On kabuki, farces, subpoenas, and theocracy
council was a well-meaning, if naïve and starry-eyed, idea when it was established, but under the weight of the cold war and the flood of Third World countries which became members in the 1970s and 1980s, the council soon turned into something more akin to a farce. Say this for the council, though: it is a dependable farce.
2. Subpoenas campaign launched
Darrell Issa (R-California) promised that when he assumed the chairmanship of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, he would launch a subpoena campaign against the Obama administration.
The campaign has begun. Felicia Sonmez reports on the 2chambers blog that Issa issued his first subpoenas of the Obama administration this week.
The subpoenas, issued Tuesday, would require DHS employees to testify about the department’s Freedom of Information Act policies and practices.
The Washington Post reports that the subpoenas came less than a week after Issa sent a separate subpoena to Bank of America to Bank of America requesting documents and information related to Countrywide Financial’s “Friends of Angelo” VIP Program. That subpoena, issued last Wednesday, was Issa’s first since becoming chairman of the Oversight Committee last month (the subpoenas of DHS were thus Issa’s second set of subpoenas, but the first subpoenas of the administration).
Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, the top-ranking Democrat on the oversight panel, penned a letter to Issa on Thursday criticizing what Cummings’s office charged were “three unilateral subpoenas issued abruptly over the past eight days without adequate consultation with Committee Members.”
4. Homeland security and theocracy
A state prosecutor argued Thursday before a Kentucky appeals court. that Kentucky has a right to legislate a government reliance on God for safety and security.
UPI reports that American Atheists National Legal Director Edwin Kagin, whose group advocates for the complete separation of church and state, argued laws pointing to God are part of an attempt to create a “theocracy.”
Both sides are appealing a trial court judge’s 2009 ruling that a state homeland security law “created an official government position on God” in violation of the Kentucky and U.S. constitutions.
Special Assistant Attorney General Tad Thomas argued Thursday the United States had two centuries of precedents saying governments had a right to refer to God in their documents.
“Since George Washington, every president in their inaugural speech referenced a deity to help assist and protect the nation,” Thomas said.
The national motto, “In God We Trust,” and the Declaration of Independence’s affirmation that people “are endowed by their creator with certain unalienable rights” also point to U.S. support of God’s protection, he said.
Judge Thomas Wingate ruled in 2009 that the 2006 homeland security provisions — which require the department’s executive director to publicize a “dependence on Almighty God” in agency training and educational materials and on a permanent plaque — went far beyond general references to the deity in the national motto, the Courier-Journal reported.
