American Education, 2011: Pumping Self Esteem into an Empty Mind

Not long ago, Dennis Prager spent nearly a full hour of his radio show reviewing his abhorrence to any education based upon pumping up self esteem as the ‘project’ goal.   He, with his usual  alas associated with such bummer ideas such as self esteem pumping, reminded his listeners that pumping air results in more air, not better behavior, more air, not more useful knowledge,  more air and not any better moral expressions to become a foundation and opportunity to become a  more decent person, a more knowledgeable citizen, and successful neighbor and parent and partner for life.

I was raised Protestant.   I’m  proud to have been raised Protestant  for all of the means by which I have been made a better person……….except for, perhaps, pride.   (and a few others I am certain my detractors can dig up).   Even my friends tell me I was a poor Protestant in the pride business.   I view myself as a traditional American….and a lucky one at that.

I was trained to believe in deeds over which I forever will be judged.  I was to carry myself as an equal except in my labor the only arena in which I was allowed to have pride…….not in myself, but what I had created from my labor.

I was never to be the center of attention unless I was on stage earning my living.   (My German Lutheran mother always made a personal allowance for that.   She and my father met at Friedman’s Super Market downtown St. Paul where she worked as a cashier, having finished school at age 13.  It turned out they both loved to dance and so competed together in ball room dancing competitions during the Roaring Twenties.) 

One was to control ones pride and stay away from crowds.  One must never dwell in self esteem.   Esteem, I was told,  is what I needed to earn from others from my accomplishments and good  deeds .  

“Self esteem is false esteem!”   or  “You seem to be thinking awfully highly of yourself today,  G.H. Ray!” she’d stab  accompanied with a tone which in itself would almost send me to an early grave.   They  were two favorite putdowns from the talents of this German Lutheran Mother.

I confess I recovered quickly after every foray.

Which comes to the task of this writing.   Looking through the political scraps I have saved over the years, I came across this following one on the front page of the B section of the Pioneer Press probably about 15 years ago:

GIRLS BOLSTER SELF-ESTEEM AT CONFERENCE…….BY Katherine Lampher, staff columnist…

Katherine Lampher was a quick mouthed light thinking University oriented Lefty of the day with a pleasant radio voice, which means she would appear on public radio at sometime or another.

“New York:     Most of the participants in the first National Girls Conference are used to studying history, not making it.  After all, they are still in school.

But the girls who gathered this weekend at the UNICEF House in Manhattan – 125 of them, ranging in age from 8 to 17, from homes as diverse as an American Indian reservation and a fisheries town in Alaska – are more than up to their task:  to craft a platform of action that will mark their hopes and dreams for th years ahead, both for themselves and for the girls who follow them.

“What we have here today is the first national beginning of the girls’ movement,” says contemporary founding feminist ?Gloria Steinem.

The conference is modeled after the 1995 United Nations Fourth World Converence for Women, when 45,000 women and men attended meetings in Beijing.  But for many of the women who helped the girls plan and rung the meetings here, the conference reminds them of the beginning of the women’s movement itself in this country a few decades ago.

Then, women sat in living rooms and began to talk about their lives.   This weekend, girls sat in meeting rooms across the street from the United Nations and talked about their lives.

One of them was 12-year old Lisa Ly of Inver Grove Heights, who took part in a workshop about girls’ rights and found herself talking about the teasing she takes from a group of boys at her school, who make fun of her because she is Hmong.

“I get a lot of put-downs in schools,” she says matter -of -factly.  “It’s because I look different.”

It’s hard to deal with, she says, because the taunts hurt her and if she complains, the teasing gets worse.  She tries to stay quiet, she says, hoping no one will notice her.  When she hears about studies that show many girls quit speaking up for themselves in their preteens, she nod her head.”

Unfortunately, the article here stops and is replaced with:     “Lanpher  continued on 6A

Page 6A apparently didn’t show up with this excerpt.

In brief Katherine Lampher was  an idiot.   The “ladies”, or  femmy  Marxist males, who probably organized this “Conference”…..and its eight year old participants…..should have been sent to girls’ camp to learn how to skin a moose. and become useful in life.   Only  females  and lefty men could be so natively nutty as to put this piece for 8 to 17 year old girls, in New York together.  

