ESPN'S SICK AND TWISTED CELEBRATION OF LAETTNER-LOATHING

            A nasty video recently published on the ESPN website illustrates two depressing social phenomena that most people are unwilling to acknowledge, let alone deplore.  But that is Splashing Rocks' job. 

            The charming title of the video is "I Hate Christian Laettner" (apparently ESPN will soon broadcast a full-length program with the same title).  The video is introduced with the an equally pleasant textual lead-in:  "Everyone hates Christian Laettner.  No one hates him more than Kentucky fans.  In honor of the upcoming 30 for 30 film,  Kaylee Hartung traveled to Lexington to see if, 23 years later, hatred for Laettner is still as intense as ever."

            Lovely, isn't it?

         

            For those unfamiliar with college basketball, Mr. Laettner was a college basketball superstar for the historically great Duke University basketball teams of the period 1989-92.  Without question, Laettner was one of the greatest collegiate basketball players of all time.  He led Duke to two consecutive national championships in 1991 and 1992.  In the latter year, he was not only the national collegiate player of the year, but USA Basketball's Male Athlete of the Year. 

            Laettner was one of those superior players who was at his very best when the competition was the most intense – which means the NCAA Tournament and its climactic "Final Four."  No one excelled in that event like Christian Laettner.  To this day, he holds the NCAA Tournament records for most career points scored (407), most free throws made (142), and most games played (23).  He was NCAA Tournament MVP in 1991.  He is the only player in NCAA history to start for his team in the Final Four for all four years of his collegiate career, including the two championships.  In short, Laettner's record of success in college basketball's premier event is simply unequalled.

            Yet with all his consistent excellence, Laettner is most remembered and recognized for one brilliant play.  The word "iconic" is grossly overused, but in this case it aptly describes what is known among college basketball fans simply as "The Shot."  With only 2.6 seconds remaining in a dramatic overtime NCAA Tournament game against Kentucky, Duke trailed by a point.  But then Laettner caught a floor-length pass from Grant Hill, calmly turned, and sank an astonishing shot to nail the victory in what many regard as the greatest collegiate game ever.  The man was simply "clutch," in that game and many others.

                                                             

                                            They loathe Laettner . . . .

                    . . . but love Lewis: The Twisted American Sportsmind   

            
            With all these sterling credentials, one would naturally think that Laettner would be greatly admired by most college basketball fans.  But for strange and disturbing reasons, a kind of mindless collective notion has developed over the years that hating Christian Laettner is somehow a normal and generally shared feeling among many of those fans.  It bears a striking similarity to the equally mindless and nasty dislike of New England Patriots superstar quarterback Tom Brady.  Another Duke basketball great, the incomparable long-range shooter J. J. Reddick, has also been singled out for this same kind of irrational mass antipathy.

            It all has to do with profound jealousy, self-loathing, and a Quisling-like repudiation of one's own racial identity.  Laettner and Brady are handsome, intelligent, and remarkably successful white competitors in sports that are largely dominated by blacks.  For some unfathomable reason, this inspires intensely negative feelings against these men among a certain class of white person who would never entertain, or at least never acknowledge, such rancor against prominent black athletes. 

            The collective Laettner-loathing has become so widely accepted among sports media that ESPN feels comfortable in promoting a video – soon to be followed by a full program – that portrays hatred of this remarkable man as a colorful, amusing, and even likeable quality. 

            The video starts with the fatuous premise that "everybody" is like the feckless white liberals at ESPN and naturally hates Christian Laettner.  It then finds amusement – and assumes the general public will also find amusement – in the piquant revelation that those colorful, salt-of-the-earth Kentucky University "fans" hate him even more.  This is presumably because Kentucky was the victim of Laettner's legendary and endlessly re-televised impossible shot.

            In ESPN's video, a vivacious woman reporter gleefully entices expressions of progressively more venomous Laettner-hate from a herd of unkempt and ill-mannered Kentucky basketball supporters.   Most of them are proudly wearing their garish and undoubtedly overpriced Kentucky basketball caps and/or jerseys.  An unprepossessing middle-aged man, with rapier-like wit, scornfully describes the handsome and accomplished Laettner as a "piece of crap."  The reporter smiles approvingly.  Another embodiment of Kentucky class and graciousness then declares that Laettner is "a bad person."

            Then a blonde, fortyish woman, apparently a mom, proudly displays a tee-shirt emblazoned with the slogan "I Still Hate Christian Laettner."  The classy lady then explains, "For Christmas this is all I told my family I wanted."  This Mom must be real proud of filling her house with that wholesome, home-bred Kentucky hate on Christmas morning. 

            Several of the responses are conspicuously "bleeped-out" by those clever ESPN producers.  They are subtly letting us know just how gross the invective gets when the target is a well-educated white superstar who – unlike the pseudo-students who play one year for Kentucky before promptly dropping the pretext of classes and jetting off to the NBA – actually graduated from an academically superior university after playing all four years of his eligibility.

            But the video descends to its nadir of nastiness when one of the Kentucky wits purports to quote his own grandmother as having described Christian Laettner as "the only Christian she knows that will burn in hell." 

            This distorted celebration of  irrational collective rancor is deeply disturbing on many levels, but it reflects two broader pathologies that are increasingly prevalent in a declining American culture.

            The first is the grossly disproportionate importance of big-time sports in the lives, emotions, and activities of a large portion of the American public.  SR has previously examined  aspects of this unhealthy phenomenon in a post comparing the addiction to big-time sports with Marx's depiction of religion as the "opiate of the people."  See "Big Time Sports:  America's New Opiate" (Feb/ 18, 2013), at http://splashingrocks.blogspot.com/2013/02/big-time-sports-americas-new-opiate.html. 

            The willingness of presumably ordinary Kentuckians to spew such extreme venom against a man they do not even know – on camera – demonstrates the distorting extremes of their loyalty to a grotesquely oversized collegiate basketball program.  And Kentucky's program is hardly alone in this respect.

            It is evident that these people would fanatically support the Kentucky basketball team, and ferociously revile its opponents, irrespective of any considerations of the character or integrity of the teams' respective players.  And their association of the basketball team with the University itself is purely delusional.

            These fans are apparently oblivious to the fact that most of Kentucky's star players cannot wait to toss away their books, end the pretext of attending classes, and promptly depart the Lexington campus at the conclusion of their first and only year of collegiate competition.  The blue-shirted Laettner-haters' blind loyalty to the University of Kentucky program is exceeded only by the one-and-done players' determination to immediately abandon it after less than a single academic year. 

