Thursday, March 17, 2016

OBAMA'S SUPREME COURT NOMINEE: LIBERAL, ANTI-SECOND AMENDMENT, UNION FRIENDLY, WORKED ON DEMOCRATIC CAMPAIGNS

Garland-compressed
OBAMA'S SUPREME COURT NOMINEE: LIBERAL, ANTI-SECOND AMENDMENT, UNION FRIENDLY, WORKED ON DEMOCRATIC CAMPAIGNS

Obama Nominates Jewish ‘Moderate’ Appeals Judge for U.S. Supreme Court Scalia Opening

republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

WASHINGTON (Reuters)  President Barack Obama nominated veteran appellate court judge Merrick Garland to the U.S. Supreme Court on Wednesday, setting up a potentially ferocious political showdown with Senate Republicans who have vowed to block any Obama nominee.
Considered a moderate, Garland, 63, is currently chief judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. He was picked to replace long-serving conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, who died on Feb. 13.
“I’ve selected a nominee who is widely recognized not only as one of America’s sharpest legal minds but someone who brings to his work a spirit of decency, modesty, integrity, even-handedness and excellence,” Obama said in the White House Rose Garden.
“These qualities and his long commitment to public service have earned him the respect and admiration of leaders from both sides of the aisle (Democrats and Republicans). He will ultimately bring that same character to bear on the Supreme Court, an institution in which he is uniquely prepared to serve immediately,” Obama added.
Senate confirmation is required for any nominee to join the bench and Senate Republicans have vowed not to hold confirmation hearings or a vote on any nominee picked by the Democratic president for the lifetime position on the court.
Republicans are demanding that Obama leave the seat vacant and let the next president, to be elected in November and sworn in next January, make the selection.
Garland, is a long-time appellate judge and former prosecutor who Obama also considered when he filled two previous Supreme Court vacancies.
Federal appeals court judge Sri Srinivasan had also been a finalist for the nomination.
In a foreshadowing of the pressure campaign the White House and its allies plan to wage in the coming weeks, the White House noted that seven current Republican U.S. senators voted to confirm Garland to the DC Circuit court in 1997.
PRAISE FROM BOTH PARTIES
Garland, who has earned praise from lawmakers of both parties in the past, was named to his current job by Democratic President Bill Clinton in 1997, winning Senate confirmation in a 76-23 vote. Prior to that, he worked in the Justice Department during the Clinton administration.
Without Scalia, the nine-member Supreme Court is evenly split with four liberals and four conservative justices. Obama’s nominee could tilt the court to the left for the first time in decades.
Republicans, hoping a candidate from their party wins the Nov. 8 presidential election, want the next president to make the selection.
Billionaire Donald Trump is the leading Republican presidential candidate. Obama’s former secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, is the front-runner on the Democratic side.
Republicans and their allies already have geared up to fight Obama’s nominee. The Republican National Committee on Monday announced the formation of a task force that will work with an outside conservative group to spearhead attack ads and other ways of pushing back against Obama’s choice.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit has served as a springboard to the Supreme Court for several justices including Scalia in recent decades.
Obama may have been looking for a nominee who could convince the Republicans to change course. Garland could fit that bill with his moderate record, background as a prosecutor and history of drawing Republican support.
Garland was under consideration by Obama when he filled two prior high court vacancies. Obama, in office since 2009, has already named two justices to the Supreme Court: Sonia Sotomayor, who at 55 became the first Hispanic justice in 2009, and Elena Kagan, who was 50 when she became the fourth woman ever to serve on the court in 2010.
Presidents tend to pick nominees younger than Garland, so they can serve for decades and extend a president’s legacy. But Obama may reason that the choice of an older nominee might also entice Senate Republicans into considering Obama’s selection.
Trump, speaking on ABC’s “Good Morning America” program, said it was critical for Republicans to take back the White House to avoid Democrats shaping the Supreme Court.
“You have four Supreme Court judgeships coming up, and that would mean they would take over, that would mean for 50 years, probably, this country will never be the same,” Trump said.
“The Republicans should do exactly what they are doing. I think they should wait till the next president and let the next president pick,” Trump said.
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Obama Selects 2nd Amendment Foe for Supreme Court

OBAMA SELECTS 2ND AMENDMENT FOE FOR SUPREME COURT

Expected to overturn Scalia ruling on 2nd Amendment if confirmed

BY KURT NIMMO
SEE: http://www.infowars.com/obama-selects-2nd-amendment-foe-for-supreme-court/; republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and 
research purposes:

Judge Merrick Garland, Obama’s pick to replace the late Antonin Scalia, “has a very liberal view of gun rights,” according to Judicial Crisis Network (JNC), a judicial group run by a former law clerk for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas.
Garland is the chief judge of the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit. He was nominated by Bill Clinton. Garland’s nomination languished in the Republican controlled Senate until after the 1996 election.
Republicans did not specifically object to Garland’s liberal views, but rather said the DC court did not need another judge and objected to the additional “cost to taxpayers of $1 million a year,” according to Senator Chuck Grassley.
As deputy assistant attorney general in the Criminal Division of the Clinton Justice Department, Garland supervised the prosecutions of Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols in the Oklahoma City bombing case. He was responsible for major decisions in the case, including seeking the death penalty for McVeigh.
According to JNC chief counsel Carrie Severino, Garland’s judicial record “leads to the conclusion that he would vote to reverse one of Justice Scalia’s most important opinions, D.C. vs. Heller, which affirmed that the Second Amendment confers an individual right to keep and bear arms.”
The Court ruled during its 2007-08 term that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm and that the D.C. law banning handguns was unconstitutional.
“Ultimately, the Court agreed with Heller that D.C.’s ban on all functional firearms in the home is unconstitutional ‘under any of the standards of scrutiny the Court has applied to enumerated constitutional rights,” writes Robert A. Levy. “Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) did not sign the brief. In fact, he reportedly stated, prior to issuance of the Heller opinion, that he backs the D.C. gun ban and opposes all laws allowing concealed carry.”
In January Obama announced a series of unconstitutional executive actions, including prohibiting the sale of firearms between individuals.
“Mr. Obama will now require that anyone who sells a gun, that is even an ‘occasional’ seller will be required to perform a background check. By defining what an “occasional seller” is, the president is essentially interpreting the law, a job reserved for the courts,” Judge Andrew P. Napolitano wrote after the actions were announced.
Attorney General Loretta Lynch sent a letter to the states demanding the federal government receive complete criminal history records and criminal dispositions, information on persons disqualified because of a mental illness, and qualifying crimes of domestic violence.
The FBI also announced it will tweak its background check system. The changes include processing background checks 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and improving notification of local authorities when”prohibited persons unlawfully attempt to buy a gun.”
Republicans in Congress and state legislatures denounced Obama’s executive actions. “Congress must be swift to respond to any executive action, and there will certainly be legal challenges as well. This debate is about more than the Second Amendment. This debate is about standing up to an out-of-control President who refuses to follow the Constitution,” declared Alabama Rep. Bradley Byrne.”
If Merrick Garland is nominated there will be little guarantee the highest Court will uphold the Constitution. It is now up to Republicans to reject Garland and force Obama to find another candidate or delay the appointment until a new president is in the White House.
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Obama Supreme Court Nominee Has Anti-Gun Record

Gun rights proponents say Merrick Garland should not be confirmed
BY STEPHEN GUTOWSKI
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
Merrick Garland, President Obama’s nominee to replace Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, has a record of opposing gun rights as a federal judge, which includes a vote to undo a landmark gun rights ruling.
Garland was one of four judges who voted to rehear the case of Parker v. District of Columbia with a full ten-judge panel after a smaller panel struck down the District of Columbia’s total ban on handguns. Garland’s vote for this en banc hearing indicates that he may believe the decision to strike down the city’s gun ban was mistaken.
The other six judges on the appeals court voted not to rehear the case, and the Supreme Court went on to rule in District of Columbia v. Heller that the Second Amendment guarantees an individual’s right to bear arms in the case.
District of Columbia v. Heller is considered by gun rights activists to be the most important Second Amendment case in history.
The Heller case is not the only time Garland has ruled against gun rights. In 2000, he ruled against the National Rifle Association in a lawsuit challenging the Justice Department’s handling of gun purchaser’s information. Garland ruled that is was permissible for the department to retain up to six months of records from the National Instant Background Check System, over the NRA’s argument that this practice effectively created an illegal national registry.
Conservatives and gun rights activists reacted negatively to Garland’s nomination, saying he should not be confirmed because of his rulings on guns.
“This is not a good nomination and should not be confirmed,” Alan Gottlieb of the Second Amendment Foundation told the Washington Free Beacon
“Judge Garland voted to grant an en banc hearing to Heller after the three judge panel struck down the District of Columbia’s gun ban law,” Gottlieb said. “The only reason to do so would be to overturn the pro-Second Amendment ruling. That was hostile to gun rights.”
The NRA, the nation’s largest gun rights organization, said it would lobby against Garland’s appointment.
“With Justice Scalia’s tragic passing, there is no longer a majority of support among the justices for the fundamental, individual right to own a firearm for self-defense,” said Chris Cox, the head of the NRA’s lobbying arm. “Four justices believe law-abiding Americans have that right—and four justices do not. President Obama has nothing but contempt for the Second Amendment and law-abiding gun owners. Obama has already nominated two Supreme Court justices who oppose the right to own firearms and there is absolutely no reason to think he has changed his approach this time. In fact, a basic analysis of Merrick Garland’s judicial record shows that he does not respect our fundamental, individual right to keep and bear arms for self-defense.”
“Therefore, the National Rifle Association, on behalf of our five million members and tens of millions of supporters across the country, strongly opposes the nomination of Merrick Garland for the U.S. Supreme Court.”
Conservative activists have raised other questions about Garland’s voting record.
“Merrick Garland has been called the ideal judge to move the Supreme Court to the left and cement President Obama’s liberal legacy for decades into the future. He was recently considered for an Obama cabinet post and clerked for the court’s liberal icon, Justice William Brennan,” said Brian Rogers, the executive director of America Rising Squared, in a statement.
Republican senators said they will not hold hearings or vote on Garland’s nomination because of the upcoming presidential election.
“The next justice could fundamentally alter the direction of the Supreme Court and have a profound impact on our country, so of course the American people should have a say in the court’s direction,” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said in a statement. “The Senate will continue to observe the ‘Biden Rule’ so the American people have a voice in this momentous decision.”
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Obama’s Supreme Court Pick Has Worked on Multiple Democratic Political Campaigns

