Regulation Archives - Page 69 of 156

Is your Neighborhood Pharmacist a Crook?

January 9, 2019/in Courts & Law, Culture War, Economy, Healthcare, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by Ann Corcoran

Some are, but maybe not your local friendly, helpful health professional!

sessions and weed — You can bet the drug industry and the Medicare fraudsters were happy to see Sessions out as Attorney General

A little over six months ago, then Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced a major federal crackdown on doctors, pharmacists and other health providers for fueling the opioid crisis and using your Medicare and Medicaid dollars to line their pockets.

Here is a bit of one story about Sessions’ announcement.

From State News June 28, 2018:

Federal agencies on Thursday announced charges in what Attorney General Jeff Sessions called “the largest health care fraud takedown in American history,” an investigation into over $2 billion in alleged fraud by doctors, pharmacists, and nurses.
Many of the allegations centered on illegitimate opioid prescriptions. The Justice Department charged 162 defendants, including 76 doctors, for their roles dispensing opioids and narcotics, the result of investigations spanning 30 state Medicaid programs and numerous enforcement agencies.
[….]
“Some of our most trusted medical officials, professionals, look at their patients, vulnerable people suffering from addiction, and they see dollar signs,” Sessions said.
The alleged fraud and false billings collectively accounted for 13 million illegal opioid dosages, the Justice Department said, and also included 23 pharmacists and 19 nurses.
The Department of Health and Human Services also announced that since July 2017, it has excluded over 2,700 individuals and 587 providers from Medicare and Medicaid “for conduct related to opioid diversion and abuse” — including 67 doctors, 402 nurses, and 40 pharmacy services.

More here.

Here are a couple of more recent cases of Pharmacy fraud

Don’t miss my post from last week about Pharmacist Haytham “Tom” Fakih in Dearborn, Michigan.

Florida Fraudster

From a Justice Department Press release in December, here.

The owner of a Miami, Florida-area pharmacy who caused Medicare to pay more than $8.4 million over a six-year period for prescription drugs that were never provided to beneficiaries was sentenced today to 87 months in prison.
[….]
Antonio Perez Jr., 48, of Miami Beach, Florida, was sentenced by U.S. District Judge Federico A. Moreno of the Southern District of Florida, who also ordered Perez to pay $8,415,824 in restitution and to forfeit the same amount. Perez was ordered to forfeit four Miami-area properties worth approximately $700,000 and multiple bank accounts totaling over $250,000. Perez previously pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit health care fraud.
[….]
During the course of the scheme, Medicare paid Valles Pharmacy Discount over $32 million, of which at least $8.4 million was for prescription drugs that Valles Pharmacy never purchased and never provided to Medicare beneficiaries, Perez admitted.

ahktmar-pharmacy — The owner of Akhtamar Pharmacy will be sentenced in February.

California case

Also in December a federal jury found Pharmacist Tamar Tatarian, 39, of Pasadena, California guilty of a Medicare fraud scheme after she billed Medicare $1.3 million for drugs she never purchased or distributed.

You will be interested to see that she was one of those caught in Sessions’ big sweep earlier this year.

Tatarian, the owner of Akhtamar Pharmacy, will be sentenced next month.

Secret decoder ring at work! Tatarian must be Armenian. See the Legend of Akhtamar. My reference to Secret decoder ring comes from Ann Coulter’s ‘Adios America’ where she rightly points out that readers of news stories about crooks and criminals must search for clues about where the alleged perp might come from and how he/she got in to the country.

Exception! See yesterday’s post about the Russians ripping off Washington staters! There the reporter actually says where those arrested were from.

EDITORS NOTE: This column with images by Frauds, Crooks and Criminals is republished with permission. The featured photo is by rawpixel on Unsplash.

New Hampshire: Chinese Prostitution Ring Busted by Feds

January 9, 2019/in Courts & Law, Culture War, National Security, Policy, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by Ann Corcoran

Just now when I was tweeting about how everyone should be calling their members of Congress and Senators today (even the Dems!) to demand they fund the President’s wall, I noted that my top tweet of the last month was one about a Chinese sex trafficking ring operating in New Hampshire and Maine.

The poor young girls were brought to the US on tourist visas and literally held prisoner by their Chinese pimps.

From the New Hampshire Union Leader:

MANCHESTER — Two homes in the city — one in a middle-class neighborhood — were used as houses of prostitution in a sex trafficking ring that involved as many as two dozen Chinese women under the control of a Concord couple, federal prosecutors said Friday.

manchester polic — Police raid house of prostitution

Neighbors of 87 Harrington Ave. — on a quiet residential street within earshot of Our Lady of the Cedars Church — said they had been complaining for two years about the operation. On Thursday, Manchester police and sheriff deputies used battering rams on the door and took away at least one Asian woman.

“Merry Christmas. For two years we’ve been waiting. Now our kids can come out and play,” said a woman who lived across the street who did not want to be identified.

[….]

….federal officials in Maine announced the indictment of a Concord couple and charged them with running the sex ring spanning Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont. Other sites of prostitution listed included hotels in Dover, Portsmouth and Kittery, where Portsmouth Naval Shipyard is located.

Multiple locations in the Portland, Maine area were also cited.

Sou Chao Li and Derong Maio, both 37, are each charged with one count of conspiracy to engage in interstate transportation and travel for prostitution; two counts of sex trafficking by fraud and coercion; and five counts of interstate transportation for prostitution. Li also is charged with possessing a victim’s passport as part of the sex trafficking scheme.

[….]

Neighbors of the Harrington Avenue home, nearly all of whom did not want to be identified, said they have been enduring traffic all hours of the day and night for years. They said middle-aged white men typically, many in SUVs and pickups, drive to the neighborhood, park on the street, enter the house and leave after 10 or 15 minutes. Some would wait in the car while another man was in the house.

“Sometimes they’d show up at my door,” one neighbor said. “I’d say ‘you guys looking for STDs? Go next door.’” [STD=Sexually Transmitted Diseases].

There is much more to the story, click here to read it all.

Here is what I want to know, did no one who reviews tourist visas from China notice any trend? We never hear about the details of that process. Was there fraud going on at the US Embassy in China?

EDITORS NOTE: This column by Frauds, Crooks and Criminals is republished with permission. The featured photo is by gabrielle cole on Unsplash.

Trump’s New Asylum Policy Will Help Block Illegal Immigration

January 5, 2019/in Immigration, National Security, Policy, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by The Daily Signal

Secretary of Homeland Security Kirstjen Nielsen recently announced a significant policy change to stop illegal immigration.

After years of catch and release, loopholes, and poor enforcement, the Department of Homeland Security is moving to plug the holes in the U.S. immigration system, and especially the loopholes that surround the asylum system.

One of the most serious problems the U.S. faces in its immigration system is that when illegal immigrants cross the border, they can claim asylum in order to avoid quick deportation. This is an especially common tactic with illegal immigrants from El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras.

Less than 10 percent of these individuals, however, will end up qualifying for asylum.

But asylum often isn’t the real objective: Those who manage to pass through the initial screening are often released into the U.S. This is made worse by various loopholes such as the Flores settlement and the Trafficking Victims Protection Reauthorization Act, which require unaccompanied children and adults with children to be released.

The result is that many “asylum seekers” will simply disappear, many not even bothering to apply for asylum after being released.

Congress should have closed this dangerous pathway for the illegal immigration of children years ago, but instead, asylum claims and the illegal immigration of children from Central America has ballooned. The U.S. currently has an asylum backlog of over 786,000 pending cases, which serves neither U.S. interests nor those of asylum-seekers with legitimate claims.

So, the administration searched its existing legal authority for ways to stop this phenomenon and found a provision of the Immigration and Nationality Act that allows the government to return aliens to Mexico while they await their immigration court hearing.

By ending catch and release and replacing it with “catch and return,” Homeland Security is ending one of the major incentives driving illegal immigration.

As the administration pursues this protocol, Mexico has said it will provide humanitarian visas, work authorizations, and other protections to those waiting in Mexico. This partnership with Mexico is a critical piece of the solution and one that the Trump administration should be commended for reaching.

This action also closely follows the recommendations of Heritage Foundation analysts for fixing the broken immigration system. Heritage research has recommended that Congress adjust the asylum process to move asylum processing to consulates in Mexico. This way, the U.S. does not have to detain asylum-seekers and none are released into the U.S. until they have proven their asylum claims are valid.

And on this note, Congress still should close these loopholes and fix the asylum system. This order will likely be challenged in the courts, and the only sure way to lastingly reform our broken asylum system is with legislation. Congress must do its job if the U.S. is ever going to really fix the problems in its immigration system.

In the meantime, the new asylum policy is welcome news.

COMMENTARY BY

David Inserra

David Inserra specializes in cyber and homeland security policy, including protection of critical infrastructure, as policy analyst in The Heritage Foundation’s Allison Center for Foreign Policy Studies. Read his research. Twitter: @dr_inserra.

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EDITORS NOTE: This column with images by The Daily Signal is republished with permission. Daily Signal photo: Kevin Dietsch/CNP/AdMedia/Newscom.

California and Los Angeles County to Remove 1.5 Million Inactive Voters from Voter Rolls

January 4, 2019/in Courts & Law, Elections, Featured, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by Judicial Watch

Good news for the voters in California and across the country.

We have signed a settlement agreement with the State of California and the County of Los Angeles under which they will begin the process of removing from their voter registration rolls as many as 1.5 million inactive registered names that may be invalid.

These removals are required by the National Voter Registration Act (NVRA), a federal law requiring the removal of inactive registrations from the voter rolls after two general federal elections (encompassing from 2 to 4 years). Inactive voter registrations belong, for the most part, to voters who have moved to another county or state or have passed away.

Los Angeles County has over 10 million residents, more than the populations of 41 of the 50 United States. California is America’s largest state, with almost 40 million residents.

We filed a 2017 federal lawsuit to force the cleanup of voter rolls (Judicial Watch, Inc., et al. v. Dean C. Logan, et al. (No. 2:17-cv-08948)). We sued on our own behalf and on behalf of Wolfgang Kupka, Rhue Guyant, Jerry Griffin, and Delores M. Mars, who are lawfully registered voters in Los Angeles County. We were joined by Election Integrity Project California, Inc., a public interest group that has long been involved in monitoring California’s voter rolls.

In our lawsuit, we alleged:

Los Angeles County has more voter registrations on its voter rolls than it has citizens who are old enough to register. Specifically, according to data provided to and published by the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, Los Angeles County has a registration rate of 112 percent of its adult citizen population.
The entire State of California has a registration rate of about 101 percent of its age-eligible citizenry.
Eleven of California’s 58 counties have registration rates exceeding 100 percent of the age-eligible citizenry.

