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Former Massachusetts governor also refuses to attend pro-life debates
By Jack Minor
A leader in the pro-life community says he doubts former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s pro-life credentials, because the candidate for the GOP nomination for president never has stopped flip-flopping on the issue.
While campaigning for governor in 2002, Romney said he would “preserve and protect” a woman’s right to choose.
He later said his views had changed, and Rev. Rob Schenck, president of the National Clergy Council, a nationwide network of conservative pastors from all Christian traditions, endorsed him, saying, “When I asked Gov. Romney pointedly about his personal view on abortion, he told me he believes every intentional abortion is an immoral end to a human life. He is clearly pro-life.”
Columnist Ann Coulter has vigorously defended Romney’s pro-life conversion. In a recent column, Coulter said, “Romney changed his mind on abortion – not when it was politically advantageous, but when it mattered. As governor of liberal, pro-choice Massachusetts, he vetoed an embryonic stem cell bill and ‘worked closely’ with Massachusetts Citizens for Life.”
But despite these assurances, Keith Mason, president of Personhood USA, has said he believes Romney wants to have the best of both worlds in order to win the moderate vote.
The personhood movement is based on a statement in the 1973 Roe vs. Wade ruling, the Supreme Court decision that legalized abortion throughout America. Prior to the decision, abortion had been a state issue.
Writing for the majority in Roe vs. Wade, Justice Harry Blackmun said the case would collapse if “the fetus is a person,” as the unborn’s “right to life would then be guaranteed by the Constitution.”
The personhood movement is an attempt to have the unborn child declared a person and thus entitled to protection under the 14th Amendment.
Personhood USA has asked the candidates of both parties to sign a “Personhood Pledge” which states in part, “I stand with President Ronald Reagan in supporting ‘the unalienable personhood of every American, from the moment of conception until natural death,’ and with the Republican Party platform in affirming that I ‘support a human life amendment to the Constitution, and endorse legislation to make clear that the 14th Amendment protections apply to unborn children.’”
To date Romney and Barack Obama are the only candidates that have not signed the pledge.
Romney also has refused to attend three pro-life events where candidates were questioned about their position.
Mason said that Romney has divorced himself from the social conservatives in America.
“We’ve gotten the attitude from Romney that he doesn’t need those of us who are pro-life. He won’t interact with us on the Personhood pledge.”
At a recent gathering of more than 150 evangelical leaders in Texas who met to choose a candidate they could rally around, Mason said Romney only received three votes. The group eventually chose to endorse Rick Santorum.
Mason dismissed the endorsements by well-known conservatives such as Coulter and Schenck.
“He is trying to earn his credentials by getting here or there pro-family leader vouching for himself, but he won’t vouch for himself. It leaves a big question mark in my mind and many others.”
Mason said while he fully supports anyone who changes his mind from supporting abortion to being pro-life, he does not believe that is true in Romney’s case.
“On Mike Huckabee’s show, Romney said he was supportive of the Mississippi personhood amendment. However a few weeks earlier, in a debate sponsored by CNN, Romney said he would not favor protecting the pre-born under the 14th Amendment because it would create a constitutional crisis,” Mason said.
“That doesn’t sound like someone who is pro-life to me.”
Mason was referring to a Sept. 5 debate sponsored by CNN in which Romney was asked a question about abortion.
“Now, as someone who believes in the inherent and equal dignity of all members of the human family including the child in the womb, would you as president propose to Congress appropriate legislation pursuant to the 14th Amendment to protect human life in all stages and conditions?”
Romney replied that he would not support such an amendment because of the crisis it would foment.
“Now, is there a constitutional path to have the Congress say we’re going to push aside the decision of the Supreme Court and we instead are going to step forward and return to the states this power or put in place our own views on abortion,” Romney said. “That would create obviously a constitutional crisis. Could that happen in this country? Could there be circumstances where that might occur? I think it’s reasonable that something of that nature might happen someday. That’s not something I would precipitate.”
However, a month later, appearing on Fox News, Romney had a different response.
In an interview with Huckabee, Romney was asked, “Would you have supported the constitutional amendment that would have established the definition of life at conception?”
Romney replied, “Absolutely.”
Mason said if Romney still is flip-flopping on the issue how can he seriously expect pro-life voters to support him.
“I believe he’s making a half-hearted attempt at even verifying his pro-life conservative credentials.”
The Romney campaign did not respond to WND’s request for comment.