Many females I know even a few conservative ones  are gassed up almost exclusively by the air of self-esteem by just being a female and that is it.    Wow, what an accomplishment!   I wonder if they ever  thanked their  Dads?

I am a profound believer that the worst thing that ever happened to America is not the Civil War, because a good overwhelmed the bad from its results.  It is the foul, poisonous revolution led by sexual, mental and political  misfits like Betty Friedan, a Communist at that,  the nut, Andrea Dworkin, and Gloria Steinem and all of the hate, stupidity and its garbage that  was the Feminist movement unleashed with  twenty years of insanity leading to the collapse of stable America culturally and politically and to the America we have today where up is down and good is bad……it is all a matter of feelings.     They all became a powerful force ruining the traditional Democrat Party of John Kennedy.

On the other hand Ted Kennedy was a total female at heart.

Now, nearly every American institution of “higher” learning houses a Department of Women’s Studies, where anybody can get pumped up with female self esteem and become a Marxist.

Arnold Toynbee claimed, “Great civilizations are not murdered.   They commit suicide.” 

That suicide is guaranteed when a civilization’s females  gain power.  No longer is the society led by problem solvers and leaders of courage and  strength who can recognize and separate the wheat from the chaff,  who have the ability to use these gifts best when needed.   Every once in a while a qualified female problem solver shows up……Maggie Thatcher and Golda Meier come to mind.   Few enough men do despite their advamtages.   

The rest of the female sex mean well, but they are natively distsy and their presence during difficult times encourages males to appear likewise.

Girls scream when they play outdoors…..scream naturally as nature’s way of teaching her to announce to all she need’s help.   By nature the human female is not generally equipped to combine wile and knowledge with the power of memory to act wisely.

Men can be trained to be coddled and womanish…..look at the American Leftwing male population as an example.  Look at who we are in Washington D. C. these days.    When the society itself, especially its females  are pumped up with stinking air  of self esteem the future of ones culture is in trouble.    Decision making disappears.  Emotions begin to govern…..Emotions are  taught both to female and male young to replace thinking and problem solving…..society is doomed. 

Self esteem training becomes superior to learning history.

Bill Whittle Reports on Michael Moore and the Left’s Hunger to “Eat the Rich”

Eat the Rich!

Bill Whittle channels Iowahawk in the following video about sticking it to the “rich” in order to enact Barack Hussein Obama’s very expensive agenda for the United States during the coming year.

Iowahawk and Mr. Whittle use the demagoguery of Jabba the Hutt Michael Moore as the jumping-off point for a scheme to soak the rich and pay for Hope ’n’ Change in America:

http://vladtepesblog.com/?p=32059

How Chris Christie Handled a Union Thug Who Asked Teachers to Pray for Christie’s Death

Chris Christie Reviews Apology From Teacher Union Official

Who Prayed for His Death!

                                                                                                                   Teachers and their Unions are in the news these days.

You have probably forgotten the episode in New Jersey late last year when  a Teachers’ Union officer had asked his fellow teachers…TEACHERS, mind you, to pray for Governor Chris Christie’ death.

Click on the video below to review the Governor of New Jersey’s response.

Unions are among the most powerful institutions in America.  They have money and are interested in politics and power.  They support Democrat and Socialist political programs and candidates whether their members like it or not.

In New Jersey the powerful and very wealthy Teachers’ Union does not like their Governor, Chris Christie.  It has spent millions upon millions of dollars in advertising for Chris Christie’s  defeat in his election and failing to defeat him, in his efforts to return New Jersery to financial solvency.   

Not long ago one of its local union  officers sent out an email asking fellow teachers to pray  for the Governor’s death.  Recently a top teachers’ union official was invited to the Governor’s office to consider an apology.

Mr. Christie has certain gifts of speech, thought and attitude that are deeply appreciated by people from my generation, especially guys over 75 years old…..old enough to know when a spade was a spade.

Please click on below for Governor Christie’s review of the apology:

http://hotair.com/archives/2010/11/20/awesome-chris-christie-tells-of-apology-from-president-of-teachers-union/

Lesson to be learned:   Beware of people such as Barack Obama, who have no sense of humor. 

