17 thoughts on “What’s In A Number?”

1. The Native Hawaiian thing could be a big deal. Certain lefty types are trying to create a new race in the US. Native Hawaiians would…not exactly sure what they want, but it could lead to more divisions…no WOULD lead to more divisions in our nation. Most likely money is involved somehow.

2. Nice bit of analysis, Mitch. But you left out a few items that might have changed the numbers.

   McCain found six other RINOs and 7 Democrats to form the Gang of 14, a group that held up judicial confirmations in record numbers. McCain went with the party when the President put on a full-court press to get a strict constructionist on the Supreme Court. But McCain prevented strict constructionists from being appointed at lower levels of the judiciary.

   Not every case makes it to the Supremes. Most cases are decided at the lower levels but they still become binding precedent for later cases. Those decisions will be made by liberal judges okayed by the Democrats on the Gang of 14, not by strict constructionists.

   And not just for one administration. Well-qualified conservative Supreme Court nominees come up from lower courts the way major leaguers come up from farm teams. McCain’s cut off conservative access to the farm teams, leaving a void it’ll take generations to fill.

   If you put one Conservative on the School Board but fill all the staff positions, principals, and teachers with Liberals, you still have a school district run under Liberal principles. McCain helped do the same with the federal judiciary.

   My three hot buttons are abortion, gun control and taxes. I think you can tell a lot about candidate by knowing how they’d vote on them. The more they favor government over individuals on those three issues, the more they’re likely to favor government over individuals in other issues. The more they waffle to gain favor on those core issues, the more they’ll waffle to gain favor on other issues. The quicker they turn on their friends on those three issues, the quicker they’ll turn on their friends on other issues.

   I’ve voted for Republicans since Nixon, sometimes with gusto (Ronaldus Magnus) and just to choose the lesser evil (Bush II). But it’s going to come down to Hillary – McCain and frankly, I’m seriously considering sitting this one out.

   .

3. The Hawaiian issue is important for everyone in the US. If it is approved, it means Congress can create new Sovereign entities within the US based on . . . nothing other than a grievance.

4. @nate, my take is pretty simple: if Mac starves the feds of money and doesn’t raise taxes or spending then 80% of the problems of the libs running the country won’t arise. He’s got his problems, but they’re nothing compared to the opposition.

   Frankly, I tend to agree with the clown here that Mac is the best hope this cycle for the GOP to win. Especially with BHO and HRC starting to fight dirty. Honestly, in a close race like they’ve got Hillary will pull out the knives to win and that can only be good for the GOP. And anything that will keep Hillary out is a good thing.

5. Thanks for going to the trouble, Mitch. Terry is right, from what I remember about the Hawaiian government issue is fraught with possibilities of a bad kind. First of all, it would create a parallel government ONLY for Hawaiians yet funded by all taxpayers. So far, we only have Native Americans as a precedent and it’s not been a great one for either side. There are also issues where Hawaiians would have rights under this government and non-Hawaiians (as measured by some standard of DNA) would not.

   McCain is so idiosyncratic, my guess is that personal experiences in Hawaii have led him to support this.

6. “First of all, it would create a parallel government ONLY for Hawaiians yet funded by all taxpayers.”
   That’s just the beginning of the problems with the Akaka Bill.
   Being considered a legal member of the Hawaiian Nation would cost nothing & bring extra benefits.
   The new sovereign entity would control revenue streams from leased lands.

   The Territory of Hawaii that was annexed in 1894 did not differentiate between ‘native Hawaiians’ and the descendents of immigrants. Neither did the Monarchy that existed before the Republic.
   Any ‘Hawaiian Nation’ that has been continuously in existence (a criteria for Native American sovereignty) would have to include the descendants of the recognized citizens of Hawaii in 1894. These would include majorities of people who do not have a single Polynesian ancestor. It’s silly to have a sovereign ‘nation’ in the US made up of the descendants of, say, Portuguese and Chinese immigrants to Hawaii but not Portuguese and Chinese immigrants to California.
   The Akaka bill tries to get around this by making membership in the new ‘Hawaiian Nation’ a purely racial affair — something it never was when there really was a Hawaiian Nation with an internationally recognized government.
   Any ‘Hawaiian Nation’ that is recognized today is a purely political creation. Shame on McCain for supporting the creation of this comic-opera government.

7. Akaka’s bill picked up additional Republican support yesterday with Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., saying he will vote for it on the floor.

   McCain, who had raised questions about the bill in the past, said he will vote for the bill primarily because it has the support of so many Hawai’i officials, including Republican Gov. Linda Lingle.

   “Here in Washington, it’s hard for us to go against the view of the governor, the Legislature — Republican and Democrat — the senators and the congressmen,” said McCain, chairman of the Senate Indian Affairs Committee.

   Gee, McCain, do you think this might be because the Akaka bill does what every Hawaii politician wants — bring more federal money to the state?
   If McCain really cared what the people of Hawaii thought about the Akaka bill maybe he’d look at an opinion poll rather than listen to the chair-warmers in congress & state government. Fer God’s sake, McCain works with Inouye in the Senate & Abercrombie in the House. He knows that they are Kings of Pork.

8. Gee, this doesn’t make me feel all warm and fuzzy about Big Mac.

   Margaret is right (of course) regarding the Hawaii parallel government. It is akin to establishing Sharia law courts to supercede US law.

