Arizona Ruling a Mixed Bag

The Foundation

"Born in other countries, yet believing you could be happy in this, our laws acknowledge, as they should do, your right to join us in society, conforming, as I doubt not you will do, to our established rules. That these rules shall be as equal as prudential considerations will admit, will certainly be the aim of our legislatures, general and particular." --Thomas Jefferson

Editorial Exegesis

"Arizona and other states suffering from out-of-control illegal immigration won an important if partial victory in the Supreme Court [Monday]. In a rebuke of the Obama administration, all eight justices (Elena Kagan recused herself) upheld Arizona's requirement that police officers determine the immigration status of anyone they stop, detain, or arrest if a 'reasonable suspicion exists that the person is an alien unlawfully present in the United States.' ... The Court threw out three other provisions of SB 1070, including one that made it a misdemeanor for an unauthorized alien to seek work in Arizona. But taken in perspective, these aren't critical to the effectiveness of Arizona's law. ... But as noted, this is only a partial victory. For example, in upholding the core provision of the law, the justices read it narrowly and left the door open to challenges to the way it is enforced. Also, Justices Scalia and Thomas got it right when they argued in their dissents that all four provisions of SB 1070 should have been upheld. There is no conflict between federal immigration law and SB 1070. As Scalia notes, Arizona has 'moved to protect its sovereignty -- not in contradiction of federal law, but in complete compliance with it.' Arizona's laws do 'not extend or revise federal immigration restrictions, but merely enforce those restrictions more effectively.' As Scalia scathingly concludes, 'If securing its territory in this fashion is not within the power of Arizona, we should cease referring to it as a sovereign State.' There is a reason we have 50 states instead of one, and the states are not mere administrative subdivisions of the federal government. Each has its own powers and its own interests, a fact that is of particularly acute interest when the federal government is failing to meet one of its fundamental responsibilities, which is precisely what is happening with illegal immigration. ... [O]n the issue of immigration the states remain dependent upon a federal government that is not to be depended on." --National Review

Essential Liberty

"Arizona and other states are fighting the Obama doctrine of cherry-picking which legal requirements the chief executive will enforce. This was the basis of the policy announced June 15 that the government would give large numbers of illegal immigrants de-facto amnesty by suspending deportation proceedings against them and allowing them to work in the country legally. The Department of Homeland Security added fuel to the fire Monday by announcing it was suspending agreements with Arizona police over enforcement of federal immigration laws. These and other actions call into question President Obama's commitment to his sworn executive duty under Article 2, Section 3, Clause 4 of the Constitution to 'take care that the laws be faithfully executed.' ... The framers of the Constitution didn't envision a president preventing states from upholding the law. ... When the federal government abrogates its constitutional duty to protect the states, the states must protect themselves. A statute on the books is useless when the occupant of the White House calculates that it's in his political interest not to enforce it." --The Washington Times

Upright

"The whole federal conflict with Arizona has come about not because Arizona wanted to make its own laws contradicting federal law, but because it wanted to enforce federal laws itself. What does it say about the Obama administration's priorities that it effectively scraps its sworn pledge to uphold the law, usurps the legislative function by ignoring federal laws, punishes those who comply and puts its own re-election first?" --Investor's Business Daily

"What Barack Obama wishes to accomplish by way of immigration outreach, chiefly to Hispanics, is his re-election. ... This is all a shame, if not a scandal. When politics, meaning the quest for votes, comes to dominate an urgent question, we are assured nothing substantive, or perhaps even useful, is going to be done. Every move becomes outreach: the act of begging. It is pretty much how we live these days. The political parties, as in Europe prior to the financial debacle, are focused on giving things, not on taking them away. When you take something away -- a well-paying government job, the right to strike against or bargain collectively with the government -- you offend, meaning you drive away votes. When, by contrast, you hand out favors, you sometimes could listen all day without hearing all the expressions of gratitude and fealty. If your profession is the harvesting of votes, which outcome do you prefer?" --columnist William Murchison

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Insight

"Never blame a legislative body for not doing something. When they do nothing, that don't hurt anybody. When they do something is when they become dangerous." --American humorist Will Rogers (1879-1935)

"A major source of objection to a free economy is precisely that it ... gives people what they want instead of what a particular group thinks they ought to want. Underlying most arguments against the free market is a lack of belief in freedom itself." --economist Milton Friedman (1912-2006)

The Demo-gogues

Poo-pooing the economy: "You know, it's fashionable right now for people to be cynical. We go in cycles like this and right now a lot of people are saying, 'Oh, America is doing terribly' and 'What are we going to do?'" --Barack Obama

Class warfare: "We created a whole lot of millionaires to boot. Businesses did just fine. And you know there are plenty of patriotic, successful Americans all across the country -- I meet them every day -- who'd be willing to make this contribution again because they understand there is such a thing as the common good. They understand that we're in this thing together." --Barack Obama

Strange thing to brag about: "I will be the first president in modern history to be outspent in his re-election campaign, if things continue as they have so far." --Barack Obama

Out of touch: "One of the things that I resent about these guys is they talk about us middle class guys and I don't live a middle class life anymore; I live in a beautiful home, they fly me around, you know what I mean?" --Joe Biden

"Make sure of two things: Be careful -- microphones are always hot, and understand that in Washington, DC, a gaffe is when you tell the truth. So, be careful." --Joe Biden

