U. S. SUPREME COURT SAYS WE CAN'T CHALLENGE GOVERNMENT'S SECRET SURVEILLANCE BECAUSE THEY ARE SECRET! KINDA REMINDS ME OF ABBOTT AND COSTELLO'S "WHO'S ON FIRST"!!

CHUCK HAGEL SWORN IN AS DEFENSE SECRETARY. GREAT.

(New Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel, left, as he was sworn in Wednesday morning at the Pentagon. His wife, Lilibet, held the Bible. Michael L. Rhodes, the Pentagon's director of administration and management, administered the oath.)

After a somewhat stormy debate in the Senate over his confirmation, former Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) was sworn in Wednesday morning at the Pentagon and took over as secretary of defense.
Hagel took the oath of office in a private ceremony. His wife, Lilibet, held the Bible on which Hagel placed his hand. The oath was administered by Pentagon Director of Administration and Management Michael L. Rhodes.
The new Pentagon chief is due to address military and civilian personnel at 10:30 a.m. ET. We'll monitor his remarks and update with any news.
Hagel replaces Leon Panetta, who is among several cabinet members who decided to retire at the start of President Obama's second term.

U. S. SUPREME COURT RULES NO ONE CAN SUE GOVERNMENT OVER SECRET SURVEILLANCE BECAUSE ... WELL, IT'S ALL SECRET! WOW!!

WASHINGTON — No one can sue the government over secret surveillance because, since it's secret, no one can prove his or her calls were intercepted, the Supreme Court ruled Tuesday, throwing out a constitutional challenge to the government's monitoring of international calls and emails.

The 5-4 decision is the latest of many that have shielded the government's anti-terrorism programs from court challenge, and a striking example of what civil libertarians call the Catch-22 rule that blocks challengers from collecting the evidence they need to proceed.

Over the last decade, the justices or lower court judges have repeatedly killed or quietly ended lawsuits that sought to expose or contest anti-terrorism programs, including secret wiretapping, roundups or arrests of immigrants from the Mideast and drone strikes that kill American citizens abroad.

The court's conservative majority believe that matters of national security and the fight against terrorism are properly decided by the president and Congress, not through lawsuits. They have erected procedural barriers to block such suits. The only exception has been lawsuits brought on behalf of the prisoners at Guantanamo Bay, which have won new appeal rights for inmates.

The intense wiretapping of international electronic traffic began shortly after the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. President George W. Bush was determined to detect secret terrorist plots, if possible, and ordered the National Security Agency to intercept calls and messages coming into and out of the country. Bush chose to bypass a special court created to oversee "foreign intelligence surveillance."

When Bush's order was revealed, civil libertarians called the mass surveillance unconstitutional. But Congress, with the support of Democrats and Republicans, approved even broader electronic surveillance in 2008. By law, the targets of that surveillance must be outside the United States, but lawmakers acknowledged that calls and messages of some Americans would be inadvertently intercepted.

Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch and other groups began a new challenge, suing on behalf of lawyers, journalists and human rights advocates. They argued the expanded surveillance was unconstitutional because it would chill free speech and permit illegal searches of "purely domestic communications."

They won a preliminary victory when the U.S. 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals in New York said they had standing to sue. Because the plaintiffs had clients and contacts abroad, they had a "reasonable fear" their calls would be intercepted, the appeals court said.

The Obama administration appealed last year, and the Supreme Court tossed out the suit Tuesday in the case of Clapper vs. Amnesty International.

Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. said the lawsuit was based on speculation, not evidence of how the program worked. The plaintiffs "have no actual knowledge of the government's targeted practices. Instead, [they] merely speculate and make assumptions," he said. Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Antonin Scalia, Anthony M. Kennedy and Clarence Thomas joined his opinion.

Alito cited the Supreme Court's strict rules on standing, which hold that a case cannot go forward unless a complaining party can show he or she has suffered an "actual or imminent" injury. Alito said that this approach prevented judges from "usurping the powers of the political branches" of government.

In dissent, the court's four liberal justices said the lawsuit should have gone forward because the plaintiffs had to alter their work practices to avoid having their confidential calls overheard. "In my view, this harm is not 'speculative,'" Justice Stephen G. Breyer said.

The PEN American Center, which represents writers, called it a "Kafkaesque holding.... The U.S. government is running a secret program that monitors people. In order to challenge the legality of the program, the court's majority says you have to show that you're being monitored. You can't show this, of course, because the program is secret," said Peter Godwin, the group's president.

Jameel Jaffer, a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union, called the decision disturbing. It "insulates the statute from meaningful judicial review and leaves Americans' privacy rights to the mercy of the political branches."

But a lawyer for six former U.S. attorneys general applauded the decision. It "sends a clear message that politically motivated litigation over national security is untenable," said Megan L. Brown, a Washington attorney who represented them. The courts should not "second-guess" the president and Congress on "sensitive national issues," she said.

WHY SOME REPUBLICANS VOTED AGAINST CHUCK HAGEL FOR DEFENSE SECRETARY, INCLUDING KENTUCKY'S MITCH MCCONNELL, WHO CHICKENED OUT!

NEWS: WHITE HOUSE PLANS PROJECT TO MAP THE HUMAN BRAIN. LOL.

BREAKING NEWS: U. S. SENATE CONFIRMS CHUCK HAGEL AS DEFENSE SECRETARY. I THANK GOD FOR HIS MERCIES -- I'M A BIG FAN OF CHUCK HAGEL'S!

CHECK BACK FOR UPDATES. UNTIL THEN, READ MORE HERE, AND HERE. WANNA SEE WHO VOTED FOR HIM AND WHO CHICKENED OUT? CLICK HERE. I THANK MY FRIEND RAND PAUL FOR HIS YEA VOTE.

SEQUESTRATION LOOMS!

DR. FRED GOTT'S OFFICES SEARCHED PURSUANT TO FEDERAL WARRANT.

About 25 state, federal and local law enforcement officers executed a federal search warrant this morning at the office of Dr. C. Fred Gott, a Bowling Green cardiologist who has been practicing medicine for 32 years.

