ACLU In The News

[Soldier4Christ]

A senior moment there brother?? 

Must have been.   

[Shammu]

Must have been.   

[Soldier4Christ]

ACLU Questions State Trooper Over Illegal Alien Arrest


This is from the Westerly Sun:

    A Rhode Island State Police trooper was following procedure when he asked 14 passengers in a van - all illegal immigrants - to produce identification following a traffic stop on Route 95, state police officials say.

    Rhode Island’s chapter of the American Civil Liberties Union feels differently.

    On July 11, at about 6:30 a.m., Trooper Thomas Chabot pulled a van over because the driver allegedly failed to use his turn signal while switching lanes on Interstate 95, said State Police spokesman Maj. Steven O’Donnell.

    After Chabot spoke with the driver, O’Donnell said the trooper asked all the passengers in the van for identification. When none of them could produce a driver’s license, he questioned the passengers, who told him they were in the country illegally, O’Donnell said.

    The trooper then called Immigration and Customs Enforcement and escorted the van to ICE headquarters in Providence. All of the illegal immigrants are awaiting deportation hearings, said O’Donnell.

So the State Trooper did his job and as a result we have 14 individuals that have no respect for our laws being deported. I can’t see what the problem is, but the ACLU are quick to the scene.

    The ACLU, however, has since complained that the trooper didn’t have just cause to ask the passengers in the van for identification and may have been practicing racial profiling when he stopped the van..

    “It’s hard to understand why a state trooper who was on radar patrol would go out of his way to stop a van solely for failure to put on a turn signal. If troopers did that everyday on Route 95, they wouldn’t have time to stop anybody for speeding,” said Steven Brown, executive director of the Rhode Island affiliate of the American Civil Liberties Union. “That at least raises a suspicion that the appearance of the driver or then passengers led to the stop.”

I’ve been pulled over for reasons just as petty as this before and can asssure you that in my case it had nothing to do with race. The race card has become a catch all in today’s times to contest the results of anything and everything one doesn’t like the result of. The liberals are always too eager to pull this one out of their hat. In all likelyhood this group was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.

The ACLU are most likely barking up the wrong tree with their complaint that the officer asked everyone for their identifications. Precedent doesn’t seem to be on the ACLU’s side for this accusation as the article states…

    “In 2004, the United States Supreme Court ruled that for the safety of the officers, it’s incumbent on them to know who they’re dealing with when they stop a car,” O’Donnell said. “The court ruling establishes that police can ask passengers for identification during a traffic stop.”

The ACLU has further allegations including a claim that the officer threatened to shoot anyone that tried to escape while being escorted to ICE headquarters. However the officer is confident that video of the stop will show this claim as false. He also points out that none of the illegals involved in the stop have filed a formal complaint. It seems the only people complaints are second hand and they are from the ACLU.

Ah well, a complaint about the deportation of illegal aliens from an organization that lobbies for completely open borders shouldn’t come as much of a suprise.

[Soldier4Christ]

Former ACLU Attorney Working In DNI Office - Still They Complain


The ACLU continues to criticize the Patriot Act and the Director of National Intelligence despite the fact that a former ACLU attorney is an insider in the DNI’s office. Tim Edgar was appointed by DNI John Negroponte to the post of Deputy Civil Liberties Protection Officer.

According to United Press International

    The ACLU was one of the organizations that successfully campaigned for an office for civil liberties and privacy within the new structure that Congress gave U.S. intelligence in its huge overhaul in 2004. But they probably never imagined that one of their top lobbyists would quit to go work there.

    Tim Edgar, formerly a senior legislative counsel at the ACLU`s Washington office started work last month as the deputy civil liberties protection officer in the office of Director of National Intelligence John Negroponte.

    He is one of a three-person civil liberties and privacy team headed by Alexander Joel, who quit a lucrative private sector job after the Sept. 11 attacks because ‘we all needed to do something for the country’ and went to work in the CIA general counsel`s office. Negroponte appointed Joel last year to the new civil liberties post, a product of the same huge 2004 Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act that created Negroponte`s own job.

Despite the fact that an ACLU insider is in such a key post advising the DNI on issues concerning civil liberties, the ACLU continues to obstruct the collection of intelligence vital to the national security of the United States. First they blamed September 11th on the inability for our intelligence agencies to connect the dots because they could not coordinate efforts and share information. Now that the DNI is in his position, they oppose every effort, not only to connect the dots, but to every method to collect the dots themselves.

We’ve seen their opposition to the NSA data mining program, the Treasury Department financial tracking program, and the renewal of the Patriot Act.

    Caroline Frederickson said the ACLU ‘wished him well,’ but added it was ‘unfortunate that the position had so little influence.’

    ‘He doesn`t have much room to run,’ she said, calling the office ‘window dressing’ and ‘neutered.’