Tells audience woman's choice should not trump child's very existence
By Anita Crane
WASHINGTON – More than 500 people leaped from their chairs to give Sen. Marco Rubio a standing ovation at the 2012 Susan B. Anthony List Campaign for Life Gala on Wednesday. The freshman Republican senator from Florida was keynote speaker at the SBA List’s 20th anniversary dinner, where Sen. Kelly Ayotte, R-N.H., and Rep. Ann Marie Buerkle, R-N.Y., also congressional freshmen, gave rousing speeches.
The Susan B. Anthony List’s primary mission is to help pro-life candidates, especially women, get elected. Twenty years ago, Marjorie Dannenfelser, a wife and mother, began this work from her home while surrounded by her children.
At this year’s gala, the SBA List gave Young Leader Awards to Lindsey Craig, former legislative assistant to Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind.; Ashley McGuire of Students for Life of America; Laura Wegmenn, a senior and pro-life activist at Hillsdale College; and Elizabeth McClung, founder and director of the Austin Coalition for Life. Ben Gordon accepted an award for his wife, Kortney Blythe Gordon, also of Students for Life of America, who passed away with their unborn child Sophy during a car accident.
Buerkle of Syracuse, N.Y., was presented with the Distinguished Leader Award. The crowd cheered for Buerkle when they learned the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee had dubbed her “the poster child of the radical rightwing anti-choice movement.”
Buerkle thanked the Susan B. Anthony List for supporting her first campaign in 2010, even though the New York Times insisted she had a five percent chance of winning.
“Really, the biggest lie when it comes to the abortion issue is that it’s a woman’s rights issue,” she said. “I have NOW [the National Organization for Women] picketing my office. Now I am a mother of six and a grandmother of five. I am the first woman to ever hold this seat in Congress for my district and NOW is picketing my office. So that tells you exactly, exactly what their agenda is. It is all about abortion.”
Mary Katharine Ham, a WMAL radio host and Fox News analyst, emceed the gala and introduced Ayotte as “the kryptonite” because she’s boldly pro-life and won women’s votes 55 to 43 percent in 2010, a striking change from 2008 when Barack Obama won New Hampshire women’s votes 61 to 38 percent.
The crowd cheered for Ayotte when she said, “I can tell you with absolute certainty that I would not be standing here tonight as the only pro-life woman in the United States Senate from the state of New Hampshire without the support of the Susan B. Anthony List. And we’re so blessed to have such a dynamic leader in Marjorie Dannenfelser.”
Ayotte said the audience inspired her and asked for help because “we need more pro-life senators” in order “to fight for what is right in this country.”
She continued, “Marco Rubio is often referred to as a rising star in the Republican Party and certainly has one the highest profiles in the U.S. Senate. But here’s what I want you to know: He has a great sense of humor, he’s down to earth, he’s a wonderful family man, and he’s smart and serious about turning our country around and preserving the American dream.
“I’ve had the privilege and I’ve very much enjoyed working with Marco on the Value Action team to make sure that we protect life, that we protect traditional marriage, and that we protect the values that we all share.”
Applause and cheers erupted when Ayotte said, “Here’s my point: Marco Rubio is the real deal!”
Rubio said he was honored to be serving with new leaders like Ayotte. He framed his next comments “with all due respect” because he noticed that he and Ayotte were significantly younger than the median age of most senators. The crowd laughed when Rubio said one of his older colleagues had said Susan B. Anthony was a friend of his and Rubio was no Susan B. Anthony. He also apologized for coming without speech notes, but his teleprompter broke and “someone else” in Washington was ahead of him at the repair shop.
Rubio said when he first got the Senate, he looked around and asked “How did I get here?” Six months later he looked around and asked, “How did they get here?” All of this led up to Rubio explaining he believes God and his constituents have given him the opportunity to stand up for vulnerable persons such as the unborn, and if he doesn’t he’ll have to answer to God.
Rubio said he was “blown away” by the young leaders awarded at the gala. He said he knows it’s difficult to be pro-life because some who support his fiscal policies tell him to “tone down” his right-to-life efforts.
But Rubio has no intentions of toning down. On Jan. 31, he introduced the Religious Freedom Restoration Act of 2012, a bill to repeal a new Obamacare mandate that violates the religious liberties and conscience rights of faith-based institutions by forcing them to offer employees insurance coverage for contraceptives, some of which cause abortions.
Rubio said he laughs when pro-lifers are described as “radical” because polls consistently reveal 50 percent of Americans agree with him, and when he digs deeper he sees that polls show 75 percent of Americans want “significant restrictions on abortion.” Still, he said, “you get more pressure, more scorn” from media and politicos for being pro-life.
“Being in politics, being in the Senate, I do a lot of speeches about a lot of things – tax policy, the national debt – these are all very important issues. These are important political issues and policy decisions throughout our country,” said Rubio.