Gott was not present during the search and has not been charged with any crime.

“This search warrant is the result of a joint investigation by the Bowling Green-Warren County Drug Task Force, Kentucky State Police, Kentucky Office of the Attorney General, Medicaid Fraud and Abuse Division, Federal Bureau of Investigation and Drug Enforcement Administration Drug Diversion Section and the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, Office of the Inspector General, Drug Enforcement and Professional Practices Branch,” according to a release from the drug task force.

“DTF was notified several months ago by the coroner’s office of several overdose deaths, and that is what initiated this investigation,” task force director Tommy Loving said this morning as law enforcement officers moved around in Gott’s office.

The federal search warrant is a sealed document. Law enforcement officers carried out computer hard drives and boxes of papers this morning and loaded those items into trucks. The computers will be taken to the Bowling Green Police Department’s computer forensic lab, Loving said. Loving referred all other questions to the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Louisville.

During their work assessing deaths in Warren County, the coroner’s office has received calls from families and law enforcement regarding concerns about overdose deaths in general, Warren County Coroner Kevin Kirby said. Overdose deaths here are attributed to prescription drugs.

“Anytime there is a problem concerning deaths, whether it be auto accidents or drug overdoses, we try to be proactive and we try to stop it,” Kirby said. “That’s where law enforcement and the coroner’s office work hand in hand.”

In 2012, the coroner’s office determined that 12 people in Warren County died from drug overdoses. That number is down from 2011 when 18 people in Warren County died from drug overdoses, according to the coroner’s annual report.

In Kentucky, about 82 people a month die from overdose deaths with the majority of those deaths attributed to prescription drugs.

“It’s a problem all over the country,” Kirby said. “Yes, we do have a problem with it (here),” Kirby said.

Gott, whose area of practice is listed on the Kentucky Board of Medical Licensure website as cardiovascular disease, graduated from the University of Louisville School of Medicine in 1978. He obtained his medical license Sept., 18, 1980, according to KBML online records.

Gott also provides pain management services, Loving said.

KBML online records note prior board action on Gott but the website does not specify what that action was. Previous disciplinary actions of the board are available only after the board receives written requests for such information. It was not possible to obtain that information prior to press time today.

Gott holds medical privileges at The Medical Center but does not perform cardiac catheterization at that facility, said Doris Thomas, vice president of marketing and development for Commonwealth Health Corporation, the parent company of The Medical Center.

Gott does not hold privileges at TriStar Greenview Regional Hospital, but is on the courtesy staff there, which means he can admit patients to that facility, Greenview marketing director Alan Palmer said.

Bluegrass Poll's Great News: Kentucky Supports Restoring Felon Voting Rights.

Written byAndrew Wolfson 

ABOUT THE POLL:

THE COURIER-JOURNAL BLUEGRASS POLL® is based on surveys conducted Feb. 19 to 21 with 616 Kentucky registered voters by SurveyUSA. Seventy-three percent of respondents were interviewed on their home telephone in the recorded voice of a professional announcer, while the other 27 percent were shown a questionnaire on their smart phone, tablet or other electronic device.
The margin of error for the polled question was plus or minus 4 percentage points. In theory, one can say with 96 percent certainty that the results would not vary by more than the stated margin of sampling error, in one direction or the other, had all respondents with telephones been interviewed with complete accuracy. Percentages based on subsamples are subject to a higher potential margin of error.

In addition to these sampling errors, the practical difficulties of conducting any survey can also influence the results.

A majority of Kentucky voters say they favor amending the state constitution to allow convicted felons to regain their right to vote once they serve their full sentences.
A poll of 616 registered voters taken Feb. 19-21 by SurveyUSA for The Courier-Journal found that 51 percent favored such an amendment, while 38 percent opposed it. The poll question had a margin of error of 4 percentage points.

Many Kentuckians appear to share the view of Thomas Vance, 62, a disabled retired Air Force master sergeant who lives in Alexandria . In a follow-up interview, Vance said denying felons the vote after they serve their sentence is “piling on.”

“It is just not fair,” he said. “If I did my time, that should be the end of it.”
Kentucky is one of only five states that bar all felons from the polls unless their voting rights are restored through a pardon from the governor or another agency.

Thirty-six states automatically restore voting rights for ex-felons, and two allow felons to vote by absentee ballot from prison. The others impose waiting periods.

The Kentucky House for six straight years — including this one — has passed a bill to restore voting rights to some felons, but Republican leaders in the Senate have blocked it from coming to a vote.
Supporters of House Bill 70, which passed the House 75-25 Wednesday and would put a constitutional amendment to restore voting rights on the ballot, said they hope the poll results will prompt the Senate to pass the bill.
“Folks in the legislature are always looking to see what the general population is thinking,” said Marian McClure Taylor, executive director of the Kentucky Council of Churches.

The poll found support for a constitutional amendment among all groups except voters who described themselves as conservatives, who narrowly opposed it, 47-44 percent.
Republicans split 45-45, while Democrats favored it 57-31 and liberals 65-24.
Raoul Cunningham, president of the NAACP’s Louisville chapter, said “it is a good sign that as many Republicans support it as oppose it.”

But Tim Coleman, the immediate past president of the Kentucky Commonwealth’s Attorney’s Association, said the prosecutors’ group still opposes automatic restoration of voting rights to felons.
Conservatives, including some prosecutors, say that by committing a crime, felons have shown they aren’t responsible enough to participate in voting and self government.

Roger Clegg, president and general counsel of the Center for Equal Opportunity, a conservative think tank in Falls Church, Va., cautioned that the poll results may reflect how the question was posed.
“I think most people share my view that some people who have completed their sentences should have their right to vote restored and some should not, depending on the seriousness of the crime, how long ago it occurred and what they have done since they got out of prison,” Clegg said. “And it is very difficult to write a statute that weighs all those factors.”

HB 70 proposes a constitutional amendment that would allow restoration of voting rights once a felon receives a final discharge from parole or probation, or their maximum prison sentence has expired.
It would exempt felons convicted of treason, intentional killing, sex crimes or bribery. The amendment would have to be ratified by voters before taking effect.