    ‘I hope he can have an impact,’ she concluded, but the statutory powers the office had would make that a steep hill to climb.

I am convinced that if Anthony Romero himself were appointed to the position, Fredrickson would still not be satisfied. The truth is, that Fredrickson has to complain even if there is nothing to complain about. If she didn’t, she would be about as relevant as Saddam Hussein’s defense attorney.

According to Joel, Edger acts like a check on the efforts being put forward by pointing out potential civil liberties concerns in proposed programs.

    Joel explained Edgar`s value to the office as something akin to a miner`s canary — flagging up potential problems before they became the center of a public conflagration.

    ‘People welcomed the opportunity … to internalize upfront’ the civil liberties perspective that Edgar brought, ‘and use that perspective as early as possible in our programs and I think it`s been extremely helpful,’ he said.

    But he declined to give details. ‘Like the job of the rest of the intelligence (agencies),’ he said, ‘Ours can be a thankless task. If we succeed, there will not be a problem … The program will proceed in a way that won`t raise any kinds of civil liberties concerns. That`s our goal.’

Edger has so far been impressed at the lengths that the DNI is going to protect the civil liberties of all Americans.

    Edgar himself said that he has been impressed by ‘how dedicated many of the professionals who work in (U.S. intelligence agencies) are to the bedrock protections,’ for civil liberties contained in the Constitution and in statutes like the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which many argue is breached by the administration’s warrantless surveillance program.

    ‘In their day-to-day work, people do want to be on the right side of that line (of constitutionality and legality), and they’re looking for this office to help keep them the right side of that line,’ he said.

    In part, there was a fear of public controversy. ‘The last thing anyone wants is for their program to be on the front pages … a poster child’ for the civil liberties issue. Edgar said that caution ‘reflects an understanding (in the agencies) that if they don`t proceed carefully they`re going to get themselves in serious trouble.’

    That is more than just wishful thinking on his part. Several former intelligence officials have told UPI in recent months that some of their still-serving colleagues are growing increasingly concerned about the legal territory they have been left occupying by the administration`s very aggressive interpretation of presidential prerogatives.

    Copyright 2006 by United Press International

One of their own on the “front line” checking and double checking programs for potential civil rights abuses and still the ACLU isn’t satisfied. Why am I not surprised.

[Soldier4Christ]

 Cindy Sheehan and The ACLU Lose In Court Ruling


A federal district court judge ruled on Tuesday that a ban preventing protestors from camping and parking near President Bush's Crawford, Texas ranch is constitutional.

Attorney David Broiles, an attorney with the Texas ACLU, sued on behalf of Cindy Sheehan  and other anti-war protestors who wanted to erect campsites on the two-lane road leading to Mr. Bush's ranch.

US District Judge Walter S. Smith had requested the demonstrators and McLennan County officials to reach a compromise less than a week ago. His ruling that county ordinances put in place last fall are constitutional came unexpectedly for the anti-war activists and their ACLU attorney.

Broiles told AP, "I can't speculate about why [the judged ruled for the ban]."

He says his clients may appeal the ruling or attempt to reach a compromise with the county, according to AP

Sheehan bought a five acre empty lot about 7 miles from Mr. Bush's ranch last month using the insurance money she received for his son's death in Iraq.

"We decided to buy property in Crawford to use until George's resignation or impeachment, which we all hope is soon for the sake of the world," Sheehan said in her newsletter.

"I can't think of a better way to use Casey's insurance money than for peace, and I am sure that Casey approves."

But the former owner of the property claims Sheehan's representative lied to her, saying he was purchasing the five acres for a Katrina victim.

[Soldier4Christ]

Sheriff must play by ACLU rules
Judge: Collaborative also covers deputies in OTR


Hamilton County sheriff's deputies are bound by the same special rules that apply to Cincinnati police when they patrol in Over-the-Rhine, a federal judge said Tuesday.

The judge's decision means sheriff's deputies might soon have to follow guidelines related to the so-called Collaborative Agreement between the city and the American Civil Liberties Union.

The agreement, signed after the 2001 riots, requires officers to record every traffic stop, undergo additional training and adhere to strict use-of-force policies.

Sheriff Simon Leis had argued the rules should not apply to his deputies because his office was not involved in the dispute that led to the agreement.

ACLU lawyers say any officer who patrols city streets is subject to the rules.

"This is not about picking a fight with the sheriff," said ACLU attorney Al Gerhardstein. "This is about underscoring the work we're doing with the collaborative. Yeah ...  right .... I might believe that.   

"It's important that he get on the team."

Magistrate Judge Michael Merz made a similar argument in his decision Tuesday: "Certainly the public interest would be well served by having the routine police patrols in Over-the-Rhine subject to the same procedures." But Merz did not order the sheriff to immediately comply.

He said the ACLU must first request a preliminary injunction, which, if granted, would require the sheriff to either comply or halt his patrols. The ACLU requested an injunction late Tuesday. If the judge grants the injunction, Leis is expected to appeal.