The lawsuit confirmed that Los Angeles County has on its rolls more than 1.5 million potentially ineligible voters. This means that more than one out of every five LA County registrations likely belongs to a voter who has moved or is deceased. We noted: “Los Angeles County has the highest number of inactive registrations of any single county in the country.”

Our lawsuit also uncovered that neither the State of California nor Los Angeles County had been removing inactive voters from the voter registration rolls for the past 20 years. The Supreme Court affirmed last year in Husted v. A. Philip Randolph Inst., 138 S. Ct. 1833 (2018) that the NVRA “makes this removal mandatory.”

The new settlement agreement, filed with U.S. District Court Judge Manuel L. Real, requires all of the 1.5 million potentially ineligible registrants to be notified and asked to respond. If there is no response, those names are to be removed as required by the NVRA. California Secretary of State Padilla also agrees to update the State’s online NVRA manual to make clear that ineligible names must be removed and to notify each California county that they are obligated to do this. This should lead to cleaner voter rolls statewide.

Prior to this settlement agreement, we estimated that based on comparisons of national census data to voter-roll information, there were 3.5 million more names on various county voter rolls than there were citizens of voting age. This settlement could cut this number in half.

Judicial Watch Attorney Robert Popper is the director of our Election Integrity Project and led our legal team in this litigation. We were assisted in this case by Charles H. Bell Jr., of Bell, McAndrews & Hiltachk, LLP; and H. Christopher Coates of Law Office of H. Christopher Coates.

This is only the third statewide settlement achieved by private plaintiffs under the NVRA – and we were the plaintiff in each of those cases. The other statewide settlements are with Ohio (in 2014) and with Kentucky (2018), which agreed to a court-ordered consent decree.

You can take pride in knowing that we are the national leader in enforcing the list maintenance provisions of the NVRA. In addition to settlement agreements with Ohio and a win in Kentucky, we have filed a successful NVRA lawsuit against Indiana, causing it to voluntarily clean up its voting rolls, and we have an ongoing lawsuit with the State of Maryland.

We helped the State of Ohio successfully defend their settlement agreement before the Supreme Court. In North Carolina, we supported implementation of the state’s election integrity reform laws, filing amicus briefs in the Supreme Court in March 2017. And, in April 2018, we filed an amicus brief in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in support of Alabama’s voter ID law. In Georgia, we filed an amicus brief in support of Secretary Brian Kemp’s list maintenance process against a lawsuit by left-wing groups. We won when the Supreme Court ruled in Ohio’s favor.

This settlement vindicates our groundbreaking lawsuits to clean up state voter rolls to help ensure cleaner elections. We are thrilled with this historic settlement, which will set a nationwide precedent to ensure that states take reasonable steps to ensure that dead and other ineligible voters are removed from the rolls.

EDITORS NOTE: This column by Judicial Watch, with video and images, is republished with permission.

It Didn’t Have To Be A Wall Of Separation.

January 1, 2019/in Courts & Law, Politics, Regulation, Religion/by Dr. Julio Gonzalez

In our prior installments of “Sunday Thoughts,” we saw a few examples of authoritarian opinions by the courts that have been used to support the leftist contention that the “wall of separation between church and state” ought to be insurmountable.  But alternative conclusions to those expressed in Jefferson’s letter to the Danbury Baptist Church exist; ones that could just as easily have been adopted by the court.

Chief Justice John Marshall, the most prolific jurist in American jurisprudence wrote, “The American population. . . is entirely Christian, and with us, Christianity and religion are identified. It would be strange indeed, if with such a people, our institution did not presuppose Christianity.”  This phrase, delivered in ex parte fashion, just like Jefferson’s, and delivered by one of the great participants in the nation’s creation could have very easily employed by the various Supreme Courts to support a more Christian-based interpretation of the First Amendment’s establishment clause.

Justice Joseph Story, one of the early members of the Supreme Court and amongst its strongest strict-constructionists said, “My own private judgment has long been (and every day’s experience more and more confirms me in it) that government can not long exist without an alliance with religion to some extent; and that Christianity is indispensable to the true interests and solid foundations of free government.”

And then, there is John Adams, our nation’s second president, a member of the Constitutional Convention and signer of the Declaration of Independence who famously wrote, “Statesmen my dear Sir, may plan and speculate for Liberty, but it is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand. . . The only foundation of a free Constitution, is pure Virtue, and if this cannot be inspired into our People, in a great Measure, than they have it now, they may change their Rulers, and the forms of Government, but they will not obtain a lasting Liberty.  (suspension points included by Adams)

Based on these authoritative precedents, courts could have easily crafted phrases vastly different from “a wall of separation of church and states” to guide their rulings.  With equal intellectual credibility, they could have said, “American governance presupposes Christianity” (based on Marshall); “Christianity stands as indispensable to the true interests and solid foundations of a free government” (based on Story); and “no lasting liberty can exist without moral and religious virtue” (based on Adams).  Had they done so, America would be a much different nation, one where children still prayed, or stood silently and respectfully while others did, and adults publicly and comfortably revered the many blessings mercifully given to them by their Creator.

The fact that twentieth century jurists did not select these equally valid, but pro-religion guidelines reveal their secularist agenda, an agenda that has sought ready refuge in the chambers of our nation’s courts.  If our aim is truly to restore our nation’s moral standing, if we want to buttress families and faith advocates, then it is fundamentally important that we remove that bastion of safety from the secularist and force them to defend their views in the public square and within the legislative branches of government. As we have previously written, a legislative override provision in our Constitution is the only way to rid secularism of its asylum.

EDITORS NOTE: This column originally appeared in The Federalist Pages. The featured photo is by Tom Archer on Unsplash.

PITFALLS OF THE VISA WAIVER PROGRAM: A serious threat to U.S. national security and public safety.

December 31, 2018/in Immigration, National Security, Policy, Politics, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by Michael Cutler

Immigration is a major factor in ever so many of the issues confronting America and Americans, but all too frequently the media neglects to identify or acknowledge the nexus between those issues and immigration. Consequently, many folks fail to recognize just how significant and pervasive the immigration issue is in their lives and why failures of the immigration system have the potential to profoundly impact them and our nation.

On December 23, 2018 the CBS News program, 60 Minutes aired a report, Inside The Corruption Allegations Plaguing Malta.

At first glance, it would be hard to imagine that Malta’s alleged corruption could have relevance to the immigration issue or that Americans should be concerned about the alleged corruption in Malta. Malta is a small, indeed, tiny nation located on an archipelago in the central Mediterranean between Sicily and the North African coast with a population of fewer than a half-million citizens (460,297 in 2017 according to Eurostat).

However, diminutive as it might be, Malta presents a serious threat to U.S. national security and public safety because of an ill-conceived program known as the Visa Waiver Program that was first implemented as a pilot program by the Reagan administration.

Over the years this program became a permanent program and the number of countries that participate in this program, which enables the citizens of participating countries to enter the United States as tourists for up to 90 days. Malta is one of those countries that participates in the Visa Waiver Program.

Here is the relevant excerpt from the 60 Minutes report:

Perhaps in that same entrepreneurial spirit, the government (of Malta) has launched a program, some call it a scheme, to sell passports to the world’s super-rich. Have a spare million? You too could buy Maltese citizenship, and as this promotional video shows, the European Union passport that comes with it.
Promotional Video: As citizens of Malta, successful applicants can enjoy visa-free access to approximately 170 countries.
Jon Wertheim: Who’s buying these passports?
Manuel Delia: Russian tycoons, Chinese tycoons, Saudi tycoons, Nigerian tycoons.
For Manuel Delia, an online journalist and longtime critic of the current government, the program, estimated to have brought in almost a billion dollars, is essentially a Trojan horse, allowing those with dubious aims to breach Europe’s borders.
Jon Wertheim: Why would they want a Maltese passport?
Manuel Delia: Because they want to go in the rest of the world, hiding where they’re really from. Maltese passports give them not only free movement for themselves through European airports, but it gives their money, their capital free movement throughout Europe.
And free movement to the United States.
Jon Wertheim: American airport, you’ve got that Maltese passport validated by the EU, you go right through passport control?
Manuel Delia: Visa-free. Absolutely. So, that’s a big reason to have it.
Applicants to the “golden passport program,” as it’s come to be known, are supposed to show that they’ve established residence in Malta for at least a year, but when we checked the listed address for a Russian tycoon it led us here. To a modest suburb and rundown basement apartment that had been divided in two.
Jon Wertheim: let’s just call this what it is. This– this is a fraud.

It is important to note that on September 11, 2001 citizens of the 26 countries that participated in the Visa Waiver Program were able to enter the United States without first applying for and receiving visas.

During the administrations of George W. Bush and Barack Obama the number of participating Countries climbed to 38 participating countries, in large measures spurred by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s Discover America Partnership that blithely ignored that the first paragraph of the preface of the official report known as 9/11 and Terrorist Travel that was prepared by the federal agents and attorneys assigned to the 9/11 Commission stated:

It is perhaps obvious to state that terrorists cannot plan and carry out attacks in the United States if they are unable to enter the country. Yet prior to September 11, while there were efforts to enhance border security, no agency of the U.S. government thought of border security as a tool in the counterterrorism arsenal. Indeed, even after 19 hijackers demonstrated the relative ease of obtaining a U.S. visa and gaining admission into the United States, border security still is not considered a cornerstone of national security policy. We believe, for reasons we discuss in the following pages, that it must be made one.

In 2015, I wrote an article, Inviting Catastrophe Through Our Ports Of Entry, that focused on the deadly threats to the homeland posed by the legal immigration system, including the Visa Waiver Program. My article included the six major ways that a properly administered visa program could help enhance national security, public safety and even airline safety that are all lost to the Visa Waiver Program:

1. The Visa adjudications process screens airline passengers flying to the United States, enhancing aviation safety.
2. The inspections process conducted at ports of entry by CBP is supposed to be conducted in one minute or less. The visa requirement requires aliens to be vetted overseas helping to provide more integrity to this process.
3. The application for a nonimmigrant (temporary) visa contains roughly 40 questions and biometric identifiers that could provide invaluable information to law enforcement officials should that alien become the target of a criminal or terrorist investigation. The information could provide intelligence as well as investigative leads.
4. False statements on the application for a visa constitute “visa fraud.” The maximum penalty for visa fraud starts out at 10 years in jail and go to a maximum of 25 years in prison when the visa fraud is done to support terrorism.
5. The charge of visa fraud can enable law enforcement authorities to take a “bad guy” off the street without tipping their hand to the other members of a criminal conspiracy or terrorism conspiracy that the individual arrested was being arrested for his involvement in terrorism.
6. Even when an application for a visa is denied, the application and the biometric identifiers provided in conjunction with that application remain available for law enforcement and intelligence personnel to review to seek to glean intelligence from that application.