Proponents of automatic restoration — including the League of Women Voters and the Catholic Conference of Kentucky — say that voting is the most fundamental expression of citizenship, that the restrictions disproportionately disenfranchise blacks, and that they are a vestige of Jim Crows laws designed to keep minorities from voting.

The League found in a 2006 study that nearly one in four African Americans is banned from the polls because of a felony conviction, compared with 1 in 17 Kentuckians overall.
The Bluegrass Poll found that 77 percent of blacks support a constitutional amendment to restore voting rights, compared with 49 percent of white voters. But more people supported than opposed an amendment regardless of race, age or sex.

Benjamin Cooley, 46, a disabled information technology profession from Hopkinsville and a Republican, said once felons have “served their time, they have paid their debt to society. They should have their suffrage restored.”

But Larry Ratliff, 58, of Verona, a retired school custodian, said, “They lost their right when they committed a felony, and I don’t think they should get it back.”
Wanda Page, 71, a retired bookkeeper who lives in Bullitt County, said she was undecided on an amendment because she thinks restoring felon voting rights should “depend on the circumstances.”

State Sen. Gerald Neal, D-Louisville, who favors HB 70, said some senators have opposed the measure in the past for fear of being seen as “soft on crime,” as well as for political reasons. It is assumed that felons whose rights are restored would more likely vote Democrat.
Neal also said that there is a “racial component” to the opposition, whether “they intend it or not,” because of the disproportionate impact on blacks.

Senate President Robert Stivers, R-Manchester, and Senate Majority Leader Damon Thayer, R-Georgetown, did not respond to requests for comment on the polls results.
Thayer, who has opposed the bill in past sessions, denied in an interview last year that politics is a consideration. He also said the greater impact on blacks didn’t concern him.
“A felon is a felon, regardless of race," he said.

If You Know About Kentucky, Then This News Will NOT Shock You: Kentucky Supported Abraham Lincoln's Efforts To Abolish Slavery — 111 Years Late!

Mae Jones Street Kidd (February 8, 1904 Ð October 20, 1999),
left, was an innovative businesswoman, a civic leader, and a skilled
 politician. She had a distinguished career in public relations, served
 in the Red Cross during World War II, and was a member of the
Kentucky House of Representatives from 1968 to 1984, representing
 Louisville's 41st state legislative district. In this photo she talked with
 Governor John Y. Brown sometime in the 1980's

By Greg Kocher 

Here's an OMG fact for you: The Kentucky legislature didn't go on record against slavery until 1976 — 111 years after the 13th Amendment prohibiting involuntary servitude became the law of the land.
Lincoln, with 12 nominations at Sunday's Academy Awards ceremony, tells of the president's struggle to have Congress pass the amendment.

What isn't told is that Kentucky, Lincoln's birthplace, refused to ratify the amendment. Mississippi was another; more on that later.
The movie depicts only the first step of the process to add an amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Moviegoers see passage of the amendment in the House of Representatives in 1865. But the amendment's story didn't end there.
Before an amendment can be added to the U.S. Constitution, three-fourths of the states must pass or ratify it. That process wasn't finished and verified until December 1865, eight months after Lincoln's assassination.

To understand why Kentucky rejected ratification, some context is necessary.
Slavery had existed in Kentucky since before it achieved statehood in 1792. In 1790, slaves were a little more than 6 percent of the population. By 1830, they were 24 percent of the population. By 1860, the year before the start of the Civil War, Kentucky had 225,000 slaves; most lived in the Bluegrass region and in the corridor between Lexington and Louisville.

Kentucky's first constitution, written in 1792, protected the right to own slaves. Slave labor was used to grow hemp in the 1800s, and tobacco in the central and western regions of the state. By 1850, 28 percent of white families owned slaves, but the average slaveholder owned five slaves or fewer.
At the start of the Civil War, Lincoln had hoped to encourage border states like Kentucky to take the initiative in abolishing slavery themselves, according to historians Lowell Harrison and James Klotter. Lincoln tried several times to get Kentucky to adopt a plan of compensated emancipation. It would work like this: If a state committed itself to a definite date to end slavery, then Lincoln would recommend to Congress that owners receive $400 for each slave. The plan didn't fly.

When Lincoln decided that ending slavery would help win the war, he declared slaves free only in those areas controlled by the Confederacy. His Emancipation Proclamation of 1863 did not affect Kentucky. Even so, the proclamation attracted protest in the Bluegrass.
"Most Kentuckians supported the Union with the understanding that a state had the right to deal with slavery as a matter of state's rights," wrote James Ramage, a professor of history at Northern Kentucky University, in an email. "When President Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, most Kentucky Unionists felt betrayed and declared that they would never accept freeing the slaves."
Kentucky Gov. James F. Robinson denounced the Emancipation Proclamation in his message to the legislature in early January 1863. The legislature also denounced the proclamation "as unwise, unconstitutional and void," and there was talk in the state of recalling Kentucky troops from the Union army. Some even advocated that Kentucky secede from the Union.

Such talk embarrassed those who supported emancipation. Samuel Lusk wrote to a friend on Feb. 4, 1863: "If the president is resolved on going to hell and destroying the best government on earth, let him place himself under the control of Kentucky politicians and he will soon have accomplished his purpose."

Meanwhile, the feds were doing little to win the hearts and minds of many Kentuckians. Federal troops resorted to abrasive measures that were illegal or unconstitutional to maintain military control of the state. This included military interference with elections, such as prohibiting "disloyal" persons from voting.

By 1864, the Union army's ill treatment of civilians and Lincoln's inclusion of black freedom as a war aim "caused many formerly loyal Kentuckians to turn their sympathies against the federal government," writes Anne E. Marshall in Creating a Confederate Kentucky: The Lost Cause and Civil War Memory in a Border State.

Among those opposing federal policies was Brutus Clay, a U.S. congressman from Bourbon County, who was steadfastly against abolition and the enlistment of slaves into the Union army. (Brutus was brother to Cassius Marcellus Clay, who argued for emancipation and published an anti-slavery newspaper, The Lexington True American.)