"We'll go all the way to the Supreme Court if we have to," said sheriff's spokesman Steve Barnett. But he said the sheriff would continue the patrols and would follow the rules of the collaborative agreement if ordered to do so.

Deputies began patrolling Over-the-Rhine last week after several citizens and business owners approached Leis and asked for help. They said crime in the neighborhood was chasing away customers and law-abiding residents.

[Soldier4Christ]

Unmarried couple sues for housing permit

By JIM SALTER
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER

ST. LOUIS -- A couple with three children has sued a suburban town that refused to give them a housing permit because the parents are not married.

The suit, filed on their behalf by the American Civil Liberties Union on Thursday, claimed that the town of Black Jack's housing law violates the state and U.S. constitutions, as well as the Federal Fair Housing Act. It seeks unspecified damages.

The ordinance prohibits more than three people from living together unless they are related by "blood, marriage or adoption."

The ACLU said Foundray Loving, Olivia Shelltrack and their school-age children are facing fines of up to $500 per week for living in their five-bedroom home in the suburb of 6,800 because Loving is not the biological father of Shelltrack's oldest child, and the couple are not married.

"The government has no business saying two consenting adults cannot live with their own children," said Tony Rothert, legal director for the ACLU of Eastern Missouri.

City attorney Sheldon Stock declined comment. Mayor Norman McCourt did not return a phone call seeking comment. McCourt has previously said the ordinance was intended to prevent crowding and has nothing to do with morality.

The city council voted to keep the ordinance earlier this year.

Last month, a North Carolina judge struck down the state's 201-year-old law barring unmarried couples from living together, calling the law unconstitutional.

The ACLU says Florida, Michigan, Mississippi, North Dakota, Virginia and West Virginia also have laws that prohibit cohabitation. Missouri does not have such a law.

[Soldier4Christ]

ACLU Loses: NYC subway searches OK


Appeals court upholds random NYC subway searches

    NEW YORK (AP) — A federal appeals court has upheld the constitutionality of random bag searches by police in America’s busiest subway system to prevent terrorism.
    The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals on Friday rejected a challenge to the searches by the New York Civil Liberties Union, saying that a lower court judge properly concluded that the program put in place in July 2005 was “reasonably effective.”

    The searches began after deadly terrorist bombings in London’s subway system. The NYCLU filed a lawsuit to stop them, saying they were an unprecedented intrusion on privacy and ineffective because they can be easily evaded.

    The appeals court said it was proper for Judge Richard M. Berman to conclude that preventing a terrorist attack on the subway was important enough to subject subway riders to random searches.

    Berman had concluded that the searches were a reasonably effective deterrent and that the intrusion on the privacy rights of riders was minimal.

    In its written ruling, the appeals court noted that New York’s subway system is an “icon of the city’s culture and history, an engine of its colossal economy, a subterranean repository of its art and music, and, most often, the place where millions of diverse New Yorkers and visitors stand elbow to elbow as they traverse the metropolis.”

    The court noted that New York’s subway system, the nation’s largest, includes 26 interconnected train lines and 468 far-flung passenger stations, carrying 4.7 million passengers on an average weekday and 1.4 billion riders a year.

    The opinion said it was “unsurprising and undisputed that terrorists view it as a prime target.”

    The appeals court also noted that the subway system was targeted for attack at least twice in the last nine years. Those attacks, thwarted by police, including a bomb plot in 1997 in Brooklyn and a 2004 plot to bomb the Herald Square subway station.

    New York Civil Liberties Union attorneys were reading the decision Friday and had no immediate comment.

Each ACLU loss in cases like these saves lives.

[Soldier4Christ]

When the ACLU claims to be the “guardian” of religious liberty…


A new entry on the ProCon website under the section “Is the ACLU Good for America?” provides opportunity to permanently dirtnap the notion that the ACLU gives a rip about religious liberty.

For the ACLU to trumpet their defense of religious liberty is kind of like an arsonist having burnt down a house and being shocked at the lack of appreciation from the homeowners when he returns to shine the doorknobs. Something the ACLU does regularly to “prove” that they aren’t anti-Christian fascists is to direct people to a document they’ve compiled that they seem to think will convince Americans otherwise. Nice little propaganda piece for the unwashed masses, but it’s really nothing more than an old Baldwin-esque diversion to give the appearance of “aid[ing] the reactionaries to get free speech now and then” in order to advance the REAL agenda.

You’d think that with the tens of thousands cases the ACLU has litigated (they claim 6,000 per year), and with the First Amendment supposedly being their “bread and butter,” they’d have hundereds of cases to point to. On the contrary, of the couple dozen cases, one of their “their” headline cases is that of a little NJ girl was forbidden from singing “Awesome God” at her talent show despite having followed EVERY rule, is not even their case at all, but ADF’s. Not only that, they include Dover v Kitzmiller, which was actually a restriction on the liberty of a local school board to determine its own curriculum (well, actually to simply make a book available in the school library that gives an alternative view to Darwinism) — nothing to do with “religious liberty.”