“The issue of life is not a political issue, nor is it a policy issue. It’s a definitional issue. It is a basic, core issue that every society needs to answer.”
He continued, “The answer ends up defining society. That’s how important the issue is.”
“What I want to do briefly tonight is to encourage you who are involved in this [right-to-life] policy because I know that sometimes it’s easy to get discouraged, especially those in the public arena, you take a beating for being pro-life. … I think sometimes it has a tendency to wear people down.”
Rubio said while people push pro-lifers to focus on the national debt, jobs, the economy and other fiscal challenges, “Well, we can’t do that.”
He said, “This speaks to more than just our politics. It speaks to what we want to do in our life to serve and to glorify our Creator.”
Parsing all the arguments for abortion and the Supreme Court’s unconstitutional decision on Roe v. Wade, he said no right, not even a woman’s right to make decisions about her own body, trumps an unborn child’s right to life. He said an increasing number in the public understand this and, “I hope it will continue to show in the political realm.”
“The only ones who can vote are the ones with the ‘right’ to choose. The only ones who can participate in the political process are the ones with the ‘right’ to choose. An unborn child can’t vote. An unborn child can’t speak,” said Rubio.
In the next breath, he said, “Actually, they can. You speak for them. That’s what you are. In this competition of two competing sets of rights, you are the voice of children that cannot speak for themselves; the lives that may never have a chance to contribute to society and make a difference; the unknown names of millions of children whose contributions to our world will never happen because their right to life was not respected. You vote for them when you vote.”
Rubio said voters represent real people, “countless other children who have yet to be created and whose lives will be challenged.”
He believes that future generations will look back at this era and “condemn us.” He believes they’ll condemn the current culture of death the same way that Americans today condemn bigots for atrocities of the past. Rubio said, “They will look at what happened in this nation since 1973 and they will characterize us as barbaric.”
Rubio concluded by saying “our job is to accelerate the process” of securing the fundamental human right to life, to do it sooner rather than later, and to try to achieve it within our lifetime.
A Georgia resident contending Barack Obama is ineligible for the state’s 2012 presidential election ballot is asking that a court cite him with contempt.
In a motion filed in the case pending before Georgia Administrative Law Judge Michael Malihi, attorney Van Irion, representing David P. Weldon, urged the court not to overlook the fact that Obama had been subpoenaed for last week’s hearing. Obama’s attorney, he pointed out, acknowledged the subpoena by asking that it be quashed. But when the judge refused his request, he but told a state elections official he would not participate.
“Plaintiff Weldon moves this court to refer an order for contempt to the Superior Court for confirmation that defendant Obama is in contempt of court,” the motion says. “Grounds for this motion are that defendant Obama willfully defied this court’s order to appear and testify during this court’s hearing of January 26.”
The motion explains that when Malihi refused to quash the subpoena, Obama and his attorney, Michael Jablonski, “requested that the Secretary of State [Brian Kemp] halt the proceedings. … The letter ended with a statement that the defendant and his attorney would suspend all further participation in the proceedings of this court pending response.”
But after Kemp confirmed later that day that the hearing would continue and said that failing to participate “would be at the defendant’s peril,” Obama and his lawyer still refused to attend.
The letter from Obama’s lawyer to the state official, “coupled with the defendant’s willful refusal to comply with an order of this court, represent a direct threat to the rule of law,” the motion says. “The … actions represent a direct threat to the entire judicial branch and the separation of powers.”
Willfully ignoring a court subpoena is “unprecedented,” Irion writes. “While past presidents have litigated against subpoenas, in every case those presidents acknowledged and respected the authority of the judicial branch. … In the instant case the defendant did not appeal to a higher court, and instead instructed the Secretary of State that he would not participate. … When the Secretary of State refused to act in an unlawful manner the defendant ignored the Secretary of State, violated an order of this court, and apparently instructed his attorney to act in a manner that violates the professional rules of conduct of this state.”
Obama’s action, he says, “amounts to no less than a declaration of total dictatorial authority. Such declaration cannot go without response from this court. Failure to respond to the defendant’s contumacious conduct would amount to an admission that this court and the judicial branch as a whole do not have the authority granted to them under articles III and IV of the Constitution.”
Irion, representing Weldon, and several other attorneys argued before Malihi last week to have Obama’s name stricken from the Georgia state ballot.
The hearing was held on concerns raised by citizens of Georgia under a state law that allows voters to challenge the eligibility of candidates on the state’s ballot. It is the states that run elections in the U.S., and national elections are just a compilation of the results of the 50 state elections.
