What is Treason?

With the return of Sgt. Bergdahl to the US there is a great deal of talk about treason.

Treason is unlike any other crime in US jurisprudence. The NY Sun gives a well measured treatise on this matter.

Treason is the only crime the Constitution pre-empts Congress from defining. It’s also the only crime to which such authorities as the police and the FBI mayn’t take a confession. It is the only crime of which the judicial branch is barred from convicting someone through the normal rules of due process. Treason is special, made so because of abuse by the English kings. And it has often been tested in our courts in ways that guide our thinking in the current crisis.

Treason against the United States, our Constitution says, may consist only in levying war against them or adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. Feature the liberality of that formulation. One can, even in war, dissent from our government without committing treason. The plain language suggests that one can even adhere to an enemy without committing treason. That is, an American whose family came over from, say, Germany, could have privately rooted for Germany in World War I.

Treason is defined in Article 3, Section 3 of the US Constitution:

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying War against them, or in adhering to their Enemies, giving them Aid and Comfort. No Person shall be convicted of Treason unless on the Testimony of two Witnesses to the same overt Act, or on Confession in open Court.

The Congress shall have Power to declare the Punishment of Treason, but no Attainder of Treason shall work Corruption of Blood, or Forfeiture except during the Life of the Person attainted.

The reason for this rather strict definition is that the English kings took a rather liberal view of treason which included sleeping with a woman of the Royal Family that you were not married to.

Bang the Princess and Hang... so to speak.

The Supreme Court has taken great care with treason. Bollman and Swartwout, two confederates of Aaron Burr, were let off by Chief Justice Marshall because conspiring to levy war, which they’d one, and actually levying war, which hadn’t been done, are two different things. The conviction of Tomoya Kawakita, who’d been born in America but was in Japan when World War II erupted and went to work in an arms plant, was sustained.

The plant used American POWs as labor. It seemed the courts were inclined to given Kawakita the benefit of the doubt but were horrified at evidence that he had struck American POWs. The Supreme Court sustained his conviction and his death sentence. President Eisenhower commuted it to life in prison; President Kennedy later pardoned him on the condition he be deported to Japan and banned from returning to American soil.

More here.

How To Stay Out Of Trouble

Twenty-five Years Ago

We've all seen this iconic depiction - "Tank Man" -  of an individual's stand against tyranny, but this author poses a very significant question about the events in Tiananmen Square:

Why hasn't Hollywood produced a movie about the massacre in Tiananmen Square?

It is estimated that the Chinese murdered several thousand protesters on this day in 1989 but movie producers seem to have no interest in documenting this outrage. Mr. Gonzalez offers an explanation:

It’s not surprising China wants everybody to forget Tiananmen – and Hollywood may be influenced by that. After all, Hollywood receives significant funding from China. One of my friends in Hollywood, Ben Shapiro, told me yesterday that “everyone is scared of the Chinese market being closed to particular films or studios.” Indeed, in 2012 Chinese audiences shelled out $2.7 billion in box office sales for “Meiguo Da pian”—big American movies –and studios from Disney to Fox co-produce movies with China. DreamWorks has even struck a deal with two government-owned Chinese companies to create “Oriental DreamWorks.” One Chinese media fund alone—the Harvest Seven Stars Media Private Equity—has about $1 billion to invest in Hollywood.

Good advice -  always follow the money.

More here and here.

Bergdahl Is No Hero

Bergdahl has been "swiftboated" by his own mates.
Those who served with him in Afghanistan know him best when it comes to his convictions, courage and competence.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/288812731285526/

His former squad leader is an admin on one of many Face Book's anti-Bergdahl sites.

Michelle Malkin has more:

Five years ago, one of the brave soldiers who risked his life to search for Bergdahl answered my questions and I published his statement on July 20, 2009:

“I know the story and the accounts that he was drunk or that he was lagging behind on patrol are not true– this soldier planned this move for a long time. He walked off the post with a day’s supply of water and had written down before that he wanted to live in the mountains…he is an embarrassment to everyone who has worn the uniform.”