            The Kentucky fans are being played for fools and suckers, and they either don't know or don't care.  If Kentucky fielded a team of five probationary delinquents against five altar boys, the blue-shirted herd would continue to bellow their rabid support for the delinquents.  They are just too heavily invested in the corrosive myth of big-time collegiate sports to change course.

            Apart from the corrupting influence of America's mega-sports fixation, the second pathology revealed  by the orgy of Laettner-hating – and Brady-hating, and J. J. Reddick-hating, etc. -- is a bizarre racial double standard.

 

            It is perfectly acceptable, and even kind of "cool" in the twisted realm of the ESPN sports herd, to openly revile successful white athletes like Laettner, Tom Brady, and J. J. Reddick (if you doubt this, just run an Internet search using "hate" with one of those names).  But expressing open contempt for black athletes, even black athletes who may have earned such contempt by their barbarous and violent behavior, is socially and politically unacceptable.

            You will never see an ESPN video entitled "I Hate Ray Lewis."  Or "I Hate Ray Rice."  Or "I Hate Allen Iverson."  Yet Christian Laettner has done nothing I am aware of to make him more despicable than these celebrated black athletes.

            Oh, wait.  That was kind of an understatement.  It's not merely that Laettner has done nothing to warrant the nasty invective that would never be directed against these or many similar errant black athletes.  He's not even in their ballpark.  Lewis (indicted for murder in 2000), Rice (documented girlfriend beater), and Iverson (15-year sentence for felony maiming, but quickly granted clemency) are proven perps, yet they are not remotely despised and reviled like Laettner, Brady, or Reddick, whose records are clean of such behavior.

            The classic example is Baltimore Ravens linebacker legend Ray Lewis.  He was indicted for murder, but was able to avoid conviction by pleading guilty to obstruction of justice.  But never mind.  The Barbarians of Baltimore have erected a heroic statue of the miscreant Mr. Lewis, and he has achieved the status of a beloved and respected elder statesman in the pro football and ESPN cultures. 

            So the documented criminal offender, Ray Lewis, is a revered Baltimore Legend, while the family man with the spotless and distinguished personal record, i.e, Christian Laettner, is an object of nationally broadcast rancor, even 23 years after his athletic triumphs.  This isn't Denmark, but something is seriously rotten here.

            One of the weirdest aspects of this whole sorry spectacle is that Laettner himself seems to take it in stride and even share in the "joke."  He recently appeared for an interview with ESPN host Dan Patrick which actually seemed designed to promote the forthcoming  hate-Laettner video.  Why Laettner would condone a national celebration of malice directed at him is anyone's guess.  Perhaps he is so inured to what he he has endured over the years that he has decided the best defense is to roll with the punches.

            But Laettner is now a 45-year-old family man, with a wife, two daughters, and a son.  Is it possible that his wife and children can lightly dismiss a nationally broadcast program explicitly featuring the widespread hatred of their husband and father?  More likely, ESPN's "I Hate Christian Laettner" programs are deeply hurtful to the Laettner family.  One can only imagine the nasty abuse the Laettner children will likely endure as a result of all this.

            Yet millions of mindless ESPN viewers will watch the program and join in the perpetuation of what amounts to media-approved hatred of a remarkable athlete who has done nothing to warrant such animus.  In today's America, it could only happen to a white heterosexual male who had the audacity to excel aggressively in an arena where most of his fellow whites are content to serve as props and spectators.

             

            

HILLARY CLINTON'S SECRET SERVER AND THE DYNASTIC DEMOCRATS

              Putative 2016 Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Rodham Clinton appears to be in big trouble – at least politically.  If her scandal-driven problems prove sufficient to derail what was assumed to be Ms. Clinton's unchallenged progress to the party's nomination, the Democrats will have only themselves to blame for the destructive disarray that will ensue. 

                By subordinating their party to a system of hereditary political entitlement, the Democrats will have left themselves without a viable alternative candidate if their anointed heir apparent -- i.e., the wife of Bill Clinton -- self-destructs.

                                                     

                Hillary Clinton: The Dem's Queen Victoria, but without the gravitas
                 
                A potentially devastating scandal has developed concerning Ms. Clinton's extraordinary scheme to shield her communications as Secretary of State from federal record-keeping and disclosure requirements.  In an act of remarkable audacity, she established an entire independent e-mail server at one of the Clinton mansions in Chappaqua, NY, in order to divert her official e-mails from the State Department's main server – effectively sheltering them from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests, congressional subpoenas, and general public scrutiny. 

                This is no mere technical mistake being blown out of proportion by media investigators and political opponents.  It was a calculated scheme designed to place Ms. Clinton in a privileged pocket of secrecy so that she could conduct her activities as Secretary of State, and her associated political activities, outside the realm of normal public and congressional scrutiny.  In short, Hillary Clinton and her courtiers sought to isolate her from the public accountability that citizens have a right to expect – at least in a functional democratic republic.

                SR leaves to others a fuller examination of the legal details and consequences of Ms. Clinton's shadowy, "off the books" system of secretive government at the State Department.  Given the Clintons' proven ability to use delay, obfuscation, and counter-attack to avoid the consequences of their wrongdoings, Hillary Clinton may yet survive this sleazy scandal as she has survived so many others.

                But what if the "Secret Server" scandal proves too damaging for the Democrats to cling to the inevitability of Ms. Clinton's nomination as their presidential standard-bearer?  It would leave them without a replacement candidate possessing the credibility, stature, and especially the readiness to enter the 2016 presidential campaign in a position of strength.  All of the alternative candidates that come to mind – at least at this juncture – are fatally flawed and deficient (so, of course is Hillary, but unfortunately, too many voters appear ready to overlook her flaws). 

                Vice President Biden is a national joke, whose recurrent tasteless verbal blunders are exceeded in vulgarity only by his shameless physical groping of both young and mature females – all recorded in painfully embarrassing photos that would make devastating campaign commercials.  Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts is a wild-eyed pseudo-Indian leftist favored by the angry and radical extremists of a leftist Democratic Party -- which may serve her well in Massachusetts, but which renders her unacceptable to most of the national electorate.  Martin O'Malley, the former Governor of Maryland, left such an unimpressive legacy that he departed office with a pathetic 41% approval rating, and his hand-picked candidate to succeed him as governor was resoundingly defeated by a Republican in a state where Republicans are as rare as white elephants.  

               The two remaining prospective candidates are even further beyond the pale:  Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders is an outright Socialist who looks like a deranged and disheveled great uncle, and would be lucky to carry even his own left-wing state; and former Virginia Senator Jim Webb is an eccentric, rude, and irascible crank whose presidential prospects are taken seriously only by himself.