The state law requires “every candidate for federal” office who is certified by the state executive committees of a political party or who files a notice of candidacy “shall meet the constitutional and statutory qualifications for holding the office being sought.”
State law also grants the secretary of state and any “elector who is eligible to vote for a candidate” in the state the authority to raise a challenge to a candidate’s qualifications, the judge determined.
The controversy over Obama’s eligibility dates to before his election in 2008. Some contend he was not born in Hawaii and that the birth documentation the White House released in April is a forgery.
Others say it doesn’t matter where he was born, as his father never was a U.S. citizen.
The Constitution requires presidents to be “natural-born citizens,” and experts say that the Founders regarded it as the offspring of two U.S. citizens.
Jablonski had asked Malihi to quash the subpoena, requested by Taitz. When the judge refused, Jablonski wrote to Kemp.
The attorney told Kemp that “serious problems” had developed in the hearings “pending before the Office of State Administration Hearings.”
Jablonski said, “At issue in these hearings are challenges that allege that President Obama is not eligible to hold or run for re-election to his office, on the now wholly discredited theory that he does not meet the citizenship requirements.”
He said the judge had “exercised no control” over the proceeding.
“It threatens to degenerate into a pure forum for political posturing to the detriment of the reputation of the state and your office. Rather than bring this matter to a rapid conclusion, the ALJ has insisted on agreeing to a day of hearings, and on the full participation of the president in his capacity as a candidate,” Jablonski wrote.
Kemp said the hearing, however, was in line with Georgia law, and he would be reviewing Malihi’s recommendations in the case.
He also had a warning about the cost of not showing up for a court hearing.
“Anything you and your client place in the record in response to the challenge will be beneficial to my review of the initial decision; however, if you and your client choose to suspend your participation in the OSAH proceedings, please understand that you do so at your own peril.”
Top constitutional expert Herb Titus contends that a “natural-born citizen” is born of parents who were U.S. citizens at the time of the birth. The argument also is supported by a 19th-century U.S. Supreme Court decision, Minor vs. Happersett in 1875. The case includes one of very few references in the nation’s archives that addresses the definition of “natural-born citizen.”
That case states: “The Constitution does not in words say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners.”
An extensive analysis of the issue was conducted by Titus, who has taught constitutional law, common law and other subjects for 30 years at five different American Bar Association-approved law schools. He also was the founding dean of the College of Law at Regent University, a trial attorney and special assistant U.S. attorney in the Department of Justice.
“‘Natural born citizen’ in relation to the office of president, and whether someone is eligible, was in the Constitution from the very beginning,” he said. “Another way of putting it; there is a law of the nature of citizenship. If you are a natural born citizen, you are a citizen according to the law of nature, not according to any positive statement in a Constitution or in a statute, but because of the very nature of your birth and the very nature of nations.”
If you “go back and look at what the law of nature would be or would require … that’s precisely what a natural born citizen is …. is one who is born to a father and mother each of whom is a citizen of the U.S. or whatever other country,” he said.
“Now what we’ve learned from the Hawaii birth certificate is that Mr. Obama’s father was not a citizen of the United States. His mother was, but he doesn’t qualify as a natural born citizen for the office of president.”
In an extensive proposal regarding what the judge’s determination should include, Irion wrote that because of Obama’s failure to meet the understood meaning of “natural born citizen,” and the fact he “presented no argument on the substance of the issue at hand,” he should be determined to be ineligible.
Irion’s proposal said Obama should have had the entire burden of proof in the case, because “the Supreme Court of Georgia has clearly established that it is the affirmative obligation of a candidate to establish his qualifications for office, and that the burden is not upon the challenger.”
His suggestions said while the Democratic Party of Georgia has a right to determine its membership, that right coexists with the state’s right to govern.
“The party is free to submit any name as their next presidential candidate. However, Georgia is not required to accept such submissions and waste taxpayer money on ballots where such candidates are clearly not qualified to hold the office sought.”
He also pointed out that voters do not have the authority to waive constitutional requirements.
“Constitutionally protected rights are held inviolate regardless of the majority’s desire to violate them. Without such protections, any law could be enacted simply because it becomes popular. …. Congress could legalize the killing of all Jews, for example, as was done in World War II Germany. Constitutional requirements are absolute, and must be followed regardless of how popular or unpopular such requirements may be.
“Defendant’s presumption that popular vote overrides the Constitution runs contrary to the Constitution.”
In Taitz’ proposal to the judge, she raised concerns about elections fraud, evidence of forgery in the birth certificate image, Social Security fraud and the use of multiple last names
“Plaintiffs assert that based on law and fact, Obama is not eligible to be on the ballot in the state of Georgia as a presidential candidate and such finding should be forwarded to the secretary of state of Georgia,” she wrote.