The smackdown comes courtesy of ADF on this question: Is the ACLU anti-religion?

ADF provides a swift Janikowski to the ACLU’s granny-panties with this answer, which clearly demonstrates the ACLU’s sinister duplicity. A sampling from the ACLU buffet of madness:

    The ACLU backed a lawsuit against Yeshiva University, an Orthodox Jewish school,
    because the university would not allow two lesbians to live in married student housing.
    The school holds the traditional Jewish position that homosexual behavior is a violation
    of God’s law. The school lost, and the ACLU crowed about how it had forced a private
    faith-based organization to violate its core beliefs. ACLU attorney Matthew Coles said,
    “It’s a fabulous ruling.”

    In Oklahoma, a thirty-year veteran school teacher had been teaching Bible lessons to his
    students during non-school time. The students voluntarily participated. The ACLU
    filed a lawsuit on against the teacher and the curriculum publisher, stating that they were
    “co-conspirators to establish religion.” The case went to a jury, which found against the
    teacher and publisher, but only awarded the plaintiffs $251 – an indication of how they
    really felt about the ACLU lawsuit. But the story does not end there. ACLU backed
    attorneys turned around and sought more than eighty thousand dollars from the teacher
    for their legal fees and costs. The Alliance Defense Fund stepped in, free of charge, to
    help him. The ACLU-backed attorneys eventually received only a fraction of their
    original demand.

    In Louisiana, the ACLU filed a lawsuit challenging a voluntary prayer group of
    Christian teachers. The teachers met on their own time, during recess, and not during
    instructional time. 7 In addition, the ACLU’s executive director has compared school
    officials who allowed a public prayer to the terrorists who attacked the World Trade
    Center and the London subway, 8 as well as calling for jail, stating that individuals that
    pray publicly “should be removed from society.”

In the ACLU’s defense of its “dedication” to religious liberty, they cite a case out of Cranston, RI:

    The ACLU of Rhode Island (2003) interceded on behalf of an interdenominational
    group of carolers who were denied the opportunity to sing Christmas carols on Christmas
    Eve to inmates at the women’s prison in Cranston, Rhode Island.

Here’s the funny thing about this one in particular — in the same city the very next year, let’s see what the ACLU does. I’ll let ADF take the mic:

    The ACLU sued the city of Cranston, Rhode Island, which had opened the front lawn of
    its city hall on an equal basis for “seasonal and holiday displays.” Citizens were
    allowed to provide displays, which could be either religious or secular. The city also
    posted a disclaimer that read: “The public holiday displays are strictly from private
    citizens or groups. They do not represent an official view of the City of Cranston, nor are
    they endorsed by the city.” Displays included a Santa Claus, a menorah, and a snowman,
    along with a crèche. The ACLU took offense with the crèche. An ADF-allied attorney
    came to the defense of the city, and a U.S. district court judge dismissed the ACLU’s
    lawsuit. He noted that nothing in the city’s public statements or in its implementation of
    its policy for Christmas displays “reveals or even remotely supports an inference that a
    religious purpose was behind the creation of the limited public forum.”

They ONLY targeted the CRECHE!!! Kind of like the official seals in Los Angeles, Redlands and Tijeras, NM. Only the crosses must go! Pomona may stay…the Zia may stay!

It comes down to this:
These cities and schools — where do they even get the idea that a man can’t share his faith on a public sidewalk, that a little girl can’t sing a song that mentions God in a talent show, that university student groups cannot select their membership based on shared beliefs, that a kid can’t wear a T-shirt with Bible verse in school, that the word Christmas may not be included on a school calendar, that a kid can’t read his Bible during recess, that even a moment of silence is “unconstitutional?” …and we can go on. What justification is used when the government to decides to muscle free expression of faith out of the public square? The echoing refrain is as predictable as Ted Kennedy is drunk — SEPARATION OF CHURCH AND STATE. This was not some spontaneous sea-change. It happened somehow…and what group has been most responsible for imposing the distorted concept of Constitutional law on our legal system and our culture? Duh.

So while the ACLU does defend a sweaty street preacher here and there or files an amicus brief in support of another organzation’s case (and takes credit for it), it cannot be denied that the ACLU has created this anti-liberty atmosphere in the first place during their eight-decade rampage through the courts and the culture. There would be no lack of clarity today that makes such cases necessary if it weren’t for the ACLU.

The ACLU’s vision of religious liberty is that of a man who beats his wife every day, but buys her a bag of ice every Saturday.