Protesting too much: "Don't forget, [Republicans are] going after [Attorney General] Eric Holder because he is supporting measures to overturn these voter suppression initiatives in the states. This is no accident, it is no coincidence." --House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) claiming that efforts of charging Holder with contempt of Congress has nothing to do with "Fast and Furious"

"It's clear that [charging AG Eric Holder with contempt of Congress] is nothing more than a political witch hunt to distract from the fact that Republicans in Congress have no interest in focusing on what we need to focus on, which is jobs and the economy." --Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-FL)

Dezinformatsia

Preparing to mourn: "Were the health-care law to be eviscerated, those who battled so hard on its behalf might draw at least bittersweet comfort from what could be called the Joni Mitchell Rule, named after the folk singer who instructed us that 'you don't know what you've got till it's gone.'" --Washington Post opinion writer E.J. Dionne Jr.

Hysteria: "Does anyone wonder like I do what this Supreme Court -- the one personified by Antonin Scalia and Clarence Thomas -- would have done in the landmark decisions in the post-World War II era? ... The fact is we have the most conservative court since the early 1930s, and maybe more conservative than that. These justices, led by Scalia, believe in original intent. They wanna judge cases the way the Founding Fathers would. Well, the Founding Fathers -- need I remind us all -- wrote slavery into the Constitution. It took a Civil War and the 13th Amendment to get it out." --MSNBC's Chris Matthews

Belly laugh of the week: "President Obama, his administration, has been remarkably scandal free. Really. And so [Republicans have] been trying with Solyndra, with Fast and Furious to get something going." --MSNBC political commentator Krystal Ball

Race bait: "I think it's a tough time to be a white man in America where the minorities are really taking over, to be quite honest." --Washington Post editor Cathy Areu

Questions no one is asking: "Is it a good goal for everyone in the world to have access to air-conditioning -- like clean water or the Internet? Or is it an unsustainable luxury, which air-conditioned societies should be giving up or rationing?" --The New York Times

Newspulper Headlines:

The Lonely Lives of Activists: "Activists Take Out Frustration on ... Ronald Reagan" --TheWeeklyStandard.com

The Private Sector Is Doing Fine: "Anti-Romney Protesters Say They're Paid to Heckle" --BuzzFeed.com

Too Much Information: "Unsatisfied, Gays Demand More From Obama" --Washington Examiner website

Everything Seemingly Is Spinning Out of Control: "Don't Look Now, but the Senate's Actually Working" --Politico.com

'Boy, I'm Glad That's Over With!': "Captain of Navy Ship Relieved Following Collision" --Associated Press

Breaking News From 2010: "Millions Still Go Without Insurance if Law Passes" --Associated Press

(Thanks to The Wall Street Journal's James Taranto)

Village Idiots

Shut up, he explained: "Bottom line is, after a level of cooperation that I think demonstrates this administration's absolute interest in finding out the truth about the Fast and Furious operation, and why that flawed tactic was used, its origins and its implementation, its efforts to work with Congress to provide it the information that was required under legitimate oversight needs, an assertion was made -- because this has become a political fishing expedition. And it is absolute evidence -- and I would refer you to the statements by congressional House -- rather, Republican congressional leaders from the beginning of the year, where they made clear that one of their chief priorities for this year was to use their investigative power in the House to score political points in this election year. I think knowing that tells you everything about the motivations here." --White House Press Secretary Jay Carney

Tax me more: "When arguing against paying their fair share of taxes, wealthy regressives claim 'it's my money.' But it's their nation, too. And unless they pay their share, America can't meet the basic needs of our people. True patriotism means paying for America." --Clinton administration Labor Secretary Robert Reich

Tax everyone more: "Where taxes are implemented on sugar-sweetened beverages, using revenue for anti-obesity programs and educational campaigns explaining the adverse effects of excessive consumption of these beverages will help to reduce the consumption of these caloric beverages and improve public health." --American Medical Association (AMA) board member Alexander Ding, M.D.

Hollyweird: "And I think ... we're going to be in a lot of trouble if we don't re-elect [Obama] because people on the other side of the fence scare me." --actor Morgan Freeman

From one Peace Prize winner to another: "Instead of making the world safer, America's violation of international human rights abets our enemies and alienates our friends." --Jimmy Carter denouncing the use of drone strikes on terrorists

Short Cuts

"President Obama was ripped by conservatives for his decree that overturned the defeat of his Dream Act in Congress. The act allows illegal alien children to stay in the U.S. but placed a ten percent tax on tanning salons. Leave it to Democrats to subsidize brown people who want to be Americans and tax Americans who want to be brown people." --comedian Argus Hamilton

"Scholars have all their precedent saying why Obamacare should be upheld; there's just the stupid text of the Constitution still in the way." --humorist Frank J. Fleming

"White House Press Secretary Jay Carney described the congressional hearings on Fast & Furious as 'a political fishing expedition.' And from what we've heard so far ... we're gonna need a bigger boat." --Fred Thompson

"The Congressional Black Causes says it is racist to refer to President Obama as 'cool.' Well, it is a good thing no one's calling him that anymore." --NewsBusted's Jodi Miller

"Gas prices are expected to drop to around $3 a gallon by this fall. The price drop is the result of a complicated system. It's called the election." --comedian Jay Leno

Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
Nate Jackson for The Patriot Post Editorial Team