During the debate on the 13th Amendment, Brutus Clay said: "If you take away from a man that which he considers to be justly his own, you make him desperate, and he will retaliate upon you. You can never by oppression make a man obey willingly the laws of his country. Act justly toward him, let him see he has a government which will protect him and he will love that government. But oppress and rob him, and he will despise and hate you."

Without Clay's vote, the 13th Amendment passed the U.S. House of Representatives in January 1865 — the climatic finale in Steven Spielberg's movie. The next month, the Kentucky legislature voted to reject it: 56-18 in the House and 23-10 in the Senate.

Slavery was still legal and visible in the commonwealth in 1865. One visitor traveling through the South that year noted that Louisville was the only place on the trip where slaves waited on him.
Nevertheless, the 13th Amendment was ratified by the necessary three-fourths majority of states and was officially adopted in December 1865. Kentucky, meanwhile, came to identify itself more with the Confederacy after the war than it did during the war. Between 1867 and 1894, Kentucky elected six governors who had been Confederates or Confederate sympathizers.

Kentucky did not move to ratify the 13th Amendment until state Rep. Mae Street Kidd, D-Louisville, one of three blacks then in the Kentucky legislature, filed a resolution to do so in 1976.
The resolution passed the Kentucky House by a 77-0 vote, and it passed the Kentucky Senate by a voice vote on March 18, 1976. The vote was symbolic — Kentucky's ratification wasn't needed for the amendment to be added to the U.S. Constitution — but it was a symbol with power.

Now, back to Mississippi. The Magnolia State ratified the 13th Amendment on March 16, 1995, but because the ratification document was never presented to the U.S. archivist, it was never considered official.

On Jan. 30 of this year, Mississippi finally sent a copy of its 1995 resolution to adopt and pass the 13th Amendment to the Office of the Federal Register.
A week later, Federal Register Director Charles Barth confirmed that he had received the paperwork, the Clarion-Ledger newspaper of Jackson, Miss., reported.
"With this action, the state of Mississippi has ratified the 13th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States," he wrote.

Words To Live By, Words Of Wisdom, And Words To Ponder For Liberty Lovers Like Me.

"And can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath?"

--Thomas Jefferson, Notes on the State of Virginia, Query 18, 1781

ABRAHAM LINCOLN WINS OSCAR. I'M ROTFLMAO!

BOMBSHELL: News Reports Pope Resigned After Findings Of Blackmail, Corruption, Gay Sex At Vatican.

The Italian media is reporting that Pope Benedict XVI resigned after receiving the results of an internal investigation, delivered in a 300-page, two-volume dossier, that laid bare a sordid tale of blackmail, corruption and gay sex at the Vatican.

The respected Italian newspaper La Repubblica reported Friday that the report stamped "Pontifical Secret," contained "an exact map of the mischief and the bad fish" inside the Holy See.

• Related: Cardinals says married priests possible | Gallery: Pope Benedict XVI to resign

The newspaper said the findings of the nine-month investigation, headed by Spanish cardinal, Julian Herranz , with the assistance of Cardinal Salvatore De Giorgi, former archbishop of Palermo, and Slovak cardinal Jozef Tomko, was delivered to the pope on Dec. 17, 2012.

"It was on that day, with those papers on his desk, that Benedict XVI took the decision he had mulled over for so long,'' the newspaper said.

La Repubblica said the panel drew upon "dozens and dozens" of interviews with bishops, cardinals and lay people. It said the pope was kept apprised of the investigation in weekly meetings from April until December. The final, bound in red leather, is being kept in a safe in the pope's Vatican quarters, the newspaper said.

A similar story was carried by Panorama, a conservative weekly.

"What's coming out is a very detailed X-ray of the Roman Curia that does not spare even the closest collaborators of the pope," respected Vatican expert Ignazio Ingrao writes in Panorama. "The pope was no stranger to the intrigues, but he probably did not know that under his pontificate there was such a complex network and such intricate chains of personal interests and unmentionable relationships."

A Vatican spokesman, the Rev. Federico Lombardi, has refused to comment on the reports.
"Neither the cardinals' commission nor I will make comments to confirm or deny the things that are said about this matter. Let each one assume his or her own responsibilities. We shall not be following up on the observations that are made about this,'' Lombardi said, according to the German news agency Deutsche Presse-Agentur.

In announcing his resignation Feb. 11, Benedict said that he no longer had the "strength of mind and body" to carry on. A conclave will select a new pope next month.
Lombardi has indicated that Benedict would meet with the three cardinals before stepping down Feb. 28, in one of his final private audiences.

La Repubblica reported that the pope would personally hand the confidential files to his successor, with the hope he will be ''strong, young and holy'' enough to take the necessary action.

The investigation was triggered last May when the pope's butler, Paolo Gabriele, was arrested and charged with having stolen and leaked papal correspondence that depicted the Vatican as a hotbed of intrigue.

The papers were published in a blockbuster book. The butler was convicted in October of aggravated theft, and later pardoned.

The three-man panel, according to La Repubblica, discovered an underground gay network whose members organized sexual meetings in several locations, including a villa outside Rome, a sauna in Rome's Cuarto Miligo distirct and even in a beauty salon inside the Vatican.
The gatherings, in turn, left them open to blackmail from people outside the Vatican, the report said, according to the newspaper.

La Repubblica quoted an unidentified man described as ''very close'' to the authors of the dossier as saying it contained information about violations of the sixth and seventh commandments, which forbid adultery and stealing.

The British newspaper, The Guardian, notes that the sixth commandment also "is linked in Catholic doctrine to the proscribing of homosexual acts."

The U.S. website, The Daily Beast, reports that investigative journalist Carmello Abbate went undercover with a hidden camera in 2010 in Rome to produce an expose called “Good Nights Out for Gay Priests.”

The scandal has erupted as the pope is clearing the decks of his pontificate, tweaking the rules of the conclave, finessing the religious rites used to launch the next papacy and making some eyebrow-raising final appointments before he retires next week.