[Soldier4Christ]

Saturday Main Stop The ACLU Show Rant
by Gribbit on 08-13-06 @ 3:36 am Filed under ACLU

by The Gribbit

Singer/Songwriter and known Conservative Activist Pat Boone has written a scathing article for World News Daily. From which I will read a few excerpts.

    “Sit down, Mr. Citizen. I hate to tell you this, but I guess the best thing is just to spit it out. You’ve got cancer.

    “And not just a localized cancer, but a malignant, fast-spreading strain of cancer. It’s already attacked all your vital organs and is infiltrating through your circulatory system to even your outer extremities. Unless we take every action available to us and attack this disease on all fronts with the strongest possible treatments, you will surely die a painful, lingering, wasting death. And, I am bound to tell you this: It may already be too late for us to turn this thing around. This cancer is that virulent, that aggressive. I’m sorry, Mr. Citizen.”

    Well – whether we realize it or not – you and I are living right now under such a sentence, such a diabolical attack. The disease is called ACLU. This cancerous organization, this poisonous growth – fraudulently self-named the “American Civil Liberties Union” – is attacking every one of our foundational bases, our vital organs; and it has now expanded its onslaughts to small towns, cemeteries, churches and even children’s groups like the Boy Scouts! Its goal is to remove every last vestige of Christian or Jewish faith from public life.

    Muslim, Hindu, Self Awareness, even militant atheist religion – they can stay. But Judeo-Christian believers must keep their mouths shut, hide any and all open expressions of their faith and retire to closed-window ghettos. Church of Satan? You can stay, oh sainted high priest LaVey. But you Christians, you Jews … Get those filthy crosses and those maddening six-pointed stars out of our sight! We don’t make up 1 percent of the American public, but we demand you do as we say!

As I state daily on Gribbit live right here on Wide Awakes Radio, the ACLU is more than willing to trump the will of 285 million people in favor of the wishes of 1. And Mr. Boone has it stated correctly when he says that they make up less than 1% of the population. The ACLU’s goal is to turn the will of the minority into the majority, not through the democratic process, but rather through the intervention of the federal courts.

As I also state almost daily on Gribbit Live, the ACLU’s use of the fantasy “establishment clause” * as a money making machine thereby furthering their goals by putting pressure on state and local governments through extortion.

They often times take “establishment clause” cases in districts where activist federal court judges are more likely to favor their positions. They choose to bring these cases against local governments which are often times cash-strapped and can ill afford the costly legal fees to defend their perfectly legal positions in court. The ACLU accomplishes this by first sending an advisory letter to the local government advising them to cease and desist from whatever they are doing; or the ACLU will initiate litigation. This letter advises the local government that even if they prevail in the Constitutional argument, the legal fees to defend themselves could run into the hundreds of thousands of dollars. This more often than not is enough to cause the town to capitulate to the ACLU’s position.

But even if the town doesn’t and it does go to trial, because the case was taken in an ACLU friendly district, the town hasn’t a chance to survive the argument. Then the appeals process could add additional costs. And in the end, the town could end up facing not only damages but legal fees reimbursements which could amount into the millions of dollars.

As Mr. Boone so adequately stated, the ACLU is opposed to every moral Judeo-Christian teaching and attempts to substitute morality with permissiveness cloaked in a veil of distortions and misuse of language by calling it tolerance.

I have to tolerate my neighbor’s personal beliefs, but I don’t have to permit him to influence mine. Excusing immoral behavior in the name of tolerance isn’t tolerance, it’s actually permissiveness. The excuse itself is the permission.

    Look at just a few of the countless things this deviant group supports and even actively promotes:

    • Abortion on demand throughout pregnancy
    • Eradication of any reference to the Ten Commandments or the Bible from public buildings or hillsides or even cemeteries
    • Extended constitutional protection for our sworn enemies!
    • Free access to pornography, including Internet pornography access for children
    • Freedom to desecrate the American flag
    • Tax-exempt status for Satanists
    • Actively pro-homosexual school curriculums
    • Legalized prostitution
    • Legalized drugs
    • Nudist camps for teenagers
    • Same sex “marriage”

    And that’s just a brief, partial list of their heavy-handed, activist campaigns!
    And what does the Anti Christian Litigation Union oppose?

    • “God Bless America” banners in schools!
    • “Abstinence before marriage” sex education
    • Christian Homeschooling
    • Legalized voluntary, majority-approved prayer in schools
    • Sobriety checkpoints and drug searches
    • Medical safety reporting of AIDS cases
    • Parental consent for teen abortions
    • Most post-9/11 security measures
    • Any Christian display in public
    • Any use of religious symbols for even historical displays
    • Any reference to God, let alone Jesus, in a school child’s speech, paper or essay answer!

