paying more in interest on the national debt than we spend on national defense. The national debt represents 93% of our total gross domestic product (GDP) with foreign governments like China and private entities owning nearly half that debt.

Surely, one of the world’s greatest debtors cannot remain the world’s greatest superpower for long. As the world’s champion of freedom, we cannot afford to be enslaved by those who control our line of credit.

Many have feared our nation slipping toward a European Socialist-style economy, yet today the U.S. wouldn’t even qualify for entry into the European Union which requires a debt-to-GDP ratio of below 60%.

Although the Berlin Wall fell over 20 years ago, freedom is not guaranteed for any country. The prospect of losing freedom is very real, especially to people like Marco Rubio, who’s running to become the next Republican senator from Florida. His parents lost their home country to communism. They fled Cuba without a dollar in their pockets in hopes of finding freedom for their family in the U.S. They did. Today Rubio is fighting to keep this country free for his children.

“The world is a safer place when America is the strongest country in the world,” Rubio has said. “But America’s security relies as much on our economic vitality and power as it does our military and diplomatic strength. Our enemies care as much about our debt as they do about our missiles. And they dream not only of more days like September 11, but also a Greece-like day of reckoning in America.”

Budget Embarrassment

The debt crisis in Greece is ominous and all too close to America. The Democrats have mapped out a future dominated by debt and deficits with no way out. After creating a massive new entitlement program in Obamacare, borrowing another $700 billion on a failed stimulus plan, giving a $787 billion blank check to Treasury under TARP, the Democratic Congress isn’t even bothering to offer a new budget. They don’t want anyone to know how much more they plan to spend.

By all appearances, the White House has given up on budget cuts without even trying. The Associated Press reported that White House Budget Director Peter Orszag recently told the liberal Center for American Progress that if the White House sent Congress a package of budget cuts it would probably “go nowhere.” And President Obama recently asked Congress for tens of billions in new stimulus funds to save the jobs his first stimulus didn’t save.

The Democrats still believe they can spend their way out of the recession. They’re wrong, but they may bankrupt the country proving their critics right. The only way Congress will ever get serious about cutting spending is by adding a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution. I introduced a bill to do this last February.

If ratified the amendment would prohibit the federal government from spending more than it collects each year. It would require a two-thirds majority vote to raise taxes. And Congress would be able to waive the balanced-budget requirement with a two-thirds majority only in limited circumstances, like during time of war.

16 GOP Cosponsors

Sixteen Republican senators are cosponsoring the balanced budget amendment: Sen. Richard Burr (N.C.), Sen. Saxby Chambliss (Ga.), Sen. Tom Coburn (Okla.), Sen. John Cornyn (Tex.), Sen. Mike Crapo (Idaho), Sen. John Ensign (Nev.), Sen. Mike Enzi (Wyo.), Sen. Lindsey Graham (S.C.), Sen. James Inhofe (Okla.), Sen. Johnny Isakson (Ga.), Sen. Jon Kyl (Ariz.), Sen. George LeMieux (Fla.), Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), Sen. James Risch (Idaho), Sen. Jeff Sessions (Ala.) and Sen. David Vitter (La.).

The balanced-budget amendment, S.J. Res. 27, would be the jurisdiction of the Senate Judiciary Committee.

Each of the Republican candidates I’ve endorsed through my Senate Conservatives Fund supports a balanced budget amendment as well.

If politicians are not forced by law to balance the budget, they will continue adding to the deficit by creating new entitlements like ObamaCare, instead of fixing bankrupt programs like Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security.

Greece tried to hide its debt and pay for its out-of-control entitlement programs with borrowed money, rather than making necessary budget cuts. The U.S. government is trying to hide spending and rely on borrowed dollars, too. Even though Americans are becoming increasingly worried about the $13 trillion debt, that’s not all they’re on the hook for. There’s much more debt hidden in unfunded liabilities for Social Security and Medicare—more than $100 trillion. But don’t expect President Obama to mention that figure anytime soon.

The debt could be deadly to our nation’s future, but it’s not yet a death sentence. America can recover if honest conservative leaders are willing to deliver this message to Americans: The government must do less, not more, if we want to save our country.

John Adams, Founding Father and second American President, was a wise man, but I desperately hope he was wrong about one thing. Adams once said: “Democracy never lasts long. It soon wastes, exhausts and murders itself. There is never a democracy that did not commit suicide.”