My article went on to discuss additional materials contained in that staff report, specifically Chapter 3, Terrorist Entry and Embedding Tactics, 1993 to 2001 which included this excerpt:

The relative ease with which the hijackers obtained visas and entered the United States underscores the importance of travel to their terrorist operations. In this section we explore the evolution of terrorist travel tactics and organization. We begin with terrorist plots in the 1990s and conclude with the 9/11 attack.
3.1 The Redbook
Since the early 1970s numerous terrorist organizations have provided their operatives with a wide variety of spurious documents. After showing their spurious passports and papers at border control, these terrorist operatives have proceeded to hijack airplanes, plant bombs, and carry out assassinations. These terrorist acts, however, can be stopped. . . .
If we all screen travelers and check their passports, as past experience proves, terrorist will lose their ability to travel undetected, and international terrorism will come one step closer to being stopped!
—The Redbook (1992)
By definition, transnational terrorist groups need to travel to commit terrorist acts. Indeed, without freedom of movement terrorists cannot plan, conduct surveillance, hold meetings, train for their mission, or execute an attack. Terrorists rely on forged passports and fake visas to move around the world unimpeded and undetected. This has been known for more than three decades. It is difficult today to judge with certainty what else was known about terrorist travel methods in the 1970s and 1980s. However, the existence of a CIA training video and manual is evidence of an understanding that terrorists relied on certain tactics when they traveled and that they could be stopped by alert individuals who recognized the use of those tactics.

Finally, consider these paragraphs:

The Redbook focused on five types of travel document fraud committed by terrorists: forgeries of some 35 national passports and the travel cachets of at least 45 countries; forged documents terrorists purchased from commercial vendors; stolen blank passports, which terrorists could fill in with biographical data of their choosing; information on genuine altered passports that had been photo-substituted or given an extended validity date (discussed in greater detail in the Passport Examination Manual, a companion to the Redbook); and genuine, unaltered passports, most likely procured with the knowledge of the issuing country or through a corrupt government official.
Thus, abuse of the immigration system and a lack of interior immigration enforcement were unwittingly working together to support terrorist activity. It would remain largely unknown, since no agency of the United States government analyzed terrorist travel patterns until after 9/11. This lack of attention meant that critical opportunities to disrupt terrorist travel and, therefore, deadly terrorist operations were missed.

Nevertheless, the Visa Waiver Program continues and Malta remains a member of this supposedly elite “club” of countries that participates in the Visa Waiver Program while sanctuary cities harbor and shield illegal aliens from detection, and the Democrats call for open borders and an end to interior enforcement of our immigration laws.

In the 1976 thriller “Marathon Man” Dustin Hoffman’s character is tortured and repeatedly asked

“Is it safe?”

That is the question we should be asking our “leaders” where the current state of border security and immigration law enforcement are concerned.

Those leaders betray their oaths of office and their obligations to bow to the special interest groups who see in America’s borders an impediment to their wealth and not the first and last line of defense of our nation and our citizens that they truly are.

Of course, the answer to that question is clearly self-evident.

EDITORS NOTE: This column with images originally appeared in FrontPage Magazine. It is republished with permission.

E-Verify and Anti-Sanctuary Bills Filed In Florida

December 23, 2018/in Courts & Law, Culture War, Immigration, Must Read, Policy, Politics, Regulation/by Federation for American Immigration Reform

In the space of roughly a week, bills have been filed in the Florida Legislature to require mandatory E-Verify by all employers, and to prohibit sanctuary policies by local governments and state agencies. The Sunshine State’s lawmakers look to be gearing up for a productive session when they convene on March 5, and these bills could be considered during interim committee weeks already scheduled for January and February.

E-Verify

On December 11, Representative Thad Altman (R-Melbourne/Indialantic) filed House Bill (HB) 89. The bill would:

Require all private employers to register with E-Verify and use it to verify that all new employees hired after January 1, 2020, are legally authorized to work in the US;
Require all state agencies, local governments, public contractors and public subcontractors to register with E-Verify and use it to verify that all new employees hired after July 1, 2019, are legally authorized to work in the US;
Create an enforcement process for private employers, run by the Department of Economic Opportunity (DEO), where employers lose their business licenses for employing illegal aliens;
Require DEO to report illegal alien employees to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE);
Ban public contracts with contractors or subcontractors who don’t use E-Verify; and
Terminate existing public contracts if contractors or subcontractors employ illegal aliens or don’t use E-Verify.

“I think it’s fair and not onerous to businesses that want to follow the law … We are sending a clear message that if you want to do business in this state, you must employ legal U.S. citizens and residents,” Altman said of his bill. Unsurprisingly, the far-left Miami New Times almost immediately ran an op-ed condemning the bill, the E-Verify program generally, and Altman personally as anti-immigrant and racist.

But not to be dissuaded by such rhetoric, a week later, on December 18, Senator Aaron Bean (R-Jacksonville/Fernandina Beach) filed Senate Bill (SB) 164, which with very minor differences mirrors Altman’s bill.

A proposal to put mandatory E-Verify on this past November’s Florida ballot had failed in the Constitutional Revision Commission (CRC) back in April after a coalition of business groups bombarded the CRC at the last minute with unfounded horror stories about how it would impose huge costs and destroy the state’s economy. This was despite the fact that E-Verify is free to use and almost always instantaneous, and also despite that, according to FAIR’s research, in 12 out of 15 states that adopted it since 2008, the unemployment decreased more than did the national rate.

But on the campaign trail in July, now-Governor-Elect Ron DeSantis (R) tweeted, “Cheap foreign labor is not an excuse to let lawlessness prevail in the sunshine state. We want people who come LEGALLY!” He can be expected to strongly support the new bills, so with backing in both chambers and the Governor’s Mansion, prospects for E-Verify in Florida appear good.

Anti-Sanctuary

On December 18, Sen. Joe Gruters (R-Sarasota) filed SB 168. The following day, Sen. Bean filed SB 170. The bills are identical and would:

Define and ban sanctuary policies, both by local governments and state agencies such as public universities;
Require local governments and state agencies to honor immigration detainers;
Require local governments and state agencies to review available information on the immigration status of people they’ve arrested, and report them to ICE if the information indicates they’re an illegal alien;
Create a duty to report sanctuary policies by officers and employees of local governments and state agencies, and give them whistleblower protection against adverse employment action if they report their own employer;
Allow anyone to file a complaint about a sanctuary policy;
Create an investigation and enforcement process for both local state attorney’s offices and the attorney general, resulting in fines for sanctuary governments and agencies and a potential for removal from office for “sanctuary policymakers”; and
Allow people to sue a local government or state agency for damages if an illegal alien injures or kills someone due to a sanctuary policy.

A companion bill has not yet been filed in the House but can probably be expected shortly.

Sen. Bean sponsored SB 308 in the Senate last year to do the same thing. Sen. Gruters is a longstanding supporter of Governor-Elect DeSantis, “has relationships with … [DeSantis’] team,” and is being backed by DeSantis to be the next Chairman of the Republican Party of Florida.

As a candidate, then-Congressman DeSantis promised, “[a]s governor, this is what I am going to do: there are going to be no sanctuary cities in Florida,” and even committed himself to removing public officials from office for supporting sanctuary policies “if I’m able to do so.” These bills are the means to fulfilling those promises, so they are likely to garner his strong support.

Anti-sanctuary bills have now passed the House by wide margins three years in a row, only to die in the Senate without so much as a full committee hearing. But with such clear and strong support so far in advance of session, there is good reason to expect 2019 may be the year that changes.

COLUMN BY

David Jaroslav

Trump, Money and the Fed

December 23, 2018/in Culture War, Economy, Policy, Politics, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by John Michael Chambers

So who are these guys in this picture?Legendary author of The Creature from Jekyll Island”, researcher and film producer G. Edward Griffin, my good friend and founder of PollMole Dr.Richard Davis, (R.I.P.), Mad Max Mullen and oh a yeah, a much younger me, John Michael Chambers. This post, Trump, Money and the Fed lay the important groundwork and understanding for what President Trump has begun to take on.

Back in 2009 as the founder of the Save America Foundation a 501(c)(4), we held a large convention in Tampa, Florida sounding the alarm bells in our desperate individual and collective attempts to save America. fast forward. Donald Trump has blasted onto the scene. Some say he cannot handle the storm when in fact he is the storm. This really is a very important article. Please read on and share this post. People need to know to secure and expand our supportive base for President Trump for what lies ahead by end of Q1 2019, will be challenging.

The following has been excerpted and somewhat revised and edited from a book I wrote in 2014-2015 while in Belize and mostly in Thailand titled, “Misconceptions and Course Corrections”. Since Trump has begun taking on the Fed (Federal Reserve), I thought it would be good to gain a better understanding of what money actually is, who the Fed is, how they came to be and what it is that they have done. This is about to come to be challenged and changed forever beginning after in 2019. I will be writing about this historical event as it unfolds. It has already begun. But for those that need a better understanding of the Fed, I have resurrected this chapter. Here goes…

What is Money?

What is money? Money is an idea backed by confidence,which is used as a means of exchange, rather than say barter. Today we live in a debt based monetary system. Some say that money is the root of all evil; I disagree with this. There was a period of time many a moon ago where money did not exist, yet there was plenty of evil around. My best guess (I could be wrong), is that people who misuse life’s energy are the root of all evil, not money. Money is not evil and abundance is wonderful; there are evil people.

In this world it seems we have assigned power to money. It’s a pretty big agreement since everyone seems to be trying to acquire the stuff. So to that end, money is power in the sense that it is the means by which one can acquire tangible items, own things, have things,influence people and agendas, as well as affording perhaps better healthcare,better food, some things luxury, and all things essential to survival. Money allows one to participate in many things as well as to travel. The person with money can also take advantage of various opportunities to explore many new aspects and experiences in life than a person without money. Having said all that, money is still not the measure of the man (woman).

Money can’t buy contentment or happiness or love, but it can ease the experience of life and living if handled properly.There is nothing wrong with acquiring great wealth. It’s what you do with this great wealth that helps determine the character of the person. Some people, as we know, become very greedy and misuse the power that comes with having lots ofmoney, and this can be seen in many ways. Others put that money to good use,such as a quality home, education for children and young adults, trust accountsfor posterity, and many are philanthropic or charitable.

History, Digging in a Little Deeper

Presently and since 1944, the U.S. dollar is the world’s reserve currency, and this, coupled with a great change that is currently taking place which will affect every person on the planet (which we will discuss a bit further on), is why we must understand more about the U.S.dollar and the debt based monetary system.

Many Americans and people throughout the world believe that the Federal Reserve in the United States is part of the Federal government. Nothing could be further from the truth. The Federal Reserve is no more a government agency than Federal Express! Check this video at marker1:09. Even former Fed chairman AlanGreenspan agrees.Freedom to Fascism, in case you missed all those years ago, can be viewed here. An absolute must see.