Click on below for Governor Christie’s reponse to a Liberal reporter complaining about the Governor’s tone:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aIxTMxul3_U

Left Wing Democrat ‘Corporation’ AARP, Subsidized by TaxPayer $$ to Make Killing from Obamacare!

The following article was sent to me by Prager fan, Mark Waldeland:

“Is there a link between support for the President’s health care takeover and special favors? In a report released today by the House Ways and Means Committee, “Behind the Veil: The AARP America Doesn’t Know,” Rep. Charles Boustany (R-La.) reveals that AARP could make $1 billion in the next 10 years from the health care takeover. Now that Medicare Advantage has been eliminated, the Washington Examiner explains that law would bring “more business to AARP’s insurance division…” Boustany, who is investigating the organization for this conflict of interest, wants the group’s tax-exempt status revoked.

For years, AARP has had a distinctly liberal bent. According to reports, the organization’s employees donated 90% of their campaign contributions to Democrats in the last two elections. As a group, AARP hasn’t been shy about lobbying the federal government either. Its $27.9 million in advocacy are third only to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Exxon Mobil. The group is also no stranger to raking in the tax dollars. Since 2003, Uncle Sam has doled out $390 million for AARP’s job-placement program. Again, this just shows ObamaCare for what it is: a product of dirty dealings and backdoor buy-offs.

Meanwhile, everyone under the sun who endorsed the law has either been paid off or exempted from the policy. If the groups who lobbied for the plan don’t want it, why should we? “Where’s my waiver?” asks Colin Hanna of Let Freedom Ring. His organization launched a petition–co-sponsored by FRC Action–asking the President for an American opt-out. Sign up here! In the meantime, help us push for a permanent waiver…called repeal!

You Can Help Restore Civility in Wisconsin by Supporting Justice Prosser!

I am passing on this following article by John Hinderaker at PowerLine, titled, “How to Support Justice Prosser,” with great enthusiasm, for Thugs are at the door of civility in Wisconsins to disruput the states’ legislative system:

John writes:

“Yesterday at noon National Review posted a good editorial on the next front in the battle of Wisconsin: the election pitting incumbent Wisconsin Supreme Court Justice David Prosser against Joanne Kloppenburg. Kloppenburg has all but vowed to toe the union line on the budget repair bill if she makes it to the court. Her campaign is inimical to the rule of law, and the larger campaign supporting her is, as the NR editorial makes out, a disgusting exercise in vilification and dishonesty.

Justice Prosser has accepted public financing for his campaign and therefore cannot accept contributions. The NR editorial advises: “[Y]ou can help his campaign by helping the Wisconsin Club for Growth (donate here) or donating to Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce (donate online here; fax donation form here).”

NR’s editorial omits the date of the election. It’s next Tuesday, April 5. I don’t know how late contributions can be made and still have an impact on the race, but today would seem to be the latest.

UPDATE: John Nolte has much more on the union thuggery on behalf of Kloppenburg.”

---

Who Are the Real Thugs in the English Struggle with Islamic Tyranny?

A Luton Update from Tommy Robinson

from the Gates of Vienna:

“As has often been pointed out in this space, the most important theater of the Counterjihad struggle is the ongoing information war. Although we can whup the enemy’s fundament on any conventional battlefield, we are currently being defeated, because Islam is winning the information war hands-down.

Right now The English Defence League is the biggest threat to the Jihad in Britain — and possibly in all of Europe. By exposing the truth about Islam, the EDL is awakening the average native English citizen to what Islamization really means.

Islam cannot succeed in the long term if this education process continues, so Muslim zealots — and their allies on the hard Left — are determined to subvert and distort the image of the EDL, thereby neutralizing the message it conveys.

The preferred technique is to cement in the eyes of the general public the idea that the EDL is a “racist”, “Nazi”, and “fascist” organization made up of violent lower-class hooligans. The latest examples of this information war in action are a series of vandalism and arson attacks on private homes in Luton that are meant to look like the work of the EDL, or to be targeting the EDL, or both.

If these attacks succeed in their purpose, the EDL will be discredited and its members intimidated — a twofer for the Great Jihad.

