Out with the Old in With the New
The Transition and first day
Welcome once again to the asylum, my dear readers. While I have several articles essentially done, I am unfortunately unhappy with them. Perhaps I will get them to a place I like soon or not, I don’t know. With the inauguration, more last-minute shenanigans from the Biden Administration, and all the work Trump has been doing in his first few days provide a wealth of things to write about.
In the eleventh hour, Biden unleashed a flurry of new pardons for people who have not yet been charged or convicted of any crimes. The Constitution in Article Two Section Two states, “he shall have Power to grant Reprieves and Pardons for Offences against the United States, except in Cases of Impeachment” (here). Further, the Supreme Court ruled that it was completely legal in the 1866 Ex parte Garland ruling, stating “the power of pardon conferred by the Constitution upon the President is unlimited except in cases of impeachment. It extends to every offence known to the law, and may be exercised at any time after its commission, either before legal proceedings are taken or during their pendency, or after conviction and judgment” (here). Will bad people who did bad things go free? Yes, they will. It is terrible, but not all bad. I say this because everyone Biden pardoned no longer has a 5th Amendment right to remain silent on anything they were pardoned for. This is because the 5th Amendment protects you from testifying against yourself when you are in peril of criminal conviction, and a pardon removes that peril just as an immunity agreement does. Once it is in place, a person can be compelled to testify (here). This means that now is the time to investigate because if they fail to answer, or lie, they can go to jail, and I am sure there are all kinds of other players, middlemen, and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) that could be imprisoned, gutted, or totally destroyed because this last group of people were pardoned (here).
Another interesting aspect of the presidential pardon is that the pardoned must accept it. In the 1915 case Burdick v. United States, the Supreme Court ruled that a pardon carries the “imputation of guilt and acceptance of a confession of it.” As such, the person receiving the pardon must accept it, especially in cases where they have not been charged or convicted. Interestingly, this is a thing they can only do once in court (here). This makes the choice either to admit they are a criminal but got away with it and must spill everything they know under penalty of perjury, with a very real risk of hanging themselves. The alternative is to reject the pardon and maintain your 5th Amendment rights with a risk of being prosecuted for all the things the pardon would have covered. While dangerous, this option has much less risk of hanging yourself. In Fauci’s case, this would almost assuredly result in perjury charges, and with the Biden family, who knows what kind of filth is under the surface? But Hunter’s laptop is in the hands of a Department of Justice willing to use it, and it has to worry them. Worse for the Biden family, Hunter has already accepted his blanket pardon going back to 2014. That means he can be compelled to testify against the rest of the family. If they all accept their pardons, then they can be compelled to reveal all the contacts, NGOs, and other entities involved in the crimes, doing a lot to clean up one stain of corruption. So, this presents an interesting possible situation where we might (not holding my breath) get to see real progress in dismantling the establishment.
While Biden’s departure was interesting, it is also history. Mr. Trump hit the ground running with predominantly legitimate executive orders (EOs). I say this because EOs have been abused almost as badly as the commerce clause of the Constitution since the early part of the twentieth century. The purpose of EOs is to direct the executive branch on policy in line with enacted laws, direct the movement of troops, and provide instruction to diplomatic resources (here). Most of Trump’s EOs are absolutely valid uses of executive power, but not all. Since there are several hundred of them, I will not cover them all but will look at the highlights.
First, let's talk about what I think Trump got wrong: his attempt to use an EO to end birthright citizenship for the babies of illegals. While I agree with the reasoning, I do not think it is constitutional or will stand in the courts. I understand the 14th Amendment was written specifically to ensure all freed slaves were made citizens of the United States and the State they resided in. This was because while Congress could have passed a law making the freed slaves United States citizens (a thing that
didn’t exist at the time), congress knew it did not have the power to make them citizens of the state they lived in. Before the Civil War, people referred to themselves as citizens of their state rather than of America (here). Only after the war, in the reconstruction period, did we see a change from these United States to the United States. As such, to try and guarantee equality to freed slaves, the 14th Amendment was passed to not only create the American Citizen but also make former slaves state citizens as well. We can see this in the wording in section one of the 14th Amendment (here):
Section 1.
All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the state wherein they reside. No state shall make or enforce any law which shall abridge the privileges or immunities of citizens of the United States; nor shall any state deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law; nor deny to any person within its jurisdiction the equal protection of the laws.
This was challenged in 1898 by the case United States v. Wong Kim Ark and was decided by the Supreme Court. The majority opinion held (here):
The question presented by the record is whether a child born in the United States, of parents of Chinese descent, who, at the time of his birth, are subjects of the Emperor of China, but have a permanent domicil and residence in the United States, and are there carrying on business, and are not employed in any diplomatic or official capacity under the Emperor of China, becomes at the time of his birth a citizen of the United States by virtue of the first clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution, “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” . . .
As appears upon the face of the amendment, as well as from the history of the times, this was not intended to impose any new restrictions upon citizenship, or to prevent any persons from becoming citizens by the fact of birth within the United States who would thereby have become citizens according to the law existing before its adoption. It is declaratory in form, and enabling and extending in effect. Its main purpose doubtless was, as has been often recognized by this court, to establish the citizenship of free negroes, which had been denied in the opinion delivered by Chief Justice Taney in Dred Scott v. Sandford, . . . and to put it beyond doubt that all blacks, as well as whites, born or naturalized within the jurisdiction of the United States are citizens of the United States. . . . But the opening words, “All persons born,” are general, not to say universal, restricted only by place and jurisdiction, and not by color or race.