After news broke this weekend of President Obama’s trade of 5 high-level Taliban commanders at Gitmo for Bergdahl’s “freedom,” I heard from another soldier who served on the search team.

“Many of my brothers died because of PFC Bergdahl’s actions, and this has been a very hard day for all Geronimos,” he told me after documenting his proof of service. Other journalists ignored his attempts to get the truth out.

Jihadi's Party Hardy

This is a very short video of a jihadi celebration.
Watch the clown in the blue shirt as he reaches across the table and accidentally sets off a party favor.
Hilarity ensues, virgins are dispensed, Allah wets his pants.



I think the flag in the background is the Free Syria Army flag.

McIslam - Over 200 Million "Served"

In an article appearing in American Thinker, Mike Konrad explores Islam's body count over the centuries. Their religion sucks but their murder instincts rock.

When one thinks of mass murder, Hitler comes to mind. If not Hitler, then Tojo, Stalin, or Mao. Credit is given to the 20th-century totalitarians as the worst species of tyranny to have ever arisen. However, the alarming truth is that Islam has killed more than any of these, and may surpass all of them combined in numbers and cruelty.

The enormity of the slaughters of the "religion of peace" are so far beyond comprehension that even honest historians overlook the scale. When one looks beyond our myopic focus, Islam is the greatest killing machine in the history of mankind, bar none.

Just examining the number of Indians and African murdered over the centuries by invading Muslims

... and Islam has surpassed the victims of 20th-century totalitarianism. However, it does not end there. Add the millions who died at the hand of Muslims in the Sudan in our lifetime.

[...]Remember that in the 7th century, North Africa was almost totally Christian. What happened to them?

It Runs Deep

Only seventy years after the horrors of Nazi Germany, hatred of Jews still runs deep throughout Europe.
From Live Wire:

Last week, Maccabi Tel Aviv basketball team beat Real Madrid in the Euroleague final.

In basketball-crazy Israel, a third of the country watched the game.

And thousands showed up in Rabin Square in Tel Aviv, to celebrate.

There, the team got hugs and kisses from PM Benjamin Netanyahu and President Shimon Peres.

Meanwhile, back in Spain, Real Madrid fans took to Twitter, with a hashtag (translated as #F…ingJews) to express their outrage over the defeat, hoping the Israeli team takes a shower after the game…in a gas chamber, and other vicious comments.

Jonathan S.Tobin, writing in Commentary: Spain, Basketball, and Jew Hatred makes this observation:

…the rash of anti-Semitic statements, especially on Twitter, in reaction to the victory of the Israeli squad shouldn’t be dismissed as only the sour reaction of supporters of a losing sports team. That the outcome of a basketball game would lead so many to resort to anti-Semitic language is not an accident or people just blowing off steam. The willingness to invoke traditional stereotypes of Jew-hatred as well as echoes of the Holocaust under these circumstances illustrates not only how deeply entrenched such attitudes are in European culture but the way Israel has become a stand-in for traditional anti-Semitism….

H/T iOTW

Sorry, No Ethics Allowed

Ethics? Ethnics? We don't need no steeking ethics!

From the Tablet:

Catholic doctors who follow church teaching on sexual ethics cannot work as gynaecologists in Britain, the Catholic Medical Association (CMA) conference was told.

Charlie O’Donnell, a consultant in emergency and intensive care medicine, said the best advice he could give to an “orthodox” Catholic wishing to specialise in obstetrics and gynaecology would be to “emigrate”.

Dr O’Donnell told the conference at Ealing Abbey, west London, on 17 May that a Catholic training to be a consultant in obstetrics and gynaecology would soon find he or she had conscientious objections to such tasks as prescribing artificial contraceptives, giving unmarried couples fertility treatment or Viagra to gay couples.

He said that supervising consultants do not have the backup to allow trainees to opt out if they have moral objections to such work. However, conscientious objection to abortion is allowed because of specific provision in the 1967 Abortion Act.

