Friday, July 09, 2010

Here Comes the Sun

Now that they are in the minority, some Tennessee Democrats are finally concerned about sunshine:


There have always been discussions held at the Plaza over legislation off-camera and out of the public eye, and that was standard procedure when the Democrats controlled both Houses, especially in the House of Representatives. If Senator Kyle has been so concerned about the Legislature adhering to the Sunshine Law, why didn't he move legislation to that effect when Democrats were in control of both Houses of the General Assembly?

Labels: , , , , ,

Thursday, July 08, 2010

Not Just for the Border

Illegal immigration isn't just an issue for border States anymore:


Illegal immigration isn't just a border issue anymore. As many as a third of children who are new public school registrants in some East Tennessee counties are entering school speaking no English, and must learn it as a second language. This is the case in places like Hamblen County, where there is as much Spanish spoken as English in Morristown's South Cumberland neighborhood. Some might say "now Oatney, aren't you just being bigoted because the presence of so many Hispanics in your community makes you uncomfortable..." Actually, I have no problem with a general increase in the Hispanic population so long as it is a legal increase, as I generally believe that this trend is good to reform people's attitudes, enhance our part of the country, and enrich our lives as members of society.

The problem lies not with the Hispanic community as a whole, but with the flood of illegal aliens (many of which are coming across the Mexican border) who are in the country, some of which are in East Tennessee. There is a reason that we have immigration laws, and that is to insure that our country is not overrun with people it cannot support and who sponge off of the taxes of citizens and legal resident aliens of all nationalities and ethnic backgrounds. When the number of illegals becomes so great that States cannot support them, and the federal government refuses to take the necessary action to secure our borders and protect both citizens and legal residents from the flood of illegals, the States are forced to act to protect their own people.

Labels: , , , , , ,

Wednesday, July 07, 2010

Big Haslam Endorsement

Knoxville Mayor Bill Haslam got an interesting "endorsement" in the race for the Republican nomination for Tennessee Governor:


On the other hand, Haslam's detractors should remember that the people who are behind KnoxViews may be in a decided political minority in East Tennessee, but they do know how the political game is played, especially the savvy founder of KnoxViews, Randy Neal. If it has become clear to Neal and his colleagues in their minds that Bill Haslam is going to be the Republican nominee for Tennessee Governor, they believe that their job is to weaken him among his own strong base and keep them from showing up to vote for him in November. If they believe Haslam would be the GOP nominee who would most easily defeat Democrat Mike McWherter, try to shift the votes and give Haslam a harder August race in advance of early voting. What better way to do those things than with a "liberal endorsement."

Labels: , , ,

Tuesday, July 06, 2010

Campfield Is It

Stacey Campfield's primary opponents are getting desperate:

Knowing WATE's reputation in East Tennessee for tending to avoid fluff stories on their own and being incredibly fair with the facts, I have to believe that it was one or both of Stacey Campfield's opponents in the Republican Primary, or their surrogates, who brought this so-called story to WATE. As Mean Gene Patterson pointed out, Coca-Cola isn't commenting, I suspect because they got a good laugh out of it.

How do you know early voting is upon us? When desperate opponents of conservative candidates who are about to win begin grasping at straws and non-issues to try and salvage campaigns that are going down the commode like a Democrat in Hawkins County. The candidates they are going after stay above the fray, but these people spread half-truths, outright lies, and have to resort to arguments like "his sign looks like a Coke can" in order to have a living prayer.

Labels: , , , ,

Monday, July 05, 2010

1776 vs. Today

The difference between the signers of the Declaration and today's political leaders:


Perhaps the difference is that these 56 men didn't just risk their lives for the sake of our independence and freedom, they risked every bit of their wealth, means, reputations, and even their families to stand on principle for something-independence-that they knew was at that time a long shot. None of them really knew whether the battle for independence would be successful, and there were many among the signers, we now know, who believed at that time that the cause was lost but they signed anyway because they believed the cause was right. Many of them lost everything they had and had to build again.

Labels: ,

Sunday, July 04, 2010

Radical Extremist Political Thought

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of the thirteen united States of America



When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.

John Hancock

New Hampshire:
Josiah Bartlett, William Whipple, Matthew Thornton

Massachusetts:
John Hancock, Samuel Adams, John Adams, Robert Treat Paine, Elbridge Gerry

Rhode Island:
Stephen Hopkins, William Ellery

Connecticut:
Roger Sherman, Samuel Huntington, William Williams, Oliver Wolcott

New York:
William Floyd, Philip Livingston, Francis Lewis, Lewis Morris

New Jersey:
Richard Stockton, John Witherspoon, Francis Hopkinson, John Hart, Abraham Clark

Pennsylvania:
Robert Morris, Benjamin Rush, Benjamin Franklin, John Morton, George Clymer, James Smith, George Taylor, James Wilson, George Ross

Delaware:
Caesar Rodney, George Read, Thomas McKean

Maryland:
Samuel Chase, William Paca, Thomas Stone, Charles Carroll of Carrollton

Virginia:
George Wythe, Richard Henry Lee, Thomas Jefferson, Benjamin Harrison, Thomas Nelson, Jr., Francis Lightfoot Lee, Carter Braxton

North Carolina:
William Hooper, Joseph Hewes, John Penn

South Carolina:
Edward Rutledge, Thomas Heyward, Jr., Thomas Lynch, Jr., Arthur Middleton

Georgia:
Button Gwinnett, Lyman Hall, George Walton

Labels: ,


Locations of visitors to this page
Profile Visitor Map - Click to view visits
Create your own visitor map