While I do not think the court ever imagined that this clause would be used strategically to gain admission to the country by illegal aliens, the fact remains that this is the prevailing guidance and has been for over 100 years. The logic used in Trump's argument to end birthright citizenship is that neither parent is a citizen; they have no right to be in The United States, and they are subject to removal when located as such; the child also shouldn’t be a citizen. Unfortunately, I don’t think that will be allowed with the open wording present in the 14th Amendment.
I think a better solution that would work within the current legal framework is to make the children citizens, as dictated by the constitution, and then deport the parents. Every state has waiting lists 2-5 years long for people who just want to adopt a healthy baby. This is because most babies are adopted by their foster family, members of a sibling group with older children, and adopted as a group. Another problem is that even if a child is a baby entering foster care, by the time the case gets to the termination of parental rights (TPR), usually, 2.5-4 years have passed, and the child is no longer a baby. It takes this long in most cases because biological parents are encouraged to work a program designed to correct the issues that resulted in their children being put into care. With off-and-on starts, multiple chances, and court dates for progress checks every 3-6 months, it takes time. TPR occurs when a court decides the biological parents are unfit or unable to care for the children, and the court doesn’t believe they will rectify these conditions in a reasonable amount of time. The time factor is placed on cases because stability and permanence are vital for the children. One frequent reason for TPR is long jail sentences (unless the child can be put into kinship or guardianship with family), typically with an 18-24 month threshold, depending on the state.
I explain all this because people deported for illegal entry are incapable of legally entering the United States for a minimum of five years (here). As such, since the child is an American, they will be unable to care for the child, justifying TPR and adoption very quickly to one of the thousands of pre-vetted and qualified families on the waiting list for a healthy baby. Older siblings are also not a problem; they can go back with their mom and dad since they are not citizens either. It is ugly, but I think it fits the existing law much better, would defeat the point of anchor babies, and would also have a deterrent effect. American citizens can suffer TPR because of extended absences due to criminal behavior. Why in the world can we not treat illegal aliens the same way when we deport the parents for the crime of illegal migration? Note that the child is a citizen, and sending them back with the parents makes it an anchor baby on a timer, so that doesn’t work. As it stands, I think we will waste millions of dollars litigating this EO only to have it overturned and waste tons of cash.
I know that there is another almost industry where people come here on tourist visas and have kids in America just so their children can have dual citizenship and a wider range of opportunities. This isn’t an issue and wasn’t covered above for a couple of reasons. First, these people do not break the law; they come here legally, and this is the primary difference. The second reason is they tend to go home and not use the baby to prolong their stay in America. Lastly, this doesn’t happen in numbers sufficient to strain our resources or be problematic. While these are similar, they are not the same.
As for Trump’s other orders, renaming the Gulf of Mexico is just silly showboating. I don’t know if he has authority, and even if he has all the federal maps printed that way, I don’t think it will survive his term; very few will adopt it, and it will be a waste of dollars trying to implement it.
I think killing all the Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) and Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) garbage from all government entities, especially our armed services, is an excellent step and fully in his power as Chief Executive. California is showing us in real time how these ideas and policies are deadly when adopted by critical infrastructure services. We have had far too many years of people hired and promoted to positions of authority not because of what they can do but who or what they are. This is a start, but from George W. Bush, Obama, and Biden, many of the top positions have been filled by true believers in this flawed ideology. These people will need to be rooted out and replaced if we are going to make any real progress in rolling back the tide of insanity (here).
Trump has also made it official executive policy that there are only two genders: male and female. The order (here) defines what a man or woman is:
(b) “Women” or “woman” and “girls” or “girl” shall mean adult and juvenile human females, respectively.
(c) “Men” or “man” and “boys” or “boy” shall mean adult and juvenile human males, respectively.
(d) “Female” means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the large reproductive cell.
(e) “Male” means a person belonging, at conception, to the sex that produces the small reproductive cell.
We are getting all the silly arguments that it is erasing trans people or it is trans genocide (here). It is nonsense. Trans people can pretend to be whatever they want. The only thing this does is remove their ability to deny objective reality and force other people to join in the imaginative mental illness. They can still do their thing, and as long as they leave our children alone, nobody will care. That is the truth. The other thing Trump did was remove trans people from actively serving in the military. This is good because the military’s job is to kill people and break things (all branches), and having minority counterculture elements in the service harms cohesion and the ability to perform that critical job (here). The inability to recruit and the serious loss of combat readiness seen in the last several years was primarily due to the DEI and ESG policies softening our military. If your target audience is fit, athletic 18-25-year-old males (the military core demographic for recruitment) watch these commercials and tell me if the modern one or the vintage one speaks more to that demographic (new army)(old Army). I think doing away with the nonsense is a good thing.
Trump also redid much of what he did in his first term as well as undid much of what Biden did, such as pulling out of the Paris Accords, opening up oil production, and redirecting government resources away from “green” garbage tech that isn’t ready for prime time (here). These are all good things as well. From Biden hitting office to the gas station starting to hurt took about 10 months, so I figure it will take about the same amount of time to get production and capacity back in line with lower prices.
God Bless you, my friends. I am sure we will discuss many other aspects of the new Trump administration over the coming weeks, and I look forward to it. Please comment and let me know what you think of my take and if I missed something you thought should have been included in my initial coverage of Trump's return to the Oval Office.
Matthew 6:33
But seek first the kingdom of God and his righteousness, and all these things will be added to you.
God Bless you
-Sam