She said the contempt “exhibited by the defendant … is so egregious that it warrants forwarding of the evidence and findings … to the attorney general of Georgia for criminal prosecution.”
“It is common knowledge and described at length in defendant Obama’s memoirs, such as ‘Dreams from my Father,’ that Obama’s father was a foreigner. Obama senior was a foreign exchange student who resided in the U.S. for a couple of years while he got his education and he returned to his native Kenya. At the time of Obama’s birth, his father, who came from Mombasa, Zanzibar region of Kenya, was a British ‘protected person’. Obama automatically inherited his father’s British citizenship upon the British Nationality act of 1948. Upon the declaration of the independence of Kenya on December 11, 1963, Barack Obama automatically received his Kenyan citizenship on December 12, 1963.”
_________ Bob Unruh joined WND in 2006 after spending nearly three decades writing on a wide range of issues for several Upper Midwest newspapers and the Associated Press. Sports, tornadoes, homicidal survivalists, and legislative battles all fell within his bailiwick. His scenic photography has been used commercially, and he sometimes plays in a church worship band.More ↓
An organization that helped craft President Obama’s environmental policies has recommended the reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine, purportedly as a method of silencing critics of the theory of global warming.
Primary among the PCAP’s recommendations is that the Department of Energy should join the Department of Housing and Urban Development, the Department of Transportation and the Environmental Protection Agency in what is known as the Partnership for Sustainable Communities.
Another key recommendation in the report is the reinstatement of the Fairness Doctrine, a former policy of the Federal Communications Commission that required the holders of broadcast licenses to give equal time to opposing viewpoints, which effectively made political talk radio unsustainable for any local station.
Reads the PCAP report: “National discourse today is tainted – and in some cases poisoned – by unbalanced ideological use of the public airwaves… To improve and better inform public discourse, it is time for the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to reinstate the Fairness Doctrine.”
Critics charge the Fairness Doctrine is as an attempt to regulate news and talk radio that violates First Amendment rights.
The University of Colorado-based PCAP draws up climate-policy recommendations for the White House and has been working with members of the Obama administration.
Following Obama’s victory in 2008, the PCAP began working with John Podesta, co-chairman of Obama’s transition team, to help the incoming president formulate an initial 100-day environmental agenda. Podesta is president and CEO of the highly influential Center for American Progress.
William S. Becker, the PCAP’s executive director, confirmed to WND in a November 2009 interview that his group’s initial proposals received a “very positive reception from the moment we delivered (the 100-day proposal) last November to John Podesta, co-chair of Obama’s transition team.”
“We continue to work with some colleagues inside the (Obama) administration, as well as continuing to push for bold action from the outside,” he said at the time.
Becker said the White House “adopted quite a few of our recommendations or variations of them.”
He cited a few examples of the influence of the PCAP and other environmental groups on Obama’s policies:
The PCAP recommended that the U.S. reach a bilateral climate deal with China prior to the U.N. Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen. The U.S. has since signed several agreements with China to share technology that reduces greenhouse-gas emissions.
The PCAP recommended an executive order that removed the gags from federal climate scientists. It became one of Obama’s first actions on environmental policy.
The PCAP recommended an overhaul of federal energy management to beef up efficiency requirements for federal agencies and to restore absolute carbon reduction targets that had been rescinded by the Bush administration. The Obama administration issued a new federal energy management order in October, including a requirement that agencies develop absolute targets for greenhouse-gas reductions.
The PCAP recommended, as did many others, that the Environmental Protection Agency embrace California’s vehicle emission standards and begin the process of regulating greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. The EPA is doing both.
The PCAP recommended major budget increases for states and communities to engage in energy and climate actions and to weatherize the homes of low-income families. The recommendations were implemented in Obama’s stimulus package.
The PCAP describes itself as seeking to engage the “best thinking of America’s leaders in government, science and civil society to identify actions that will empower all elements of society to meet the challenges of energy security and climate change.”
The group actively promotes the theory of man-made global warming.
While the PCAP coordinates with the White House, WND previously exposed how Obama’s controversial former “green jobs” czar, Van Jones, is one of 20 members of the PCAP’s advisory board.
Jones’ name appeared on the group’s most recent recommendation paper.
Jones resigned in September 2009 after it was exposed he founded a communist revolutionary organization and signed a statement that accused the Bush administration of possible involvement in the 9/11 attacks.
Meanwhile, the PCAP is not alone in calling for the silencing of the critics of global warming theory.