It is imperative if you want to understand how the money system works that you procure a copy of “The Creature from Jekyll Island,” a second look at the Federal Reserve by the legendary author, researcher, and film producer, Mr. G.Edward Griffin. This book will outline in great detail the formation of the Federal Reserve System.Below is a summary.

1910

In November of 1910, on Jekyll Island,Georgia, seven men who represented directly or indirectly one fourth of the world’s wealth, met in secrecy for nine days. It is there, at this location,where the Charter of the Federal Reserve was drafted. The Federal Reserve is a privately held for profit corporation,a banking cartel. The main objective for a corporation is to make a profit, and they do indeed make a profit. Let’s take a brief stroll through history as we look into the formation of the Federal Reserve and the results of the Federal Reserve Charter that was enacted into law by the U.S. Congress in1913.

J.P. Morgan, Senator Nelson Aldrich, Piatt Andrews, Frank Vanderlip, Henry P. Davison, Paul Warburg, and Charles D.Norton arranged for hundreds of millions of dollars to be poured into the campaigns of the most powerful members of Congress. In 1912, they backed an obscure Princeton professor for President of the United States, Woodrow Wilson.He later became President.

The Coup’ of 1913

Late on Tuesday December 23, 1913, just days after the Christmas recess had commenced, a secret Senate vote was“arranged” with only a few Senators remaining in Washington D.C.The act passed with 43 voting “yea” and 25 voting “nay.” 27 did not vote since they had not been notified and had already left town to go home for the Holidays. All had previously expressed their opposition to the act. So on Dec 23, 1913, their plan worked by one of the most cunning manipulations in parliamentary history;Congress passed the Federal Reserve Act of 1913.In its charter, the act clearly states as its main objective: “To provide the action with a safer,more flexible, and more stable monetary and financial system.”

This means of a fractional reserve debt system controlled by a private for Profit Corporation has not worked out too well for the American people and thus the world to a greater or lesser extent.I mean we do not have a more stable monetary financial system at all.What we have is a debt based monetary system no longer backed by gold or silver. We have a currency that will soon be replaced as the world’s reserve currency. The Federal debt alone is $19 trillion dollars. It is mathematically impossible topay off this debt which will in a couple of short years will soon reach $22trillion and will make the U.S. situation look like Greece on steroids! Therefore “a safer, more flexible and more stable monetary and financial system” as set forth in this charter clearly has not worked out so well. And so by this means of fractional reserve banking,governments may secretly and unobserved, confiscate the wealth of the people and not one man in a million will detect the theft. This system of fractional reserve banking and the printing of all this fiat (now digital fiat) currency,is purely inflationary and the U.S. dollar has lost over 95% of its purchasing power since its inception.

1944 The Bretton Wooods Agreement

Another critical factor, which contributed to the rise of power in America, was the Bretton Woods agreement of1944. The Bretton Woods system of monetary management established the rules for commercial and financial relations among the world’s major industrial states in the mid-20th century. The BrettonWoods system was the first example of a fully negotiated monetary order intended to govern monetary relations among independent nation-states. It is through the Breton Woods agreement that the U.S. dollar became the world’s “reserve currency.

Preparing to rebuild the international economic system as World War II was still raging, 730 delegates from all 44 Allied nations gathered at the Mount Washington Hotel in Bretton Woods,New Hampshire, United States, for the United Nations Monetary and Financial Conference.

The delegates deliberated upon and signed the Bretton Woods Agreements during the first three weeks of July 1944. Setting up a system of rules, institutions, and procedures to regulate the international monetary system, the planners at the Bretton Woods Agreements during the first three weeks of July 1944. Setting up a system of rules, institutions, and procedures to regulate the international monetary system, the planners at Bretton Woods established the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD),which today is part of the World BankGroup. These organizations became operational in 1945 after a sufficient number of countries had ratified the agreement.

The chief features of the Bretton Woods system were an obligation for each country to adopt a monetary policy that maintained the exchange rate by tying its currency to the U.S. dollar and the ability of the IMF to bridge temporary payments. Simply stated, the power centers of the world met in Bretton Woods, New Hampshire and it was decided that international trade and settlements such as the purchase of oil for example, must be exchanged with the U.S. dollars. This meant that the central banks of these nations were required to have sufficient U.S. dollars.

As a result, the increasing global demand for the U.S. dollar continued and based on supply and demand this kept the dollar strong. Another reason for this decision in 1944 is due to the fact that up until that point in history, America’s currency was kept under control without runaway inflation as the U.S. dollar was backed by gold and silver and the trust and confidence in the US.Dollar was strong. Confidence is the critical underlying factor that keeps the financial structures and systems in place.Including confidence in the currency itself. In fact it can be stated that money is nothing more than an idea backed by confidence and a means to easily facilitate trade and keep order. What happens when this confidence is shattered?

1971 – The Nixon Shock

On August 15, 1971, the United States unilaterally terminated convertibility of the dollar to gold. As a result, the Bretton Woods system officially ended and the dollar became fully ‘fiat currency,’backed by nothing but the promise of the federal government. This action, referred to as the Nixon shock, created the situation in which the United States dollar became a reserve currency used by many states. From the1970’s and forward, Americans enjoyed what is considered to be a lavish lifestyle in comparison to most countries around the world.

Lesson from the Dustbin of History

“Give me control of a nation’s money supply, and I care not who makes its laws.”– Amschel Rothschild, Mayer and German banker. He was the founder of the Rothschild family international banking dynasty.

“The best way to destroy the capitalist system is to debauch its currency.” “The best way to crush the bourgeoisie (middle class), Is to grind between the millstones of taxation and inflation.” – Vladimir Lenin, Chairman of Russia’s Council of peoples Commissars 1917-1924

“By a continuing process of inflation,government can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens.” –John MaynardKeynes, Fabian Socialist and father of Keynesian Economics

“The dirty little secret is that both houses of Congress are irrelevant. Both congress is now being run by Alan Greenspan (Ben Bernanke today) and the Federal Reserve and America’s foreign policy is now being run by the IMF. When the President decides to go to war he no longer needs a declaration of war Money in our current system is nothing more than debt, and we have lots of it!.“ – Robert Reich 22nd U.S.labor Secretary

“The government should create, issue, and circulate all the currency and credit needed to satisfy the spending power of the government and the buying power of the consumers. The privilege of creating and issuing money is not only prerogative of government, but it is the government’s greatest .” –President Abraham Lincoln

“If the American people ever allow private banks to control the issuance of their currency, first by inflation and then by deflation, the banks and corporations that will grow up around them will deprive the people of all their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered.” –President Thomas Jefferson

“Inflation has now been institutionalized at a fairly constant 5% per year. This has been determined to be the optimum level for generating the most causing public alarm. A 5% devaluation applies, not only to the money earned this year, but to all that is left over from previous years. At the end of the first year, a dollar is worth 95 cents.At the end of the second year, the 95cents is reduced again by 5%, leaving its worth at 90 cents, and so on. By the time a person has worked 20 years, the government will have confiscated 64%of every dollar he saved over those years. By the time he has worked 45 years,the hidden tax will be 90%. The government will take virtually everything a person saves over a lifetime.” – American Author, Researcher and Filmmaker, G. Edward Griffin

“I am a most unhappy man. I have unwittingly ruined my country. A great industrial nation is controlled by its system of credit. Our system of credit is concentrated. The growth of the nation, therefore, and all our activities are hands of a few men. We have come to be one of the worst ruled, one of the most completely controlled and dominated Governments in the civilized world no longer a Government by free opinion, no longer a Government by conviction and the vote of the majority, but a Government by the opinion and duress of a small group of dominant men.” – President Woodrow Wilson, aftersigning the Federal Reserve into existence

Money in our current system is nothing more than debt, and we have lots of it! Weeks away from http://usadebtclock.com/$22Trillion and that’s just the Federal debt alone!

Concluding Remarks

So the Federal Reserve, a private for profit baking cartel,comes to the table with no “skin in the game.” They unleash what is now digital fiat currency with no tangible backing or accountability into the banking system and this is then leveraged by Fractional Reserve Banking. The banks then can loan out these dollars (with a multiplier of 10 or 100 or more times the amount than they received from the Fed.), to other banks, to governments, corporations, and individuals and charge an interest rate. They typically own title for example, as in a mortgage or car loan. And when they decide to“reap the harvest,” they seize the assets when the consumer is unable to survive in a jobless inflationary climate (which they helped to create). They also fund both sides of all wars for huge profits as the innocent little children are laid in shallow graves and billed as nothing more than “collateraldamage”.

This subject of Fractional Reserve Banking is also defined in great detail in a simple to understand format in the DVD titled“ Money as Debt”

This Federal Reserve Act of 1913,although passed by congress, was in contradiction to the United States Constitution which in Article 1, Section 8, Phrase5. It clearly states the following regarding money that “ have power to coin money, regulate the Value thereof, and of foreign Coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures.“ This power was given to a private bank called the Federal Reserve in 1913. Congressman Charles A. Lindbergh Sr. back then said – “This Federal Reserve Act establishes the most gigantic trust on earth. When President Wilson signs this bill, the invisible government of the monetary power will be legalized. This is the worst legislative crime of the ages that has been perpetuated by this banking and currency bill. From now on, all depressions will be scientifically created.”

And since the inception of the Federal Reserve, the U.S. Dollar has lost over 97% of its purchasing power. I believe the U.S. Dollar may experience a false sense of stability for the short to near term as the Euro and other currencies falter and fail, but once the U.S. dollar loses its world reserve currency status (at least as we know it) as the global financial reset is now upon us just a few short months from now (It is December23, 2018 as I write today), Trump will make his move against the Fed. Watch for my article on this in the coming days.

2019 and Beyond

It is because of this power and control which money affords that you will come to realize why governments and banks around the world are moving towards a cashless society. That’s right, a cashless society. If governments can control your money they can control your life. There are more and more laws, rules, and regulations in the U.S., Europe,and many places around the world restricting the amount of cash you can withdraw from your own accounts. Banks are now beginning to charge negative interest to hold your money.

Pulling cash from your bank or excessive international bank wires in any amount over a few thousand dollars, the banks can report you to the government as a “suspicious person,” potential money launderer, or terrorist, and a series of such withdrawals can put you in violation of criminal structuring/money laundering regulations, with huge fines and jail sentences. The ultimate goal of the global socialists is to eliminate all cash on a global basis and force everyone on the planet into the computerized electronic banking/credit card system. Cryptocurrencies have gained much momentum (albeit very volatile).