                In short, if Ms. Clinton's candidacy implodes, the Democratic bench appears to be empty of credible replacements.  And the reason is evident.  The Democratic Party's preoccupation with dynastic politics created an overwhelming presumption that Hillary Clinton, the heir to the Clinton Political Dynasty, would be awarded the party's 2016 presidential nomination almost as a matter of hereditary entitlement.  So powerful and prevalent was this dynastic assumption that other potentially viable candidates demurred pursuing the nomination as an exercise in futility.

                Hillary Clinton is an elderly, uninspiring, pampered, and greedy grandmother.  She is utterly lacking in political charisma – compare her style, for example, with that of Jack Kennedy or, for that matter, Barack Obama – and she has a well-documented record of dishonesty, evasion, sleaze, self-dealing, and sharp practice in her governmental and political career.  She is a Queen Victoria without the gravitas and an Evita without the sex appeal.  She became Senator from New York, Secretary of State, and now presumptive Democratic Presidential Candidate for one reason and one reason only:  She was the politically loyal wife of Bill Clinton, a moderately popular and absolutely lucky president, and gained considerable popularity among a certain kind of American woman because of her ability to endure her husband's degenerate misbehavior, in and out of office, with a remarkable degree of self-containment and sang-froid.

                Why would such a shifty, unimposing, unattractive, and simply tacky person be considered the inevitable choice as the Democratic nominee for president in 1916?  It is simply because of the Democrats' preference for dynastic succession and connection, rather than individual merit and excellence, as the natural system for selecting much of their political leadership.  Although the Republicans have had some political dynasties of their own – notably and obviously the Bush presidencies – their tendency to embrace hereditary politics pales in comparison to the Democrats.

                The standard and precedent for this phenomenon was set by the notorious example of the Kennedy family.   The super-rich whiskey tycoon, Joseph Kennedy, parlayed his wealth and friendship with President Franklin Roosevelt to become Ambassador to Great Britain and a powerful Democratic power-broker.  He hoped his eldest son would become President, and when that son died, he transferred the family political ambitions to the next-in-line, John F. Kennedy. 

                The rest is history.  Jack Kennedy's brief and undistinguished presidency was misportrayed by the liberal-democratic media as a romantic neo-Camelot after he was assassinated by a deranged communist.  Like a latter-day Borgia, he had appointed his 36-year-old younger brother Robert as Attorney General despite his glaring lack of legal qualifications – his only compelling qualification was being the President's brother and confidante.  After Jack Kennedy's death, RFK parlayed his status as the Kennedy Heir into election as a Senator from New York, even though he was obviously from Massachusetts.  Then his dynastic connection had all but assured him the Democratic presidential nomination in 1968 when he too was assassinated.

              But the Democrats remained addicted to the notion of hereditary political royalty.  The youngest Kennedy brother, Ted, had already been handed the family senate seat in Massachusetts, and after Robert's death, the dynastic presidential expectations devolved upon him.  The force of the Kennedy's dynastic entitlement was so great that not even Ted Kennedy's notorious abandonment of Mary Jo Kopechne in the dark waters of Chappaquiddick could derail his presidential expectations.  Only the ruthless exploitation of the powers of incumbency by Jimmy Carter's team prevented Ted Kennedy from seizing the Democratic presidential nomination in 1980.  The ensuing years have seen the Royalist Democrats, like so many 18^th century champions of a Stuart Pretender, cast about desperately for yet another Kennedy – whether John F. Kennedy Jr., his sister Caroline, or the severely addled Patrick Kennedy – to restore the Family Dynasty to its place of hereditary political power.

                The Kennedy's, alas, are hardly the only Democratic political dynasty.  The governments of two of the nation's most dominant states, California and New York, for example, have been dominated by hereditary Democratic entitlement for much of the past 50 years.

                Edmond G. "Pat" Brown held the governorship of California from 1959 to 1967.  California's Democratic voters then awarded the governorship to Pat Brown's son, Jerry, in 1975, and re-elected him for an additional term in 1979.  After an interlude in which he repeatedly sought the presidency and served in other offices, Jerry Brown reclaimed the family governorship in 2011 and was re-elected to an unprecedented fourth term in 2014.  Thus, the Brown family has exercised a dynastic Democratic stranglehold on California's highest office for a substantial portion of the modern era. 

                A similar dynastic Democratic domination of the governorship has prevailed in New York.  Mario Cuomo served as governor of New York for three terms, from 1983 to 1994.  Not content with prolonged leftist misrule by one Cuomo, Democratic voters bestowed the state's governorship on Mario Cuomo's son, Andrew, in 2010.  Andrew Cuomo had previously parlayed his family connections – including his marriage to Kerry Kennedy, daughter of Robert F. Kennedy – to become Attorney General of New York and Secretary of the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

                One could go on, because the Kennedy, Brown, and Cuomo Dynasties are but the most prominent examples of a "royalist" tendency that is embedded in modern Democratic politics.  We could move over to the city level and find, for example, that the Daley family, featuring the vulgar reigns of Mayors William and Richard Daley, has dominated Chicago's mayor's office and its Democratic political machine for almost a half-century. 

                And this ethos of dynastic entitlement, akin to pre-modern Europe's Divine Right of Kings, continues to permeate Democratic politics in the present and toward the future.  Needless to say, Hillary Clinton's  unchallenged primacy in claiming the Democratic nomination for president is but the most prominent current manifestation of the phenomenon.  A mere minute's perusal of the Internet, moreover, will reveal that media and political liberals are obsessed with the exciting prospect – exciting for them, but appalling for the rest of us – that the likes of Chelsea Clinton and even (one instinctively winces at the mere thought) Michelle Obama may perpetuate their respective family political lineages in the future.

                Whatever the reason and consequences, the grossly misnamed Democratic Party is dedicated to anything but "democratic" selection and aspiration in choosing leaders for both the party and the Nation.  It prefers political offices and political power to devolve through an ingrained system of virtual dynastic succession and hereditary entitlement.  The smug, evasive, and utterly unimposing persona of Hillary Clinton would never triumph in a genuinely merit-based competition for selecting the most appealing and accomplished candidate.  Unless the Secret Server debacle or some other scandal proves fatal, however, Ms. Clinton is nearly certain to receive the Democratic nomination as the proximate heir to the Clinton political dynasty.  The prerogatives of dynastic succession are so strong in the Democratic Party, moreover, that she may claim the nomination notwithstanding the serious damage she may suffer from Secret Server or other distasteful scandals.