[...]Last week the president of the CMA, Dr Robert Hardie sought clarification concerning reports that doctors and nurses with conscientious objections would be barred from obtaining a diploma from the Faculty of Sexual and Reproductive Health (FSRH). Medical staff normally need the diploma to work in sexual and reproductive healthcare.
Jim McManus, the Vice Chairman of the Healthcare Reference Group for the Catholic Bishops' Conference of England and Wales, said that any move that would result in Catholics being excluded from practising as gynaecologists would be unlawful.

H/T Wintery Knight

Why Guns?

"And indeed, gentlemen, there exists a law, not written down anywhere but inborn in our hearts; a law which comes to us not by training or custom or reading but by derivation and absorption and adoption from nature itself; a law which has come to us not from theory but from practice, not by instruction but by natural intuition. I refer to the law which lays it down that, if our lives are endangered by plots or violence or armed robbers or enemies, any and every method of protecting ourselves is morally right."

Cicero, Pro Milone, 53 BC

Flags In

Extra Ammo ... Check. Butt Kitty,... Check

It's Spring And Mayhem Is In The Air

In the Spring a young man's fancy lightly turns to thoughts of mayhem.

In Georgia a prison inmate thought it was all for a Milky Way:

A Clayton County jail inmate received a life sentence Friday in the 2012 murder of his cellmate during a fight over a Reese’s peanut butter candy.

This afternoon, William Alexander Brooks pleaded guilty to murdering, Kenneth Robert Grochowski over the candy, according to Channel 2 Action News. He was given life with the possibility of parole.

Brooks, who drowned Grochowski in the cell’s toilet, was originally arrested in August 2012, on theft charges. The incident between cellmates happened August 14 or 15, according to police. Grochowski, 57, was found unresponsive around midnight following roll call.

In California another knucklehead makes a statement in blood:

A young Californian gunman identified locally as the son of the assistant director of The Hunger Games film franchise is suspected of killing six people and wounding seven more in a murderous rampage from his black BMW.

The killer, who also died, conducted a series of drive-by shootings in a college town on a busy Friday evening, just hours after apparently posting a chilling video outlining his murderous plans for “retribution” because of rebuffs by women.

In Brussels a lone gunman rips the scabs off old wounds:

Three people were killed and one badly injured in a shoot-out on Saturday in Belgium.

A Jewish community figure, Joel Rubinfeld, told AFP it clearly "is a terrorist act" as a man had been seen driving up and entering the museum before opening fire inside and running off.

Mr Rubinfeld, who heads the country's anti-Semitic League, said the act was the result of "a climate of hate." Didier Reynders, Belgian foreign minister, said on Twitter: "I am shocked by the murders committed at the Jewish museum, I am thinking of the victims I saw there and their families."

A Frenchman gets overzealous at a hellish bris milah:

A tiny French village has been rocked by the news that its recently elected mayor has been castrated and killed by a jealous love rival who accused him of having an affair with his wife.

The barbaric killing of Dominque Leboucher, 55, has been greeted with horror in the small Normandy village of Bretteville-le-Rabet, 10 miles south of Caen.

Mr Leboucher's mutilated body was found lying in a pool of blood at his home close to the town hall, where he had been based since being elected mayor in March this year.

Demote General Motors

I was a Chevy guy for about thirty years. My first car was a 1959 Impala (a salt-infested, rotted out mess, pretty much like the one above) - I bought it for $25 and it lasted exactly two weeks. Most of my cars have been Chevrolets. So far it's been three Impala's, a 1962 Nova, a 1983 Cavalier, two Celebrity station wagons (1984 and 1987 - my wife drove the '87 for ten years), a 1973 Suburban and a 1991 Lumina. The only other car I really liked was my 1965 Tempest that I bought off a farmer for $600 in 1970.