This will eventually lead to the National ID card, then the Global ID card, and then the chip through injection. This is the ultimate control and this is the direction the world is presently heading.I recommend getting a copy of the McAlvany Intelligence Advisor report May 2015 titled “War on Cash”, orread more about this in my archived articles section under “financial”.

So What to Do About All This?

There will be quite the bloodbath in the stock, bond and real estate markets. In fact, this has just begun. Support President Trump. Stay the course. Awaken others. Turn off the fake news. It is poisoning your mind, thoughts and feeling world and making you miserable. Follow Q-There is a plan.Stay informed. Sign up to receive my weekly articles to your in box via this FREE RSS Feed.

Surveys indicate that people no longer trust the media for news, politicians for the truth, or that Wall Street has Main Street’s best interest in mind. The John Michael Chambers Report informs and empowers individuals in a changing world. Sign up. Be informed and empowered. Stay connected.

As to your personal finances? The time for action is now. While so many others will continue to operate in the deceitful and flawed modalities being advised by an industry they no longer trust, critical thinkers see the dangers and opportunities. But you must act. A great change is on the near term horizon. The time for action is now. You can survive and thrive through the battle that has just begun for global currency supremacy. Got questions? I can help. Contact me.

Video Commentary

Beginning 2019, I will be providing a short weekly commentary video reflecting on the state of affairs as they unfold weekly. There will be unprecedented events occurring in 2019 and 2020. We will make sense of the madness as Trump takes on the Fed and the Deep State. The first video will be launched here on January 6, 2019 and each Sunday thereafter. Until then, have a Merry Christmas!
See you soon!

Net Neutrality Repeal: The Internet Apocalypse That Never Came

December 23, 2018/in Culture War, Must Read, Policy, Politics, Regulation/by Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)

Whether the naysayers are willing to admit it or not, less government regulation results in better outcomes for both companies and consumers.

This month marks one year since the FCC repealed the controversial net neutrality rules, officially killing the internet as we knew it forever—or so net neutrality proponents would have liked you to believe. But as we take a closer look at what has actually happened in the year since the rules have been abolished, we find that the (often hysterical) rhetoric doesn’t reflect reality at all. On the contrary, the internet has actually improved since regulations were relaxed.

Hysteria Ensued

The internet has been a household commodity available for public use since August 6, 1991. However, according to net neutrality’s most fervent supporters, the internet didn’t truly take off until February 2015, when the FCC passed and adopted the new rules.

In both the lead up to the vote on net neutrality and its subsequent repeal, mass hysteria ensued in which many people were honestly convinced that without government intervention, all the online services we enjoyed would cease to exist. In an article called “How the FCC’s Killing of Net Neutrality Will Ruin the Internet Forever,” the magazine GQ even went so far as to say:

Think of everything that you’ve ever loved about the Internet. That website that gave you all of the Grand Theft Auto: Vice City cheat codes. YouTube videos of animals being friends. The illegal music you downloaded on Napster or Kazaa. The legal music you’ve streamed on Spotify. …The movies and TV shows you’ve binged on Netflix and Amazon and Hulu. The dating site that helped you find the person you’re now married to. All of these things are thanks to net neutrality.

It’s rather shocking that this sentiment was so widely accepted as truth considering that every single one of the listed examples existed prior to net neutrality. In fact, the only reason the internet was able to become such an integral part of our lives was that it was left virtually untouched by regulatory forces. And since spontaneous order was allowed to occur, internet users were blessed with unbridled innovation that brought forth a robust variety of services, which GQ prefers to attribute to government action that wasn’t taken until nearly 24 years after internet use became the norm.

These small details were, of course, ignored by much of the public, and the panic continued. The ACLU joined the frenzy, telling readers that without net neutrality we “are at risk of falling victim to the profit-seeking whims of powerful telecommunications giants.”

We now realize that these dire warnings actually came to fruition, reminding us just how absurd the push for net neutrality rules was in the first place.

What Is Net Neutrality?

Net neutrality sought to define the internet as a public utility, putting it in the same category as water, electric, and telephone services. Doing so left it open to regulatory oversight, specifically when it came to connection speeds and the price providers were allowed to charge consumers for its use.

The new rules mandated that each internet service provider was henceforth forced to provide equal connection speeds to all websites, regardless of content. Prior to its passage, providers had the freedom to offer different connection speeds to users, including the option to pay more for faster speeds on certain websites.

If, for example, Comcast noticed that a majority of its users were streaming content on Netflix, it might offer packages that charge extra for the promise of being able to connect to the site at quicker speeds. In reality, this is just the market responding to consumer demand, but not everyone saw it this way. Others saw it as an abuse of power by “greedy” internet service providers.

Then-President Obama praised net neutrality, saying:

For almost a century, our law has recognized that companies who connect you to the world have special obligations not to exploit the monopoly they enjoy over access in and out of your home or business. It is common sense that the same philosophy should guide any service that is based on the transmission of information—whether a phone call, or a packet of data.

Unfortunately for those who think net neutrality rules are a good idea, the railroad industry serves as a perfect example of just how hazardous declaring consumer goods “public utilities” can truly be.

Like the internet, railroads changed the world by connecting us with people, ideas, and goods to which we did not previously have access. In 1887, the Interstate Commerce Commission (ICC) was created specifically to regulate railroads in order to “protect” consumers from falling prey to the “profit-seeking whims” of the railroad industry. Much like today, the concern was that powerful railroad companies would arbitrarily increase rates or partner with other companies in a way that harmed consumers, just like the aforementioned Comcast/Netflix example. And as a result, the ICC made the railroads public utilities. But the ICC ended up doing more harm than good.

As Robert J. Samuelson of the Washington Post writes:

The railroads needed ICC approval for almost everything: rates, mergers, abandonments of little-used branch lines. Shippers opposed changes that might increase costs. Railroads struggled to meet new competition from trucks and barges. In 1970, the massive Penn Central railroad — serving the Northeast — went bankrupt and was ultimately taken over by the government. Others could have followed.

Without the freedom to innovate and provide the best possible service to consumers without having to first jump through a series of regulatory hoops, the railroad industry’s hands were tied, and progress was stagnant.

In 1980, the negative impacts became too much for even the government to ignore, and the ICC was abolished. Shortly thereafter, the industry recovered. Not only did freight rates and overall costs decrease, but railroads were also finally able to make a profit again—something that became a struggle in the wake of the ICC’s creation. In other words, the repeal of regulatory oversight resulted in a win-win situation for all parties involved. And it appears the same is true of the repeal of net neutrality.

You’ve Got to Admit It’s Getting Better

If we were to believe the hype being spread last year, by now the sky should have fallen and the internet made obsolete or exorbitantly expensive, as Banksy implied, from the lack of oversight. But that has not been the case. Instead of costs skyrocketing or connection speeds slowing down, things have actually gotten much better.

According to Recode, internet speeds actually have increased nearly 40 percent since net neutrality was abolished. Uninhibited by government regulations, service providers have been free to expand their fiber optic networks, allowing for greater speed:

Finally some good news: The internet is getting faster, especially fixed broadband internet. Broadband download speeds in the U.S. rose 35.8 percent and upload speeds are up 22 percent from last year, according to internet speed-test company Ookla in its latest U.S. broadband report.

You’d think this news would have inspired a slew of “oops, we were wrong” articles to be written by those who worked so diligently to spread fear in the lead-up to the repeal. But this has not been the case.

Wired, which published many articles in favor of net neutrality, did publish an article called “A Year without Net Neutrality: No Big Changes (Yet),” where it admits that none of the scary predictions actually came true. But it still clung to its paradoxical belief that an internet free from regulation is not truly free.

Whether the naysayers are willing to admit it or not, less government regulation results in better outcomes for both companies and consumers. So the next time we are told that a lack of regulation is going to be the end of life as we know it, we would do well to remember what really happened when the government finally freed the internet from its grasp.

COLUMN BY

Brittany Hunter

Brittany is a senior writer for the Foundation for Economic Education. Additionally, she is a co-host of Beltway Banthas, a podcast that combines Star Wars and politics. Brittany believes that the most effective way to promote individual liberty and free-market economics is by telling timely stories that highlight timeless principles.

EDITORS NOTE: This column by FEE with images is published with permission.

What Life Inside Venezuela’s Crumbling Authoritarian Regime Looks Like

December 21, 2018/in Culture War, Economy, Policy, Politics, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)

The citizens rely on the government for their livelihood, but they have little control over the government that supposedly represents them.

Sixty-five miles southwest of Venezuela’s capital Caracas lies Cagua. It’s a small city with just over 100,000 people—who live each day in survival mode. The 2018 Global Peace Index ranks Venezuela 143 out of 163 countries. Violent crime, homicide, and violent demonstrations are ranked at 5/5, making it one of the least peaceful and most dangerous countries on earth.

The Failure of Price Controls

The monthly pay that most Venezuelan workers bring home is 4,500 bolivars, or around 11 U.S. dollars, making shopping for groceries in the socialist country nearly impossible. And since the idea of buying a house or a car is simply out of the question, young people don’t have the ability to become independent from their parents.

Oswaldo, a young man who lives in Cagua, graduated with a degree from a university in Venezuela in 2016. In an interview, Oswaldo described his life in Venezuela and the struggles he faces each day as a young man striving to succeed inside a failing country.

In addition to the problem of finding food and basic medicine, Oswaldo explained that citizens are often plagued with faults in electricity, water, and gasoline services. Many places in the country have to ration water consumption, but much of their drinking water in cities like Valencia is contaminated, anyway. The government has kept the gasoline prices so low that shortages are becoming the norm. This misallocation of resources is inevitable when gas prices are less than one penny for a gallon—sometimes dropping even lower than that.

A Different Kind of Refugee Crisis

While there is nothing explicitly prohibiting him from leaving, Oswaldo said the sketchy documentation system and price of flights deter him from even attempting to flee. The country, too, lacks the adequate resources to document who leaves and returns, posing potential problems for any Venezuelan citizen who wished to return. Nevertheless, more than 3 million Venezuelans have fled their homeland since 2015—numbers comparable to Syria and Afghanistan’s emigration tally.

Movement inside the country isn’t much different. Public transportation, once a system commonly used by Venezuelans, has become a rarity. Bus owners often cannot cover the cost of the spare parts to fix their vehicles, forcing citizens to find new ways to travel.

It’s not out of the ordinary to see cargo trucks transporting people across the country or pickup trucks packed with individuals, transporting as many people as possible. The police and military have been known to take things into their own hands, charging fines and collecting bribes from innocent travelers in order to make their own ends meet.

Corruption at Every Level

Oswaldo says that getting rich in Venezuela is possible, but the only way to do so is by contracting with the government. Venezuela’s former national treasurer from 2007 to 2011 even admitted recently that he received more than $1 billion in bribes while in office. According to Oswaldo, if a business has a good relationship with the crony government, they can make a small fortune. But businesses that rely strictly on customer demand for their products rarely do.