As WND was first to report, just prior to his appointment as Obama’s so-called regulatory czar in 2009, Cass Sunstein wrote a lengthy academic paper suggesting the government should “infiltrate” social network websites, chat rooms and message boards.
Such “cognitive infiltration,” Sunstein argued, should be used to enforce a U.S. government ban on “conspiracy theorizing.”
Sunstein’s official title is administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs.
Among the beliefs Sunstein classified in his paper as a “conspiracy theory” is that man-made global warming is a deliberate fraud.
When GOP candidate had chance to influence bench, he appointed leftists
BOSTON – Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney has announced that he will appoint conservative judges to the federal bench if he wins the White House.
In a forum hosted by former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, Romney said he likes “strict constructionists” on the federal bench.
“I’d like people who recognize that their job is to protect the Constitution and to follow the Constitution as it was written and intended,” he said. “And to follow the laws of Congress as written and intended, rather than the Supreme Court seeing its role as springing from or departing from the Constitution.”
That statement echoes what Romney said during a 2008 California debate.
“I would approve justices – I would have favored justices like Roberts and Alito, Scalia and Thomas,” he said. “I like justices that follow the Constitution, do not make law from the bench. I would have much rather had a justice of that nature.”
Political analyst Steve Baldwin contends that Romney’s constitutional rhetoric is the product of his quest for the White House.
“When Gov. Romney first started to prepare himself to run for the presidency in 2004, the Romney team initiated an effort to schedule media appearances and speaking engagements for the governor focused on a number of themes important to conservatives, including judicial philosophy,” Baldwin said. “Much of this PR blitz had to do with the defense of traditional marriage, an issue on which Romney also misled conservatives as has been written elsewhere.”
The Hillary Goodridge vs. Department of Public Health decision forcing the issue of homosexual marriage was announced in November 2003. In response, Romney wrote a commentary on judicial activism for the Wall Street Journal.
He fired his first salvo in the battle over conservative judges in his Feb. 5, 2004, Journal commentary piece, “One man, one woman.”
“Beware of activist judges,” he wrote. “The Legislature is our lawmaking body, and it is the Legislature’s job to pass laws.”
Romney extolled the virtue of the “balance of powers.”
“The Supreme Judicial Court decides cases where there is a dispute as to the meaning of the laws or the Constitution. This is not simply a separation of the branches of government, it is also a balance of powers,” Romney wrote.
“One branch is not to do the work of the other. It is not the job of judges to make laws, the job of legislators to command the National Guard, or my job to resolve litigation between citizens.”
He continued his “conservative blitz.”
Quoting Romney, Baldwin said, “On June 22, 2004, Romney spoke before the United States Senate and stated that the ‘real threat is not the constitutional amendment process, in which the states participate, but activist judges who disregard the law and redefine marriage.’”
Baldwin noted that Romney didn’t stop there: “At the 2007 Family Research Council’s Voter Values Summit, Romney said, ‘I’ll appoint and fight for justices who follow the law and the Constitution and who understand judicial restraint and who won’t legislate from the bench.’”
Romney’s campaign staff continued to press the theme in 2008, by the design of the campaign website. Baldwin said the site theme was the Constitution.
“Romney’s 2008 campaign website likewise featured conservative judicial themes. ‘The Bill of Rights are under constant assault from activist judges,’ And that, ‘Romney will appoint judges who respect the Constitution and the rule of law, and will not legislate from the bench,’” Baldwin said, adding that Romney’s campaign had solid input from conservative judges.
“Romney campaign surrogates were tasked with placing articles in conservative publications that boasted about his alleged conservative judicial views. One such surrogate was Pepperdine University Constitutional Law Professor Douglas Kmiec, a Romney adviser on judicial issues and co-chair of Romney’s ‘Advisory Committee on the Constitution and the Courts,’” he added.
Pepperdine constitutional Law professor and Romney legal adviser Douglas Kmiec wrote an Oct. 10, 2007, article for National Review Online trumpeting Romney’s promise to appoint judicial conservatives.
“Romney is pledged to name to the Supreme Court individuals with the intellectual qualities and philosophy of judicial restraint of Justice Scalia, Alito and Roberts,” Kmiec wrote.
He added a warning line: “We cannot afford a president who is only faking his attachment to conservative legal principle.”
Legal analysts say candidate Romney is different from Gov. Romney.
Liberty Counsel Action Vice President Matt Barber said Romney’s appointments were constitutional “living document” poster children.
“Many of Romney’s appointments were not only liberal, not only Democrats, but were radical counter-constitutionalists. How on earth can we expect that, as president, he would be any different?” Barber asked rhetorically.