'Moderate' Merrick Garland volunteered for Walter Mondale, Michael Dukakis, and Bill Clinton
BY BRENT SCHER
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
President Barack Obama’s choice for the vacant seat on the Supreme Court was presented as a moderate that could have bipartisan appeal, but Merrick Garland has previously disclosed in official documents that he has offered his services to numerous Democratic presidential candidates.
Buried in a questionnaire Garland submitted to the Senate Judiciary Committee in 1995 is his disclosure of volunteer work for Democratic politicians that stretched from his years as a college student up to Bill Clinton’s presidential campaign in 1992.
“I provided volunteer assistance on a Presidential Debate for President Clinton in October 1992 and for Michael Dukakis in October 1988,” Garland wrote in response to a question on his previous political involvement. “I did some volunteer work for Walter Mondale’s presidential campaign in 1983-84. As a college student, I worked two summers for the campaign of my then-congressman, Abner Mikva, in 1972 and 1974.”
Screen Shot 2016-03-16 at 5.18.34 PM
Garland was not a regular volunteer when he offered his services to Democratic presidential campaigns.
Garland’s work for Mondale, Dukakis, and Clinton all came after his graduation from Harvard Law School, once he had begun his professional legal career.
During the 1988 election, Garland was already a partner at a prominent private law firm. By the time he volunteered for Clinton in 1992, he was working as a prosecutor for the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington, D.C. After Clinton won in 1992, Garland got a job in the administration as deputy assistant attorney general in the Justice Department’s criminal division.
Although the bulk of Garland’s volunteer work was for presidential candidates, his most interesting political work may be the two summer internships he completed with Rep. Abner Mikva (D., Ill.).
Mikva, a University of Chicago Law School graduate who served as a representative for a Chicago district from 1969 to 1979, was named to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit by President Jimmy Carter.
He held that position until Clinton offered him a position in his administration as White House counsel. Clinton then nominated Garland, Mikva’s former intern, to take over his seat on the D.C. Circuit.
Mikva is also a longtime acquaintance of Obama. In 1991, when Obama graduated from Harvard Law School, he received a clerkship offer from Mikva. Obama declined the position but started a lasting friendship with Mikva that still exists.
It remains a long shot that the Republican-controlled Senate will confirm or hold hearings on Garland, Obama’s nominee. The New York Times wrote Wednesday that if Garland were put on the court, it would become “the most liberal in decades.”
The four other judges that Obama was reportedly considering for the nomination were all donors to his political campaigns for president.
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Obama’s Union-Friendly Supreme Court Nominee

Analysis reveals Garland’s deference to labor regulators, pro-union attitude
BY BILL MCMORRIS
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
Barack Obama’s Supreme Court nominee has had a friendly relationship with labor regulators at the expense of business.
D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals Chief Justice Merrick Garland has a history of showing deference to federal labor regulators in reviewing unfair labor practice charges against employers. An analysis conducted by OnLabor found that Garland ruled in favor of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), a top federal labor arbiter, in 18 of 22 appeals that appeared before his court. Garland granted the agency leeway in interpreting its regulatory approach and interpretation of its mission.
“Judge Garland wrote the majority opinion in 22 cases involving appeals of NLRB decisions. In all but four, Judge Garland upheld the entirety of the NLRB’s decision finding that an employer had committed unfair labor practices,” ONLabor said in a blog post. “This deference to the NLRB has had favorable consequences for labor and unions.”
Labor unions welcomed President Obama’s nominee. AFL-CIO President Richard Trumka called on Senate Republicans to confirm Garland quickly, citing his “impeccable credentials and deeper experience.”
“Judge Garland’s career shows a deep commitment to public service and to the rule of law,” Trumka said in a release. “Judge Garland is a superbly qualified nominee who deserves prompt consideration and confirmation by the United States Senate. Working people deserve and expect no less.”
The NLRB serves as the nation’s top arbiter of labor disputes at the federal level and is designed to help employers, unions, and workers settle conflict outside of the judicial system. Cases begin at the local level and can be appealed all the way to the Washington, D.C.-based five-member board. Parties then have the option of appealing to their local circuit court or the D.C. Circuit.
OnLabor said Garland’s track record shows that he is generally deferential to all regulators, but noted that many of his rulings indicate a pro-union approach to labor law. In the four cases when he ruled against the NLRB he demonstrated “an outlook that is generally favorable to union activity.”
“In two of these four cases, for example—Carpenters and Millwrights, Local Union 2471 v. N.L.R.B., 481 F.3d 804 (D.C. Cir. 2007) and Guard Publishing Co. v. N.L.R.B, 571 3.d 53 (D.C. Cir. 2009)—Judge Garland upheld the aspects of the NLRB’s decisions that were favorable to the union involved, and overturned only the part of the NLRB’s decision in each case that was favorable to the employer,” OnLabor found.
Steve Bernstein, a labor attorney with Fisher & Phillips, said that Garland’s track record falls in line with the ideology President Obama has sought in other nominations.
“During Judge Garland’s 19-year tenure on the D.C. Circuit, he has developed a track record of authoring decisions that are consistently deferential to the NLRB,” Bernstein said in an email. “If Judge Garland is appointed to the Supreme Court, we can certainly expect him to continue to be highly deferential to the federal agencies in their exercise of administrative authority.”
Obama nominated Garland to replace conservative Justice Antonin Scalia on Wednesday. Senate Republicans have vowed to block any nomination to the court before the November election.
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Former NLRB Judge: Garland Pushed the Envelope to Advance Unions

