26 APRIL 2018

 

IT IS TIME FOR A BALANCED BUDGET AND DEBT ELIMINATION

 

The Federal Debt adversely affects every state in the union and while every President and Member of Congress (including candidates) proposes a long term solution, the reality is that any plan proposed or implemented will at best only survive to the next Administration or Congressional Term.

 

However, there is a long term solution to balance the budget and eliminate the national debt. That solution is a Constitutional Amendment. Every politician announces their support for the concept of a balanced budget constitutional amendment, but nobody to date has actually put forth a plan that will actually accomplish this objective.

 

The objectives of my plan are –

 

To reduce the budget deficit to ZERO (balanced budget) within 10 years

 

To eliminate the national debt within 40 years.

 

The particulars of my plan are -

 

Requiring Congress to annually fund the United States Government in a single act of the legislature with an absolute fixed date for the enactment thereof.

 

For a time-period of ten years the budget deficient shall be reduced by ten percent annually by restricting the borrowing authority of congress by ten percent per year until which at such time thereof no annual expenditures shall exceed annual revenue actually collected during the previous year thereof. Thereafter, for a time-period of forty years the national debt will be eliminated by one-fortieth (1/40) as the first annual budget expenditure with the remainder thereof allocated to funding the government thereof.

 

The United States Supreme Court will be designated as the Court of a Competent Jurisdiction to conduct Bankruptcy Proceedings in regards to such Constitutional Amendment thereof and authorized to enter such orders in the interest of justice to enforce such Constitutional Amendment thereof.

 

Provided that Congress has failed in a timely manner to enact such annual budget or where such annual budget thereof has failed to comply with the requirements of such Constitutional Amendment thereof, then SCOTUS would enter a Court Order authorizing the government to borrow funds not to exceed such amount as permitted by said Constitutional Amendment thereof, and to appropriate such funds not to exceed such amount as permitted by said Constitutional Amendment thereof to fund the government as the President may deem in the national interest.

 

Thereafter, Congress would be required to annually fund the government in a single Act of the Legislature or a Continuing Resolution with the limitation that expenditures would not exceed annual revenue collected during the previous year as on deposit in the National Treasury and such would be subject to review and enforceable by SCOTUS upon Petition by the President, any Member of Congress, or by SCOTUS Sua Sponte.

 

Benefits of my plan are –

 

A ten year transition to a balanced budget will simultaneously control out of control national debt and minimize hardships across all social-economic entities and individuals.

 

The elimination of the public debt over a forty year time-period will simultaneously stimulate the economy in an exponential manner while minimizing hardships across all social-economic entities and individuals. Likewise, insofar as a large percentage of the national debt is owed to the Social Security Trust Fund, such debt replacement thereof will ensure the solvency of the Social Security Trust Fund, especially so if a constitutional amendment was enacted to prohibit the withdraw of Social Security Trust Fund money for any reason other than to provide Social Security Benefits to Social Security Beneficiaries thereof.

 

 

 

JANUARY 2018

 

Is Liberty and Freedom going up in Smoke and down the Drain?

 

I define Liberty as the right of every person to live their life in any manner that they choose so long as they do not violate the equal rights of someone else. Freedom is the right to make choices, both good and poor choices alike. Just this past week the San Antonio City Council passed an Ordinance that bans retailers from selling tobacco products to Texans who are under 21 years old and imposes a $500 fine upon retailers who violates the Ordinance. While the San Antonio City Council purports to seek health promotion, it actually works in effect to deprive Texans of their Liberty and Freedom.

 

As a Licensed Vocational Nurse and an Emergency Medical Technician I know that tobacco products are detrimental to health and wellness. I also know that intoxicating substances both legal and illegal, and junk food diets, are also detrimental to health and wellness. Disregarding the concept of liberty and the notion of freedom, the Nanny State (Liberal Democrats) in their quest under the guise of “health promotion” to save us from ourselves, they seek to control every aspect of our lives from which they have no limits to their reach and application.

 

New York City is famous for its attempt to ban large soda containers, the big-gulp ban, that thankfully the state courts invalidated at its very inception. Yesterday it was soda, today its tobacco, tomorrow we have yet to see what the Ban-It-Brigade has targeted as unhealthy. But I think by analyzing their past we can predict their future. First we look at the manufacturer and paying particular attention to whom will be identified as the vulnerable and susceptible advertising market. Second we look at the product itself. Candy causes tooth decay and they target children, ban the candy. Cheeseburgers causes obesity and they target fluffy people, ban the burger. Salt causes high blood pressure and they target everyone, oh my, how evil, ban the salt. This can go on and on and on, with no end ever…

 

I don’t smoke or dip or drink alcohol or use any legal or illegal intoxicating substances simply because I don’t want to, not because the government has forbidden me from doing so. In reality it is totally impossible for the government to control any substance that any determined person wants to put inside their body. The prohibition of alcohol in the last century did not work, and our current war on drugs is an abysmal failure. If the government has been unable to control marijuana what makes the Ban-It-Brigade think that the government can control tobacco. Get real...

 

Yes, countless things are unhealthy, but I value my liberty and freedom more than the Nanny State (Liberal Democrats) regulation of my heath. There is also the question of when does a person attain the age of majority and is entitled to all the rights, privileges, responsibility, and accountability, that is inherent in the age of majority, or is the age of majority set arbitrary, which questions whether age of majority laws by design or in effect violate the constitutional right to the equal protection of the law.