The following article about the situation by EDL leader Tommy Robinson was published tonight on the English Defence League website (see the original article for links to full-size versions of the photos):

Since we held our extremely success full demonstration in Luton the town is alive with positive talk among the local people about the EDL. People were expecting a bloodbath, a bunch of rowdy thugs out to fight and riot with the Islamic community. Well that was the hype anyway — or should I say “Hope” for some? Of course, that’s not what we delivered.

The level of opposition that we encounter from every angle is astounding when you think about it. The aggressors and idiots who try to provoke and attack us come from the Islamic community, from the deluded and often riotous militant-Left brigade… and let’s not forget the real “far right” — those white supremacist dinosaurs. And of course there are many other bands of various misfits.

The point is we have survived many attacks, and we have become bigger, better and more organised than people give us credit for. Our opponents know this, so their actions become more and more extreme. This is exactly what we have seen in Luton since the demo.

Some people just can’t accept any positive media about the EDL, they can’t accept anything less than a sensationalist or even manufactured headline that paints us in the very worst light imaginable. That is how scared these people are about our message. They are so scared that we are gaining ground that they will do anything they can to turn the screw on us. They know that with growing mainstream support, not just with the working class but with middle England too, we are becoming their worst nightmare. To counter our success it takes something drastic. Desperate times mean desperate measures.

One example that comes to mind is when Socialist Worker reported that Bolton Mosque had been attacked on the eve of our demonstration in the city. They made it really clear that we were almost definitely to blame. But, of course, the incident had nothing to do with the EDL — and the police were all too happy to make this clear to the local community.

But this sort of thing is happening daily — our opponents reporting their own prejudiced assumptions as if they were unbiased news stories.

Why do some people still believe that the EDL racist? Because that’s what they really want to believe! They want us to be the bad guys, and for everyone else to believe that too, because perhaps then people won’t realise how clueless groups like Socialist Worker and the UAF really are.

They accuse us of dividing communities. How? By telling the truth? We encourage an open debate, we educate our members. They keep talking about giving ‘no platform’ and ‘smashing’ the EDL. They accuse us of things without any evidence, and they continue to tell people that we’re racists despite all the evidence to the contrary.

Which group is really dividing communities?

Anyway, here’s the latest example from Luton showing the desperate measures our opponents are willing to take…”

Comment:   I have been closely  following these events in the United Kingdom for a couple of months now.   I have toured the internet to gather all possible information regarding the battle for England’s future……a socialist democracy or a Islamist Sharia Dictatorship?

The Dictatorship has been winning.   These Arab Islamists have tons of money to cuddle and bribe both Labor and Conservative, Liberal and Independent bureaucrats, news people, entertainment people, school people, the Church of England people, and above all local officials.   If these people behave there will be no Peaceloving Islamists to assault and burn the town’s possessions.

They are of single purpose……to expand Islam and Sharia.   These Islamists are in a conquering mood, just like those chameleons who showed up at Ground Zero to build a mosque there to symbolize Islam’s victory over the American infidel.

This scenario is far too difficult for American Democrats and other Leftists to understand, for they have elected a Barack Hussein Obama who was born and for a time raised as a Muslim in Kenya.   He, as president has opened the American borders to anyone and everyone to invade.   He is chief spokesman of Islam thus far in explaining some niceties about Peaceful Islam, especially pre Ramadan time.

We know nothing about the president’s other faith, the one for political posturing.   He is empty mouthed at Lent and Easter.   He plays golf on Sundays claiming his beliefs are private.  

This certainly doesn’t bother me, for whatever Mr. Obama says, it is all the same bull, the same noise, the same mouth, with no more meaning , dedication or honesty than a baritone.

I find Tommy  Robinson a hero.   He is disliked among the entire establishment in London.   He didn’t go to university.   He doesn’t sound prissy like a Conservative and doesn’t lie like the Lefties always do which ever side of the Atlantic they dwell.     When he speaks, he wins friends.  (How unfair!)

Yes, the funniest thing about Tommy Robinson, whose real name is Stephen Lennon, is that he sounds like a real, true-to-life human being with some worries about the country where he was born, and seems to have a very special brain well organized for thought unfettered and untethered by college…….   CAN YOU IMAGINE THAT?