Our exceptional country has avoided this dire fate so far, but if there’s not a strong intervention by the American people in November—voting in new members ready to vote for a balanced-budget amendment—Adams could be right after all.

Mr. DeMint, a Republican, is the junior senator from South Carolina. He previously served in the U.S. House of Representatives

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=37615

• FOXNews.com, June 22, 2010
  
  

  

  AFP/Getty Images

• The top U.S. general in Afghanistan told Rolling Stone magazine he felt ‘betrayed’ by the man the White House chose to be his diplomatic partner, Ambassador Karl Eikenberry, while his aides insulted some of President Obama’s closest advisers, including Vice President Biden.

  The top U.S. war commander in Afghanistan apologized Tuesday for an interview in which he said he felt betrayed by the man the White House chose to be his diplomatic partner, Ambassador Karl Eikenberry.

  The article in this week’s issue of Rolling Stone depicts Gen. Stanley McChrystal as a lone wolf on the outs with many important figures in the Obama administration and unable to convince even some of his own soldiers that his strategy can win the war.

  In Kabul on Tuesday, McChrystal issued a statement saying: “I extend my sincerest apology for this profile. It was a mistake reflecting poor judgment and should never have happened.”

  In Rolling Stone, McChrystal is described by an aide as “disappointed” in his first Oval Office meeting with an unprepared President Barack Obama. The article says that although McChrystal voted for Obama, the two failed to connect from the start. Obama called McChrystal on the carpet last fall for speaking too bluntly about his desire for more troops.

  “I found that time painful,” McChrystal said in the article, on newsstands Friday. “I was selling an unsellable position.”

  It quoted an adviser to McChrystal dismissing the early meeting with Obama as a “10-minute photo op.”

  “Obama clearly didn’t know anything about him, who he was. The boss was pretty disappointed,” the adviser told the magazine……………

  http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2010/06/21/mcchrystal-says-ambassador-betrayed-criticism-afghan-war-strategy/



…In our times, American democracy is being dismantled, piece by piece, before our very eyes by the current administration in Washington, and few people seem to be concerned about it….

By THOMAS SOWELL,  Investors Business Daily

When Adolf Hitler was building up the Nazi movement in the 1920s, leading up to his taking power in the 1930s, he deliberately sought to activate people who did not normally pay much attention to politics.

Such people were a valuable addition to his political base, since they were particularly susceptible to Hitler’s rhetoric and had far less basis for questioning his assumptions or his conclusions.

“Useful idiots” was the term supposedly coined by V.I. Lenin to describe similarly unthinking supporters of his dictatorship in the Soviet Union.

Put differently, a democracy needs informed citizens if it is to thrive, or ultimately even survive.

In our times, American democracy is being dismantled, piece by piece, before our very eyes by the current administration in Washington, and few people seem to be concerned about it.

The president’s poll numbers are going down because increasing numbers of people disagree with particular policies of his, but the damage being done to the fundamental structure of this nation goes far beyond particular counterproductive policies.

Just where in the Constitution of the United States does it say that a president has the authority to extract vast sums of money from a private enterprise and distribute it as he sees fit to whomever he deems worthy of compensation? Nowhere.

And yet that is precisely what is happening with a $20 billion fund to be provided by BP to compensate people harmed by their oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.

Many among the public and in the media may think that the issue is simply whether BP’s oil spill has damaged many people, who ought to be compensated.

But our government is supposed to be “a government of laws and not of men.”

If our laws and our institutions determine that BP ought to pay $20 billion — or $50 billion or $100 billion — then so be it.

But the Constitution says that private property is not to be confiscated by the government without “due process of law.”

Technically, it has not been confiscated by Barack Obama, but that is a distinction without a difference.

With vastly expanded powers of government available at the discretion of politicians and bureaucrats, private individuals and organizations can be forced into accepting the imposition of powers that were never granted to the government by the Constitution.

If you believe that the end justifies the means, then you don’t believe in constitutional government.

http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article/537967/201006211813/Is-US-Now-On-Slippery-Slope-To-Tyranny-.aspx

Patriot Post, Brief, Monday, June 21, 2010

President or monarch?