                In the end, Republicans should be grateful for the Democrats' addiction to honoring the entitlements of political royalty.  Although the campaign for the GOP presidential nomination includes a dynastic candidate of its own in Jeb Bush, Bush's status and prospects are not remotely comparable to Hillary Clinton's. 

                While the Democrats are eager to hand Ms. Clinton the nomination with hardly a semblance of genuine opposition, Jeb Bush faces not only fierce competition from a large field of strong candidates, but the implacable, and likely decisive, opposition of the conservative wing of the Republican party.  Unlike Democratic liberals who swoon and kowtow to hereditary Kennedy's and Cuomo's and Clinton's, Republican conservatives adamantly reject further perpetuation of a Bush dynasty or anything resembling it. Consequently, Jeb Bush is unlikely to gain the GOP nomination.  If he does, it will be despite his Bush family credentials, not because of them.

                The Founding Fathers fought a ferocious revolution to replace the tyranny and privilege of hereditary monarchs with the competitive politics of a democratic republic.  Over two centuries later, the Dynastic Democrats seem bent on reverting to the decadent and complacent rule of political royalty.

                ADDENDUM:  Almost on cue, the political website, Politico, has provided prompt confirmation of this post's thesis that liberal Democrats remain perversely obsessed with the notion of hereditary political royalty.  Three days after our posting, Politico headlined an article entitled, "Excited for Jeb and Hillary?  Just Wait for Chelsea and George P!"  The title conveys all one needs to know about this piece of heavy-breathing political royalty nonsense.  All one can respond is, "No, we are not excited, but we are surely horrified by the ghastly prospect you pose."

WHO'S DISCRIMINATING IN THE LORETTA LYNCH NOMINATION?

           SR has previously explained the compelling grounds for blocking the confirmation of Loretta Lynch, Obama's nominee to continue Eric Holder's anti-constitutional and racially biased policies as Attorney General.  See the recent Splashing Rocks posts of November 11, 2014, and February 17, 2015, at http://splashingrocks.blogspot.com/.

            Republican Senator Rand Paul of Kentucky recently announced his strong opposition to Lynch's nomination, based on a combination of issues:  (1) her support of Obama's unconstitutional amnesty order for illegal aliens; (2) her enthusiasm for draconian civil asset forfeiture remedies as U.S. Attorney; and (3) her refusal to condemn and oppose the possible use of a drone missile to kill a suspected American citizen terrorist on American soil.  Significantly, Paul's opposition had nothing to do with the controversial race-related issues -- like her embrace of radical race-based law enforcement policies pushed by the likes of Al Sharpton and the NAACP -- that Lynch's nomination squarely presents.

            Notwithstanding the clearly libertarian basis of Paul's opposition, the incorrigibly divisive Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) predictably condemned his position as racist.  Of course, these race-obsessed fanatics consider opposition to any black nominee as racist, unless the nominee is a conservative or a Republican, like Clarence Thomas.  The CBC's mindless attack on Sen. Paul is all the more absurd because Paul is the very kind of opportunistic Republican who advocates pandering to the leftist black establishment's bogus claims of persistent societal discrimination.

            But the CBC poses exactly the wrong question regarding possibly racial aspects of the Lynch nomination.  The honest question is not whether opposition to Lynch's nomination is racist, inasmuch as there are compelling grounds to oppose her that have nothing to do with race or even racial issues – most importantly, her open embrace of Obama's patently unconstitutional amnesty order to empower illegal aliens.

           

            The real question – the one nobody seems willing to raise – is whether Lynch's nomination was itself made on the basis of race.

            Eric Holder – who is not only black, but openly biased in favor of blacks in his administration of the Justice Department – has been Attorney General for six years.  Meanwhile, the second of the Nation's two most prominent law enforcement offices – Secretary of Homeland Security – is held by another black attorney, Mr. Jeh Johnson.  (Johnson is a Democratic activist who served as special counsel to John Kerry's 2004 presidential campaign,  and was an early supporter of Obama's presidential campaign).   With Obama as President -- and thus the Nation's chief law enforcement officer (it is he who must "take care that the laws are faithfully executed," see U.S. Const. art. II, sec. 3) -- this means that blacks (who constitute about 13% of the U.S. population) have a monopoly and a stranglehold on all three positions directing the Nation's law enforcement policies and practices.

            Ms. Lynch's confirmation as Attorney General will perpetuate that monopoly.  Yet no one seems to notice.  More accurately, no one seems to want to notice.

            It is especially pertinent to consider the broader context in which Ms. Lynch was singled out as the one attorney uniquely qualified to hold the highest legal post in the Executive Branch.   Blacks constitute about 4.8% of attorneys in the United States according to data compiled by the American Bar Association.  The black percentage of those highly experienced and accomplished attorneys qualified to serve as attorney general is probably lower than 4.8%, if only because substantial numbers of blacks only started  to enter the leading law schools, law firms, and other proving grounds for high legal office in relatively recent years. 

            Given these realities, the likelihood that a nondiscriminatory process would naturally result in the selection of two consecutive black attorneys for the federal government's highest legal post is rather remote. Moreover, the argument that Ms. Lynch's selection is entirely logical and unsurprising because she is an experienced United States Attorney is unpersuasive.  Lynch is only one of some 93 U.S. Attorneys, a position which is outranked in any event by numerous other Justice Department positions (Solicitor General, Deputy AG, Associate AG, and numerous Assistant Attorneys General).  Nothing about Ms. Lynch's tenure as U.S. Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, or her other unremarkable career positions, distinguished her as a particular standout among U.S. Attorneys.

            In short, applying the standards that liberals insist on applying in other employment and promotion contexts – standards that call for a finding of discrimination whenever non-racial criteria do not themselves establish the selectee's superior qualifications – the circumstances of Ms. Lynch's selection would, at a minimum, raise an inference of racial discrimination.

            This does not prove that Ms. Lynch was nominated purely on the basis of race.  She does possess the basic credentials that could be considered minimal for an Attorney General, especially her experience (if not her particular distinction) as a U.S. Attorney.  And her evident sympathy for the Obama/Holder legal policies was undoubtedly a consideration – i.e., even a qualified black attorney who did not support those policies would not have been selected.

            Nonetheless, there are powerful reasons for suspecting that a second consecutive nomination for Attorney General selected from a group representing less than 5% of the qualified pool was based upon racial preference.  In light of Obama's and Holder's biased and divisive statements and actions concerning racially-charged incidents such as that in Ferguson, Mo., and the Trayvon Martin case, there are ample factual grounds for harboring such suspicion.  Yet no prominent public voice – whether in the political or media arena – seems willing even to suggest the issue, let alone confront it. 