He has one major difficulty……HE SEES THINGS AND TELLS THE THINGS  HE SEES , THEY WAY THEY ARE!

What ever is the world coming to?

For a view of a recent speech given by Tommy Robinson at a rally in his hometown,  Luton, click below:

 
 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSyw0tpVGN4

What Credibility Can Obama Claim When His Speeches Are Only Baritones?

 

The President’s Credibility Gap

The following article was written bey Ross Douthat at the New York Times:

Addressing the nation Monday evening, President Obama suggested that the United States was in the process of reducing its military footprint in Libya, even as he explicitly rejected the idea of pursuing regime change in Tripoli by force of arms. Both statements seemed calculated to make our intervention seem tightly limited rather than open-ended. (“I want to be clear,” Obama said. “The United States of America has done what we said we would do.”) But two days later, both look dubious in the extreme.

No sooner had the president finished speaking than the Times’s Eric Schmitt came out with a story undercutting the idea that America can be just be one partner among many in the Libyan operation. (American military involvement, Schmitt reported, “is far deeper than discussed in public and more instrumental to the fight than was previously known.”) The next day in London, representatives of the allied powers took turns insisting that regime change was, in fact, the coalition’s goal in Libya. And 24 hours later, with Qaddafi’s forces counterattacking and the rebels falling back in disarray, American policymakers find themselves furiously debating whether our air campaign needs to be supplemented by an effort to arm the rebels directly — which would obviously represent a further escalation of the conflict, and one that would arguably fall outside the United Nations mandate that we claim to be enforcing.

Does it matter that Obama’s words don’t really seem to match his administration’s actions?  There’s an argument that it doesn’t, advanced by Stephen Walt and Kevin Drum among others. “In the end,” Drum suggests, “Obama will be judged on whether his approach works,” rather what he says or doesn’t say about it. Likewise Walt: “Because this was clearly a war of choice, what matters is not the justification that he provided for it or the ways he attempted to assuage concerns about possible precedents … What matters is what actually happens in Libya over the next few weeks or months.”

Now in the broad sense it’s true that nothing matters in warmaking as much as the outcome. But if and when things do go wrong in war — or if and when they turn messy and long-running and inconclusive, as seems all too likely in this case — it usually goes harder on politicians if they’ve been less than honest about the nature and scope of the conflict, what the risks might be, and how deeply the United States is willing to commit itself. Here I think Peter Feaver’s point is well taken:

Alas, the president only talked about optimistic scenarios. The obligatory gestures about a “difficult task”  – “Libya will remain dangerous…”; “Forty years of tyranny has left Libya fractured and without strong civil institutions” — barely scratched the surface of what could go wrong here. I did not expect the president to run down the “dirty dozen” list of bad things that might happen. That is the work of strategic planning shops. But I did expect more steeling of the American public for possible adverse developments.

Should those developments come, I suspect it will be worse for Obama politically if he’s perceived to have misled the public about what America is getting into in North Africa. And on the evidence of the last 48 hours, that’s precisely what he did on Monday night.”

Comment:   The president loves to speechify.   He gave a speech about bullying on the school yard.   He is against it.   The speech was given with the same beat, the same upturned nose, the same posture and inflections as his speech last Monday about bombing Libya without mentioning anything to Congress about his extended his bullying speech to stop bullying.

I happen to be for bullying Colonel Khadafi, Quaddafi, Ghadaffii or whoever he is living there in Tripoli causing trouble.  But I would like someone to bully this incompetent, devious, Marxist president, Barack Hussein Obama and his fellow Marxists in the new Democrat party here in the United States of America.

If you want to listen to a phony, listen carefully to each and every Barack Hussein Obama speech, but try to get past the hymn of the baritone……listen to the lyrics.    I know it’s tough for women to do, so listen to the comrade with your steady male friend for support.

Wisconsin Union and Democrat Thugs Threaten Businesses Mafia Style

WSEU circulating boycott letters

 

By Don Walker of the Journal Sentinel

“Members of Wisconsin State Employees Union, AFSCME Council 24, have begun circulating letters to businesses in southeast Wisconsin, asking them to support workers’ rights by putting up a sign in their windows.