“We live in a Constitutional Republic. The President’s job under the Constitution is to enforce the laws made by the elected Congress. His job is not to create new laws and enforce them all by himself. His job is as magistrate under the Constitution, not as Caudillo. He is not the law. He is supposed to enforce what Congress decides. The BP behavior is reminiscent of how, immediately after assuming office, Mr. Obama, with no Congressional authority or administrative allowance, simply made a phone call to fire the head of GM. When I called the White House press office to ask under what law or regulation Mr. Obama was acting, I was told he did not need a law. If the government put a lot of money into GM, it could call the shots at GM, I was told. But under what authority, I asked. ‘None needed,’ was the final answer. … The same goes for Mr. Obama’s demand that BP pay the lost wages of oil and gas workers suspended from work because of the moratorium on Gulf of Mexico underseas drilling. There simply was no legislation allowing this kind of specific demand.

Mr. Obama’s demand was in the nature of a threat, more than a Constitutional act. … [T]o create specific enactments and actions without any authority — now Mr. Obama’s specialty — is so at odds with the law of the land that it terrifies me. These are not the acts of a teacher on Constitutional law. These are the acts of a big city boss or a third world dictator.”

–columnist Ben Stein

http://patriotpost.us/edition/2010/06/21/brief/

Andrea Bocelli Confirms: He’s Not Merely Anti-Abortion, he’s “For Life”

“Enlighten the people, generally, and tyranny and oppressions of body and mind will vanish like spirits at the dawn of day.”

—Thomas Jefferson, letter to Dupont de Nemours, 1816

June 22, 2010
Tuesday of the Twelfth Week in Ordinary Time
Father Edward McIlmail, LC

Matthew 7:6, 12-14
Jesus said to his disciples: “Do not give what is holy to dogs, or throw your pearls before swine, lest they trample them underfoot, and turn and tear you to pieces. Do to others whatever you would have them do to you. This is the Law and the Prophets. Enter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the road broad that leads to destruction, and those who enter through it are many. How narrow the gate and constricted the road that leads to life. And those who find it are few.”

Introductory Prayer: I believe in the power of prayer, Lord. This time spent with you is the most important time of my day. Let me be confident of your presence and your love, in order to take full advantage of these privileged moments.

Petition: Lord, help me appreciate better the beauty of the Christian faith.

1. Our True Values We take great care to guard what is most valuable to us, right? The truth is, we often take great risks with what is most precious. We say we value life and limb, but think nothing of speeding in heavy traffic. We say we want to get to heaven, but we dabble in sin, even serious sin, almost daily. We surf racy Web sites. We cut down people in office gossip. We close our hearts to the needy. We habitually vote for politicians who defend abortion. We take sin oh-so-lightly. Likewise, we might let the holy things of our faith languish. We might neglect the sacrament of reconciliation. We receive Communion unworthily. We stay silent when a relative brags about using contraception. We do nothing when a child withdraws into the world of Internet for five hours a day. Is there something about which I should be speaking up?

2. Do unto Others To decide what to do in any given situation, we can ask ourselves how we would like to be treated. “For the measure with which you measure will in return be measured out to you” (Luke 6:38). The respect we have for ourselves is often reflected in the respect we show others. Rudeness, indifference and irritability toward others bespeak a problem in us. The Golden Rule isn´t just for others; it is also to guard our own dignity. Are there people toward whom I am routinely uncharitable? Do I realize that this lack of charity can hurt my character more than it hurts their feelings?

3. The Broad Road and the Narrow Gate Modernity is like a 24/7 convenience store. We can get anything, anytime. We can end up thinking that everything about life should be easy, be it marriage, self-discipline or even our salvation. The illusion of ease shouldn´t fool us. Working toward our salvation is hard work. Original sin left a deep mark on all of us. Struggling toward salvation takes prayer, sacrifice and constant vigilance. Do I sense that the living of my faith in today´s world is easy? If so, I´m probably not living it well. Where have I avoided the narrow road of holiness? Am I too attached to food, clothes or the opinions of others?

Conversation with Christ: Help me to see, Lord, that my real dignity lies in treating others well, and in renouncing my disordered passions. Let me shake off mediocrity in my spiritual life and make the most of the time you give me.

Resolution: Today, I will make a special sacrifice for a loved one.

http://www.regnumchristi.org/english/articulos/articulo.phtml?se=363&ca=975&te=735&id=20302

CATHOLIC NEWS AGENCY, JUNE 22, 2010