Maybe it's just because she is the first female speaker of the house...who knows -- but Nancy Pelosi's wardrobe has been getting a ton of attention of late with most of the discussion
revolving around her signature strand of South Sea Cultured Pearls,
which are estimated to cost around 80k!! Caption and Image Credit:
diamondvues.com
One-Party Rule Does Away With Transparency
Be
afraid, be very afraid – Nancy Pelosi, the Democrat Party Majority
Leader of the House of Representatives, fearing nothing in terms of
expense to political capital or a push back from a Democrat Political
Party controlled Executive Branch when Barack Obama take office on
January 20, 2009,
will seek to dispense with a few of those pesky openness and legislative transparency rules
that govern the law making procedures that currently guide the way our
elected representatives in the House of Representatives do their
business.
What this means is that many of the processes that
were once open to scrutiny from the public (you and me … voters),
rebuttal from factions with a different viewpoint, and those just plain
caring for more democracy and debate rather than less will have less
influence upon how things get done in our government.
In the
most simple of terms, Nancy Pelosi plans to reduce the freedoms of a
majority of Americans making the processes in the 111th session of the
House of Representatives one where the Nation of citizens serves the
acts of the House of Representatives as opposed to the concept that the
House of Representatives serves for the acts of the Nation of citizens.
America the free will turn a corner where this is no longer a nation by the people, for the people …
In
Article I of the U.S. Constitution, "all legislative powers" were
"vested in a the House of Representatives of the United States, which
shall consist of a Senate and House of Representatives." The House of
Representatives has the responsibility to debate and create the laws
under which our country operates. Image Credit: crapo.senate.gov
This excerpted and edited from U.S. Constitution Online –
Constitutional Topic: The Preamble
This
Topic Page concerns The Preamble. The first paragraph of the
Constitution provides the context for the Constitution - the "why" of
the document.
The
Constitution was written by several committees over the summer of 1787,
but the committee most responsible for the final form we know today is
the "Committee of Stile and Arrangement". This Committee was tasked
with getting all of the articles and clauses agreed to by the
Convention and putting them into a logical order. On September 10,
1787, the Committee of Style set to work, and two days later, it
presented the Convention with its final draft. The members were
Alexander Hamilton, William Johnson, Rufus King, James Madison, and
Gouverneur Morris. The actual text of the Preamble and of much of the
rest of this final draft is usually attributed to Gouverneur Morris.
The
newly minted document began with a grand flourish - the Preamble, the
Constitution's r'aison d'etre. It holds in its words the hopes and
dreams of the delegates to the convention, a justification for what
they had done. Its words are familiar to us today, but because of time
and context, the words are not always easy to follow. The remainder of
this Topic Page will examine each sentence in the Preamble and explain
it for today's audience.
We the People of the United States
The Framers were an elite group - among the best and brightest America had to offer at the time. But they knew that they were trying to
forge a nation made up not of an elite, but of the common man. Without
the approval of the common man, they feared revolution.This
first part of the Preamble speaks to the common man. It puts into
writing, as clear as day, the notion that the people were creating this
Constitution. It was not handed down by a god or by a king - it was
created by the people.
[not elite leaders who seek less openness in the way the transact their daily business]
in Order to form a more perfect Union
The
Framers were dissatisfied with the United States under the Articles of
Confederation, but they felt that what they had was the best they could
have, up to now. They were striving for something better. The Articles
of Confederation had been a grand experiment that had worked well up to
a point, but now, less than ten years into that experiment, cracks were
showing. The new United States, under this new Constitution, would be more perfect. Not perfect, but more perfect.
establish Justice
Injustice,
unfairness of laws and in trade, was of great concern to the people of
1787. People looked forward to a nation with a level playing field,
where courts were established with uniformity and where trade within
and outside the borders of the country would be fair and unmolested.
Today, we enjoy a system of justice that is one of the fairest in the
world. It has not always been so - only through great struggle can we
now say that every citizen has the opportunity for a fair trial and for
equal treatment, and even today there still exists discrimination. But we still strive for the justice that the Framers wrote about.
[Pelosi’s
move seeks to make this process less transparent, less fair, and
strives for less justice in the process of the House of Representatives]
insure domestic Tranquility
One
of the events that caused the Convention to be held was the revolt of
Massachusetts farmers knows as Shays' Rebellion. The taking up of arms
by war veterans revolting against the state government was a shock to
the system. The keeping of the peace was on everyone's mind, and the
maintenance of tranquility at home was a prime concern. The framers
hoped that the new powers given the federal government would prevent
any such rebellions in the future.
provide for the common defence
The
new nation was fearful of attack from all sides - and no one state was
really capable of fending off an attack from land or sea by itself.
With a wary eye on Britain and Spain, and ever-watchful for Indian
attack, no one of the United States could go it alone. They needed each
other to survive in the harsh world of international politics of the
18th century.
promote the general Welfare
This,
and the next part of the Preamble, are the culmination of everything
that came before it - the whole point of having tranquility, justice,
and defense was to promote the general welfare - to allow every state
and every citizen of those states to
benefit from what the government could provide. The framers looked
forward to the expansion of land holdings, industry, and investment, and they knew that a strong national government would be the beginning of that.
[by
the PEOPLE, for the PEOPLE - not billions of collected tax money by the
government, for the government to expand its holdings in industry,
investment in junk mortgages, and land - as in houses]
and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity
Hand
in hand with the general welfare, the framers looked forward to the
blessings of liberty - something they had all fought hard for just a
decade before. They were very concerned that they were creating a nation that would resemble something of a paradise for liberty, as opposed to the tyranny of a monarchy,
where citizens could look forward to being free as opposed to looking
out for the interests of a king. And more than for themselves, they
wanted to be sure that the future generations of Americans would enjoy
the same.
[The House of Representatives seeks to become more tyrannical and less open]
do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America
The
final clause of the Preamble is almost anti-climatic, but it is
important for a few reasons - it finishes the "We, the people" thought,
saying what we the people are actually doing; it gives us a name for
this document, and it restates the name of the nation adopting the
Constitution. That the Constitution
is "ordained" reminds us of the higher power involved here - not just
of a single person or of a king, but of the people themselves.
That is it "established" reminds us that it replaces that which came
before - the United States under the Articles (a point lost on us
today, but quite relevant at the time).
Reference Here>>
We,
the House of Representatives, in order to promote ourselves over the
scrutiny of the common man, dispense with these rules of openness in
procedure and debate so that we can grasp even more power (with less
shared power and input), as we seek to establish a ruling class without
the insight and rancor from the masses. We do ordain and establish
these changes in our rules for the Democrat Political Party to the
detriment of all other points of view and justice for the common man
ruled by this governmental body.
Thank you Democrat Political Party and it’s Majority Leader, Congresswoman Nancy Pelosi.
Kiss liberty and the pursuit of happiness here, during this time of one-party rule / Carter's Second Term, GOODBYE!