If businesses fail to comply, the letter says, “Failure to do so will leave us no choice but (to) do a public boycott of your business. And sorry, neutral means ‘no’ to those who work for the largest employer in the area and are union members.”

Jim Parrett, a field representative of Council 24 for Southeast Wisconsin, confirmed the contents of the letter, which carries his signature. But he added that the union was also circulating letters to businesses thanking them for supporting workers’ rights.

Parrett said that since the letters were sent out, he has received threatening phone calls as well as calls from people supporting the state workers.

“I’ve gotten a lot of threatening phone calls,” Parrett said.

Parrett said he believed the letter campaign was going on in other parts of the state. His region includes Racine and Kenosha counties, as well as parts of Waukesha and Walworth counties.

“It’s going on in other parts of the state,” he said Wednesday.

Parrett referred questions to Marty Beil, the head of the Wisconsin State Employees Union. Beil was not immediately available for comment.

In the letter from Parrett to some businesses, he says that, “It is unfortunate that you have chosen ‘not’ to support public workers rights in Wisconsin. In recent past weeks you have been offered a sign by a public employee who works in one of the state facilities in the Union Grove area. These signs simply said, ‘This Business Supports Workers Rights,’ a simple, subtle and we feel non-controversial statement gives the facts at this time.”

Parrett said a number of WSEU locals in his region represent more than 1,300 union workers who have a combined yearly income of more than $56 million.

“The recent actions taken on the governor’s budget repair bill have taken more from workers than dollars. It took away our right to bargain things such as: sick leave and how it is used, vacation and how it is used, overtime and how it is ‘fairly’ distributed. Our grievance procedure has been virtually destroyed. These are things that make life working in a 24/7 facility tolerable,” Parrett wrote in the letter.

Parrett adds in the letter: “State employees fully expect to take some lumps financially in these tough economic times, we have offered and we will. But don’t take away rights to what has kept workplace peace for half a century and has worked well.”

Terri Gray, executive director of the Union Grove Chamber of Commerce, said she had received many calls from member businesses about the union-led effort. She said most of the calls came from businessmen and women who preferred to remain neutral in the dispute between Gov. Scott Walker and organized labor.

“They don’t want to pick a side,” she said. “I told them, ‘I believe you can choose to not choose.’”

Gray said the campaign appeared to have started a day or two ago. She said she didn’t know whether the sign campaign was having an impact.

Asked Wednesday about the boycott effort, the Rev. Jesse Jackson said “that any nonviolent tactic used to get attention to the steamroller tactics it seems to me are reasonable. I encourage people to remain nonviolent and disciplined in their protests.”

Asked if he supported boycott efforts in Wisconsin, Jackson did not directly endorse them.

He said: The best way to resolve conflict is when everybody is at the table and they can negotiate through some rational institutional process.”

Barack Obama Admits He Was Born in Kenya…….Maybe…

This video has been circulating through the email world and at last has found me.   I do not know whether or not it is authentic or has been worked over.  Mr. Obama could clear all this up by presenting us with his birth certificate.  He has a duty to do so.  

It is my observation that from all of the countless speeches Mr. Obama baritones, he has a difficult time discovering and conveying truth.

If this video  is not  authentic but has been doctored, this is exactly the kind of politics that American values enemies, the Leftwing of today’s Democratic Party perpetrates to destroy citizen faith in our beloved country.    If this video is not authentic its editors rise to the same slimy level of public discourse as do  Bill Ayers, Media Matters, George Soros, Anthony Weiner, Charlie Schumer, Gerry Nadler, Harry Reid, Sean Penn, Nancy Pelosi, Arlen Specter, Paul Krugman, and so many others who confound the community’s right to know the truth.

http://www.youtube.com/v/MwhKuunp8D8&hl=en_US&feature=player_embedded&version=3

Please click on below to view the video in which president Obama admits he was not born in Hawaii.

Unfortunately this former Senator from Illinois, the one who was also a senator in Illinoi who preferred to announce ‘present’ rather than to vote on issues, important or otherwise, is the present president of the United States.   I personally have considered him that since his inauguration on January 20, 2009.