    This group of U.S.-educated lawyers has proudly filed expensive suits:

    • leading to the U.S. Defense Department banning military units from sponsoring Boy Scout troops or even letting them meet on government property;
    • supporting an 18-year-old man accused of raping a 14-year-old mentally handicapped boy, arguing that teens should be “free from state compulsion”;
    • representing the pro-pedophile North American Man/Boy Love Association – at no cost! – after two group members were accused of raping and murdering a 10-year-old boy;
    • successfully driving Boy Scouts out of a local park, because Scouts do not permit homosexual leaders; then winning 940,000 tax dollars to cover their attorney fees and court costs!
    • successfully pressuring the L.A. County Board of Supervisors to remove a tiny cross from the long-official county seal (though no one had objected to it) – and then pledging to target all other U.S. governmental agencies with any religious symbols on their seals;
    • recommending that New Orleans public school officials be “fined or jailed” for failing to stop a prayer before a high-school football game – claiming that prayer at school-related functions is “un-American and immoral”!

It is no secret that the ACLU is opposed to traditional Americanism. They oppose any public display of patriotism, religion, free speech demonstration which is not in line with their radical agenda, and capitalism as a system. They object to the Constitutional protections guaranteeing the rights of citizens to own and possess firearms. They ignore the rights of states as guaranteed in the 10th Amendment.

    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.

So the ACLU claims to defend the Bill of Rights, when have they defended this one?

*Note:

Gribbit contends that the wording of the 1st Amendment is such that there is no “establishment clause”. In fact it is a phrase in his opinion. It is part of the “Freedom of Religion Clause” to which there are two parts. The “establishment phrase” and the “free exercise phrase”.

[Soldier4Christ]

ACLU Continues to Dig Hole for Itself on Katrina Memorial, LA Times Buys Joe Cook’s “Arguments”


From the LA Times today: Swords Being Crossed Over Memorial to Katrina Victims

    NEW ORLEANS — A proposed memorial to victims of Hurricane Katrina from St. Bernard’s Parish that includes a cross bearing a depiction of Jesus has spurred a conflict between parish officials and the American Civil Liberties Union.

    The ACLU says incorporating a cross in the memorial is unconstitutional because local government officials were part of the committee that conceived the idea and because the group thinks the site where it will be erected is public land.

    But parish officials insist that the land where the memorial will be placed is private, though it is near a public waterway. And they argue that parish employees, who are members of the memorial committee, are volunteers who worked on the project on their own time, using private funding.

OK, so the ACLU is arguing that public employees have no right to take part in any community activity outside their official capacity. Wouldn’t a prohibition of this sort violate some right to something? I guess I should just trust the “Guardian of Our Liberties” and concede that it doesn’t.

The ACLU “thinks” this is public land? Either it is or it isn’t public land. Ooooooooooooh, I get it…it’s NEAR public land. There’s your smoking gun ACLU!

Joe (people that pray are the same as 9/11 terrorists) Cook descends more deeply into the absurd:

    Joe Cook, executive director of the ACLU of Louisiana, said his group had initially learned of the memorial through news reports. He is waiting to receive information from the parish about the project and the involvement of parish employees.

    “The cross, with a government endorsement, sends a message that only Christians are welcome in St. Bernard Parish,” Cook said. “That is a very inappropriate message for a government to send.”

    Cook said that to his knowledge, the memorial would be placed in a waterway that is normally public land.

    “Even if it’s private land, at this point it’s [about whether] the government is entangled with the memorial,” Cook said. “If a private group had come up with this idea and funded it, we would protect their right to do that.”

So…Joe Cook doesn’t know the details of the project, yet threatens to sue.

What does “normally public land” mean?

The kicker is the last quote. I don’t even think I need to describe how absolutely LUNATIC Cook’s statment is.

    Cook said his group would prefer to resolve the matter without litigation. A decision will not be made until the ACLU has all the facts.

Vintage ACLU — threaten a small, hurricane-crippled community (without all the facts) with the full force of a national organization endowed with limitless resources…then say you’d rather this not be litigated. Yeah, you’d rather the community be intimidated into submission. This folks, is the the ACLU perfectly encapsulated.

[Soldier4Christ]

Federal Court Rules Protecting America is Unconstitutional


The ACLU has convinced a federal judge that monitoring overseas communications of terrorists is against the constitution. Despite the fact the preamble lists defending the nation as an acceptable federal government function, the ACLU and US District Judge Anna Diggs Taylor said that the risk “innocent” communications could be intercepted far outweighed the risk of Al Qaeda attacking the United States. Despite programs such as ECHELON, CARNIVORE, and others that existed happily (albeit controversially) under the Clinton Administration, the possibility that George Bush might actually defend the country is a threat the Constitution cannot bear.

Despite the evidence, the media still calls the case a matter of “warrantless wiretapping” despite the fact that the clear intention is to monitor international calls. This ongoing deception is an attempt to create hysteria that the US is becoming a “police state” and that the treats are from Republicans, not terrorists. This is the same political quarter that brings you the idea (despite all evidence to the contrary) that George Bush and not Al Qaeda is behind 9/11.

