100+ Days of Change

OK. I know I am behind the times, but I just got around to watching FRC's "100 Days of Change" video. It was pretty good and shows how widespread Pres. Obama's change is.

Texas Senate and Pro-life Legislation

HT: FreeMarket

The Texas Senate passed the Ultrasound Bill (20-9). They also passed a bill allowing a Choose Life license tag. Now we shall se what the House does with them.

Faces of Lawsuit Abuse

There is a website I found recently called Faces of Lawsuit Abuse. It shows the depth of frivolous lawsuits by highlighting real life people that have been sued (some of them hundreds of times) over silly things. These kinds of lawsuits are ruining many small businesses. I encourage you to check out the site.

Obama's Proposed Reg. Czar Would Like E-mail Control

Just yesterday I posted a link to an article claiming that Pres. Obama would like more control over the Internet. It looks like his proposed Regulatory Czar, Cass Sunstein, would like control over your e-mails too. That's right America. According to WorldNetDaily, he would like to check your e-mails to make sure they are civil. If not, you will receive a warning asking if you want to continue. If you do, Mr. Sunstein thinks you should have to wait 24 hours to send it so that you can cool down. And the intrusion into your private life doesn't end there. He wants us bloggers to submit to a "fairness doctrine" where we post not only our opinions but also the opinions of those who disagree. Oh, and non-profits like National Right to Life for example should be forced to link to Planned Parenthood (or some other abortion promoting site).

On other issues, Mr. Sunstein is equally anti-freedom. For example, he claimed in 2007 that hunting should be banned in America. He also thinks that the second amendment has nothing to do with the individual right to bear arms. HELLO! I thought that was the whole point.

He is also something of an animal rights extremist claiming that animals should not even be used in the entertainment industry and agriculture.

God help us if this man is given any position of power.

Hate Crimes Bill

The House and Senate are poised to pass the Hate Crimes Prevention Act of 2009. It is HR 1913. This bill adds sexual orientation and gender identity to the list of attributes that qualify for "hate crime" penalties. It seems very innocuous, but in other countries this has lead to mere words being hate crimes. If this passes, it will be a great challenge for the church. Will our leaders be willing to go to jail for speaking the truth about homosexuality? The bill could be law in as little as two weeks. I also think that hate crimes laws are poor legislation because they give penalties for thoughts. Other than self defense, does the reason for the crime really matter? If you hurt or kill someone, you deserve to be punished. And there are already libel and slander laws for written and spoken offenses. True justice is applying the law the same regardless of station, race, gender, etc. It is unjust for certain people to be counted as more important or valuable before the law.

Obama in Charge of Internet?

HT: Religious Freedom Coalition

It appears that a couple of Senators would like Pres. Obama to be in charge of the Internet and even the San Francisco Chronicle thinks it is a bad idea. Sens. Jay Rockefeller (D-W. VA) and Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) have introduced the Cybersecruity Act of 2009. It is SB773. Here is a quote from the Chronicle by James G. Lakely.

The bill's language also allows the commerce secretary to "access all relevant data" on those "critical" networks "without regard to any provision of law, regulation, rule, or policy restricting such access." The bill as currently written provides zero structural oversight over the proposed broad new executive branch powers.

I seem to recall people such as Sen. Rockefeller being troubled about granting such vaguely defined surveillance powers to President George W. Bush, even when targeted only at suspected terrorists in wartime. Yet Rockefeller said in a statement after introducing the bill, "We must protect our critical infrastructure at all costs - from our water to our electricity, to banking, traffic lights, and electronic health records. The list goes on."

If protecting America's "traffic lights" is on that list, it's an absurdly long one. Al Gore may take credit for inventing the Internet, but it does not belong to the federal government.

Good grief. Is there no end to where our government is willing to reach? This is a terrible, terrible idea.