Obama’s Supreme Court nominee ignored the ‘court’s duty to interpret the law’
by BILL MCMORRIS
republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
A former top labor arbiter warned that President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, Judge Merrick Garland, will “push the envelope” on constitutional interpretation to advance liberalism.
Garland ruled in favor of the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB), the nation’s highest federal labor arbiter, on 18 of 22 cases and even when he sided with employers he demonstrated “an outlook that is generally favorable to union activity,” according to an analysis from OnLabor.
Peter Schaumber served as an NLRB board member from 2002 to 2010 and witnessed several of his agency’s decisions appear before Garland, the chief justice of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals. He said that the nominee’s jurisprudence in those cases indicates that he will “significantly tilt the balance of the court” in favor of the regulatory state and ideological liberalism.
“Garland certainly on NLRB issues will defer to the agency even in circumstances that push the envelope,” Schaumber told the Washington Free Beacon. “In some respects [the NLRB] seems like a narrow issue but it says lot. He came down on the wrong side.”
Schaumber pointed to Northeast Beverage Company v. NLRB (2009) as an example of Garland’s “results-oriented” jurisprudence.
The NLRB ruled that a Rhode Island beer and soda distributor was guilty of an unfair labor practice after firing five employees who walked off the work site. Schaumber dissented in the ruling, saying that there was no evidence of an “ongoing labor dispute” that would warrant legal protections given the presence of a “no-strike clause” in the union contracts. The D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals overturned the NLRB findings with Garland dissenting.
“The employees simply used working time to engage in union-related activity customarily reserved for non-working time,” the Court of Appeals said in its ruling. “We hold the drivers’ departure from work to obtain information is not protected by [the law]. Because the employees’ walkout was unprotected, Northeast had a legitimate business reason for disciplining them. We therefore deny enforcement to the Board’s order with respect to the suspensions and subsequent discharges of the Vetrano drivers.”
Garland dissented, saying that the courts should defer to the agency because “reasonable minds can differ about what is reasonable,” and he was “unable to conclude that the Board’s application of [the law] to the facts of this case was unreasonable.” He also said that the NLRB had sufficiently demonstrated that the employer favored non-union workers over those belonging to the Teamsters.
“Evidence is sufficient to support the conclusion that Northeast’s ‘policy was to avoid hiring Union-represented employees’ and that the reasons it offered for suspending, discharging, and refusing to hire them at Bethel were pretextual,” Garland wrote in his dissent.
Garland’s colleagues said that Garland’s dissent was not rooted in the letter of the law.
“Our dissenting colleague points to no facts that establish an ongoing labor dispute—that is, a controversy—between the drivers and Northeast,” the majority wrote in a response. “As our dissenting colleague correctly notes, we defer to the Board’s reasonable interpretation of its own precedents … but we will not uphold an order of the Board when it has “erred in applying established law to the facts of the case.”
Schaumber said that Northeast Beverage Co. v. NLRB helps illustrate one of the main conflicts in modern jurisprudence. When courts fail to crack down on misinterpretations of the law from federal agencies it opens the door to regulatory abuse and leaves citizens and Congress with no check on executive power. He said that Garland’s approach would lead agencies to “achieve desired results” at the expense of the rule of law.
“Judge Garland did not exercise his authority to correct the bureaucrats who misapply the law and fulfill the court’s duty to interpret the law,” he said. “Everything I’ve seen suggests he would do the same on the Supreme Court.”
Obama nominated Garland to replace the recently departed Justice Antonin Scalia on March 16. Republicans promised to block any nomination in the Senate until after the November election.

OBAMA WRITES $500 MILLION CHECK TO UNITED NATIONS "CLIMATE CHANGE FUND" IN DEFIANCE OF CONGRESS

Obama Admin. Writes $500M Check to UN Climate Change Fund in Defiance of Congress
SEE: http://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/politics/item/22771-obama-admin-writes-500m-check-to-un-climate-change-fund-in-defiance-of-congressrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

