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It is not this lady, or any other of this or any other President's nominations, who deserves an up-or-down vote in the Senate. It is We The People, according to our Constitution, who deserve a vote. The Constitution stipulates that the President shall make nominations, subject to consent of the Senate. The Senate also has the duty/opportunity to advise the President on nominations -- whatever is meant by 'advise'. There exists no ambiguity with 'consent'.
For the President of the United States to call you vigilantes shows either a gross lack of understanding of his role as this country's chief executive, or unbridled contempt for for our sovereignty.
Even if they came WOP (without papers), they understood that they had to become Americans. They might have spoken Finnish, German, and Italian in their houses, but they learned to speak and read/write English -- the common language. They also understood that to not learn the language of the general population would consign them to being second-class citizens. As a kid in the 1960s, I used to hear these languages spoken in my home town. Now that all the old folks have died-off, I can't recall hearing anything but English any time I've returned for visits since coming down here to Houston as a young man in 1979.
Today's immigrants are not encouraged to jump into the American melting pot. They can conduct official business in a multitude of languages. They have non-English broadcasting networks (there's a market for them, but there shouldn't be).
Why is this an issue? Because language is the glue of society. The ancient Persians, Greeks, Romans, Chinese, Catholics, Moslems (and others) built -- and maintained -- their empires on a common language imposed upon conquered populations. As they released their grip on the tongue, so they lost their cohesion -- and dissolved or are in decline.
And so it is with the United States of America. All public discourse must be in one common language -- [American] English. If we fail to do this, I shall see political division and the accompanying civil strife in my lifetime. That is, the Federated States of Northwestern America will have a beef with Estados de America Espano, the new Confederate States of America will be at odds with Central States of America -- both of whom will be protesting actions of the [remnant] United States of America. And, various groups internal to these new nations will be in conflict for the thrones -- conflicts which will rarely be fought with the ballot box.
One explanation is that she apparently doesn't do dry runs on her speeches. She now says that she never actually watched Desperate Housewives. Is she naïve or a liar?
The minimum We The People demand from you, Mr. President (on behalf of your wife and your staff), is an apology. The apology isn't for the jokes, but for the bad display of [un-]social graces. I'm not a prude -- I've told and laughed at such jokes with "the guys".
I'm not speaking on MJ's guilt or innocence. I've not seen the evidence and am not sitting on the jury. I am concerned that the jury is being fed hearsay. An innocent man may experience injustice; a guilty man may not be convicted according to time-honored rules which serve to protect the innocent.
Prior to starting these on Oct. 1, 2004, I was wildly moody from enduring several years of stress. It's now a month later, and the mood swings are subsiding...
I also ached from head to toe, made worse by having to be on my flat feet for eight hours per day. To combat this, I earlier in the summer had upped the ante from aspirin to naproxen (Aleve). That relief began to wear thin. The aches 'n pains now are back at manageable levels. I go most days without a fix; I still need to hit the naproxen once or twice a week -- no longer twice a day.