            The result is that Obama is given complete impunity to make whatever race-based appointments he chooses.  Indeed, by selecting a black nominee, Obama gains the automatic support of the liberal media; the monolithic Democratic Party of Sharpton, Jesse Jackson, and the NAACP; and pandering Republicans like Senators Orrin Hatch (Utah) and Lindsey Graham (S.C.).  The critical need for strong leadership in nondiscriminatory law enforcement is thus subordinated to the imperatives of reflexive political correctness.

         

             Although the predominant liberal media refuse to report it, there is a near epidemic of mob violence by black juveniles in many parts of America today.  Shopping malls have been an especially prominent target for such thug-mob lawlessness, as demonstrated in the extensive and disturbing documentation reported on the American Thinker website .  See "Forget The Terrorists: Malls Already Under Attack from Black Mob Violence," American Thinker (Internet report, Feb. 23, 2015).  Ironically, only today the DHS Secretary warned citizens to be wary of possible Islamic terrorist attacks at Minnesota's Mall of America.  Yet the Obama Administration is silent and unconcerned about the actual ongoing violence in American malls perpetrated by mobs of lawless black juveniles.  

            As the millennials might remark in their quaint jargon, WTF?

            This disturbing mall-riot phenomenon (among others) demands a firm and forceful response from law enforcement to restore a safe and civilized environment in malls, shopping centers, and other public places. Yet many local police departments have sought to minimize the gravity and obvious racial component of these civil disturbances.  

            This troublesome police reticence is undoubtedly influenced by the fear of press and political charges that a forceful and aggressive police response would be "racist."  It is also undoubtedly influenced by Obama's and Holder's persistent and prominent endorsement of the false premise that police throughout the United States harbor an unjustified bias and suspicion against juvenile black males.

            Another attorney general in the mold of Eric Holder – which accurately describes Loretta Lynch -- is the last thing needed to set the tone for U.S. law enforcement in unsettled times such as these.  Obama and Holder view lawless, undisciplined black offenders as victims rather than perpetrators.  And they view policeman who seek to confront and prevent such lawlessness as culpable racists rather than honorable officers seeking to do their dangerous job under enormously difficult circumstances and conditions. 

            Loretta Lynch's public statements and positions have demonstrated that she operates on the same false premise as Obama and Holder – i.e., that a strong element of anti-black discrimination is prevalent in U.S. law enforcement. 

            As demonstrated by decades of government statistics conclusively refuting the related canard that the death penalty discriminates against blacks, for example, the assumptions and premises underlying the distorted, race-obsessed approach to law enforcement embraced by Obama and Holder are false.  The confirmation of Loretta Lynch would only ratify and reinforce that divisive and dangerous mentality at the Justice Department.

            

SENATE REPUBLICANS MUST STAND FIRM TO BLOCK THE SECOND COMING OF HOLDER

              Back in November, Splashing Rocks explained why the Senate should not confirm Ms. Loretta Lynch of New York City to succeed the insidious Eric Holder as Attorney General --  let alone rubber-stamp her nomination during the post-election lame duck session of Congress.  See http://splashingrocks.blogspot.com/2014/11/no-kumbaya-confirmation-for-holder-20.html. 

                Although the Senate did deny Ms. Lynch a swift confirmation in the lame duck, it now appears that a sufficient number of Republican senators may capitulate to their own pathological compulsion to support black nominees, regardless of fitness, to enable this provocative and politicized appointment to go through.  But the battle is not over yet.  A number of GOP senators, like Rand Paul of Kentucky, have become more outspoken in their opposition.  And a group of feisty conservative House Republicans have recently sent a letter to their senate colleagues stressing the urgency of blocking a nominee whose confirmation would rightly be viewed as a ratification of the Obama-Holder axis's subversion of constitutional government in America.

                Yet some spineless Republican senators seem determined to offer a preemptive surrender to the continued dominance of the Dark Side at the Department of Justice.  In particular, Vichy-Republican Senators Orrin Hatch (Utah), Jeff Flake (AZ), and Lindsey Graham (SC) signaled their readiness to support the Lynch nomination even before she had stated her unqualified support of Obama's unconstitutional grant of executive amnesty to millions of illegal aliens.  

                 Al Sharpton and his choice for Attorney General:  Loretta Lynch

               In gratuitously declaring their blind support for Lynch even before the hearings and Committee background investigation had been completed, these invertebrate appeasers have formulated a contemporary revision of the Queen of Hearts' famous legal dictum from Carroll's Through the Looking Glass.  While the mad queen declared, "Sentence first, verdict afterwards," the Spineless Senators effectively declare, "Confirmation first, hearing afterwards."

                That embarrassing Ted Kennedy-courtier, Orrin Hatch, was not even content to indicate mere support for Ms. Lynch.  Instead, he impulsively slobbered, "I'm going to be a strong supporter of her nomination. . . .  And I believe she's not only qualified, but exceptionally well qualified, and a very good person, to boot."  Has Hatch forgotten that Kennedy is no longer around for him to suck-up to?

                Hatch's clueless claim that the undistinguished and politically compromised Lynch is "exceptionally well qualified" is utterly unfounded and gratuitous. On the contrary, Ms. Lynch is palpably unqualified to serve as Attorney General in an era when a keen and principled grasp of constitutional law is more essential to that position than ever  – and when the Nation is in desperate need of a racially unbiased Justice Department. 

                Lynch's unqualified support of Obama's unconstitutional seizure of Congress's authority over immigration, and her unquestioning embrace of Holder's racially biased law enforcement policies, demonstrates her ignorance or disrespect of the Constitution.  Even as I write, a federal district judge in Texas has issued a preliminary injunction blocking implementation of the unconstitutional amnesty order that Lynch has embraced and endorsed.  And this is wholly apart from her lack of scholarly experience, let alone distinction, in addressing the many other complex issues of constitutional law the Nation faces today.  

               Ms. Lynch is a garden-variety, patently Democratic, pedestrian federal prosecutor -- one of some 93 equally "qualified" U.S. Attorneys -- nothing more.

                Lynch's confused understanding of the law and the Constitution is also typified by her ridiculous assertion that “the right and the obligation to work is one that’s shared by everyone in this country regardless of how they came here.”  

