Order tossed for I-912 backers

The Washington Supreme Court has thrown out a judge’s order that forced backers of a anti-gasoline-tax initiative to report the online-air activities of two Seattle talk-show hosts as in-kind campaign contributions in 2005.

All nine justices agreed that the lower court ruling by Thurston County Superior Court Judge Chris Wickham was incorrect on free-speech grounds.

They issued two separate decisions Thursday to explain their views in the case, which dealt with KVI Radio hosts John Carlson and Kirby Wilbur.

The backers of Initiative 912, who had sought unsuccessfully to overturn the gasoline-tax increases, now are considering whether to pursue a civil-rights claim for damages against the prosecutors in San Juan County, Seattle and other jurisdictions in the case.

“This is a vindication of free speech and freedom of the press, and a direct and clear repudiation of the use of Washington’s campaign finance laws to intimidate and harass media voices with which the government disagrees,” William Maurer, executive director of the Institute for Justice’s Washington Chapter, said in a statement e-mailed to reporters.

To understand the fuss you have to go back to 2005, before I had even launched this blog.  This section sums it up fairly well.

San Juan County Prosecutor Randall Gaylord, who led efforts to treat the on-air commentary as in-kind political contributions, could not be reached for comment. But Gaylord said in a statement sent to news organizations that the Supreme Court altered the rules for talk-show hosts in campaigns by requiring a political committee to own the radio station before drawing the line between advocacy and campaigning.

The case dealt with the No New Gas Tax group’s Initiative 912, which was aimed at repealing the gasoline-tax portion of a transportation-financing package approved by the Legislature in 2005. Carlson and Wilbur both advocated strongly for the repeal, urging listeners to sign petitions and donate money.

Harsh?  I don’t think so.  It’s completely true, according to the News Tribune:

Democrats support Watada, caucuses

Leaders of the state Democratic Party voted overwhelmingly Saturday to support Lt. Ehren Watada, the Fort Lewis officer who refused orders to serve in Iraq.

Maybe traitor is too harsh, but I have no kind words for the man who joined the service knowing we were in a war, and then used specious reasoning to justify his refusal to fight.  He ignores the entire reality of the chain of command and his responsibility as an officer, and the oath he took when he was granted his commission.

And maybe it is accurate, as he left his unit without its leadership as they deployed to harms way.  He is at best a dishonorable disgrace to his uniform, to his service and to his country.

But the democrats think he is mom and apple pie.

“We support and commend Lt. Ehren Watada for his courage, moral leadership, and commitment to duty demonstrated by his act of resistance to the continued costly, destructive and immoral U.S. military occupation of Iraq,” the resolution said.

Yes.  Leadership by refusing to lead, Morals by violating his oath to obey, and commitment by refusing to serve.

Clear Democrat principles.

Mike Carnahan, a Democratic Central Committee member from Clark County, spoke against the Watada resolution. It’s an all-volunteer military, he said. “I find it offensive as, a veteran, to have him doing what he’s doing,” Carnahan said.

But other veterans on the committee said that, particularly as an officer, Watada shouldn’t just blindly follow.

“To say he’s required to follow all orders would be to negate the Nuremberg trials,” said Mike Mosbarger, a Mason County Democrat.

Those were the war crimes trials of Nazis after World War II, some of whom offered the unsuccessful defense that they were just following orders.

In a time when there are so few Hollywood celebs who will take a conservative, or frankly even a common sense stand, to hear one not only take that stand, but nail it down is encouraging.

In this interview on the O’Reilly Factor, he lays out in simple and sincere terms what he feels.  Hot Air sums it up thus:

He talked about the war, about protesters on the left who deface the president, and how we’ve been invaded by “propaganda,” by which he means the noisy international anti-war movement.

Watch the video and then I recommend the interview I will link to below, also via Hot Air and Michelle Malkin.  When Mr Voight says he supports the troops, I for one believe him.

I posted the section of the interview that deals directly with politics here, the rest of it was more devoted to his movie, though it was also interesting.

And I will cheat and give you the money quote from the end of the interview.  Rarely has the truth been made so abundantly clear:

But there’s still a role for journalism in democracy, right?

Of course. You bet. There’s a place for good actors in movies too. But you can do damage to a decent movie by going off in the wrong direction too. My brother Chip [Taylor] wrote a song—he wrote “Wild Thing” and he wrote it at 2:00 in the morning—one of the lyrics was very telling: “The trouble with humans is they’re only human / The trouble with trouble is it’s always around.” That’s the deal. We have to fight against gravity to stand up. We should help each other. And the truth is very important. Journalism can be helpful too, but once it bends to sensationalism and commercialism and becomes agenda-driven, it’s not so good.

Ah, the truth speaks so clearly some days.

Patriot Act

Jon Voight understands that America is under attack. Why don’t you?

I really don’t know what to make of this.  I recall when she ran for the Senate she came on very strong with the Hillary Rodham Clinton moniker, in true liberated women fashion.  It didn’t really bug me though I thought it was fairly obvious why she did it on several levels.

Come to think of it, and a quick Google search confirms, she began using that name long before then, so I retract the implication that it was a campaign tool in 2000.  But is it a campaign liability now?

I wouldn’t think so.  I wonder if there is a focus group that thinks so though.  Maybe some survey said that some target demographic values the traditional name structure.

Or, does she perhaps want to promote a more unified stance with Bill, and now draw on his name appeal which remains strangly powerful, where she was (understandably) trying to make herself comfortably distant from him (and his hijinks) during her Senate run?

I don’t honestly know.   Regardless, according to this story, she is ready to lose the Rodham and just be Mrs Bill for a while, and all indications are that the focus of the ommission is her presidential bid..

All I will say is I think it says something about her, but Ii won’t say what.  You decide for yourself if it is relevant and if so to what measure. 

