By Jan Ting, CIS.org
The Obama administration’s challenge to the Arizona immigration statute SB1070 is not about its popularity, or whether the statute is wise or unwise policy. Legislatures are permitted to enact laws thought unpopular or unwise by others. And as Chief Justice Roberts observed, and the administration’s lawyer agreed, the challenge is also not in any way about civil rights or racial profiling.
By Jon Feere, CIS.org
A high-immigration group called the National Foundation for American Policy has released a new report on the alleged costs of ending the current application of the 14th Amendment’s Citizenship Clause. The Center for Immigration Studies has published a number of reports on birthright citizenship and it is clear that neither Congress nor the Supreme Court has ever mandated that children born to illegal and temporary aliens must be considered U.S. citizens under the Constitution. Rather, the permissive policy is the result of agency policymaking. At least one influential jurist, Circuit Judge Richard Posner, feels that the policy could be ended through a simple act of Congress. This debate, as well as the history of the Citizenship Clause is detailed in our report, “Birthright Citizenship in the United States: A Global Comparison”.
by Teri Blumenfeld*
Muslims who kill in the name of their religion frequently evade punishment in Western courts by pleading insanity or mental incompetence. Jurors, judges, and forensic psychiatrists are prone to accept the claim that some form of mental incapacity, not religious belief, accounts for “homegrown” jihadist terrorism in North America and Europe.
This state of affairs results from the failure by prosecutors to frame acts of jihadist violence as expressions of faith. This failure to prosecute jihadists vigorously stems from several sources: a deep-rooted, Western reluctance to impugn religion; a cult of political correctness; and culturally naïve wishful thinking. Viewing jihadists as crazy offers a comfortable conceit that ignores the stark reality that disaffected but sane Muslims are seduced by an ideology that espouses violent hatred of Western civilization.
By Jon Feere, CIS.org
Ten states have joined California in filing an amicus brief to the U.S. Supreme Court objecting to what they allege are unconstitutional provisions of Arizona’s S.B. 1070, the “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act”. The 10 other states are New York, Connecticut, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Maryland, Massachusetts, Oregon, Rhode Island, and Vermont.
Among other things, California et al. argue that Arizona’s law has “interstate effects”, namely that it would drive illegal immigrants out of Arizona and into other states. As explained in the brief:
Americans are getting informed about the dangers Islamists pose to civilized societies — threats like stealth infiltration of Sharia (Islamic “law”) into our legal/social system, “honor” killings, homicide bombings, intolerance, support for terrorism… There are too many apologists for Islamist outrages amongst our university academe, primary and secondary educators, media elite, government officials, etc. But the blogsphere, activist organizations, and concerned citizens have learned about Islam, and are fighting back against political correctness gone mad (though we still have a long way to go). Thanks to the efforts of the Florida Family Association, The Learning Channel has pulled its shameless whitewash of Islam, a TV show called, “All-American Muslim,” off the air:
by David J. Rusin*
Resistance to a new bill aimed at limiting foreign law in Pennsylvania courts serves as a case study of how Islamists and their allies operate: peddling falsehoods about Shari’a, painting Muslims as victims, and denying that anyone seeks to institutionalize aspects of Islamic law — even as they vigorously promote that very agenda. With similar legislation being debated across the U.S., understanding their tactics is critical.
…If Florida courts accept provisions of Islamic Sharia law or other foreign laws and legal codes which are inconsistent with American laws it will undermine public policies enacted by our representative form of government and change our value system. …
The dangers of Shariah should be self-evident and, thankfully, the good people of the Florida Family Association (FFA) are working against Islamism in their home state. The Obama administration, some other Western governments, and the Western mainstream media are generally soft-peddling the dangers of radical Islam, so people who value freedom and democracy should be ever vigilant. If the FFA can fluster Ahmed Rehab of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the terrorist-apologists and Shariah pushers du jour, the FFA must be doing something right.
What would Shariah mean? It would mean Islamists attempting to “destroy Western civilization from within.” It would mean misogyny and “honor killings” of innocent women. It would mean religiously-sanctioned lying (“taqiyya”) to advance the overriding of our Constitution with Islamic “law.” It would mean non-Muslims (”infidels”) living at best as third-class citizens (“dhimmitude”). It would mean Muslim cab drivers refusing blind customers with “unclean” seeing-eye-dogs. It would mean allowing the creation of autonomous Islamic “no-go zones” right here in the U.S. where American law would have no standing. Should I go on? Would you live under Shariah for fear of “inciting” Muslim anger rather than standing up for democracy? I won’t. Luckily, there are groups like the Florida Family Association fighting Shariah — and succeeding:
A briefing by Mark Durie*
Mark Durie is a theologian, human rights activist and pastor of an Anglican church. He has published many articles and books on the language and culture of the Acehnese, Christian-Muslim relations and religious freedom. A graduate of the Australian National University and the Australian College of Theology, he has held visiting appointments at the University of Leiden, MIT, UCLA and Stanford, and was elected a Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities in 1992. On January 18, he spoke to the Middle East Forum in Philadelphia.