The citizens rely on the government for their livelihood, but they have little control over the government that supposedly represents them. After an election, for instance, it’s not uncommon for the opposition leader to be imprisoned. Votes are often illegitimate and the corrupt electoral body names the government-backed candidate the winner.

For these reasons, political participation has diminished considerably since early 2017, Oswaldo says. Opposition parties don’t want to call out their rulers and risk being singled out by those in power. The cycle of corruption and control of people’s lives is never-ending.

Freedom Has an Uphill Battle

Organizations promoting freedom aren’t currently being persecuted because the government doesn’t feel threatened, Oswaldo says. But that could change at any moment. “All Venezuelans are at risk in our country,” he said. “Those most exposed are those who do political activism since their work puts the stability of the government at risk.”

Oswaldo is fighting for freedom in his home country—freedom that’s so often taken for granted in the United States. But Venezuelans are starting to get used to the lack of liberty and the never-ending struggle for their survival in Venezuela, which could very well lead to the regime remaining in power for some time. There are few people inside the country willing to fight against socialism, having seen the horrors of patriots fighting against a dangerous regime. But Oswaldo is holding out for the day that people have more control over their government and citizens can finally have the opportunity to find better lives.

It’s an uphill battle, Oswaldo says, but it’s a battle worth the fight.

COLUMN BY

Jake Grant

Jake Grant is the Outreach Director for the Coalition to Reduce Spending and a contributor to Young Voices. The views expressed are his own and do not necessarily represent the views of his employer. Follow him on Twitter @thejakegrant.

RELATED ARTICLES:

The Ongoing Implosion of Venezuelan Statism

Venezuelan Gangs Are Using Food to Recruit Kids

Socialism, Not Corruption, to Blame for Venezuela’s Oil Production Drop

Venezuela’s Socialist Nightmare: A Prediction on Where It Ends

EDITORS NOTE: This column by FEE with images is republished with permission. Image by Jamez42 [CC BY-SA 4.0], from Wikimedia Commons

Trump Administration scuttles Obama-era WOTUS “Waters of the United States” rule

December 19, 2018/in Culture War, Energy, Environment, Policy, Politics, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow

In a significant victory for farmers, ranchers, and other landowners, the Trump administration December 11 pulled the plug on an Obama-era regulatory scheme that would have subjected millions of acres of private land to federal zoning.

By rolling back Obama’s 2015 “Waters of the United States” (WOTUS) rule, the administration has put an end to the biggest power grab in the 48-year history of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The Obama-era rule was sold as an effort to “clarify” the federal government’s jurisdiction over bodies of water under the 1972 Clean Water Act (CWA), which granted EPA and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers jurisdiction over “navigable waters of the United States.”

Over the years, questions arose over whether Washington also had jurisdiction over bodies of water, which may not be navigable themselves, but which are adjacent to, or have some connection to, navigable waters. The Supreme Court’s 2006 Rapanos v. United States decision, failed to resolve the issue, with Justice Anthony Kennedy infamously opining that federal jurisdiction extended to such waters provided they had a “significant nexus” to navigable waters.

The Power Grab

What constituted a “significant nexus” was anyone guess, leaving landowners, municipalities, businesses, and just about everyone else completely in the dark. Eager to take advantage of a murky situation and beef up EPA’s enforcement authority, the Obama administration in 2015 proposed “clarifying” the issue by greatly expanding EPA’s jurisdiction to include ditches, ponds, groundwater, and even “ephemeral” waters (those that form only after rainfall). The rule would have forced farmers, ranchers, and other landowners to obtain permits from EPA if they wanted to make any modifications to their property. A host or organizations sued EPA, and a federal judge ordered a stay on the rule in 24 states.

Having vowed to kill the rule during the 2016 presidential campaign, President Trump issued an executive order in February 2017 directing EPA to carry out the “elimination of this very destructive and horrible rule.” Trump’s first EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt, tried to delay implementation of the Obama WOTUS rule, but a U.S. district court in South Carolina invalidated the delay in August 2018.

Now, the Trump administration has its own plan for untangling the jurisdictional mess that has surrounded the regulation of waterways for decades.

What is and What is not Subject to Federal Regulation

“Our proposal would replace the Obama EPA’s 2015 definition with one that respects the limits of the Clean Water Act and provides states and landowners the certainty they need to manage their natural resources and grow local economies,” said Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler in a statement. “For the first time, we are defining the difference between federally protected waterways and state protected waterways.”

Under the Trump proposal, the federal government, for the first time, has divided navigable waters into six categories:

traditional navigable waters (rivers, bays, the Great Lakes, etc.);
waterways connected to navigable waters, including tributaries;
certain navigable ditches used for commercial shipping, such as the Erie Canal;
lakes and ponds that contribute to navigable waterways;
impoundments of jurisdictional waterways; and
wetlands adjacent to navigable waterways through “direct subsurface connection.”

Trump’s WOTUS proposal also clearly states what EPA and the Corps of Engineers will not regulate. These include “features that only include water during or in response to rainfall (e.g., ephemeral features); groundwater; many ditches, including most roadside or farm ditches; prior converted cropland; storm water control features; and waste treatment systems.”

Acting EPA Administrator Wheeler, who has been nominated for the top job at the agency by President Trump, points out that most bodies of water not covered under the new proposal are still subject to state protection. “We don’t need to have the dual protection and the dual requirements and permits at both state and federal levels,” he said on the Hugh Hewitt radio show (Washington Times, Dec. 12).

The difference between the Obama and Trump approaches can not be understated. A 2015 American Farm Bureau Federation study, for example, found that 99% of Pennsylvania would be subject to the Obama WOTUS rule.

“This new rule will empower farmers and ranchers to comply with the law, protect our water resources, and productively work their land without having to hire and army of lawyers and consultants,” said farm bureau president Zippy Duvall (Washington Times, Dec. 12).

The fight is far from over, with environmental groups expected to bring suit against EPA and the Corps.

There will be a 60-day public comment period that will last until mid-February 2019.

COLUMN BY

Bonner Cohen, Ph. D.

Bonner R. Cohen, Ph. D., is a senior policy analyst with CFACT.

EDITORS NOTE: This CFACT column with images is republished with permission.

VIDEO: Parkland Father Andrew Pollack Is Leading the Charge for Safer Schools

December 18, 2018/in Courts & Law, Education, Gun Rights, Policy, Politics, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by NRA Institute for Legislative Action

Andrew Pollack: “Numerous Entities Failed My Daughter.” 10 Months After Parkland.

Father of Meadow Pollack, Andrew Pollack, joins Grant to discuss his efforts to secure schools and protect our children 10 months after the Parkland massacre.

EDITORS NOTE: This column with video is republished with permission. The featured image is from Andrew Pollack – Parkland Parent @meadowmovement Facebook page.

Why a Judge Ruled Obamacare Unconstitutional, and What Policymakers Should Do Next

December 17, 2018/in Culture War, Healthcare, Must Read, Policy, Regulation, Taxes, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by The Daily Signal

A judge has declared Obamacare unconstitutional—but the case is far from over.

U.S. District Judge Reed O’Connor, a George W. Bush appointee, granted a motion for summary judgement in favor of 20 states led by Texas that had filed a lawsuit seeking to strike down the Affordable Care Act on Friday.

Now that O’Connor has ruled, the losing side is sure to appeal to the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, and ultimately the Supreme Court.

However, as the case continues to wind its way through the legal system, it is imperative that policymakers pursue real health care reform. Obamacare isn’t working for too many American families and individuals slammed with high premiums and few choices. Rather than looking for ways to keep Obamacare in place amid these legal challenges, lawmakers should pursue real solutions.

The Judge’s Reasoning in Striking Down Obamacare

As part of the last year’s Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, Congress repealed the financial penalty associated with failing to comply with the individual mandate, effective in 2019.

In 2012, in NFIB v. Sebelius, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the individual mandate by the narrowest of margins when Chief Justice John Roberts, providing the deciding vote, devised a novel theory construing the penalty associated with violating the individual mandate as a tax that Congress has the power to levy under the Constitution.

Texas argues that once the penalty is reduced to $0, it can no longer be considered a legitimate tax, and that therefore the individual mandate would no longer have a constitutional leg to stand on.

Moreover, Texas argues, in upholding the individual mandate, the Supreme Court appeared to rely on the argument that Congress considered the individual mandate to be a central—indeed, indispensable—component of Obamacare that is not “severable” from the rest of its provisions, and that without it, the rest of the law should be invalidated.

A group of 17 states led by California are defending the law, arguing that even a tax of $0 is still a tax, and that it was never Congress’ intent to get rid of the rest of Obamacare when it repealed the financial penalty associated with the individual mandates as part of last year’s tax bill.

In granting the plaintiffs’ motion, O’Connor stated, showing his agreement with Texas’ argument:

The [Tax Cuts and Jobs Act] eliminated that [individual mandate] tax. The Supreme Court’s reasoning in NFIB—buttressed by other binding precedent and plain text—thus compels the conclusion that the individual mandate may no longer be upheld under the tax power. And because the individual mandate continues to mandate the purchase of health insurance, it remains unsustainable under the Interstate Commerce Clause—as the Supreme Court already held.

Finally, Congress stated many times unequivocally—through enacted text signed by the president—that the individual mandate is “essential” to the ACA. And this essentiality, the [Affordable Care Act’s] text makes clear, means the mandate must work ‘together with the other provisions’ for the Act to function as intended. All nine justices to review the [Affordable Care Act] acknowledged this text and Congress’s manifest intent to establish the individual mandate as the [Affordable Care Act’s] ‘essential’ provision. The current and previous administrations have recognized that, too. Because rewriting the ACA without its ‘essential’ feature is beyond the power of an Article III court, the Court thus adheres to Congress’s textually expressed intent and binding Supreme Court precedent to find the individual mandate is inseverable from the [Affordable Care Act’s] remaining provisions.

What Should Be Next

But the legal fight aside, we need a better health care solution than Obamacare.

One of Obamacare’s core conceits was that what (allegedly) worked in Massachusetts would also work on a national scale. That hasn’t borne out.

Instead, Obamacare led to years of increasing costs and decreasing choices. Premiums doubled in the first four years of the program. Millions lost the coverage they used to have. Americans found it harder to pick the right plan and doctor, as health plan choices declined and provider networks narrowed. Frustrated providers are drowning in red tape and increasingly feeling burned out. Meanwhile, taxpayers are on the hook for the money needed to paper over Obamacare’s flawed structure.

Those who seem to benefit most from Obamacare are big insurance companies that embraced the law and receive a steady stream of taxpayer subsidies and politicians who made endless promises to reform Obamacare but failed to deliver.