But the best car I ever owned was the 2001 Chevy Impala. I picked it up used in December 2001 with only 17,000 miles on it and traded it in at 75,000 in September 2008. I liked it so much that we bought a used 2006 Impala for my wife in 2007 with only 4,000 miles - and I was very disappointed in it. It was like a different company had made it.

General Motors has seen better days; they have had 30 automobile recalls this year alone. And it's all their fault.

DETROIT -- General Motors is recalling about 500 pickup trucks and SUVs to fix faulty air bag controls, its 30th recall so far this year.

The company is in the midst of a company-wide safety review after it mishandled the recall of more than 2.6 million older small cars with faulty ignition switches. GM has acknowledged knowing about the switch problem for more than a decade before it began recalling the cars in February.

Meanwhile, federal safety regulators said that it was "likely" that more than 13 people died in the cars recalled for the defective ignition switches.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration or NHTSA said in a statement, "The final death toll associated with this safety defect is not known to NHTSA, but we believe it's likely that more than 13 lives were lost."

By refusing to address the ignition switch problem for ten years, General Motors probably saved a lot more than the $35 million in fines imposed so far by the government. That's the nature of the game they play - dollars versus your lives and fortune.

I remember our 1987 Celebrity had the power steering go after only 40,000 miles. I complained about it to a friend (our police department's garage manager who used to work for GM car dealerships) who just grinned and said that they saved $0.55 on every Celebrity manufactured just by using cheaper bushings in the steering assembly.

The Celebrity was manufactured from 1982 to 1990 when it was replaced by the Chevy Lumina. Sales of the Celebrity averaged 350,000 annually from 1984 to 1987. In 1986 Chevrolet sold almost 405,000 Celebrities, making it one of the most popular cars in the U.S. For argument's sake, let's say that General Motors sold a total of 3 million Celebrities in its eight year production cycle. That's over $1.5 million GM saved by sliding cheap bushings into the power steering assembly alone. That savings cost me over $600 when the unit went south. Who knows what other "savings" cost consumers a bundle?

Not that General Motors is the only corporation screwing the consumer - no - not by a long shot. But I now avoid their products like the plague. Our two current vehicles are a Ford Explorer and a Toyota RAV4.

Goom bye GM.

Battle At The K-Cup Korral

I never squeal.
I may yell or grunt or grimace, but I never squeal.

Until this morning. It was close, very close, but nothing squealish escaped my lips. Barely.

It all started when I finished breakfast and was rinsing out my cereal bowl and juice glass. I was then going to make myself a fresh cup of coffee in my Keurig machine. Nothing unseemly came to my attention in the short distance between the sink and the Keurig sitting next to the stove. It's strategic location near the refrigerator bespoke of the pleasures of Half and Half that would soon grace the sleek interior of my stainless steel Keurig travel mug.

Yes, an authentic, genuine Keurig coffee travel mug; desired by many but acquired by few. Perhaps God, in His Infinite Wisdom, decided that my overweening, hypercaffeinated pride needed to be addressed. If so, the events unfolding would challenge my faith and courage as never before.

Perhaps it was this appearance of domestic tranquility and the anticipatory weight of the empty coffee mug in my hand that beguiled me into believing that all was well, that all was as it should be. That horror would dare steal into this peaceful scene, my domicile, my domain.

I approached the Keurig not realizing that my heart meds would shortly undergo a trial that would indeed test their mettle to the utmost. I stood in front of the machine and moved the mug closer to place it under the spout to await Heaven's Brown Nectar. I reached towards the storage drawer to withdraw a K-cup. That's when the multi-legged fiend struck.

The Centipede From Hell scurried out from under the coffee stand and lunged at me. I think he had a knife. I heard his thin, rasping breath as he scampered around the sugar bowl and the muted "schwep schwep schwep" of his hooves gaining traction on the slippery resin countertop. Venomous drool flew off his poisoned fangs as he whipped his head around seeking a fatal opening through which to strike at me.