“Actions speak louder than words, and Mitt Romney’s actions as governor scream from the rooftops that he cannot be trusted with this most important of presidential responsibilities.”
Barber cites two specific examples of Romney’s radical appointments.
“As governor of Massachusetts, Mitt Romney not only failed in this regard, he appointed a number of very liberal, if not radical, ‘living, breathing’-minded judges to the bench,” Barber said.
“Two that come to mind were extreme homosexualists Marianne C. Hinkle and Stephen Abany,” he said. “They both had a long history of pro-gay activism, yet Romney didn’t hesitate to put them on the bench.”
“These are people who outrageously believe the postmodern notion that newfangled ‘gay rights’ trump our constitutionally guaranteed First Amendment rights,” he said.
Baldwin agreed, citing Romney’s statements about the two requirements he actually used when selecting judges.
“Romney did focus on two criteria: their legal experience and whether they would be tough on crime. In other words, the nominee could be a gay activist or a pro-big government, pro-quota, pro-gun control Democrat Party hack who detests every judicial principle treasured by our founding fathers,” Baldwin said. “But if he happens to be tough on crime and have prosecutorial experience, he gets past the Romney filter. Many of Romney’s nominees fit that description.”
Baldwin added that Romney did have some ideological criteria for many of his nominees:
“It was criteria commonly used by the left. For starters, his nominees were mostly pro-abortion. Indeed, while campaigning for governor in 2002, Romney told the National Abortion Rights Action League (NARAL) that his judicial nominees would more likely protect abortion rights than would those of a Democrat Governor, according to notes from a person attending this meeting.”
Another Romney criteria, Baldwin explained, was “diversity.”
“The other criteria consistently emphasized by Gov. Romney in deciding judicial selections was ‘diversity.’ This is the silly notion that judgeships should reflect the population in terms of race and gender and even sexual orientation, regardless of a person’s judicial philosophy,” he said. “Clearly, the use of diversity quotas demonstrates Romney’s lack of a coherent conservative worldview.”
Barber agreed with Baldwin’s assessment, adding that Romney’s record while governor is reason for concern, because the next president may radically reshape the federal bench.
“Our next president has the potential to appoint two, possibly even three Supreme Court justices,” Barber said. “This will influence the trajectory of law and public policy for decades to come. We absolutely must have a president who can be trusted to appoint ‘originalist’ judges who will strictly interpret the Constitution in the context of the founders’ original vision.”
Barber concluded, “If the Constitution is a ‘living, breathing’ document as President Obama believes, then it is rendered meaningless.”
Georgia citizens today delivered sworn testimony to a court that Barack Obama is slam-dunk disqualified from having his name on the 2012 presidential ballot in the state, because his father never was a U.S. citizen, which prevents him from qualifying as a “natural-born citizen” as the U.S. Constitution requires for a president.
The historic hearing was the first time that a court has accepted arguments on the merits of the controversy over Obama’s status. His critics say he never met the constitutional requirements to occupy the Oval Office, and the states and Congress failed in their obligations to make sure only a qualified president is inaugurated. His supporters, meanwhile, argue he won the 2008 election and therefore was “vetted” by America.
The hearing was before Judge Michael Malihi of the Georgia state Office of State Administrative Hearings. In Georgia, a state law requires “every candidate for federal” office who is certified by the state executive committees of a political party or who files a notice of candidacy “shall meet the constitutional and statutory qualifications for holding the office being sought.”
State law also grants the secretary of state and any “elector who is eligible to vote for a candidate” in the state the authority to raise a challenge to a candidate’s qualifications, the judge determined.
Several of the attorneys introduced passages from Obama’s own writings that Barack Obama Sr. was his father. They then introduced evidence that the man never was a U.S. citizen, that he was a citizen of Kenya at the time of junior’s birth and was therefore a subject of the United Kingdom.
His father’s citizenship, they said, precludes him from serving as president, since the Founders required that officer to be a “natural-born citizen,” not just a “citizen.”
The term is not defined in the Constitution, but evidence introduced included a passage from a 1875 Supreme Court opinion that states:”The Constitution does not in words say who shall be natural-born citizens. Resort must be had elsewhere to ascertain that. At common law, with the nomenclature of which the framers of the Constitution were familiar, it was never doubted that all children born in a country of parents who were its citizens became themselves, upon their birth, citizens also. These were natives or natural-born citizens, as distinguished from aliens or foreigners.”
Weldon explained in his presentation that the 14th Amendment granting citizenship did not redefine Article 2, Section 1 of the U.S. Constitution, which includes the requirement for a president to be a “natural-born citizen.”
The attorney argued also that another later court case referenced citizenship in the dicta, not the central holding in the case, and thus was not controlling.