Real Solutions for Pre-Existing Conditions

Regardless of these facts, expect many in Congress to call for immediate restoration of Obamacare in the name of protecting the sick and people with pre-existing conditions.

Some on the left claim Congress must protect Obamacare because only Obamacare allows Americans with pre-existing conditions to get coverage. That’s an irresponsible, false dilemma and Congress should reject it.

There are steps that states can take right now to ensure people with pre-existing conditions are protected, even if Obamacare ultimately goes away.

Congress should let states review their health care regulations and pursue innovative ways to make coverage more affordable and accessible to Americans—regardless of their income or medical status. Every state legislature is about to go into session in early 2019, so this is both a desirable and possible approach.

Empower the States

Congress does have a role to play in helping families and individuals get the quality private coverage they want, and helping health care professionals meet their needs. Conservatives have a proposal to achieve this: the Health Care Choices Proposal, which undoes Obamacare’s damage by letting states innovate.

Under Obamacare, insurance companies receive taxpayer subsidies dollar for dollar as they raise prices. This proposal does away with that flawed spending scheme.

Instead, it would convert existing Obamacare spending into a grant that states would use to ensure chronically-ill patients have access to the health coverage of their choice. Greater flexibility and resources to the states means that all Americans, even those who are chronically sick, would have access to more health plans at better prices.

The Health Care Choices Proposal would lower premiums up to an estimated 32 percent and ensure that everyone can access a quality private coverage arrangement of their choice.

And everyone who gets a subsidy could decide what coverage to use it for, including private or employer-sponsored health insurance.

Individuals and families would be able to decide what coverage arrangement works for them, and decide whether to work directly with a doctor for primary care and buy catastrophic coverage, or get a plan that covers more costs up front. The proposal would be especially helpful to the working poor, who may want to have private coverage but lack the means to pay for it.

For most people, this is a much better option than what happens today: being pushed onto a government-controlled plan a bureaucrat thinks is best for them.

This proposal would build on a promising, emerging trend already happening in the states. When states have been given even a little bit of freedom from Obamacare’s mandates, they’ve been able to lower premiums using tools that ensure that the sick still retain access to care.

Politicians have long promised to replace Obamacare with solutions that help everyone. It’s time to deliver—no matter which way the courts go.

COMMENTARY BY

Marie Fishpaw

Marie Fishpaw is director of domestic policy studies at The Heritage Foundation’s Institute for Family, Community, and Opportunity.

John G. Malcolm

John G. Malcolm is the vice president of the Institute for Constitutional Government and director of the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies, overseeing The Heritage Foundation’s work to increase understanding of the Constitution and the rule of law. Read his research. Twitter: @malcolm_john.

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EDITORS NOTE: This column with images is republished with permission. Photo: Paul Hennessy/Polaris/Newscom.

Sign Petition to Uphold the Scientific Definition of Sex in Federal Law and Policy

December 16, 2018/in Culture War, Featured, Healthcare, News, Policy, Politics, Regulation, Science/by Dr. Rich Swier

A petition has been created to define gender as immutable and binary. The on-line form of this document may be signed by anyone in agreement with its contents.

You may sign the petition here.

Full text of the petition:

December 4, 2018

Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker, U.S. Department of Justice

Secretary Alex Azar, U.S. Department of Health and Human Services

Secretary Betsy DeVos, U.S. Department of Education

Dear Mr. Whitaker, Secretary Azar, and Secretary DeVos,

We, the undersigned medical, legal, and policy organizations and individuals applaud the Trump Administration’s intention to uphold the scientific definition of sex in federal law and policy, such that girls and women will regain their sex-based legal protections, and the human rights of all will be preserved.

On February 22, 2017, the Department of Justice, in conjunction with the Department of Education, sent a Dear Colleague letter rescinding unprecedented “guidance” the previous administration had issued to expand the definition of sex in Title IX to include gender identity. On October 4, 2017, the Department of Justice issued a Memorandum regarding Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 to clarify that gender identity is not legally included in the definition of sex, pointing out that the ordinary meaning of “sex” is biologically based. The New York Times article on Oct. 21, 2018 regarding a leaked memo from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) leads us to believe that HHS is continuing this trend and leading an effort to have a uniform, scientifically based, definition of sex across the various agencies. We write to applaud and encourage this effort.

Not only is an expanded definition of sex unscientific, but it has also proven harmful, as we detail below.

According to the Institute of Medicine, sex is a narrowly defined biological term. Sex is a biological trait that defines living things as male and female based on the complement of sex chromosomes and the presence of reproductive organs.[i] The American Psychiatric Association defines sex similarly as the “biological indication of male and female (understood in the context of reproductive capacity), such as sex chromosomes, gonads, sex hormones, and nonambiguous internal and external genitalia.” [ii]

Human sex is a binary, biologically determined, and immutable trait from conception forward.The norm for human design is to be conceived either male or female. Human sexuality is binary by design for the obvious purpose of the reproduction of our species. This principle is self-evident. “XY” and “XX” are genetic markers of male and female, respectively, and are found in every cell of the human body including the brain. Sex is established at conception, declares itself in utero, and is acknowledged at birth.

Sex differences are real and consequential. The Institute of Medicine recognized the singular importance of sex to health and the field of medicine nearly two decades ago. Sex chromosomes impart innate differences between men and women in literally every cell of our bodies.[i] There are over 6500 shared genes that are expressed differently in human males and females.[iii]These differences impact our brains, organ systems, propensity for developing certain diseases, differential responses to drugs, toxins and pain, differential cognitive and emotional processes, behavior and more.[i]

Individuals who identify as transgender deserve optimal medical treatment which is influenced by biological sex. In reality, an individual who identifies as transgender remains either a biological male or female. This objective biological fact has bearing upon their health even beyond sex-specific illnesses.

Diseases that affect both sexes often have different frequencies, presentations and responses to treatments in males and females; therefore, different preventative, diagnostic, and treatment approaches may be required for males and females. Doctors and scientists unconstrained by transgender politics know full well that were we to treat patients in accordance with a discordant gender identity, instead of their real sex, the results could be catastrophic.[i] For example, the heart medication, Betapace, is three times more likely to cause a lethal heart rhythm called torsades de pointes in women than it is in men.[iv]

Sex is not a spectrum; congenital disorders are not additional sexes. The final result of sex development in humans is unambiguously male or female over 99.98 percent of the time. “Intersex” is a term that encompasses a variety of congenital disorders of sex development that result in sex ambiguity and/or a mismatch between sex chromosomes and appearance.These disorders occur in less than 0.02 percent of all births.[v], [vi] A spectrum is defined as “a continuous distribution” or a distribution in which “no specific outcome is more likely than others.” [vi] Clearly, the existence of rare disorders of sex development do not constitute a sex spectrum.

As evolutionary biologist Dr. Colin Wright of University of California, Santa Barbara recently penned, “The claim that classifying people’s sex upon anatomy and genetics ‘has no basis in science’ has itself no basis in reality, as any method exhibiting a predictive accuracy of over 99.98 percent would place it among the most precise methods in all the life sciences.” [vi]

The use of congenital disorders to advance the myth that there are a multitude of human sexes which exist on a spectrum is ideological and political activism, not science.

Gender identity is not an immutable trait found anywhere in the body, brain, or DNA.[vii] Gender identity is an awareness of, and comfort level with, one’s physical body. Gender identity may be factually correct or factually incorrect, and, unlike sex, may change. Children with gender dysphoria, for example, will come to identify with their biological sex in 61-98 percent of cases by adulthood.[viii] There is also a rise in the number of adults who seek surgery to reverse their past sex reassignment surgeries.[ix]

The claim that upholding the scientific definition of sex will increase suicide among transgender identifying people is false. Individuals who identify as transgender may have mistaken beliefs about themselves and their bodies. They suffer real emotional distress and are at a higher risk for mental illness, including suicidal ideation, as compared to the general population. Social and medical “gender transition and affirmation,” however, is not proven to decrease suicide rates.

The rate of suicide attempts among transgender identified individuals has been estimated to be almost 9 times that of the general population.[x] Sweden is a transgender affirming country that has adopted laws and policies conflating sex and gender-identity. Nevertheless, a study conducted by researchers there in 2011 found the rate of completed suicides among surgically “gender-affirmed” adults to be 19 times greater than that of the general population.[xi] Clearly, transgender affirmation does not prevent suicide, and may paradoxically worsen the emotional health of these individuals in the long term.

Upholding the scientific definition of sex in law and policy protects everyone’s right to privacy, protection and equal treatment, especially that of girls and women. It is impossible to protect girls’ and women’s rights unless the law defines them solely according to objective biological reality and not according to subjective gender identity. When gender identity is erroneously treated as equivalent to sex in law and policy, then a male may at any time demand the rights, protections and access afforded to females. This automatically strips girls and women of their right to sex-based privacy, protection, and a proper playing field to compete equally. Transgender ideology thereby transforms all that was once reserved for females alone into another male prerogative.

Boys, for example, are literally running away with state level championship titles in girls’ sports because they identify as transgender.[xii] How is it just to award honors – which could include athletic college scholarships – reserved for female high school athletes, to boys who are innately biologically bigger, stronger and faster?

Of greater concern, gender identity has been used to allow biological males in spaces previously reserved for women. As a result, girls and women are suffering sexual assaults at the hands of biological men in women’s shelters,[xiii], [xiv] women’s prisons [xv] and even elementary school girls’ bathrooms.[xvi]

As the biological men and women they are, transgender-identified individuals possess the same human dignity and right to the equal protection of the law as all Americans. For the law to respect the human dignity of all Americans, including those who identify as transgender, it must be based on biological truth; not on ideological falsehoods at the expense of children and women’s rights, health and well-being.

For all of these reasons, it is with unwavering conviction that we urge the Trump Administration to uphold the original scientific meaning and legal intent of the term “sex” in federal law and policy.

Please note that university and hospital affiliations are for identification only and do not imply institutional endorsement.