The Vatican newspaper L'Osservatore Romano said in editions published late Friday that Benedict had signed a decree earlier in the week making some changes to the papal installation Mass, separating out the actual rite of installation from the liturgy itself.

He is also studying the text of a separate document governing the rules of the conclave, though it's not known if it will address the thorny issue of whether the election can begin earlier than March 15, by some interpretations the earliest the vote can start under the current rules.
And on Friday, the Vatican announced Benedict had transferred a top official in the secretariat of state, Monsignor Ettore Balestrero, to Colombia.

Some of the documents leaked in the midst of the "Vatileaks" scandal concerned differences of opinion about the level of financial transparency the Holy See should provide about the bank, the Institute for Religious Works. However, Balestrero himself wasn't named in any significant way in the leaks.

Lombardi said Balestrero's transfer had been months in the works, was a clear promotion and had nothing to do with what the Vatican considers baseless reporting.

READ MORE HERE.

Rand Paul: No Decision Yet On Presidential Run.

Rand Paul, R-Ky., speaks during a community forum Friday, Feb. 22, 2013, at Butler County Cooperative2 Extension Office. (Photo by Miranda Pederson/Daily News)

By KATIE BRANDENBURG

MORGANTOWN — U.S. Sen. Rand Paul reiterated Friday that he will wait until 2014 to decide whether he will run for president.
Paul, a Republican from Bowling Green, said it’s a compliment to him and to Kentucky that his name is being mentioned as a potential candidate. He spoke about the issue Friday when questioned by an audience member during a community forum in Morgantown.

While the Republican Party has a lot of support in Kentucky, it has struggled in some areas, he said. “So I think we need some new ideas that are a little different than what we’ve been presenting, and I think I could be part of that, but we haven’t made any firm decisions,” Paul said.

He spoke about a number of his policy ideas during the forum hosted by the Morgantown-Butler County Chamber of Commerce at the Butler County Cooperative Extension Service.

He stood at the podium next to a large check for $600,000 made out to “The U.S. Taxpayer.” The check represented money from his official operating budget that he will return to the U.S. Treasury, he said.

Paul announced the return of money from his operating budget earlier in the week. He said government needs to give employees incentives to save money.

Paul also spoke about the potential impact of the sequester – a mandated round of budget cuts set to go into effect next month – and ways in which the government can save money.

The sequester would cut $1.2 trillion over 10 years, but government spending will continue to increase, Paul said.

“Spending still is going to go up,” Paul said. “It’s not a cut in spending. It’s a cut in the rate of growth of spending.”

He made cuts in his office without laying people off, Paul said.

“We watch what we spend,” he said.

Paul said the government should choose not to fill the positions of governmental retirees and bring pay for employees down to market value. He also suggested a cut in foreign aid spending.

The ideas are part of Paul’s proposal, unveiled this week, to help prevent federal layoffs.

To improve the U.S. economy, it’s important to keep tax dollars in the hands of people in places such as Morgantown, he said. “You don’t get richer if I raise your taxes and send more money to Washington,” Paul said. “It’s typically wasted.”

He gave some examples of what he considers government waste, including about $5.2 million spent on a study of goldfish to find out about how they behave democratically.

Paul also took questions from the audience.

Kirk SanCartier, 51, of Morgantown, asked Paul about gun control efforts in Washington.

Paul said he wouldn’t have a problem with teachers or principals having guns in their desks at schools as a safeguard against gun violence.

The people who obey gun laws are not the people who are prone to gun violence, he said.

SanCartier said he’s concerned about his gun rights being taken away.

“Everybody has a right to protect themselves,” he said. “We do a lot of hunting, and that’s a very family oriented thing right now.”

If people spent more time with their children, many of the problems with gun violence wouldn’t exist, he said.

SanCartier doesn’t want people dictating how he can protect his family. “I’m afraid they’re trying to trample on our rights,” he said. “I’m afraid they’re trying to change the Constitution.”

James Runion, Morgantown-Butler County Chamber of Commerce president, asked Paul about coal mine permits in counties near Butler County, where many local residents work.

Paul said the president has been open about his feelings about coal, and that environmental regulations on coal don’t bode well for the industry.

“If this president has his way, there will be no more coal mined,” he said.

Runion was raised in eastern Kentucky and said coal is important for the state and for Butler County. “We want to keep jobs, not just in Butler County, but we want to keep Butler Countians working in other counties,” he said.

OKAY, THESE CARTOONS BY NICK ANDERSON ARE LOL FUNNY!

U. S. SUPREME COURT RULES "PADILLA" IMMIGRATION CASE NOT RETROACTIVE; "REBUTTABLE PRESUMPTION" ATTACHES TO STATE COURT RULING ON ISSUES PRESENTED TO IT.

Supreme Court Limits Reach of 2010 Ruling on Deportation Warning
By ADAM LIPTAK

WASHINGTON — In 2010, the Supreme Court ruled that criminal defense lawyers must warn their clients if deportation could be a consequence of a guilty plea. On Wednesday, the court limited the reach of that ruling, saying it did not apply retroactively to people whose convictions had become final by the time the justices announced their 2010 decision, Padilla v. Kentucky.

Wednesday’s decision was bad news for the petitioner, Roselva Chaidez, a Mexican woman in Chicago who has been a legal permanent resident of the United States since 1977. In 2003, she was accused of participating in an insurance fraud by falsely claiming to have been a passenger in a car involved in an accident.

She pleaded guilty and was sentenced to four years of probation. The conviction came to light in 2009 when she applied for citizenship and was told she would be deported because of it. Based on the Padilla decision, a federal judge in Illinois set aside her conviction.

Justice Elena Kagan, writing for herself and six other justices, said the federal judge’s ruling was at odds with the Supreme Court’s central precedent concerning retroactivity, its 1989 decision in Teague v. Lane. The Teague decision said that a ruling is retroactive if it applies existing precedent, but not if it announces a new legal principle. New rules count only from when they are announced.