Via Hot Air:

According to Raw Story, Hearst Newspapers will report that Hillary Clinton will drop her maiden name “Rodham” in her campaign for President.

Here are a few excerpts via Raw Story:

# Clinton identifies herself as “Hillary Clinton” in her campaign press releases and on her campaign website. The lone mention of her maiden name is in a campaign biography that says “Hillary’s father, Hugh Rodham, was the son of a factory worker from Scranton, Pa.”

# She continues to use “Hillary Rodham Clinton” in her New York-focused press releases and in the Senate.

You read that right. 

The new binding energy targets the EU voted on and approved to lower CO2 and make Europe more ‘green’ will actually increase global warming, threaten endangered species and speed the deforestation of the South East Asian rainforests.

Via the Mighty Orb:

EU green targets will damage rainforests

European union green fuel targets will accelerate the destruction of rainforests in South-East Asia and threaten the habitat of endangered species, such as the orang-utan.  

In March EU leaders agreed to set a binding climate change target to make biofuel - energy sources made from plant material - account for 10 per cent of all Europe’s transport fuels by 2020.

But the European Commission has admitted that the objective, which aims to cut carbon dioxide emissions, may have the unintended consequence of speeding up the destruction of tropical rainforests and peatlands in South-East Asia - actually increasing, not reducing, global warming.

Can you say oops?

European consumption of plant-based fuels will soar from around three million tons at present to more than 30 million tonns in 2010, driving a boom in imports of cheap biofuels.

Europe is still years away from self-sufficiency in biofuels produced from straw and other waste vegetation. As a result, demand for cheap imports of fuels, such as palm oil, is expected to soar.

Countries such as Indonesia have already begun planning an increase in the production of palm oil, a development campaigners fear will see more rainforest fall to the axe and rare peat soil burned.

Andris Piebalgs, the European Energy Commissioner, has confirmed that, despite setting the biofuel target, the EU has no system to certify that imports exclude palm oil or fuel production that has resulted in the destruction of rare natural resources.

Oops again.

”No mandatory certification exists at present that will guarantee that tropical rainforests or peatlands in South-East Asia are not destroyed for the production of palm oil,” he said.

TGIF.

I think I have posted this before but it’s worth a second look. 

The second clip is the singer, Plumb, on Showbiz Tonight (CNN) discussing what the song means. 

I listen to talk radio every day on my way to work in my car, and usually via the Internet at work.

One of the dangers of this is you occasionally hear a story that frustrates the hell out of you and you cannot call in to comment on it.  This is one such case.  I can’t think of a story that has infuriated me more due to the completely idiotic overreactions and the number of people jumping to conclusions..

I am going to post the story first:

http://www.komotv.com/news/7202241.html

Restrictions on the use of security videotape have been tightened at a suburban Tacoma high school after images of two girls kissing were shown to the parents of one of the girls, officials say.

Keith Nelson, dean of students at Gig Harbor High School, said he saw the students kissing and holding hands in the school’s busy commons, checked a surveillance camera and showed the parents the tape because they had asked him a few weeks earlier to alert them to any conduct by their daughter that was out of the ordinary.

OK, stopping for a moment, I have to immediate point out that there are several issues at work here, and people are mixing them into a single complaint, which clouds the issue.  I see the essential questions as:

• Are surveillance cameras in school a violation of privacy?
• Do parents have the right to about their children’s activities at school, and should the administrator have agreed to watch the child?
• Is two girls holding hands and kissing considered “out of the ordinary behavior”? Is this a gay issue?
• Should the video tape have been shown to the parents?
• Did the parents overreact to the video?
• Is Ken Schram an idiot?

OK the last one will make sense in a minute.  You see, Ken is one of those who blasted off into orbit over this regardless of the facts.  Here is his commentary on it (with my responses, as always):

Another topic I have avoided lately is abortion.  It is frankly one I am biased on.

The recent news that the SCOTUS has upheld a bad on Partial Birth Abortion, the procedure called intact Dilation and Extraction has caused the left to go up in flames, with visions of coathangers and back alley abortions abundant.

Nothing could be farther from the truth. The law the SCOTUS upheld banned one specific procedure, except in the case of the mother’s health.  Other forms of late term abortion like Dilation and Evacuation are still perfectly legal.

The law only affects about 5% of abortions.

And to be clear the law was passed because this type of abortion is fairly gruesome.

I dislike abortion as a rule, but Partial Birth abortions are particularly vile in my opinion.

So all the cries about the end of the world are simple media posturing and demagoguing.

When the law was passed it had bipartisan support, too.  The votes were 281–142 in the House of Representatives and 64–34 in the Senate.  By party, that broke down to 218 Republicans and 63 Democrats in the House supported it, and 4 Republicans, 137 Democrats, and 1 independent opposed it.  In the Senate the bill was supported by 47 Republicans and 17 Democrats and opposed by 3 Republicans, 30 Democrats, and 1 independent.

Among the votes saying yes to the bill were these Democrats (a few notables in bold):

House:

• Robert Cramer (D-AL)
• Artur Davis (D-AL)
• Marion Berry (D-AR)
• Mike Ross (D-AR)
• Allen Boyd (D-FL)  
• Jim Davis (D-FL)
• Sanford Bishop (D-GA)
• Jim Marshall (D-GA)
• Jerry Costello (D-IL)
• William Lipinski (D-IL)
• Baron Hill (D-IN)
• Peter Visclosky (D-IN)
• Ken Lucas (D-KY)
• Rodney Alexander (D-LA)
• William Jefferson (D-LA)
• Chris John (D-LA)
• Stephen Lynch (D-MA)
• Richard Neal (D-MA)
• Dutch Ruppersberger (D-MD)
• Michael Michaud (D-ME)