My law enforcement training saved me. As this was definitely a close quarters combat situation I had to keep my head. Dropping into a modified Weaver Stance, I unholstered my JC Penny Mod. 30 dish towel (300 thread count, double stitched edging, 100% non-waxed cotton, tumble dry) and aimed a devastating blow at the suspect. Merciful Heavens! He was so fast! Luckily my Mod. 30 incorporates the latest hypervelocity technology (I only carry the best) and the resulting shock wave blew the suspect to the kitchen floor.

Recovering from the recoil, I quickly delivered a series of strikes at the suspect. He desperately attempted to evade a veritable blizzard of high-speed cotton. Over and over again he scrambled for cover ... but this wasn't my first rodeo.  It had been quite a few years since I last bested the same sort of creature in a contest of wits and strength in an epic battle fought in the kitchen sink. Since then my time on the range and an upgrade in weaponry had transformed me into an even more fearsome opponent. My skills were simply too advanced for him. A crippling blow knocked off six or seven of his legs (arms?) and he was mine.

I paused for a second to admire his fortitude and spirit. He was a worthy adversary.  In his final moments he gazed up at me, his gaze steady and unyielding but yet, acknowledging my mastery over him. Or maybe it was his ass I was looking at. I simply can't tell one end from the other on these things. Another quick blow and it was over. Done.

It was a bittersweet victory. My relaxing, happy times with the Keurig will never be the same. From now on my survival instincts will always be on alert while contemplating that stretch of countertop.

For who knows what evil lurks in the shadowy confines of the K-cup drawer?

Up And Coming Killer

Smart money is on pancreatic cancer to become the second highest cause of cancer deaths in the US within the next six years.

Pancreatic cancer is expected to become the second most common cause of cancer-related death in the United States in 2020, overtaking deaths from breast and colon cancers, according to new research.

The disease, which claimed the lives of both Steve Jobs and Patrick Swayze, is set for a 'startling' rise.
Currently, the top three causes of cancer-related death in the United States are lung, colorectal and breast cancers.

[...]By combining predicted demographic changes and changes to the incidence and death rates of specific cancers, the Pancreatic Cancer Action Network was able to project numbers of diagnoses and deaths for major cancers in the US in the coming years.

My internist pokes me in my fat gut and says this is a "Diabetes Factory." He warns that starch/sugar is the culprit here and that the pancreas is forced to make more insulin than it should because of sugar and the starches that are so readily converted to sugar. He thinks there is a direct causation with cancer and a high starch, high sugar diet.

I am beginning to think he is right. As I see the number of fat kids in school today (I think there were maybe a dozen or so fat kids in my whole high school of nearly 1,000 kids back in the 60's) I can see where to lay my money in the cancer sweepstakes. Throw lung cancer and diabetes into the race and it's a Trifecta O'Death.American Society for Clinical Nutrition

From the American Society for Clinical Nutrition:

Consumption of sugar and sugar-sweetened foods and the risk of pancreatic cancer in a prospective study

Emerging evidence indicates that hyperglycemia and hyperinsulinemia may be implicated in the development of pancreatic cancer. Frequent consumption of sugar and high-sugar foods may increase the risk of pancreatic cancer by inducing frequent postprandial hyperglycemia, increasing insulin demand, and decreasing insulin sensitivity.

INTRODUCTION
Pancreatic cancer is among the most deadly cancers: the overall 5-y survival rate is only ≈5% (1). Because of this poor prognosis, identification of modifiable risk factors for pancreatic cancer is important. Evidence is mounting that abnormal glucose metabolism and hyperinsulinemia may be involved in the development of pancreatic cancer. Conditions such as diabetes mellitus, a high body mass index (BMI; in kg/m2), and physical inactivity, all hallmarks of insulin resistance, have been directly related to the risk of this malignancy (2-5). Moreover, prospective studies have reported approximately twice the risk of pancreatic cancer in persons in the highest category of postload plasma glucose (6), fasting serum glucose (7, 8), or fasting insulin (7) concentrations compared with persons in the lowest category.

More here, here, and here.