Left And Right Politics

Unless you’ve been living under a rock for the past week, you’ve heard about Arizona Governor Jan Brewer has sign the Bill (sb1070) into law. A law that makes it necessary for all people to carry their identification card with them at all times. The law gives Police Officials the authority to ask and to see the information not only from aliens but from any individual that is considered suspicious or when there is enough suspicion that suspect is not legal resident.

The Democrats as well as many different Hispanic coalitions up in arms saying that the bill is unconstitutional and racially bias. How can a bill that targets people who are here illegally (Russian, Canadians, Mexicans and many other) be racially bias? Yes the bill passed in the state of Arizona and they do have an extreme problem with the illegal Mexican population. Before you get annoyed by the comment of “problem”, let me list the issues that Arizona is having with the illegal population in their state.

* 22% of the felonies in Maricopa county are committed by illegal immigrants.
* The federal government has estimated that the illegal population in Arizona has grown from 330,000 in 2000, to 560,000 in 2008.( http://www.dhs.gov/xlibrary/assets/statistics/publications/ois_ill_pe_2008.pdf )
* 17% of those arrested by the Border Patrol in the Tucson area already have criminal records in the United States.
( http://www.tucsonweekly.com/tucson/the-krentz-bonfire/Content?oid=1945848 )
* In 2007, the Center for Immigration Studies estimated that 12 percent of workers in Arizona are illegal immigrants.
( http://www.cis.org/immigrants_profile_2007 )

These are just four that I have listed, but the issues go on forever. Issues that include some illegal immigrants being on welfare, having no insurance, as well as their U.S. born children (which shouldn’t have been born here if their parents stayed in their own country) in the school system. I won’t even go into the issue of these illegal immigrants paying taxes.

The problem is not they want to come here and take part in the American dream, it the fact that they are not coming into this country through the legal system. I am a second generation American, my grandparents came here to this country through Ellis Island. I agree with the law that Arizona’s Governor has passed and as Americans we all should.

Tags: America, homeland security, illegal immigrants, immigration, Laws, National Security

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The race for the Florida U.S. Senate seat just became even more interesting as Alex Snitker becomes the first Libertarian to qualify for the ballot in the state’s history.

TALLAHASSEE – Standing on the steps of the historic State Capitol building, Alexander Snitker made some history of his own by becoming the first Libertarian U.S. Senate candidate to ever appear on the Florida ballot. Snitker announced that he had met all the requirements to qualify for the ballot, which included paying the $10,440 filing fee.

“This race just became at least a three-way dogfight,” Snitker told the assembled media at a press conference in Tallahassee on Wednesday.

Prior to the announcement, the race for Florida’s U.S. Senate seat was considered a two-way contest between the Democrat and Republican nominees, with Kendrick Meek and Marco Rubio being the front runners from each respective party.

Rumors continue to grow that Gov. Charlie Crist will drop out of the GOP primary to run as an independent, which would result in a four-way contest between the two major parties, a Libertarian, and an independent.

Snitker is running on a platform centered on a Constitutionally-limited federal government. While Snitker and Rubio agree that the government is too large and spends too much money, they differ on how to solve the problem. Snitker proposes a balanced budget Amendment, abolishing the IRS in favor of the Fair Tax, an audit of the Federal Reserve, and a non-interventionist foreign policy.

However, on moral issues, Snitker sometimes sounds more like a Democrat. When asked his position on gay marriage, he queried, “Why should the federal government be involved in marriage at all? Isn’t marriage between two individuals? I haven’t found anything in the Constitution that governs individual relationships, so it is a power reserved to the states or to the people.”

The 34-year-old former Marine and office equipment salesman for AXSA Document Solutions considers himself to be a “citizen statesman” in the tradition of the Founding Fathers. “The framers of the Constitution never envisioned that someone would want to make a 40-year career out of serving in Congress,” he said. “They looked at it as a civic duty — you made the laws and then you went home to live by the laws that you made.”

To achieve that goal, Snitker proposes a two-term limit in the Senate, and a six-term limit in the House, both equaling 12 years maximum. He also supports ending Congressional pensions and perks.

After the announcement, opinion in the blogosphere seemed to be split right down the middle. Many tea partiers and conservative bloggers viewed him as a better alternative to Rubio; a regular guy as opposed to a career politician and lawyer. Most said they liked his strict Constitutional interpretation of the issues. However, others angrily warned that he would split the conservative vote, with a few even speculating that he was part of a progressive conspiracy.

Snitker addressed the split-the-vote issue by saying, “The two-party political class has gotten us to where we are today. If my opponents are concerned about splitting the vote, I suggest they do what is best for the country and drop out of the race.”

While most pundits give him only the slimmest chance of victory in November, Snitker says don’t count him out just yet. “I’m in this to win.”

Tags: Alex Snitker, balanced budget amendment, capitol building, Congress, Congressional, constitution, federal government, federal reserve, florida ballot, foreign policy, gay marriage, gov charlie crist, Government, Kendrick Meek, libertarian, Marco Rubio, Political, Republican, republican nominees, senate candidate, senate seat, state capitol, u s senate

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Written by John Balker:

The rights of individuals have been put in the back burner in today’s political world. For example, to prevent terrorism, the government has imposed security measures and enforced racial profiling on individuals. I have traveled on many domestic and international flights in the past few years and have been subject to such security measures.