By Andrew Whitehead
The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), an Islamist hate group founded by terrorists, has called GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich to task for Gingrich’s refusal to support a Muslim candidate for president if said candidate adhered to Sharia law.
According to CAIR’s National Legislative Director Corey Saylor:
by Ann Snyder*
Over the past few months, a “mosque” in Toronto has inspired quite a hubbub in the blogosphere and Canadian press, even prompting demonstrations, including some in September. As in many mosques, the genders are segregated, with males sitting in the front and females in the back, but it is the location of the “mosque” — a public school — that initiated the controversy. The Valley Park Middle School basically converts its cafeteria to a temporary mosque in which Muslim students hold Friday (jum’ah) prayers.
We live in ominous times. Our government embraces false “allies” while betraying true ones; our right to be armed is threatened; our religious freedoms are threatened by unethical political dogmas and nefarious foreign funding; our entertainment is dominated by a depraved group of money-hungry, unethical anthopomorphs; our primary and secondary schools are poisoned with political correctness that teaches that no one is responsible for his/her own actions; our academia is dominated by anti-Semitic, Islamo-philic bigots; and, our government is filled with self-serving, lying, unethical thieves. It is time to remember the sacred words penned by this great nation’s Founding Fathers, the American Declaration of Independence:
by Bruce Maddy-Weitzman*
Where does Tunisia, the unlikely igniter of the Middle Eastern upheavals, stand on the democratic transition scale three months after the overthrow of the long reigning autocrat Zine al-Abidine Ben Ali? And can the country, which stood (mostly by choice) at the margins of Arab political life since achieving independence in 1956, serve as a democratizing exemplar for other Arab states?
The answer to the second question seems fairly clear. As early as 1991, Samuel Huntington identified what he termed one of the most important global political developments of the late twentieth century — a third wave of democratization among thirty previously nondemocratic states.[1] There was no Arab state on his list, yet he identified Tunisia as a prime candidate for future democratization owing to its pace of economic growth, educated middle class, and concurrent liberalization measures undertaken by the country’s new president, Ben Ali.
By Gary Gerofsky
The video entitled, “Shariah Muslims Hate Free Speech,” filmed at an Israel “Apartheid” Week (IAW) hate-fest at the University of California (UC) at San Diego is a typical example of what is happening on North American campuses. This video is a microcosm of how some people, with a pathological need to appear to be fair-minded and even-handed, play into the hands of Islamists. This radical Muslim hate-speech goes unchallenged. These Islamists enjoy the right to free speech protected by the American constitution but, beyond that and for no good reason, are encouraged to spew the hate speech to which they feel entitled. People who should know better are abusing the Constitution by upholding local and campus rules and regulations in higher regard than the Constitution which has been effectively supplanted and undermined. Hate speech is being protected by bureaucrats, Islamist sympathizers, the peace-at-any-cost gang and the ignorant. Free speech is being challenged only when it comes from those who are seen to be interfering with hate as expressed by Islamists in venues such as IAW. Hate speech is seemingly being protected more than is the free speech to challenge the insidious hate.
By Barry Rubin
The gap between dominant Western perceptions of the Middle East and the region’s reality is dangerously wide. While the “Arab Spring” is celebrated as an advance for moderation and democracy, in fact the advance is going to revolutionary Islamists. Developments in Turkey and Egypt especially threaten to plunge the Middle East back into an era of conflict, instability, and the worst threats to Western interests in decades.
There are several things very much predictable about the future of the Middle East area during the next year. First, on June 12, 2011, Turkey will have an election. That election will probably be won by the government, whether or not it gets a two-thirds majority. The current rulers will interpret this as a signal to take a much tougher line toward Israel and the United States. It is possible that the extent of the increase of Turkey’s enmity toward Israel after that election will astonish the world.
By Thomas Drewing
The GOP still doesn’t get it. They think that people will be mollified by the appearance of taking the Constitution and “We The People” seriously. And they know that far more people will be satisfied by the “news” that they are going to actually read it aloud, than will actually tune in and listen to that very reading.
What is lost on many of them though is the fact that this will be the first time many, if not most, of the actual Congress Critters themselves, have actually heard the words our country is founded upon. And in their desire to appear as though they have gravity and thoughtfulness, they will sit there, and place themselves in a thoughtful appearing state to listen. And actually… that is enough to make the difference.
You are currently browsing the archives for the Constitution category.
Articles/Entries