The judge in this case, an appointee of Jimmy Carter, doesn’t seem to understand the difference between overseas surveillance and domestic surveillance. Will the CIA start needing warrant the next time the spy on a terrorist overseas?

According to the ruling:

    The President of the United States, a creature of the same Constitution which gave us these Amendments, has undisputedly violated the Fourth in failing to procure judicial orders as required by FISA, and accordingly has violated the First Amendment Rights of these Plaintiffs as well.

Let’s skip past the FISA court idea, one that is still in dispute publicly and in the courts (other district courts either ruled for the government or declined to rule at all) and discuss the First Amendment issue. Debating what due process should exist for wiretapping is something that can and will take place, however, the idea that plotting terror attacks against the citizens of the United States of America could even possible be protected by the First Amendment should make everyone who cares about the safety of their family cringe. What other possible meaning is there to that phrase?

Many scoffed at the idea of framing resistance to the Patriot Act and the “warrantless wiretapping” programs as an attempt to establish an “Al Qaeda Bill of Rights”, however, with Judge Taylor’s ruling and the help of the ACLU, the shroud of the First Amendment has been extended to protect those who plot to kill Americans.

    John Bambenek is an academic professional for the University of Illinois and a columnist for the Daily Illini and blogs at Part-Time Pundit deep from the corn fields of Illinois. . He is the current owner of BlogSoldiers, a blog-only traffic exchange.

[Soldier4Christ]

ACLU threat to small FL town: You must harbor illegals


This is rich. The ACLU is threatening to sue the City of Palm Bay, Fla. should it pass an ordinance designed to reduce the impact of illegal immigration in the city.

From the Orlando Business Journal:

    The proposed legislation seeks to level the playing field for construction companies unable to compete with firms that hire low-wage, illegal workers. It would fine businesses that hire illegal immigrants $500 for each violation and keep them from seeking city contracts for two years. Third-time offenders would be permanently barred from doing business with the city.

But of course, the ACLU cannot possibly allow a city to get away with this!

    Kevin Aplin of the ACLU of Florida’s Brevard chapter contends they discriminate against immigrants and fail to protect the community.

    “Employers who fear retribution for hiring undocumented workers — even if they are unaware of their citizenship status — may begin to discriminate to avoid potential legal complications,” he says in a release. “The city is creating a a situation that hurts everyone and helps no one.”

Are you required to get a stupid chip implanted in your brain before you’re hired at the ACLU? This doesn’t discriminate against “immigrants,” this law would discriminate against ILLEGALS and the companies that employ them! Since when can a city not pass a law regarding immigration? The Constitution does not include immigration laws as the exclusive domain of the federal government.

OK, I have unassailable proof that, yes stupid pills are aplenty in Mr. Aplin’s medicine cabinet. From the Orlando Sentinel:

    “What employers may end up doing is, for fear of not being compliant, they may feel it’s safer not to hire anyone who looks or sounds foreign, i.e., Latinos or anyone who looks brown,” said Kevin Aplin, vice president of the Brevard ACLU.

The most rib-cramping part of the ACLU’s argument goes a little something like this:

    “It is neither the place of local government, nor in the overall interest of our country for local communities to assume responsibilities of the federal government,” said Howard Simon, Executive Director of the ACLU of Florida. “Preventing a chaotic patchwork legal system in which penalties imposed on employers vary from community to community is precisely why only the federal government should have the power to enforce immigration laws.”

So, the ACLU is concerned that the federal goverment will be hamstrung in the enforcement of immigration laws now? How ridiculous when you consider how hostile the ACLU is to immigration laws. In their threatening letter they can’t even bring themselves to refer to illegals as having done anything wrong at all while continuing to break the laws of this nation. From their threat mail:

    Most significantly, the provisions of the Ordinance which places civil penalties upon employers for hiring persons whose immigration status “violates” federal law…

I didn’t add the quotes around “violates.”

Being that the ACLU has done significant damage to the federal government’s immigration enforcement efforts, hasn’t sued any cities that, say, forbid their police officers from asking a offender’s immigration status, haven’t sued any churches that harbor illegals and actually provides manuals that allow illegals to evade law enforcement…shouldn’t they send one of these letters to themselves if they are concerned about immigration law enforcement?

More ACLU hypocrisy. Shocking.

[Soldier4Christ]

Gender-bender code-breaker get special treatment, ACLU is all for it


From Pace, FL:

    Pace High School is usually in the news for its sports and academics. Now the school is making headlines because of it’s dress….. code.

    There is one student, whose name we won’t reveal to protect his identity, who comes to school dressed as a girl. And he’s allowed to despite what the student code of conduct says, which states, ’students whose personal attire distracts other students shall make alterations before entering the classroom’.

So the school has dress code, but this kid is allowed to break it…why?