A U.S. senator has accused the Obama administration of bypassing Congress and giving $500 million to the United Nations Green Climate Fund. 
During a hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on March 8, Senator John Barrasso (R-Wyo.) asked a State Department official how the president was able to give a “handout to foreign bureaucrats” without congressional approval.
“We have reviewed our authorities and made a determination that we can make this payment to the Green Climate Fund,” replied Heather Higginbottom, deputy secretary for Management and Resources.  “We do not believe we are in violation of the Anti-Deficiency Act, and clearly our lawyers and others have looked at our authorities and our abilities to do this,” she added.
That didn’t seem to satisfy Barrasso. “It appears to be latest example of the administration going around Congress because the American people don’t really support what the president is doing with this initiative,” he said. “I firmly oppose what the president is doing here and this misuse, I believe, of taxpayer dollars, I think completely in violation of the law,” Barrasso told Higginbottom.
“The United States’ national debt currently is $19 trillion. We have struggling communities across this country in need of help,” he added.
Higginbottom, almost certainly, was just following orders when she sent the check for half a billion dollars to the globalist green lobby headquartered at Turtle Bay in Manhattan.
And, she’s right. Here’s the statement released by the White House on November 14, 2014:
Today, President Obama is announcing the intention of the United States to contribute $3 billion to the Green Climate Fund (GCF), reflecting the U.S. commitment to reduce carbon pollution and strengthen resilience in developing countries, especially the poorest and most vulnerable.
Then, just to show that the climate-change con isn’t a Democratic invention, he added:
The U.S. contribution to the GCF builds on a history of U.S. leadership to support climate action. In 2008, the Bush Administration pledged $2 billion to the Climate Investment Funds, which were established as a transitional measure to finance efforts to help developing countries address climate change. The U.S. pledge to the GCF demonstrates a continuation of the bipartisan resolve to help developing nations reduce their own emissions, whose dangerous impacts on the climate affect us all, as well as to help the most vulnerable cope with the impacts of climate change. The GCF will also help spur global markets in clean energy technologies, creating opportunities for U.S. entrepreneurs and manufacturers who are leading the way to a low-carbon future.
The president then goes on to cite the 2009 Copenhagen Accord as the legislation that enabled this expenditure of taxpayer dollars.
There’s just one little problem: the Constitution.
Article I, Section 9 reads, in relevant part: “No Money shall be drawn from the Treasury, but in Consequence of Appropriations made by Law.”
Combine that with the fact that Article I, Section 1 grants exclusive lawmaking power to the Congress, and the president and his climate-change cronies at the United Nations have themselves in a familiar place: ignoring the Constitution.
Barrasso informed Higginbottom of a couple of very important facts about the money her boss had drawn from the Treasury to give to the UN Green Climate Fund.
Not only did the Congress not authorize this expenditure of funds, but, Barrasso told Higginbottom, the latest budget “specifically prohibited the transfer of funds to create new programs.”
How, then, the senator wondered, were the White House and State Department able to get around that explicit prohibition in the budget?
“We reviewed the authorities and opportunities available to us to do that, and believe we are fully compliant with that,” Higginbottom answered. “I’ll be happy to follow up with you and your staff.”
Then, when Barrasso followed up, asking Higginbottom if the State Department program was raided to come up with the “pledge,” Higginbottom had an answer for that, too. “We looked across the appropriations bills and made allocations based on what our budget was and what resources were provided to us,” she said.
Barrasso was obviously fuming about this payment, and for good reason.
In a letter sent to President Obama on November 19, 2015, Barrasso and 36 of his colleagues promised that “Congress will not allow U.S. taxpayer dollars to go to the Green Climate Fund” unless the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change was “submitted to the Senate for its constitutional advice and consent.”
In the letter, the senators remind the president that “Congress holds the power of the purse.”
So much for separation of powers.
And the Obama administration isn’t shy about admitting it, either. In a statement made to Fox News, State Department spokeswoman Katherine Pfaff put the people in their place. As reported by Fox News, Pfaff said, “Did Congress authorize the Green Climate Fund? No,” she said, adding that department lawyers “reviewed the authority and the process under which we can do it." 
To his credit, Barrasso isn’t backing down.
According to a story in Politico, Barrasso believes the payment may have violated the Anti-Deficiency Act, a law prohibiting the federal government from spending money in advance of an allocation of funds by the Congress.
Barrasso is prepared to take the issue to court.
He may want to consider other options, however, in light of another aspect of the story that shows the Senate in a less than flattering light.
As reported by Fox News:
The department may have been able to effectively use a loophole to contribute the money — namely, because Congress did not include specific language barring spending to the GCF. Analysts say this dispute could have been avoided if Congress had simply included a specific prohibition on spending for the climate fund. 
H. Sterling Burnett, a senior fellow with the Heartland Institute, stated,
The problem is that the horse has already left the barn. There was not a specific line item in the budget prohibiting spending on the GCF. I am sure [State Department lawyers] have come up with some creative way to fund it, but it would not be an issue if Congress had explicitly prohibited it.
Senate Republicans backed away from including a specific rider in last year’s omnibus bill after President Obama threatened to veto it if such a rider were included.
“They were gutless,” said Burnett, who noted the first installment is a “drop in the bucket” when compared with the $3 billion.
In other words, the Senate could have refused to pass the omnibus spending bill until language was added that explicitly prohibited the payment of any money to the GCF. They did not do so, however, and now the president is showcasing a maneuver he’s proven very adept at performing: slipping through loopholes left open by a less-than-courageous Congress.

BIGGEST BRAZIL PROTESTS EVER THREATEN COMMUNIST MOVEMENT

Foto da ficha de Dilma no Departamento de Ordem Política e Social (DOPS) de São Paulo, registrada em janeiro de 1970.
BIGGEST BRAZIL PROTESTS EVER THREATEN COMMUNIST MOVEMENT 
BY ALEX NEWMAN
SEE: http://www.thenewamerican.com/world-news/south-america/item/22757-biggest-brazil-protests-ever-threaten-communist-movementrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