9. Let me just say I agree with Terry that the Akaka bill is bad idea. My position is based on the idea that it was foolish (but it’s part of the Constitution so barring an amendment or some treaty, we’re stuck with it) to create separate nations for the indigenous peoples on the continental United States rather than simply assimilate them entirely into the majority culture as has been done with various immigrant populations. If they want to keep part of their “cultural identity” in terms of non-political aspects, more power to them but there should be NO LEGAL DISTINCTION AT ALL between one group of American citizens and another based on race or ethnicity. What makes this particularly problematic is that if we start having a “native Hawaiian government” in a non-continental State where the majority culture is distinctly different from the continental one, we could eventually see a Quebec-style call for succession and our flag could soon be reduced to 49 stars.

10. McCain found six other RINOs and 7 Democrats to form the Gang of 14, a group that held up judicial confirmations in record numbers.

    I think you’ve got that backwards, the judicial nominees were being held up BEFORE the Gang of 14 and it was AFTER they were formed that most of them started being confirmed including Justices Roberts and Alito.

11. “create separate nations for the indigenous peoples on the continental United States”
    Congress has no power to create nations. It can only recognize existing nations. This is one of several places where the Akaka Bill defies the constitution.
    This isn’t so much of an anti-McCain issue as an anti-Akaka bill issue with me. The people that will pay for this are not the wealthy. The price will be paid by the working people in HI who are not lucky enough to have had even a single great-great-great-great-great-grandparent who arrived on these shores before Captain Cook. If your great-great grandparents arrived here in the 1840’s and were accepted as full legal citizens of the Hawaiian Kingdom you are still not good enough to be considered a ‘native Hawaiian’ under this bill.
    The people who call themselves ‘native Hawaiians’ arrived on these shores contemporaneously with the end of the Roman Empire, about 1,300 years before Captain Cook. They came from Tahiti. They speak Polynesian, the lingua Franca of the Pacific. They are not ‘native Americans’ any more than Samoans are ‘Native Americans’. This is not part of the American continent. They became ‘Americans’ only after they were annexed by the United States of America in 1894. The ‘native Hawaiians’ insist that this annexation is illegal and they are, therefore, not American in any sense of the word other than when the designation ‘native American’. means ‘Federal dollars’.
    Pfah.

12. Re; The Akaka Bill – thanks for the info. Bad, bad idea.

    And while I’m quite aware that there are points on both sides of McCain – and whatever they are, he’d seem to be our guy, and no matter WHAT his faults I’ll take him over either of the Tic contenders – this article was merely an attempt to give context to his ACU rating, a datum that is commonly bruited about by Mac’s friends and foes.

    Nothing more.

13. Then, Mitch, you also missed one of my biggest qualms about the guy: his 2nd Amendment attitude. He’s earned his C+ from the NRA. Of course, Bush isn’t any better, but that’s damning both of them, not praising them.

14. There are some serious land issues that the Akaka bill does address. These are much too complex to get into here, other than to note that in the Midwest most of the land was originally granted by the sovereign United States to the railroad, homesteaders, etc. In Hawaii the history of who held original title to the land & how it ended up in the hands of the current owner of record is much more complex. There are multiple & conflicting authorities involved.
    Basically the Akaka bill would move a lot of these hot-button public land issues from state to federal jurisdiction. I think that’s why the local pol’s, D & R, support the Akaka bill while a majority of Hawaii citizens oppose it.

15. Then, Mitch, you also missed one of my biggest qualms about the guy: his 2nd Amendment attitude. He’s earned his C+ from the NRA.

    That’s odd considering that the NRA consistently gave McCain a rating of an “A” until he sponsored McCain-Feingold and suddenly we’re supposed to believe he became a gun-grabber?

    McCain supports instant criminal background checks of anyone purchasing a gun (something the NRA has supported in the past) WITHOUT a mandatory waiting period but unlike the NRA, he thinks it should apply to sellers who aren’t licensed firearm sellers who sell at gun shows. Other than that, the only other restriction he supported was requiring manufacturers to include trigger locks or comparable safety items.

    On the other hand, he’s consistently opposed mandatory waiting periods and voted against the Brady Bill. He’s opposed arbitrary bans on “assault weapons” and certain types of ammunition. He’s co-sponsored legislation to get DC to lift its gun ban. Voted to protect law-abiding citizens from having their firearms confiscated after an “emergency” (e.g. Hurricane Katrina). And perhaps most importantly of all – he supported the Protection of the Lawful Commerce in Arms Act to stop the gun grabbers like Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton (who both supported such suits) from using the courts to bankrupt or regulate the firearms industry with litigation.

    I’d say that looking at McCain’s record in total, the NRA’s “rating” come off as somewhat arbitrary.

16. Thorley, he’s also (and much more recently) teamed up with Americans for Gun Safety (a front group) and Lieberman to “regulate” gun shows — his regulation would have effectively made not informing participants of the Brady law regs a criminal matter for the organizers.

    He’s voted for the requirement of trigger lock sales with all firearms, but the initial version he voted for also required their use which is problematic if you need a gun for self-defense.

    He’s also voted for studying “cop killer” bullets, voted for additional Internet sales regulations, voted to make youth operation of “semiautomatic assault weapons” illegal, etc.

    Overall, he’s still acceptable in that he’s generally fought the more onerous regulations, but he’s been slowly slipping into more and more restrictions (sort of like his 1st Amendment position, really). The McCain of 1999 was very good, the McCain of 2006 is more problematic.

17. “the NRA consistently gave McCain a rating of an “A” until he sponsored McCain-Feingold and suddenly we’re supposed to believe he became a gun-grabber?”
    The NRA seems to believe that by preventing private groups from campaigning for or against a candidate you have restricted their ability to advocate for 2nd amendment rights. Sounds reasonable to me.

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