                No, Ms. Lynch.  If a person entered and remains in this country illegally, that person does not have the "right" to work.  On the contrary, it is unlawful for such a person to be employed in the United States.  8 U.S.C. 1324a.  This patently erroneous statement alone demonstrates not only Lynch's ignorance of the law, but a recklessness that is flatly inconsistent with the responsibilities of the Nation's chief law enforcement officer.

                Moreover, Senator Hatch's assertion that Ms. Lynch is a "very good person" is an entirely unfounded and gratuitous throw-away line.  The Mormon senator from Utah doesn't even know this heretofore obscure Brooklyn prosecutor, let alone know her long enough or well enough to make authoritative pronouncements on her purported virtue. 

                But here's something we do know:  the degenerate racial agitator and riot-inciter, Al Sharpton, was actively involved in her selection as Obama's nominee, and has declared his confidence that Lynch "will continue in the same vein that Eric Holder had began."  [sic]

                Although there is every reason to doubt Sharpton's honesty and integrity in areas such as tax compliance and inter-racial crime, there is no reason to doubt his conviction that Loretta Lynch will adhere to the same politicized left-wing, anti-constitutional, and racially preferential policies inflicted on the Nation by Holder.  Indeed, Sharpton would have no reason to enthusiastically support Lynch's confirmation unless he were confident that she would further Sharpton's (and Holder's) race-based goals in areas such as criminal law, affirmative action, school discipline, and racial preferences in housing, education, and employment.

                Unfortunately, the Senate Judiciary Committee's toothless and timid examination of Ms. Lynch's background failed to identify a glaring indicator of her blind commitment to the same divisive, race-based approach to justice and law enforcement that has been the hallmark of Eric Holder's tenure at DOJ.

                As reported by the lively Gotnews.com website, Lynch not only endorses the fraudulent narrative that the death penalty is discriminatorily applied against blacks, but apparently is heavily influenced by that false doctrine in her adamant opposition to the death penalty as a tool of federal law enforcement.  See http://gotnews.com/read-lorettalynch-hates-death-penalty-leads-dead-blacks/.  Every senator who votes on the Lynch nomination should read this piece and the sources supporting it.

                This writer has been extensively involved in litigation (e.g., the landmark case of McCleskey v. Kemp), legislative battles, and scholarly debates that have demonstrated that, far from discriminating against blacks, capital punishment is in fact disproportionately imposed on white murderers.  Indeed, a recent posting on this blog presented data reported by Obama's own Justice Department confirming these indisputable facts.  See The Capital Canard of Death Penalty Discrimination, SplashingRocks.blogspot.com (July 17, 2014).  As that article documented, "For roughly three decades now, whites have consistently received a disproportionately large number of death sentences in relation to their portion of the relevant population of homicide offenders, whereas the reverse is true with respect to black homicide offenders."

                Notwithstanding these hard  facts, Loretta Lynch (in her capacity as a prosecuting U.S. Attorney) has rejected the enforceability of the death penalty based on her blind endorsement of the insidious leftist myth that capital punishment is discriminatorily applied against blacks.  Not only does this demonstrate the utter fallacy of her defenders' hackneyed assertion that she is a "no nonsense prosecutor" – the discriminatory death penalty argument is the very epitome of legal "nonsense" – but it provides clear confirmation that Lynch is committed to the dangerous doctrine that federal law enforcement must be tilted and tailored to accommodate the most extreme canards of black racial agitators like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson.

               

                Eric Holder, a left-wing, race-obsessed fanatic, has been Attorney General of the United States for about six years, since the beginning of the Obama administration.  Holder hardly bothers to pretend to administer the laws and enforce justice even-handedly as between blacks and whites.  In his official capacity as Attorney General, he has openly singled out blacks as "my people."  Whites, East Asians, and others who are not "his people," we must assume, are on their own as far as law enforcement goes.  He has openly and aggressively taken the side of violent black offenders against blameless law enforcement officers and white victims in case after case, relentlessly driven by his fanatical commitment to the most extreme notions of black entitlement and black preference.  And Al Sharpton is confident that Loretta Lynch "will continue in the same vein" as Mr. Holder.

                Six years of discriminatory law enforcement is more than enough.  But with the nomination of Loretta Lynch, Mr. Obama appears determined to perpetuate Holder's race-based administration of justice for the remainder of his term in office.  If Al Sharpton's (not to mention Holder's) enthusiastic promotion and support of Lynch's confirmation were not enough to confirm this, Lynch's endorsement and application of fraudulent and divisive doctrines like the myth of the discriminatory death penalty should remove all doubt.

                Unless the newly elected Republican Senate wants to reaffirm and ratify Mr. Holder's lawless maladministration of the Justice Department, it should firmly reject the nomination of Loretta Lynch --  who was clearly selected to perpetuate Holder's policies at DOJ for the remainder of this administration.

                Addendum:   A portion of Ms. Lynch's testimony in her hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee raises additional troubling questions and inconsistencies respecting her position on the death penalty – and her honesty.

                As noted above, reports on Lynch's remarks at a panel discussion in 2002 contain specific quotes and information strongly indicating that she objects to use of the death penalty because of a purported disparate impact on blacks which has been conclusively disproven by Justice Department statistics and other data.  At her confirmation hearing, however, Lynch tried to deflect possible criticism or objections to her position on the death penalty in the following colloquy with Sen. Lindsey Graham (R.-SC):

                Sen. Graham: "Do you support the death penalty?"

                Lynch:  "I believe the death penalty is an effective penalty.  My office was able to achieve a death verdict there—"

                Graham:  "How about yes?"

                Lynch:  "So, we have sought it, yes," Lynch replied.

                The astute reader will notice that Lynch very carefully avoided answering Graham's question.  Her cagey statement that the "death penalty is an effective penalty" does not mean that she supports it or even that she would be willing to order its enforcement as Attorney General.  Saying the death penalty is "effective" could merely be an acknowledgement of the truism that, on the rare occasions when it is actually carried out, it is "effective" in eliminating a particular defendant through execution.  Lynch's response was patently evasive.

                And when Graham pressed again for a straightforward "yes" answer, Lynch again avoided a direct answer with another evasive statement affirming that her office (the U.S. Attorney's Office in Brooklyn) had sought (and obtained) the death penalty in one case – probably referring to the notorious case of cop killer Ronell Wilson.  She carefully and craftily avoided giving a direct affirmation that she "supported" the death penalty, and answered instead a question that Sen. Graham did not ask.  If Lynch was referring to the Wilson case, moreover, it was the Office of the Attorney General, rather than her office, that made the decision to pursue the death penalty.