The biggest protests in Brazil's history took place on Sunday, with millions of outraged citizens pouring into the streets across the nation to demand the ouster of radical president Dilma Rousseff and her corrupt, communist-minded Workers' Party (PT). Brazilians from all walks of life also called for Rousseff's predecessor, fellow PT operative and Obama buddy Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva, to be imprisoned for his role in the massive corruption scandal that has shaken Brazil to the core. In the Brazilian Congress, talk of impeachment is getting louder as the PT house of cards comes crashing down. And the consequences of the implosion of the radical party, which openly allies itself with Marxist-Leninists and was intimately involved in setting up the Castro-backed totalitarian network known as the Foro de São Paulo, could extend far beyond Brazil.   
The massive protests took place all across the country. “Dilma out!” shouted furious citizens by the millions. In São Paulo, the largest protest in Brazil's history brought almost 1.5 million people to Avenida Paulista, according to the military police. Similar protests, although not as gargantuan, took place in hundreds of cities and towns all across Brazil. In the capital, Brasilia, some 100,000 protesters took to the streets, according to law enforcement. According to police estimates, some three million protesters took to the streets nationwide. Critics and attendees who spoke to The New American suggested even those numbers could be too conservative, with other estimates suggesting four million protesters across Brazil. Others said the numbers were above six million or even eight million.
Either way, they were the largest in Brazilian history, by far. The latest protests were even larger than similar anti-regime protests that rocked Brazil last year. And that is despite President Rousseff warning of potential “violence” against protesters who took to the streets. “The darn right-wing gets 6.5 million people in the streets without a single crime, exchange of punches, or one police-related incident, and the government speaks of 'fascist violence,'” fumed Olavo de Carvalho, a leading Brazilian opposition figure who helped expose the radical nature of the PT and its allies. “The government itself is paying agitators to throw punches, break windows, and set tires ablaze, yet claims to be the epitome of democratic order.”
The uprising is also about as mainstream as can be. In an editorial on Sunday, leading Brazilian newspaper Estadão noted that the protests highlight the fact that the public is fed up. “Most Brazilians, as they have for some time attested in public opinion polls, demand that the Workers' Party's Dilma Rousseff leave the presidency of the Republic. The opportunity to express that demand concretely, and, with it, drive the institutional machinery responsible for enacting it according to the Constitution, is offered today, in the popular protests scheduled for today. It is time for good Brazilians, exhausted in front of a president that does not honor the charge of the office and who is today the principal obstacle to national recovery, to say in a single, loud, appealing voice: 'Enough!'”
It is clear that these demonstrations represent an uprising against the broader corrupt establishment, not just the corrupt PT, which is itself a tentacle of a broader problem. When former presidential candidate Aécio Neves tried to join the protesters, for example, Brazilians erupted in fury, blasting him as a “thief” and an ally of the corrupt PT. Running with the leftist “Social Democracy” party, Neves came close to winning the most recent presidential election that, according to critics, was marked by widespread fraud. But instead of seriously challenging the outcome based on credible reports of vote fraud from all across the country, Neves conceded to the PT and allowed the “fundamental transformation” of Brazil to proceed uninterrupted.   
His rhetoric sounded much like the protesters, though. “The demonstrations today brought together citizens who, respecting all plurality, are united in seeking an end to this government,” Neves was quoted as saying in Brazilian media reports. “And we are in search of an exit to this impasse through the Constitution.” He was presumably making a reference to some calls for military intervention to remove the regime among some activists, a proposal that polarized the opposition and was seized on by pro-regime voices to paint PT critics as nostalgic for dictatorship. The public, though, was not buying Neves' efforts to portray himself as a leader of the public uprising.     
Other leftists, including environmentalist Marina Silva, another leading candidate in Brazil's most recent presidential election, also distanced themselves from the PT and emphasized that impeachment was not a “coup,” as PT operatives have been attempting to claim. Even PT politicians are abandoning Lula and Rousseff as the cards come crashing down amid the biggest corruption and embezzlement scandal in Brazil's troubled history. Some analysts compared it to rats fleeing a sinking ship.
Beyond the implications for Brazil's communist movement and its allies, the uprising is also an ominous sign for Obama, whose administration used U.S. tax dollars to help finance the state-controlled oil giant Petrobras at the center of the corruption scandal that is rocking Brazil. Lula and his associates are known to be friendly with their current counterparts in Washington. In a video shot by BBC Brasil, Obama points to Lula and says, in Portuguese, “This guy is the man, I love this guy.” Then, in English, he praises Lula as the “most popular politician on Earth.” After the dubious reelection victory by Rousseff, an ex-terrorist whose communist terror group once kidnapped the U.S. ambassador to Brazil, Obama celebrated the news and vowed even closer ties with her regime.  
The star of the protests seemed to be Judge Sergio Moro, who is overseeing the corruption case against Lula and his associates. The judge is currently considering a request by prosecutors on whether to put Lula in prison while he awaits his criminal trial for money laundering and massive corruption, which included diverting state funds to keep his radical party in power. Protesters all across Brazil carried giant inflatable Lula look-alike dummies dressed in prisoner stripes, and demanded that the corrupt ex-leader — a close ally of Castro and the international communist movement — be put behind bars.
A number of Lula's associates have already gone down. Last week, a Brazilian judge sentenced Marcelo Odebrecht, the former CEO of the Odebrecht conglomerate, to 19 years in prison for his role in the corruption. And Rousseff, who served as a senior official in the Lula regime before becoming his hand-picked successor, is also known to be deeply intertwined with the corruption. The investigation into the "Petrolão" (Big Oil) scandal is known as “Operation Car Wash," or Operação Lava Jato in Portuguese. More than a few senior government figures are ensnared in it.    
But the scandal is hardly news to those who have followed Brazilian politics (without relying on the establishment press for information). Indeed, many protesters carried signs with Olavo de Carvalho on them, with some declaring that “Olavo was right.” The anti-communist author and philosopher has played a key role in raising awareness about the communist forces seeking to take over Latin America. He previously told The New American that Latin American communism was basically headquartered in Brazil. After years of hard work trying to expose Lula, Rousseff, and their international associates in tyranny, Carvalho's work is finally paying off, as Brazil appears to be experiencing a massive public awakening.
In a statement released after the historic protests on Sunday, though, the renowned Brazilian figure warned that this was all just the beginning. Fixing the problems caused by PT and its allies will take decades, he said. “And the resistance will be even more fierce once the bandits are outside of the federal government, forced to search for support abroad,” he added. “The trouble is only just getting started.” Congressmen from across the political spectrum said they got the message and that it was time for Rousseff to be removed from power. But again, the road to recovery and real liberty will be long, and the PT still has powerful friends across Latin America and beyond.  
Indeed, Rousseff, Lula, and the PT are at the center of an international communist network known as the Foro de São Paulo (FSP). Founded by Lula, Communist Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, the communist Sandanistas, and Marxist narco-terrorist groups such as the FARC, the totalitarian alliance came to dominate much of Latin America. FSP members and operatives have also received strong support from establishment forces in the United States, including the Obama administration, Big Labor, and the global government-promoting Council on Foreign Relations, despite being correctly identified as hostile to America and liberty by top U.S. officials. Moscow and Beijing have also been key supporters of the totalitarian alliance.  
But with FSP tentacles under growing pressure almost everywhere — from Venezuela and Brazil to Ecuador, Argentina, Bolivia, Chile, and beyond — the so-called “Pink Tide” is now playing defense. Ironically, investors seemed delighted with the news of imminent regime change in Brasilia. Shares on Brazilian stock markets have been soaring as the end of Rousseff's regime and a crackdown on widespread government corruption appear increasingly likely. She may well resign soon.
Still, the PT is powerful, and no doubt has some remaining tricks up its sleeve. Like rabid animals backed into a corner, the dangerous communist movement in Brazil is now especially dangerous. Americans and the U.S. Congress should ensure that the Obama administration does not intervene on behalf of its endangered ideological comrades in Brasilia.
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Amid Historic Uprising in Brazil, Regime Shields Corrupt Leader