Justice Kagan said Padilla broke new ground and so was of no help to Ms. Chaidez. There was evidence for Padilla’s novelty, Justice Kagan wrote, in the case itself. Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr., in a concurrence in Padilla, said the majority’s approach was a “dramatic departure from precedent.” In a dissent in the case, Justice Antonin Scalia said that “until today” lawyers were required to give advice only about the criminal prosecution itself and not about other consequences of conviction like deportation.

Justice Clarence Thomas, in a separate opinion on Wednesday, said he continued to believe that “Padilla was wrongly decided” and so would have ruled against Ms. Chaidez whether she received bad legal advice before or after 2010.

In a dissent in the case, Chaidez v. United States, No. 11-820, Justice Sonia Sotomayor disputed the majority’s retroactivity analysis, saying it failed “to account for the development of professional standards over time.”

In a second decision issued Wednesday, Johnson v. Williams, No. 11-465, the court ruled that there is “a strong but rebuttable presumption” that a state court has actually ruled on all of the issues before the court even if its decision did not specifically address each of them. The question matters under a 1996 federal law that limits federal court review of state convictions where an argument has been “adjudicated on the merits” by a state court.

In 2011 in Harrington v. Richter, the Supreme Court ruled that a state court decision was “on the merits” even though it offered no reasoning at all. The question in Wednesday’s decision, Johnson v. Williams, No. 11-465, was what to do about a decision that addressed one argument but said nothing about another.

Justice Alito wrote the majority opinion, joined by seven other justices, leaving open one possible line of attack. “If a federal claim is rejected as a result of sheer inadvertence,” he wrote, “it has not been evaluated based on the intrinsic right and wrong of the matter.”

Justice Scalia voted with the majority but objected to the possibility of litigation over whether an argument had been “inadvertently overlooked” as a “newly-sponsored enterprise of probing the judicial mind.”

HAVE WE CREATED OUR OWN GESTAPO?

IMAGINARY PROBLEMS. LOL.

I'M SORRY, BUT I CAN'T QUIT LAUGHING AT THE FEUD BETWEEN THE "TEA PARTY" AND KARL ROVE, WHO THEY DEPICT AS A NAZI! HA, HA, HA!!

YOU CAN READ MORE HERE.

FOR REAL THOUGH, IT IS ABOUT TIME FOR CHANGE: YES, AN AFRICAN BORN POPE. I TOTALLY AGREE WITH JOEL PETT ON THIS ONE

PROPOSED KENTUCKY DOMESTIC RELATIONS BILL WILL ALLOW "DATING" COUPLES TO GET EMERGENCY PROTECTION ORDERS (EPOs) AND DOMESTIC VIOLENCE ORDERS (DVOs)

State bill would allow domestic violence orders even if couple isn't living together
Written byJessie Halladay

FRANKFORT, KY. — People who are in dating relationships, but who have never lived together, could seek protection with a domestic violence order under a bill passed from the House Wednesday afternoon.

House Bill 9, which passed 92-5, would broaden the law that allows for victims to request an emergency protective order to include those people who are in dating relationships. Current law only allows protective orders be granted to people who live or have lived together.

Rep. John Tilley, D-Hopkinsville, brought the bill to the House, pointing out that only Kentucky and South Caroline do not allow protective orders in dating relationships.

Tilley, the father of three girls, said the bill will extend protection particularly for the group most vulnerable to dating violence, girls aged 16 to 24.

The bill will now move to the Senate for consideration.

Last week, after testifying before the House Judiciary committee, Marcia Roth, director of the Mary Byron Project, said the bill is an essential piece of legislation that will protect people. She pointed out that many people have been killed by partners they never lived with.

While the bill has made it through the House before, it has never made it through the Senate. But Roth said she hopes this year will be different.

“The seriousness of this is evident,” Roth said last week.

Editor's note:As a Lawyer who practices Family law extensively, the only problem I see is in defining a rather amorphous term: "dating".
What is to be considered "dating" and for how long is the couple to date? Does going out to McDonald's count or does it have to be an expensive place like Red Lobster?

THIS GOP CARTOON FROM MIKE LUCKOVICH IS C-R-U-E-L!

IN NEW CAMPAIGN AD, MITCH MCCONNELL MOCKS THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY FOR NOT FINDING A CANDIDATE TO RUN AGAINST HIM! LOL. WATCH AD.

MARTIN LUTHER, JR.: I HAVE A DREAM; POTUS BARACK OBAMA: I HAVE A DRONE!

HAPPY PRESIDENTS' DAY.

ABOVE IS THE PICTURE OF THE ONLY TWO PRESIDENT'S WHO MATTER TO AMERICA AND THE WORLD.

WORDS TO LIVE BY, WORDS OF WISDOM, AND WORDS TO PONDER BY WISE LIBERTY LOVERS LIKE ME.

"The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into different depositories, and constituting each the guardian of the public weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by experiments ancient and modern, some of them in our country and under our own eyes."

-- George Washington, Farewell Address, 1796

GOP MODERATE MARCO RUBIO. LOL.

THIS CARTOON IS FUNNY.

ARE YOU PLANNING ON GOING ON THE OOZE CRUISE?

OBAMA "THE DRONE".

HAPPY 22ND WEDDING ANNIVERSARY TO ME AND WIFEY, DR. ANNE ONYEKWULUJE. AND HAPPY VALENTINE'S DAY TO ONE AND ALL.

AND MANY, MANY MORE WHERE THOSE CAME FROM. CHEERS.

THE STATE OF THE REPUBLICAN PARTY (GOP). ROTFLMAO!

JOEL PETT COULDN'T RESIST ASHLEY JUDD VERSUS MITCH MCCONNELL.

IF YOU ARE LIKE ME AND YOU MISSED POTUS BARACK OBAMA'S STATE OF THE UNION ADDRESS, GOP'S RESPONSE BY MARCO RUBIO, AND RAND PAUL'S TEA PARTY RESPONSE, YOU CAN WATCH THEM HERE. ENJOY OR WINCE.