    Classmates say a boy dressing as a girl is distracting to them and they want to know why they can’t dress the way they want to. For instance, girls are not allowed to show their midriff. Boys are not allowed to wear muscle shirts. Adam Hasson is a 12th Grader at Pace HS: “I think that if someone is going to be able to cross dress and stuff like that, than like, hair colors shouldn’t be an issue. I mean, that’s just as big of a distraction as someone dyeing their hair color red.”

Hasn’t Mr. Hasson heard, we must bow down to the agenda of the “gender expression.” This attitude is a sick result of things like this: “Beyond the Binary.” A confused kid like this should be helped, not celebrated and coddled for his sad disorder.

    The boy, who has asked to be called a girl’s name, has the American Civil Liberties Union backing his position to cross-dress. Susan Watson is the regional director: “The ACLU is speaking out on this issue to make sure that all students have the right, that all students attend schools that are safe.” She also goes on to say, given the fact, class is still continuing at PHS, there is nothing distracting here.

The ACLU employing its reflexive subterfuge…or is it the comical incoherence of mental midgetry? Are we to believe this kid is “safe” in a short skirt and pink Uggs?

    But, classmates are commenting. Hasson: “I think we’re all equal. Just because he changes his clothes and acts like a female, doesn’t mean he should get priority.”

It takes a teeager to sound like the grown up in the story. Anyone surprised?

[Soldier4Christ]

Stolen Jesus portrait complicates ACLU lawsuit

A member of the Harrison County school board said if police recover the stolen portrait of Jesus that has hung outside the Bridgeport High School principal's office for nearly 40 years, it would be put back in its place.

"I can assure the ACLU that when we recover it, it will go back up," said Michael L. Queen. "Or there will be maybe a picture similar to it that will go back up."

The ACLU and another civil rights group on June 28 jointly sued the school board on First Amendment grounds to have the portrait taken down.

The heist came just a day after a federal judge in Clarksburg set a trial date for Feb. 26, 2007, in the case against the Warner Sallman "Head of Christ" print, which the school board voted Tuesday to fight with about $150,000 in donated cash.

Before 4 a.m. Thursday, a suspect broke a window to a technology lab in the back of the school and headed straight for the portrait. The suspect covered his face when near security cameras and made off with the picture, school officials said. The suspect apparently didn't disturb or steal anything else.

The suspect left behind the wooden frame and the portrait's backing, said schools Superintendent Carl Friebel. The suspect also left some fingerprints on the window frame, and images were caught by three security cameras.

Clarksburg television station WBOY reported that Bridgeport police believe the suspect is either a current or former student of the high school.

With the picture gone, it looked like Harrison school officials might have avoided the costly lawsuit.

But with Queen's vow, the future of the lawsuit is uncertain. The school board was to meet today to discuss the matter.

"It infuriated me," Queen said. "A public school was broken into. Our role is to provide safe schools. Aside to that, something was stolen. Aside from that, the portrait was stolen."

Spokespersons for both the ACLU and Americans United for the Separation of Church and State said they were appalled by the theft and the matter would have been better handled in court.

"As things develop, we'll decide how to proceed," said Terri Baur with the ACLU. She declined to respond to Queen's vow.

Jeremy Leaming with Americans United declined to comment about the future of the suit.

Richard Yurko, the school board's lawyer, said, "I wish I knew what to say."

He added he would need to confer with co-counsel as to how the theft affects the lawsuit.

Superintendent Friebel said the school board's lawyers would address Queen's comments at the meeting today.

"This whole thing certainly complicates the position of the board," Friebel said. "It's going to make it very interesting."

Friebel said he got a call from the school's principal, Lindy Bennett, just after 8 a.m. Thursday saying the school was broken into and the portrait was stolen.

Bennett refused to comment, citing the pending litigation.

Local authorities in a press conference Thursday afternoon described the suspect as being a white male about 5-foot 7-inches tall with brown hair and weighing between 220 and 250 pounds. Bridgeport Police Detective Mike Lemley said the intruder was in the school for only five minutes, the Associated Press reported.

"The subject obviously knew the video camera system, where they were located, because he would cover his face in that area and stay away from the area as much as possible," the AP quoted Lemley as saying.

Friebel said the suspect fled through an emergency exit that didn't require a key.

The theft is the strangest twist in the saga since an FBI lawyer from Clarksburg, Harold Sklar, resumed his effort to have the portrait taken down earlier this year after school administrators for years failed to act on his request.

Sklar is named as the plaintiff in the suit, as is former teacher Jacqueline McKenzie.

Yurko in a Washington Times report said a legal group predicted the board had about a 1 percent chance of winning the case.

A federal judge in Michigan has already ruled in favor of plaintiffs when they sued a school system in a nearly identical situation.

"If the court follows that ruling, we will probably lose," Yurko told the newspaper.