Many of Irion’s arguments were echoed by Hatfield, a strategy that at least one constitutional expert, Herb Titus, said was sound.
Titus taught constitutional law, common law, and other subjects for nearly 30 years at five different American Bar Association-approved law schools. From 1986 to 1993, he served as the founding dean of the College of Law and Government in Regent University in Virginia Beach, Va. Prior to his academic career, he served as a trial attorney and a special assistant United States attorney with the United States Department of Justice in Washington, D.C., and Kansas City, Mo.
He told WND the fact that Obama’s father was a Kenyan citizen should be sufficient.
“That is much stronger than the question of where he was born,” he said. “That alone is evidence. … They don’t need anything additional.”
Taitz argued multiple prongs of the case: that the birth certificate released by the White House is a forgery; that he probably has had several citizenships, such as when he was listed in Indonesia as an Indonesian citizen; and that he’s been known under the names Obama, Soetoro and Soebarkah.
She also had a private investigator, Susan Daniels, testify that it appears Obama is using a fraudulent Social Security number.
Documents and imaging expert Doug Vogt asserted the birth documentation released by the White House was a creation of a software program and not a scan of any original document. That would mean Obama’s documentation, despite what the White House released in April, is still under wraps.
Obama and his attorney boycotted the proceedings, issuing a letter to Georgia Secretary of State Brian Kemp that the judge was letting attorneys “run amok.” The statement came after Malihi refused to quash a subpoena for Obama’s testimony and his records, which effectively was ignored by the White House.
The judge is expected to review the evidence and make a recommendation to the state whether there is reason to be concerned about Obama’s name on the 2012 ballot.
He apparently will have no defense evidence, but Kemp had warned Obama about that.
“Anything you and your client place in the record in response to the challenge will be beneficial to my review of the initial decision; however, if you and your client choose to suspend your participation in the OSAH proceedings, please understand that you do so at your own peril.”
WND reported earlier on the stunning decision from Malihi, who refused to quash the subpoena even after Obama outlined his defense strategy for such state-level challenges, which have erupted in half a dozen or more states already.
“Presidential electors and Congress, not the state of Georgia, hold the constitutional responsibility for determining the qualifications of presidential candidates,” Obama’s lawyer argued. “The election of President Obama by the presidential electors, confirmed by Congress, makes the documents and testimony sought by plaintiff irrelevant.”
But the judge thought otherwise.
“Defendant argues that ‘if enforced, [the subpoena] requires him to interrupt duties as president of the United States’ to attend a hearing in Atlanta, Georgia. However, defendant fails to provide any legal authority to support his motion to quash the subpoena to attend,” he wrote in his order.
“Defendant’s motion suggests that no president should be compelled to attend a court hearing. This may be correct. But defendant has failed to enlighten the court with any legal authority,” the judge continued.
“Specifically, defendant has failed to cite to any legal authority evidencing why his attendance is ‘unreasonable or oppressive, or that the testimony … [is] irrelevant, immaterial, or cumulative and unnecessary to a party’s preparation or presentation at the hearing, or that basic fairness dictates that the subpoena should not be enforced,’” the judge said.
Jablonski also had argued that the state should mind its own business.
“The sovereignty of the state of Georgia does not extend beyond the limits of the State. … Since the sovereignty of the state does not extend beyond its territorial limits, an administrative subpoena has no effect,” the filing argued.
The image released by the White House in April:
Obama long-form birth certificate released April 27 by the White House
Titus said, “‘Natural born citizen’ in relation to the office of president, and whether someone is eligible, was in the Constitution from the very beginning. Another way of putting it; there is a law of the nature of citizenship. If you are a natural born citizen, you are a citizen according to the law of nature, not according to any positive statement in a Constitution or in a statute, but because of the very nature of your birth and the very nature of nations.”
If you “go back and look at what the law of nature would be or would require … that’s precisely what a natural born citizen is …. is one who is born to a father and mother each of whom is a citizen of the U.S. or whatever other country,” he said.
“Now what we’ve learned from the Hawaii birth certificate is that Mr. Obama’s father was not a citizen of the United States. His mother was, but he doesn’t qualify as a natural born citizen for the office of president.”
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Jerome R. Corsi, a Harvard Ph.D., has authored many books, including No. 1 N.Y. Times best-sellers "The Obama Nation" and "Unfit for Command." Along with serving as WND's senior staff reporter, Corsi is a senior managing director at Gilford Securities. Gilford Securities, founded in 1979, is a full-service boutique investment firm headquartered in NYC providing financial services to institutional and retail clients, from investment banking and equity research to retirementMore
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