POTUS BARACK OBAMA:



MARCO RUBIO:


RAND PAUL:

LIKE MITCH MCCONNELL, JOEL PETT IS ALSO HATING RAND PAUL.

By Exiting Papacy While Still Standing, Pope Benedict Follows An Admirable Precedent Uheard Of For Nearly 600 Years! Good For Him!!

By exiting papacy still alive, Pope Benedict follows a precedent not seen for 598 years
By Matthew Schofield

Before April 19, 2005, Cardinal Josef Ratzinger talked warmly of retiring. He was looking forward to a leisurely life, with his books, his brother and his beloved gray cat back in ancient Regensburg, Germany, where he owned a house.

But his plans changed when he was elected to head the Roman Catholic Church, becoming Pope Benedict XVI. Retirement was forgotten; the expectation was that Ratzinger, now Benedict, would die occupying “the chair of Peter,” as the pope’s throne is known.

Monday, Benedict shocked the world by announcing he would step down at the end of February, the first pope to do that in nearly 600 years. That the decision was so startling speaks more about the history of the church he led than his longevity, which was never expected to match the eight years he served. Benedict XVI became pope two days after his 78th birthday, having already survived a stroke. He admitted then that his reign might be short. Most popes die in their 70s.

When Benedict steps down at 8 p.m. Feb. 28 in Rome, age 85 years, 318 days, he will have lived longer than all but three of his 264 predecessors. Pope John Paul II was a full year younger when he died in 2005.

“After having repeatedly examined my conscience before God, I have come to the certainty that my strengths, due to an advanced age, are no longer suited to an adequate exercise of the Petrine ministry,” Benedict said Monday.

He went on to note: “In today’s world, subject to so many rapid changes and shaken by questions of deep relevance for the life of faith, in order to govern the bark of Saint Peter and proclaim the Gospel, both strength of mind and body are necessary, strength which in the last few months, has deteriorated in me to the extent that I have had to recognize my incapacity to adequately fulfill the ministry entrusted to me. For this reason, and well aware of the seriousness of this act, with full freedom I declare that I renounce the ministry of Bishop of Rome, Successor of Saint Peter, entrusted to me by the Cardinals on 19 April 2005.”

Global reaction was immediate and respectful. President Barack Obama thanked him on behalf of all Americans and said, “I have appreciated our work together over these last four years.”

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said: “If the pope himself has now, after thorough consideration, come to the conclusion that he no longer has sufficient strength to exercise his office, that earns my very highest respect. In our time of ever-lengthening life, many people will be able to understand how the pope as well has to deal with the burdens of aging.”

French President Francois Hollande called it “a humane decision and one tied to a desire that must be respected.” A spokesman for Israel’s Chief Rabbi Yona Metzger told the Agence France-Presse news service that under Pope Benedict XVI, Judaism and Catholicism “became much closer . . . leading to a decrease in anti-Semitism around the world.”

The move makes him the first pope since Gregory XII in 1415 to retire. As that retirement came during a power struggle between Rome and France, when there were actually two and, for a short while, three popes, some church officials argue that the last pope to retire was Celestine V in 1294.

In fact, that it is possible for a pope to retire is thanks to Celestine V, a former hermit who served only five months and was imprisoned (and, legend has it, murdered) not long after leaving the office on orders of his successor. One of a handful of accomplishments by Celestine V was to write the canon that allows retirement, which noted ill health as a possible reason.

When Benedict visited Cuba in March 2012, he looked noticeably stronger than the stooped John Paul II had when he made the same trip in 1998 – when John Paul was just 78. But Benedict has been growing noticeably weaker in recent months. He no longer walks the 100 yards down the aisle at St. Peter’s Basilica to celebrate Mass; instead, he rides on a wheeled platform. He appeared to nod off during Christmas Eve services. Doctors reportedly had told him that he should not make a trans-Atlantic trip to Brazil scheduled for July.

If age alone were not debilitating enough, Benedict XVI’s time in charge has included the stress of dealing with the church’s global sexual abuse crisis, which at one point even threatened to taint Benedict’s brother, who was accused of non-sexual abuse of children at a time when the sexual abuse scandal was rocking Germany.

The scandals led German Cardinal Meisner earlier this month to talk about the prevailing mood of “Catholiphobia” in Germany and in much of Europe.

Unlike his plans before he accepted “canonical election as Supreme Pontiff,” Benedict won’t be returning to Regensburg. Instead, he’ll retire to a Vatican monastery, after a brief stay in Castel Gandolfo, officially the papal summer home, while his new quarters are readied.

Michael Klonovsky, a German author and Catholic, noted that the nature of the pope’s departure – meaning, alive – will lead to “critical voices concerning his resignation, some will say a reactionary pope failed, but maybe he just became a victim of inner-Vatican intrigues?”

Still, many Germans remember proudly his election, a moment that inspired the tabloid headline “We are Pope.”

“He is an intellectual, so he must be looking forward to going back to his writing and publishing,” Klonovsky noted. “He will be criticized for retiring, as a pope is supposed to die in the chair. But to resign is a more worldly thing to do – it shows a connection to the real world.

“And his brother must be happy. Benedict XVI always had to work on Christmas.”

Read more here: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/02/11/182706/by-exiting-papacy-still-alive.html#storylink=cpy

EDITOR'S COMMENT:
WHAT THE POPE HAS DONE IS VERY COMMENDABLE AND ADMIRABLE.

WHILE HIS PREDECESSORS PREFERRED TO BE CARRIED OUT FEET FIRST, HE CHOSE A DIFFERENT ROUTE, AVOIDING REIGN AS A SENILE HEAD OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH.

POPE BENEDICT RESIGNS, MIKE LUCKOVICH MAKES US LAUGH OUT LOUD (LOL).

Kentucky Legislature Tackles Tough Issues In Short Session: Soft Drinks And Beer Cheese.

Kentucky legislature tackles tough issues: soft drinks and beer cheese
Written by Joseph Gerth

It’s good to know the Kentucky House of Representatives is keeping its eye on the ball.