BY ALEX NEWMAN
SEE: http://www.thenewamerican.com/world-news/south-america/item/22788-amid-historic-uprising-in-brazil-regime-shields-corrupt-leaderrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
The communist-minded regime ruling Brazil is quickly becoming almost a caricature of a “Banana Republic,” but there are still glimmers of hope amid an unprecedented public uprising. In an act of corruption and lawlessness so extreme that it sent shock waves around the world, radical Brazilian President and ex-terrorist leader Dilma Rousseff acted to shield her corrupt predecessor from prosecution and jail time by appointing him as a cabinet minister with legal immunity.
Shortly after the announcement, though, the investigating court released a phone conversation between the two desperate politicians conspiring to do precisely that, sparking nationwide outrage. A separate judge also blocked former Brazilian President Luiz Inacio “Lula” da Silva's appointment as protesters surrounded Congress. The stakes are as high as they can be. But as the regime and its allies circle the wagons, the outcome of the dangerous situation, as of now, remains uncertain.
Some analysts expected the communism-touting Rousseff to step down or be impeached following the largest protests in Brazilian history this week — demonstrations demanding her immediate ouster and the imprisonment of her corrupt associates. Instead, she doubled down. In frantic press conferences and speeches, sounding detached from reality, she even accused her critics — some four out of five Brazilians, according to polls — of plotting a “coup d'etat” against her regime. With the exception of PT bosses and their communist-minded hangers-on implicated in the crime spree, though, virtually every political leader in Brazil has denounced PT claims that a lawful impeachment process would represent a coup.
Outraged and embattled citizens rushed into the streets across Brazil to say “enough.” Riot police were even deployed in the capital, Brasilia, as furious Brazilians encircled government institutions. Talk of a general strike to force the regime out of power is growing louder as Brazilians run out of patience and out of options to stop the impunity. More chaos and further unrest are likely, too, as the regime struggles fiendishly to keep itself in power and its operatives out of jail. Some criminals involved in the scandal have already been sentenced to major prison terms, sparking panic among top officials implicated in the scheme hoping to hide behind immunity.
In a speech given early Thursday, Rousseff, whose communist terror group once kidnapped the U.S. ambassador to Brazil, defended her decision to appoint Lula as her chief of staff. She claimed the move was not aimed at protecting him from what appeared to be a likely prison sentence for corruption, bribery, and money laundering, but about saving Brazil and doing what was best for “the people.” With a straight face, she claimed to be fighting corruption, too, even while vowing to go after the judicial branch for its role in exposing the brazen corruption that surrounds her regime.
Surrounded by cheering sycophants from her Workers' Party (Partido dos Trabalhadores, or PT), Rousseff also attacked the millions of “screaming people” who just days earlier took to the streets. As The New American reported Monday, the largest protests in Brazil's history were demanding her impeachment and the imprisonment of Lula for massive corruption. Even the PT's allies on the Left and far Left — the socialist PT party openly allies itself with Marxist-Leninist forces and brutal communist dictatorships — distanced themselves from Rousseff's imploding regime. Now, even some top PT figures are blowing the whistle in what analysts have described as rats fleeing a sinking ship.
On March 15, two days after the largest protests in Brazilian history brought between four million and eight million people to the streets, the former leader of the PT in the Senate blew the whistle on his comrades. He told the Supreme Court that dozens of top politicians were involved in the "Petrolão" (Big Oil) corruption scandal, in which the PT diverted funds from state-controlled oil giant Petrobras to enrich themselves and keep their corrupt party in power. He also said Rousseff and Lula were trying to interfere in the investigation, known as “Operation Car Wash,” or Operação Lava Jato in Portuguese. Other high-level officials have confirmed those allegations.  
Even Aécio Neves, the leftist “Social Democrat” politician who ran against Rousseff in the 2014 election, was implicated in the testimony at Brazil's high court by the senior PT operative. Neves, who quickly conceded the election to Rousseff despite widespread and credible evidence of vote fraud across Brazil, tried to ingratiate himself with the protesters during the weekend's demonstrations. But in a sign that the Brazilian uprising is targeting the entire establishment rather than just Rousseff's party, protesters called him a “thief” and chased him out of their ranks. Now he may have even bigger problems on his hands.  