He is a Marxist and has been a misfortune as president.  This fact doesn’t seem to bother Democrats.

“http://www.youtube.com/v/MwhKuunp8D8&hl=en_US&feature=player_embedded&version=3“

Black Panther Scandals Continue at Obama’s Dept. of Justice

The following article was written by J. Christian Adams, titled, “NEW CONGRESS STEPS TO PLATE WITH NEW BLACK PANTHER SCANDAL.”

“The Department of Justice has avoided giving Congress and the Commission on Civil Rights answers about the New Black Panther voter intimidation dismissal by pointing to the ongoing review by the Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR). The OPR review is now done and that diversion no longer applies.

As reported by Pajamas here and here, the results were exactly as expected: DOJ concludes that DOJ did nothing wrong. DOJ used the OPR investigation to avoid providing information to outside investigators on September 9, 2009. Again, on November 16, 2009, the Department of Justice told the Civil Rights Commission that it couldn’t be forthcoming with information until the OPR report was finished. It used a similar tactic to avoid congressional scrutiny.

Now that the OPR report is done, it’s time for the Department to cough up the information to the House Judiciary Committee and to Congressman Frank Wolf. Wolf has also asked for a long list of information which was never provided because of the OPR investigation, or at least that’s what DOJ said was the reason. Now that the OPR investigation is complete, here is a list of things that the Judiciary Committee and other members of Congress could ask for:

1. Everything requested in Congressman Frank Wolf’s letter of July 22, 2009, and letter of July 17, 2009.

2. All the documents prepared by the trial team attorneys on the case for the OPR investigation, including attachments.

3. Any internal documents or work product prepared by DOJ staff concluding that the “facts and law” did not support going forward. The extent of this request, or the lack thereof, will illuminate the extent to which credible legal analysis drove the dismissal as compared to flip hostility to the theory of equality in law that supported the lawsuit. If there is little work to show under this request, it will illuminate the shoddy nature of the dismissal. Any documents provided under this request should be compared to the work product of the four lawyers who were on the case.

4. All of the documents and emails between the top levels of the Justice Department about the case. A Judicial Watch lawsuit has revealed the existence of enormous amounts of traffic between the Office of the Deputy Attorney General and the Office of the Associate Attorney General, and even the Office of  the Attorney General, about the lawsuit. A privilege log reveals the existence of the emails, but DOJ has fought like crazy to keep the contents concealed. No such privilege exists against Congress.

5. Emails between Acting Assistant Attorney General Loretta King and any outside party. Congress should demand that the emails be unredacted. Just like the email redactions to Congressman Darrell Issa’s probe into the Department of Homeland Security later revealed sizzling language describing the lawless nonsense taking place there, King’s emails may also include some sizzling descriptions of the matter likely to inflame ordinary Americans.

6. Emails between Acting Assistant Attorney General Loretta King and any party inside DOJ about the case. Why? See number #5 above.

7. All emails and documents from outside parties about the case. These documents exist but have not been turned over.

8. All internal memoranda discussing how the Department sought to invoke various privileges against United States Commission on Civil Rights subpoenas, as well as to members of Congress. Because these positions were at odds with prior Department policies, Congress has a duty to investigate why Attorney General Eric Holder changed policies to conceal information using privileges which prior administrations refused to acknowledge. This is important to determine whether or not legislation is needed, or whether Congress should trim the Department’s budgetary wings given the amount of time and taxpayer money that has been used to stonewall the whole affair.

One of the beautiful designs in our Constitution is that Congress has ultimate oversight authority over the executive branch.  This tradition is borrowed from the powers of Parliament over the king. Parliament secured these powers from the crown through at least one lost head and many more lives at battles like Naseby. The oversight authority of Congress derives from the principle that the people are the ultimate power in this nation, not the sovereign. Under the Constitution, the people are most represented by the House of Representatives. One of the outcomes of the 2010 election is that the executive branch may now have to answer some of the questions I’ve outlined above.  It’s a great testament to the genius of our Constitution that the grand design continues to work as planned.

J. Christian Adams is an election lawyer who served in the Voting Rights Section at the U.S. Department of Justice. His website is http://www.electionlawcenter.com.