The state’s pension programs are a gazillion dollars in the red, the Kentucky’s antiquated tax system can’t keep up with the needs of the commonwealth and the state’s legislative districts have been out of whack for a year longer than they should have been.

Many problems like this won’t be addressed during the short 2013 session of the Kentucky General Assembly because, legislators say, there’s just not enough time.

So, in steps state Rep. Donna Mayfield, R-Winchester, to show that the really important things can still be addressed. Even in a 30-day legislative session.

Important things like soft drinks and beer cheese.

Really. It’s 2013 and Kentucky’s legislature still hasn’t declared that Clark County is the home of beer cheese. Oh, the humanity.

Now, I must say that I don’t know a whole lot about this subject.

I know plenty about beer and enough about cheese. But Mayfield’s legislation doesn’t include a lot of “what-fors” and “whereases” as many of these naming bills do, to explain why beer cheese is important.

But the Beer Cheese Festival Website tells me it was first served in a Clark County restaurant owned by John Allman back in the 1940s.

Mayfield also wants to name Ale-8-One the official “Kentucky original soft drink.” If you haven’t spent a lot of time in central Kentucky, its a locally-produced ginger ale since 1926.

No wonder Kentucky trails all but a few other states in virtually every metric that matters (thank you, Mississippi and Alabama) if its taken us this long to pass such significant legislation.

We can put a man on the moon, but we can’t name Ale-8-One the official something or other?

We have a state wild animal game species, state horse, state fruit, state flower, state rock and state soil. State soil? Crider soil series.
I don’t know why.

Legislators approved a state gemstone, state rock, state mineral, state tree, state arboretum and state dance. It’s clogging, if you need to know.

There is the state botanical garden, official state science center, state honey festival, state musical instrument, state song and state bluegrass song. Blue Moon of Kentucky, as you might expect.

We have a state music, state theater pipe organ, a state outdoor musical, a state center for African-American Heritage and a state latin motto, which, seems to be in violation of the state’s aforementioned official language, which is english.

The Corvette is the state’s official sports car even though the vast majority of Kentuckians couldn’t afford one. There’s a state Shakespeare festival, a state commonwealth theater, a state amphitheater, and a state tug-o-war championship. That’s in Fordsville.

There is the state covered bridge capital, a state steam locomotive, a state bourbon festival and a state silverware pattern: Old Kentucky Bluegrass — The Georgetown Pattern. You can’t buy it at Macy’s. In fact, I can’t find anywhere where you can buy it.

Not to be outdone, but Rep. Reggie Meeks, D-Louisville,eeee has filed House Bill 56, which would make the Kentucky long rifle the official gun of Kentucky. Shouldn’t Russ Smith, the University of Louisville guard be named the “official gun” of Kentucky?

But I digress.

In his years heading the state House State Government Committee, former Rep. Mike Cherry, D-Princeton, did a pretty good job of killing such bills.

He’s retired now and Rep. Brent Yonts, D-Greenville, is now running the committee. We’ll see if he kills the bills like Cherry did, or lets them fly as past committee chairmen have obviously allowed.

If Yonts holds votes on such bills, I have an idea. How about an official state waste of time?

Surely, I jest. Kentucky really has outdone itself in “naming” bills, which are largely used to pat ourselves on the back when we can’t claim credit for great schools, the welfare of our children or high wages for our workers.

We have a state language, state bird, state agriculture insect, state fossil, state butterfly and a state drink. The drink, by the way, is milk. Not bourbon. Figure that?

WORDS TO LIVE BY, WORDS OF WISDOM, AND WORDS TO PONDER FOR LIBERTY LOVERS LIKE ME.

"They that can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety."

-- Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1795

DID I TELL YOU JOEL PETT DISLIKES MITCH MCCONNELL?

It’s Time For The Legalization Of Hemp In Kentucky. I Agree!

It’s time for the legalization of hemp in Ky.

Public opinion in Kentucky seems to be becoming more receptive to the legalization of hemp in our state.

Many people may not know this, but industrial hemp once flourished in Kentucky, especially during World War II, when farmers were encouraged to grow it for the war effort because other industrial fibers were in short supply.

GO HERE TO CONTINUE READING.

DONALD "THE CHUMP" TRUMP SUES BILL MAYER. LOL.

THE DRONE PRESIDENT.

FOR THOSE OF YOU, WHO ARE LIKE ME, AND MISSED GOVERNOR STEVE BESHEAR'S "STATE OF THE STATE" ADDRESS, WATCH IT HERE. ENJOY, OR DESPAIR.

Watch the Republican response:

POTUS BARACK OBAMA AS LUCAS MCCAIN: THE RIFLEMAN OR AS MICHAEL DUKAKIS! LOL.

KARL ROVE'S AMERICAN CROSSROADS PAC CROSSES PATH WITH ASHLEY JUDD IN NEW AD, REMINDS KENTUCKIANS "SHE'S A RADICAL HOLLYWOOD LIBERAL WHO VIEWS TENNESSEE AS HOME"! LET THE AD WARS COMMENCE.

American Justice Department Justifies Killing Americans Abroad With Links To Al-Qaida.

GOP AND PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS OF 2016. LOL.

UNITED STATES OF PARANOIA! LOL.

WORDS TO LIVE BY, WORDS OF WISDOM, AND WORDS TO PONDER FOR LIBERTY LOVERS LIKE ME.

"If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one, subject to particular exceptions."

-- James Madison, letter to Edmund Pendleton, 1792

THE FALSE MAVERICK, JOHN MCCAIN, "FLIPS OUT" OVER CHUCK HAGEL'S NOMINATION LOL.

CITY OF CHICAGO HAS GUN CONTROL, AND IS THE DEADLIEST CITY IN AMERICA. YOU GO FIGURE! WATCH NEWS STORY.

GODADDY.COM CONTINUES TO PUSH THE SUPERBOWL AD ENVELOPE. WATCH.

ED KOCH, FORMER THREE TERM NEW YORK CITY MAYOR, HAS DIED. R. I. P. .

THE NEW REPUBLICAN PARTY. ALL I CAN DO IS *SIGH*.