                Something simply does not add up here.  Lynch's statements at the 2002 conference provide strong evidence that she strongly objected to the death penalty based on the leftist/racialist myth that it is discriminatorily applied against blacks.  Yet when faced with the prospect that anti-death penalty testimony in her hearings would undoubtedly raise complications for her confirmation among Republican senators, Lynch provided evasive and non-responsive answers, deceptively couched to leave the Committee with the false impression that she does support the death penalty.  The clueless media in fact inaccurately reported that Lynch had affirmed her support for the death penalty, in an obvious effort to reinforce the utterly bogus narrative that she is a moderate, no-nonsense prosecutor.

                More importantly, neither the feckless Senator Graham nor other Republican members of the Committee responded to the obvious prevarication in Lynch's testimony by pressing her to reconcile her race-based anti-death penalty statements in 2002 with her mendacious attempts to create the misimpression that she is now a death penalty supporter.  This is a classic case of what veterans of confirmation hearings have labeled "confirmation conversion" – a sudden and drastic shift of position on a crucial issue in order to facilitate a positive senate confirmation vote.

                The bottom line is that Lynch's misleading testimony on the capital punishment issue provides further grounds to oppose her confirmation – i.e., the failure to testify honestly and forthrightly to the Judiciary Committee.

"PAVANE FOR A DEAD PRINCESS" -- KAREN CARPENTER 32 YEARS LATER

              Today marks 32 years since Karen Carpenter, the beloved Drummer Girl from Downey, California, passed to a better place.  Lovers of great pop music can only be grateful that the unforgettably beautiful recordings produced by Karen and her talented brother and lifelong collaborator, Richard, remain with us to provide a harmonic refuge from the grating cacophony of what passes for popular music today.

                At the height of her success from 1970 to 1975, the Carpenters' songs ruled the charts, the duo were in constant demand for major television appearances, and Karen's enormous popularity spread worldwide from Southern California to the UK, Japan, and ultimately even the Peoples Republic of China.  Ms. Carpenter was indeed the Princess of Pop for her era.  So it seems fitting to commemorate her passing with a classical composition by Maurice Ravel which captures the beauty and melancholy of her tragically abbreviated musical legacy – Pavane for a Dead Princess (video courtesy of YouTube embedded below).

 Ravel's "Pavane for a Dead Princess,"a fitting commemoration for a musical princess

                As thoroughly documented in these pages and elsewhere, see http://splashingrocks.blogspot.com/2013/02/remember-drummergirl.html, an extensive list of Ms. Carpenter's past and recent musical peers have testified to the unique quality of her mellifluous contralto and her standing as one of the 20^th century's truly Great Ladies of song.  Leon Russell, the colorful musical virtuoso who wrote some of the Carpenters' most compelling songs (including the haunting slow-rock ballad Superstar) may have put it best when he said, "Well, Karen Carpenter was just a singularly amazing singer. There was just not anybody like her."  Elton John expressed similar sentiments, when he declared that Karen possessed "one of the greatest voices of our lifetime." 

                         

The late Princess of Pop, wearing her trademark jumper in the early years of her stardom

                Interestingly, Sir Elton made that observation in an interview in which he was subtly drawing the distinction between music that is favored because it is "hip" and fashionable, compared to music that is simply excellent, even if denigrated or downgraded because it might be romantic, rather than reverberating or raunchy.   His fuller remarks were as follows:

                Elton:  I'm never going to be thought of in the same terms as David Bowie
                or Lou Reed.  I'm a different animal.  But then you get Michael Stripe telling
                me he used to go around LA with Courtney Love in a limo listening to Yellow
                Brick Road.  I guess I'm not the sort of artist people are writing in their to-ten
                list, but . . .

               Interviewer:  You're in their cars.

               Elton:  Yeah, like you would never say, "I like the Carpenters."  Yet Karen

               Carpenter is one of the greatest voices of our lifetime.  You would slip Led 

               Zeppelin on and put the Carpenters in the closet.  I accept that.

                            

Quoted from: http://www.rollingstone.com/music/features/sir-bitch-is-back-20041125#ixzz3Qj4AOYz.

                Sir Elton was pointing out an anomaly that has deprived Karen Carpenter and the Carpenters of their rightful place in the pantheon of recognized giants of American pop and rock music (e.g., their absurd exclusion from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame) -- even while they are recognized and revered as musical legends in leading international markets such as Japan and the United Kingdom (as well as in the world's largest nation, China).  The stifling conformity to the libertine, leftist, and anti-suburban cultural norms of the Woodstock generation and its latter-day heirs created a climate in which feckless youngsters who deeply loved Karen's voice and the Carpenters' music were ashamed to admit it, as though they would somehow be shunned simply for expressing their personal musical tastes. 

             Drumsticks and flowers -- a visitor's tribute to Karen at her burial site

                The very same mindless conformity explains the virtual black-listing of Carpenters' recordings, even today, from the playlists of even many American radio stations that purport to play "classical" pop and rock from the 60's and 70's.  No American group produced more hits than the Carpenters in the 1970's, yet many stations perversely exclude their recordings from their "classic" playlists for that very decade.  Think of the crass absurdity:  A station pretends to play the hits and classics of the 1970's, but refuses to play the group that produced more of those very hits and classics than anyone else.  Only in America.

                As Elton John and his interviewer noted in their exchange, millions of people privately listened to the "unhip" music like the Carpenters "in their cars," notwithstanding the contempt of the self-appointed hipsters and opinion-makers.  Today, you could substitute "on You Tube" for "in their cars." 

                Although radio stations might suppress Carpenters recordings based on a philistine canard, legions of music lovers worldwide still listen to Karen's incomparable voice and Richard's harmonic arrangements on You Tube and other Internet outlets -- sources which are not filtered or censored by the prejudicial norms of a degenerate contemporary culture.  One 45-year-old video of Close to You alone has been visited by 20 million viewers, and well over 60 Carpenters' videos have been visited by at least one million viewers.  And in those East Asian cultures (Japan, China, Thailand, etc.) that are not infected by the bizarre biases of American's twisted contemporary tastes, the musical legacy of Karen and the Carpenters lives on and grows in brightness like an unquenchable flame.

                                       

                                An ethereal Karen Carpenter at Huntington Gardens

                In 1975, the Carpenters filmed a video for their last Top 5 hit, Only Yesterday, at the remarkably beautiful botanical setting of the Huntington Library and Gardens in San Marino, California, near Pasadena.  A still shot from that video shows a ghostly image of a solitary Karen Carpenter strolling gracefully over a gentle rise in the gardens.  It is a fittingly ethereal vision, capturing the spirit of the departed princess who spread so much beautiful music throughout the world during her short time here.