With prosecutors seeking to have Lula imprisoned while he awaits trial on serious criminal charges, Rousseff and her co-conspirators realized they had to intervene. And now, their conspiracy has been blown wide open thanks to a wiretap on Lula's phone by federal police. During a phone call between Rousseff and Lula, Rousseff says the papers showing his appointment as chief of staff (and hence legal immunity) were on the way “in case of need.” The need, of course, would be in case police showed up to enforce a court order to put him behind bars. “We'll only use it in case of emergency,” Rousseff can be heard saying on the tape.
Federal Judge Sergio Moro, who has become a hero to Brazilians for his role in courageously tackling corruption at the highest levels of government, decided to release wire-tapped recordings of Rousseff's conversations on March 16. “A free society requires that the governed know what their leaders do, even when they try to act hidden in the shadows,” he wrote, adding that shadowy efforts to curry favor and protect Lula by his allies did not appear to be working. Brazilians erupted in furious protests as they learned of the conspiracy.
But Rousseff and her co-conspirators have vowed to take action against the judicial officials for exposing their conversations. “All the judicial and administrative means available will be adopted to repair the flagrant violation of the law of the Constitution of the Republic, committed by the judge who was author of the leak,” Rousseff fumed in a statement apparently aimed at intimidating the judge and anyone else involved in pursuing justice and rooting out corruption in government.
At the last moment, another federal judge in Brasilia, Itagiba Catta Preta Neto, issued an injunction blocking Lula's appointment as chief of staff. The order explained that Rousseff's appointment of Lula to shield him from prison prevents the “free exercise of the Judiciary Power, the operation of the Federal Police and of the Federal Prosecutor's Office.” The regime's attorney general, though, quickly vowed to appeal the judge's order so that Lula can take his post and be shielded from the ongoing prosecution and potential jailing.
Impeachment proceedings in the Brazilian Congress are ongoing. And even traditional PT allies are trying desperately to distance themselves from the stench of the mushrooming scandal. Prosecutors are closing in on Lula and other top officials involved in the corruption and the broader effort to advance totalitarianism in Brazil and across Latin America. And allies are becoming harder to find for the embattled PT cabal, though it still has powerful friends in Cuba, Venezuela, Ecuador, Bolivia, Washington, D.C., Moscow, and beyond.  
As The New American has been reporting and documenting for years, Lula and his PT were among the founders, along with communist dictator Fidel Castro, the communist Sandinistas, and Marxist narco-terrorist group FARC, of a totalitarian network known as the Foro de São Paulo (FSP). Despite warnings about the alliance from top U.S. officials, the Obama administration nevertheless has poured American taxpayer funds on FSP members — including on the PT-controlled Petrobras at the center of the scandals in Brazil. The Council on Foreign RelationsMoscow, and Beijing have also been instrumental in aiding the criminal totalitarian network that now dominates much of Latin America.  
Critics are still fuming about the latest developments. “Recent events prove, in the most complete and unequivocal way, that the state created by the 'New Republic' is immune to public outcry, is an autonomous structure that hovers over the nation, unreachable and unattainable,” said anti-communist philosopher and professor Olavo de Carvalho, a leading opposition figure who has played a giant role in exposing the totalitarian designs and methods of the PT and its FSP allies. “'Our institutions,' before which so many prostrate in worship, are a circle of protection built around the triumphant criminality and the most cynical coup-d'étatism.” Protesters in cities across Brazil carried signs reading “Olavo was right” as his efforts to expose the crime syndicate increasingly bear fruit.
The situation in Brazil is explosive. It could quickly spiral out of control as the PT and its FSP allies are backed into a corner in Brazil, making them extremely dangerous. A victory for the Brazilian people would represent a massive blow to corruption and international communism, which is why Rousseff was willing to take the extreme step of trying to install Lula in her cabinet. A victory for Rousseff, Lula, the PT, and the FSP would represent a devastating blow to liberty, honesty, prosperity, and the people of Latin America. The stakes, in other words, are extremely high, and the consequences of what comes next will be felt for generations.