Sincerely,

Michelle Cretella, M.D.
Executive Director, American College of Pediatricians

Quentin Van Meter, MD
President, American College of Pediatricians
Pediatric Endocrinologist

Donna Harrison, M.D.
Executive Director, American Association of Pro-life Obstetricians and Gynecologists

Peter Morrow, M.D.
President, Catholic Medical Association

Stephen M. Krason, Ph.D.
President, Society of Catholic Social Scientists

Paul McHugh, M.D.
University Distinguished Service Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins Medical School and the former psychiatrist in chief at Johns Hopkins Hospital

Michael K. Laidlaw, M.D.
Endocrinologist and member of gdworkinggroup.org

Craig Stump M.D., Ph.D., FACE
Endocrinologist, University of Arizona College of Medicine

Paul W. Hruz M.D., Ph.D.
Pediatric Endocrinologist, Physician-Scientist, Associate Professor of Pediatrics, Associate Professor of Cellular Biology & Physiology

Angela Lanfranchi M.D. FACS

Clinical Assistant Professor of Surgery Rutgers-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School

Susan J Bradley, M.D., FRCP(C)

Professor Emerita, University of Toronto

J. Michael Bailey, Ph.D.
Professor of Psychology Northwestern University

Marie T. Hilliard, MS, MA, JCL, Ph.D., RN
The National Catholic Bioethics Center

Mary Lou Singleton, MSN, FPC-BC

Christopher Doyle, LPC
Co-Founder National Task Force for Therapy Equality

David Pickup, LMFT
Co-Founder National Task Force for Therapy Equality

Laura Haynes, Ph.D., California Licensed Psychologist
USA Representative, International Federation for Therapeutic and Counseling Choice (IFTCC.org)

Michael Farris, J.D.
President, CEO, & General Counsel
Alliance Defending Freedom

Matthew D. Staver, Esq.
Founder and President, Liberty Council

Charles LiMandri, J.D.
Founder and President, Freedom of Conscience Defense Fund

Robert J. Muise, Esq.
Co-Founder, American Freedom Law Center

Gerard V. Bradley, J.D.
Professor of Law University of Notre Dame

Steven D. Smith, J.D.
Warren Distinguished Professor of Law University of San Diego

Maimon Schwarzschild, J.D.
Professor of Law University of San Diego

Larry Alexander, LL.B.
Warren Distinguished Professor of Law University of San Diego

Tony Perkins
President
Family Research Council

Frank Cannon
President
American Principles Project

Matthew J. Franck, Ph.D.
Senior Fellow, Witherspoon Institute

Sharon Slater
President, Family Watch International

Austin Ruse
President, Center for Family and Human Rights

Allan C. Carlson, Ph.D., Editor,
The Natural Family: An International Journal of Research and Policy

Patrick Lee, Ph.D.
McAleer Professor of Bioethics
Center for Bioethics, Franciscan University of Steubenville

Christopher Wolfe, Ph.D.
Distinguished Affiliate Professor, University of Dallas
President, American Public Philosophy Institute

Rev. D. Paul Sullins, Ph.D.
Research Professor of Sociology and Director, Leo Institute for Catholic Social Research, The Catholic University of America

Robert G Kennedy, Ph.D.
Department of Catholic Studies University of St. Thomas

Jennifer Roback Morse, Ph.D.
Founder and President, The Ruth Institute

References

[i] Exploring the Biological Contributions to Human Health: Does Sex Matter? In: Wizemann TM, editor; Pardue ML, editor. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press; 2001.

[ii] American Psychiatric Association, Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders: DSM-5 (Washington, D.C.: American Psychiatric Publishing, 2013), p. 829.

[iii] “Researchers Identify 6,500 Genes That Are Expressed Differently in Men and Women,” Weizmann Wonder Wander (Weizmann Institute of Science), May 3, 2017, online at: https://wis-wander.weizmann.ac.il/life-sciences/researchers-identify-6500-genes-are-expressed-differently-men-and-women; reporting on: Moran Gershoni and Shmuel Pietrokovski, “The landscape of sex-differential transcriptome and its consequent selection in human adults,” BMC Biology 15:7 (2017), which says, “[T]here are over 6500 protein-coding genes with significant SDE [sex-differential expression] in at least one tissue.” Online at: https://bmcbiol.biomedcentral.com/track/pdf/10.1186/s12915-017-0352-z.

[iv] Lehmann MH, et. al. Circulation. 1996 Nov 15;94(10):2535-41. Abstract available online at: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/8921798

[v] Sax L. “How Common is Intersex? A Response to Anne Fausto-Sterling,” Journal of Sex Research 39:3 (August 2002), pp. 174-178. Online at:

http://www.leonardsax.com/how-common-is-intersex-a-response-to-anne-fausto-sterling/.

[vi] Wright C. “The New Evolution Deniers.” Quillette. Nov 30, 2018. Available online at: https://quillette.com/2018/11/30/the-new-evolution…

[vii] McHugh PR, Mayer LS. “Sexuality and Gender findings from the Biological,Psychological and Social Sciences.” The New Atlantis. Fall 2016. Available onlineat: https://www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/introd…

[viii] Ristori J, Steensma TD. Gender dysphoria in childhood. Int Rev Psychiatry. 2016;28(1):13-20.

[ix] Borreli L. “Transgender Surgery: Regret Rates Highest In Male to Female Reassignment Operations.” Newsweek. October 3, 2017. Available online at: https://www.newsweek.com/transgender-women-transge…

[x] Haas AP, Rodgers PL & Herman J. “Suicide Attempts Among Transgender and Gender Non-Conforming Adults: Findings of the National Transgender Discrimination Survey,” Williams Institute, UCLA School of Law, January 2014. Available online at: http://williamsinstitute.law.ucla.edu

[xi] Cecilia Dhejne, et al., “Long-Term Follow-Up of Transsexual Persons Undergoing Sex Reassignment Surgery: Cohort Study in Sweden,” PLoS ONE 6 (2011); online at: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0016885.

[xii] Mayer R. “Transgender Track Athlete Wins CT State Championship, Debate Ensues.” June 13, 2018. CBS News. Available online at: https://newyork.cbslocal.com/2018/06/13/transgende…

[xiii]Hoggard, Corin. “Shelter forced women to shower with person who identified as a transgender woman and sexually harassed them, lawsuit says.”ABC 30 Action News, Fresno, CA, May 23, 2018; online at: https://abc30.com/homeless-women-harassed-in-showe…

[xiv] Sam Pazzano, “Predator who claimed to be transgender declared dangerous offender,” Toronto Sun, February 26, 2014; online at: http://www.torontosun.com/2014/02/26/predator-who-claimed-to-be-transgender-declared-dangerous-offender.

[xv] Janet Fife-Yeomans, “Sex change killer Maddison Hall to be free as a bird,” Daily Telegraph, April 2, 2010; online at: https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/sex-change-killer-to-be-free-as-a-bird/news-story/b1fecc9a9a4717607de6e980980e0ba5?sv=e95663cd723e2f8ffa0caa3329e03203.

[xvi] Alliance Defending Freedom, “US opens investigation into sexual assault of minor child in Georgia, violation of Title IX,” Press Release (October 3, 2018); online at:

http://www.adfmedia.org/News/PRDetail/99205?search=1.

EDITORS NOTE: The featured photo is by Ken Treloar on Unsplash.

How School Districts Weaponize Child Protection Services Against Uncooperative Parents

December 13, 2018/in Culture War, Education, Policy, Politics, Regulation, Waste, Fraud and Abuse/by Foundation for Economic Education (FEE)

Parents are increasingly required to obey, to conform to a school’s demands even if they believe such orders may not be appropriate for their child.

Schooling is adept at rooting out individuality and enforcing compliance. In his book, Understanding Power, Noam Chomsky writes:

“In fact, the whole educational and professional training system is a very elaborate filter, which just weeds out people who are too independent, and who think for themselves, and who don’t know how to be submissive, and so on—because they’re dysfunctional to the institutions.”

This filtering process begins very early in a child’s schooling as conformity is rewarded and divergence is punished.

Public Schooling Breeds Obedience

Most of us played this game as schoolchildren. We know the rules. The kids who raise their hands, color in the lines, and obey succeed; the kids who challenge the rules struggle. The problem now is that the rules are extending beyond the classroom. Parents are increasingly required to obey, to conform to a school’s demands even if they believe such orders may not be appropriate for their child.

In my advocacy work with homeschooling families across the country, I frequently hear stories from parents who decided to homeschool their kids because schools were pressuring them to comply with various special education plans, push medications onto their children, or submit to other restrictive procedures they felt were not in their child’s best interest. Even more heartbreaking is the growing trend of school officials to unleash child protective services (CPS) on parents, homeschooling or not, who refuse to give in to a district’s demands.

Weaponizing Child Protective Services

An investigative report by The Hechinger Report and HuffPost released last month revealed that schools are increasingly using child protective services as a “weapon” against parents. It said:

Fed up with what they see as obstinate parents who don’t agree to special education services for their child, or disruptive kids who make learning difficult, schools sometimes use the threat of a child-protection investigation to strong-arm parents into complying with the school’s wishes or transferring their children to a new school. That approach is not only improper, but it can be devastating for families, even if the allegations are ultimately determined to be unfounded.

More troubling, these threats disproportionately target low-income and minority parents. According to the report:

Such families also have fewer resources to fight back. When a family in a wealthy Brooklyn neighborhood learned roughly two years ago that their child’s school had initiated an ACS [New York’s Administration for Children’s Services] investigation against them, they sued the city education department. Parents from lower-income, majority-black and Latino neighborhoods, few of whom can afford that option, say such investigations can be a regular, even expected, part of parenting.

Bullying Proactive Parents

For parents who are unhappy with their child’s school and decide to withdraw their child for homeschooling, threats of child welfare investigations can sometimes turn to actions. In Massachusetts, a mother is reportedly suing the Worcester Public Schools after school officials called the Massachusetts Department of Children and Families (DCF) on her for alleged “educational neglect,” even though the mother contends that she dutifully filed her homeschooling paperwork for her eight-year-old son mid-year.

Brian Huskie, a public high school teacher and homeschooling father in New York, noted a similar case last year with one of his students. Dissatisfied with the school, the parents decided to remove their daughter from the district, filed the necessary homeschooling paperwork, and were soon visited by child protective services investigating “educational neglect.” Huskie detailed the incident on his blog, writing that the school made a “decision to weaponize CPS against a district family.”

Parents who push back against a district’s recommendations or withdraw their child from school for homeschooling are often trying to ensure their child’s well-being. Questioning various educational interventions and examining alternatives is part of a parent’s job. They should be praised for looking out for their child’s best interest, while schools should be sure that they use social services agencies to investigate serious claims of abuse and neglect—not just district snubs or paperwork quarrels.

If, as Chomsky suggests, many of us have grown acquiescent to power due to our successful schooling, it can be hard to challenge authority. It can be even harder when that authority is strengthened by government force and when we may not have the resources to fight it.

Supporting parents, broadening their education choices, and respecting their decisions are crucial steps in liberating families and curbing government coercion.

COLUMN BY

Kerry McDonald

Kerry McDonald (@kerry_edu) has a B.A. in Economics from Bowdoin and an M.Ed. in education policy from Harvard. She lives in Cambridge, Mass. with her husband and four never-been-schooled children. Kerry is the author of the forthcoming book, Unschooled: Raising Curious, Well-Educated Children Outside the Conventional Classroom (Chicago Review Press). Follow her writing at Whole Family Learning.

RELATED VIDEO: Child protection services “Legally Kidnapped.”

EDITORS NOTE: This column with images is republished with permission.