                

OPEN BORDERS AND A LOST REPUBLIC

            It has become almost trite to quote Benjamin Franklin's famous response to the lady who asked him what kind of government the Constitutional Convention had established in 1787, but it has never been more relevant than it is now.  Mr. Franklin tersely responded, "A republic, madam – if you can keep it."

            Judging by the feckless response to Obama's recent seizure of the legislative power by nullifying the nation's immigration laws, much of America has meekly submitted to the effective dissolution of our republican form of government.  As Franklin prophetically feared over two centuries ago, we have failed to "keep" our constitutional republic.  

               Franklin's Warning Resounds Ominously in the era of  government by decree

            This is not defeatist hyperbole.  It is harsh political and cultural reality – at least in the present sorry epoch of our history.

            A poll conducted by Quinnipiac University indicates that 45% of Americans actually support Obama's imperious grant of amnesty to millions of illegal aliens who he knows will support him and his degenerate party at the polls (48% opposed the action according to the poll).  In other words, nearly half of Americans apparently endorse the abandonment of a representative and responsive democratic republic in favor of quasi-dictatorship by an arrogant, racially biased leftist.

            This is the depth to which the unworthy heirs of Washington, Franklin, and Jefferson have descended under Obama's Caligulan misrule.

            The contemporary failure of the republican ideal does not lie in some flaw in the constitutional structure the Framers passed down to us.  There are ample remedies in the Constitution – including Congress's powers to control the purse and to impeach the President, and the courts' extensive powers of judicial review – to override Obama's imposition of government by executive decree.  There are also indirect supplemental remedies, such as the Republican Senate's ability to block any and all of Obama's executive and judicial nominations when the next Congress convenes in January.

            Sadly, however, most of those who exercise the legislative and judicial powers in America today either lack the will and courage to wield those powers against the President, or actually support and endorse Obama's seizure of unconstitutional powers.  The few righteous voices in the congressional wilderness who are willing to invoke the necessary potent remedies, such as the admirable Texas conservative, Senator Ted Cruz, have thus far been unable to rally sufficient support to mount a credible counter-attack.

            With appalling audacity, Obama has effectively decreed that the laws governing and restricting immigration into the United States have no meaning, force, or consequences; that the millions of aliens from the South who have violated our laws, invaded our nation, and brazenly seized our public resources are not only exempted from deportation or any other adverse consequence for their transgressions, but are to be rewarded with government benefits and largesse; and that the law-abiding Americans who have constantly  supported and defended this country must bear the cost and imposition of this lawless invasion across our national borders.

            This must be marked:  Not only are Obama's alien preference decrees blatantly and subversively unconstitutional because they usurp power that belongs to Congress alone under Art. I of the Constitution; but they are infused with scorn for all traditional Americans who rightfully oppose them, and who expressed that opposition  in nationwide elections less than one month ago. 

            The ink is barely dry on the November election returns registering the Nation's comprehensive rejection of Obama's main policies -- emphatically including his well-known intent to issue an executive decree legalizing the status of some five million illegal aliens.  In an unambiguous vote of "no confidence," the voters ousted the Democrats from control of the U.S. Senate and reduced their representation in the House of Representatives to the lowest level in over 80 years.  In a parliamentary system of government, Obama would have been rendered politically impotent and forced to call for new elections. 

            Although ours is not a parliamentary system like Japan's or the UK's, our constitutional and political structures contemplate that any responsible President would recognize the sentiment expressed in the election landslide by adjusting his policies – and his attitude – in response to the voters' expressed preferences.  Not so Obama, who is incurably egotistical and scornfully indifferent to the wishes of all but those of his own race (that is, the black half of it) or those of his leftist ideology.  Far from conceding any ground to the voters or the representatives they had just elected, Obama has brazenly reaffirmed his most unpopular policies and programs.

            The Great Virginian, Thomas Jefferson, once explained "Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition."

            The "subservience and venality" lamented by Mr. Jefferson not only permeates a substantial portion of today's American populace (as shown by the nearly 50% who apparently approve Obama's amnesty decree), but sadly is on full display among the leadership of the Republican majority that was just elected to forcefully oppose Obama -- rather than to appease him.  Neither Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell nor House Speaker John Boehner has displayed the forceful anger and determination that is required to counter Obama's unconstitutional edicts.  They both appear unwilling to adopt the hard measures that would provide the minimum response to Obama's arrogant usurpations. 

            But the Nation cannot afford such prevarication and timidity in the face of Obama's dangerous misrule.  McConnell and Boehner should announce that Congress will exercise its power over appropriations to deny funding for any government resources, personnel, or contracts that are needed to implement the lawless amnesty decree.  

            Yet an almost paranoid fear of adverse media reaction to the misnamed "government shutdown" that might follow from such targeted defunding deters the Republican leadership from taking the minimal necessary action.  That leadership seems oblivious to the fact that congressional Republicans have just achieved a massive election victory in defiance of arguments that last year's so-called shutdown crisis would doom them to defeat.

            Absent forceful congressional counter-measures such as a sweeping denial of funding for any aspect of the amnesty program, the collapse of constitutional governance initiated by Obama's lawless decrees will only accelerate.

            Most critics of Obama's amnesty decree have focused on how it violates the constitutional separation of powers, by arrogating to the President the legislative power over immigration.  While this is true enough and disastrous enough, the decree goes beyond that and violates what may be the most fundamental and elemental provision of the Constitution:  the Guarantee Clause, found in Art. IV, sec. 4 of the Constitution, which provides in part:

                "The United States shall guarantee to every State in

                 the Union a Republican Form of Government, and

                 shall protect each of them against Invasion."

            In one fell swoop, Obama's amnesty decree violates both of the quoted  mandates of the Guarantee Clause.  A Republican Form of Government is one in which power is held by the people and their elected representatives, yet Obama's actions on alien amnesty, illegal recess appointments, and unilateral revision of laws like the Welfare Reform Act deprive all the States of the effective legislative representation that is the essence of a Republic.  And far from protecting the States against the alien invasion from Mexico and Central America, Obama has indisputably encouraged and facilitated that invasion by repeatedly rewarding and protecting the invaders.

            Benjamin Franklin warned us over two centuries ago that the Republic bequeathed to us by the genius, blood, and bravery of our Founding Fathers would not be easily maintained.  Unless more Americans and their representatives gather their resolve to resist Obama's ominous encroachments , the Guarantee Clause and the rest of the Constitution will soon be reduced to an empty and ineffectual parchment.