 

What is the age of majority? Is it 18 when a person is eligible to vote, to contract, to drive a motor vehicle, to purchase and possess a firearm, to voluntarily join or be involuntarily conscripted into military service, to get married and have children, to be eligible for the death penalty, or is it 21 when a person can purchase and consume alcoholic beverages, or as the times have changed in San Antonio, purchase and possess tobacco products. Should the age of majority be fixed in all rights, privileges, responsibilities, and accountability, at one age, and if yes, what age should the age of majority be, 18, or 19, or 20, or 21.

 

To me it is incomprehensible and defies common sense to hold that a person is not fit to purchase and consume tobacco products or an alcoholic beverage and yet they are deemed fit enough to perform military service, to kill and to be killed in the name of the nation and state, and to purchase and possess a firearm. If a person is too young to smoke a cigarette or drink a beer then they are too young to be entrusted with military weapons of mass-destruction, missiles, bombs, tanks, machine-guns, explosives, riffles, pistols, so on and so forth...

 

If alcohol and tobacco are too dangerous for anyone under 21 years of age, then obviously it is too dangerous for anyone under 21 years of age to vote for the leader of the free world, to drive a motor vehicle, to marry and be entrusted with the care and custody of our most precious resource, societies children. If at 18 years old someone is responsible enough for their own actions that they are subject to the death penalty, then how can they not be responsible enough to smoke a cigarette and drink a beer, or should eligibility for the death penalty be raised to 21 years of age. At what age is the nanny state going to consider someone an adult and then treat them as an adult?

 

Insofar as the United States Constitution has set the age of majority to vote in elections at 18 years of age, then logically the constitutionally fixed age of majority is 18 years of age. Likewise, considering that the age for conscription into military service, the age of consent for marriage and sexual activities, and eligibility for the death penalty has been fixed at 18, then more than sufficient precedent is set to hold that the proper age of majority is 18 years of age. Furthermore, considering that the United States Constitution is the Supreme Law of the Land and the Fourteenth Amendment guarantees the Equal Protection of the Law, then it would seem that laws that restrict any right or privilege based upon being under 21 years of age is facially unconstitutional or unconstitutional as applied to those who are over 18 but younger than 21 years of age. The United States Supreme Court in the case of Wisconsin V. Constantineau (1971) 400 US 433 held that a person has a constitutionally protected liberty interest to purchase alcohol on equal par with other persons in the state.

 

Other things must also be considered, such as enforcement. San Antonio is surrounded and infiltrated with cities from which San Antonio has no jurisdiction to impose its regulatory will upon, and they seem to have no appetite to chew up and spit out liberty and freedom of choice. So any “21-underage” San Antonioan who wants to buy tobacco products need only leave the San Antonio City Limits. As such, the only one who currently will be harmed by the Tobacco Ban is the San Antonio Retailers.

 

But that is only for now. Democrats in Congress and in the Texas Legislature are seeking Nationwide and Statewide 21+ Tobacco Regulation, and when the wind blows in the left direction enough, we can be sure that the San Antonio City Council that is dominated by Nanny State Liberal Democrats will amend the Ordinance to prohibit possession and use, which will transform our young citizens into petty criminals once they reenter the San Antonio City Limits with their tobacco products.

 

We have more than enough criminal problems in San Antonio than to reprioritize police resources to snuff-out the smoke and spit out your dip. Are we really going to see the police citing Texas Adults (18 to 20 year olds) because there is a cigarette butt in the ash tray, keep it real, that’s possession, or is that cigarette butt going to be the probable cause to effect an arrest and a search of their car incident to a lawful arrest. Is the smell of tobacco enough for a magistrate to issue an arrest or search warrant. Make no mistake, where there is a law there will be law enforcement. Let us not forget about Eric Garner in New York City, he died while being arrested for the most serious of all criminal offenses, he sold a loose cigarette. Is someone going to die because they were legal at 18 years old in the State of Texas, but under age 21 in the City of San Antonio to be in possession of tobacco products. Stupid laws result in stupid law enforcement. Take it another step further, if San Antonio actually has no intention to enforce the law, which is exactly what the Ordinance is now insofar as it does not prohibit possession and use, then why enact it in the first place. Stupid is as stupid enacts city ordinances.

 

I remember when I was in the Army and stationed at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, which is on the Tennessee – Kentucky State Line. On State Route 41A at the corner of Stateline Road there are two gas stations on each side of Stateline Road, one on the Kentucky side and the other on the Tennessee side, literally across the street from each other. Tennessee law banned the sale of alcohol on Sunday while Kentucky did not. Guess where everyone bought alcohol on Sunday and guess who otherwise had much lower sales receipts. What makes the San Antonio City Council think that Joe and Jane 18 to 20 will not simply go legally purchase their tobacco products outside the City of San Antonio, which means that other cities will reap the financial benefits while San Antonio retailers will lose revenue.

 

In conclusion, a central theme in my campaign is to “fix stupid” and restricting liberty and freedom is extraordinarily stupid. As such, I will support legislation to fix an age of majority in the State of Texas at 18 years of age from which any person whom is of the age of majority shall be entitled to all the rights and privileges of the age of majority thereof and from which such legislation will specifically override all state and preempt all local laws to the contrary thereof and to create a cause of action for declaratory, injunctive, and monetary damages, to include punitive monetary damages against the state entity and any local jurisdiction that enacts or enforces any conflicting state statute or local statute, ordinance, policy, custom, practice, or usage, that deprives any Texan of any right or privilege incidental to their age of majority.

 

 

 

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