In fact, I was awaiting the arrival of a family member from a Northwest flight coming in from Amsterdam (a couple days after Christmas) when the irrational restrictions on individual freedoms became ever so obvious. A Nigerian man who felt sick in the plane and used the restroom multiple times was detained because a few days earlier another Nigerian mad tried to set off an explosive on the same flight heading into Detroit. The poor man just felt ill, and the government poured in Department of Homeland Security employees, sniffing dogs, police and ambulances. What a waste of resources and a horrible inconvenience! I waited at the airport for nearly five hours. I would expect the government to be able to handle security threat in ways that do not impose so severely on individual freedoms in this day and age.

In today’s political atmosphere, issues besides terrorism, including government bailouts and universal health care, are also infringing upon the rights of individuals. The U.S. government has swept into the everyday lives of Americans in a big way. Americans facing foreclosure are being offered government assistance and extra money for energy efficient utilities. Instead of encouraging an independent populous, the government at federal, state and local levels, is encouraging dependency.

Government bailout of the auto companies in Detroit is an example of exactly this. Now, Detroiters are turning to the government for more money to improve railways to Chicago and increase jobs. The government should promote the rights and abilities of individuals to improve their lives and those of their community. Universal health care is another bill being pushed by today’s Democrats to involve government to control an essential part of people’s existence i.e. their health care needs.

An individual deserves the right to decide their own health care plans. A competitive, privatized health care industry with few governmental regulations is the way to go. When it comes to government involvement, less is always better. Unfortunately, individuals freedoms are slowly disappearing and the United States is becoming more like Communist China by the day.

Tags: America, civil liberties, department of homeland security, energy, freedoms, Government, government control, Government Spending, Health Care, homeland security, individual rights, personal freedom, united states, universal health care

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WASHINGTON – Libertarian Party (LP) Chairman William Redpath issued the following statement today in response to President Barack Obama’s State of the Union address:

“Tonight’s speech was a reminder that, for decades, the policies of Republicans and Democrats alike have failed. Libertarians are asking people to take matters into their own hands. Instead of just complaining, we’re encouraging ordinary Americans to step up and run for Congress on the Libertarian Party ballot line.

I can say exactly the same thing about President Obama’s speech tonight that I said about George W. Bush’s State of the Union speech in January 2008: ‘Tonight’s State of the Union address went much as expected. Instead of calling for a more limited role of the federal government in American society, the President laid out plans that would only increase the government’s intervention into the realm of economics, health care, education and foreign policy.

I am weary of the President’s unspoken premise that only government–indeed, only the federal government–can accomplish good in our society.

President Obama seems to be totally blind to the concept that government can cause problems rather than solve them. His speech was filled with ‘More’: more handouts, more spending, more programs, more bailouts, more regulations. We Libertarians want less government, not more.

Not to be outmatched by the Democrats, the Republican Party conveyed its lack of seriousness in addressing this nation’s government spending problems by having Bob McDonnell, Virginia Governor for eleven (11) days, deliver its rebuttal to the President. If they were really serious about addressing the dire fiscal circumstances of this nation, they would have had Paul Ryan, a six-term congressman from Wisconsin, who has proposed the most serious plan of anyone in the two older parties to keep us from going off a fiscal cliff.

Last week, Alan Auerbach, Professor of Economics and Law at UC Berkeley and US government fiscal policy expert, said that the Democratic and Republican parties are in a ‘death embrace’ with their government spending. The only political party that is rationally and forthrightly addressing the need to cut government spending and end our culture of ever expanding entitlements is the Libertarian Party.

As Americans lose hope in Obama, we Libertarians are warning voters against running back to the Republicans who got us into such big messes in the first place. Republicans started the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Republicans made the false intellectual case for bailing out banks and car companies. Republicans argued that deficits don’t matter. Republicans gave us the giant Medicare expansion bill.

The President’s suggestion of a ’spending freeze’ was especially ludicrous and insulting to the intelligence of Americans. The amounts involved are minuscule, and Congress won’t accept them anyway. Will Obama sign the spending bills that ignore his ‘freeze’? You bet he will. Instead, the President should demand across-the-board cuts in all areas, including entitlements.

The President talked a lot about jobs. Unfortunately, the policies he supports are responsible for most of the unemployment we see today. High taxes, minimum wage laws, hiring regulations, firing regulations, mandatory unemployment benefits, and other government interference make it much more difficult for businesses to hire and keep employees. As expected, the President’s prescription is to increase the dosage of this government poison.

While our nation is declining dangerously right now, a turnaround could be straightforward and simple with steps like these: 1. Bring our troops home from Iraq and Afghanistan; 2. Stop rewarding failed companies with bailouts; 3. Cut taxes and spending and let the free market work.

Finally, on the matter of political rhetoric, I call upon the two older parties to stop spoon feeding politics to the American people as if we are a bunch of overgrown children. These are difficult times that call for more than rhetorical flourish or positioning a group of diverse people around a politician. Older party politicians need to be specific about their proposed policies, as Libertarians are.

And, I know I’m probably just wasting electrons, but can’t we go back to the days in which the President sent a copy of his speech to Congress and left it at that. The speech last night took 1/7000th of an entire year. I think the vast majority of the American people would agree that we have better ways to spend our time.”

William Redpath has served as the Chairman of the Libertarian Party since 2006. For more information, or to arrange an interview, call LP Executive Director Wes Benedict at 202-333-0008 ext. 222.

The LP is America’s third-largest political party, founded in 1971. The Libertarian Party stands for free markets and civil liberties.

Tags: America, American, Bush, civil liberties, Congress, federal government, foreign policy, free markets, Government, Government Spending, Health Care, libertarian, libertarian party, Libertarian Party, Obama, Political, politicians, Republican, republican party, republicans and democrats, state of the union address, taxes, Washington

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