We always knew that Team Hussein was ultimately behind the gargantuan smear campaign against Alaska Governor and GOP vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin.  Just as we always knew that they maintained a substantial multi-layer barrier of insulat…

When is neglect, abuse, or murder a FEDERAL crime – under the jurisdiction of FEDERAL investigators not bound to the Herbst-O’Malley Agreement?

I have two law degrees. The first one was with honors from a Top Ten school almost thirty years ago. The second is in tax law.

jim m on September 22, 2008 at 5:55 PM

Yeah, sure…you didn’t know what the word advocate meant.
Must have been to taxing…

I just can’t understand how that agreement not to prosecute can in any way be legal – Constitutionally speaking. I wonder if it’s ever been challenged on Constitutional grounds.

Barack Obama says the IL BAIPA would have been unconstitutional because it would give legal personhood to pre-viable children (the same argument NARAL had until the Federal BAIPA excluded any impact on abortion “rights”) – but IL law already does that, correct? Is Obama saying that IL law is unconstitutional because it undermines Roe?

That was the general idea I had. Roe v Wade says that legal personhood cannot exist before birth. If the judiciary defines “birth” as the mother’s intent for the child to live, then wouldn’t the constitutional requirement for legal personhood be, at the very least, birth – that is, the mother’s intent?

BAIPA says that since Congress is supposed to count persons, it is up to them to define the word “person”, but it sounds like the SCOTUS in Roe gave a specific parameter within which Congress had to define it – specifically requiring the person to be “born” in order to be a legal person.

If the judiciary had already ruled that the Constitutional definiton of “born” referred to mother’s intent rather than location of the child (as they did in PP v Farmer BEFORE BAIPA passed), wouldn’t Congress be bound by that Constitutional definition of “birth”, which is a prerequisite for legal personhood as per Roe?

It looks like the Farmer decision applied to a New Jersey statute that was virtually identical to a Nebraska statute that the US Supreme Court struck down. I don’t think the Farmer decision would affect an Illinois statute or its interpretation unless the Illinois statute was virtually identical to the Nebraska statute.

Criminal laws are mostly created by legistlation (statutes) by states, although there are some federal criminal statutes. State constitutions “trump” state legislation and the US consitution “trumps” both state and US federal criminal statutes. In other words, the statute is struck down in whole or in part if it conflicts with the applicable constitution or constitutions. So, what’s that mean? Take a look at the D.C. gun case this summer that was decided by the US Supreme Court. In that case, the US Supreme Court sent back to a lower court the D.C. law prohibiting the private ownership of guns because the US Supreme Court decided that the D.C. law conflicted with the Second Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

Hope this helps a bit.

The debates will make/break this election.

Here’s my chant of late (in present tense):

The media lies, America dies.

Now it’s time for us to have some fun, and there actually seems to be something to follow here, unlike “Bush lied, people died.”

flutejpl on September 22, 2008 at 8:54 AM
Here’s my chant of late (in present tense):

The media lies, America dies.

These people would only have had to call the AIP to know that the claim was false. Is there some sort of reasonable diligence required, or can people make up lies wholesale without libeling anyone?

Another question deals with PP v Farmer, where it was ruled that “birth” refers to the mother’s intention, not to the actual location of the child. That was a constitutional decision, right? If the judiciary has already defined “born” in a Constitutional sense and Congress gives a different definition, what happens if an abortion survivor is suffocated to death? If a criminal case was filed, could the defendant appeal on Constitutional grounds?

I don’t understand the relationship between Constitutional law and criminal law.

Right2bright, I haven’t seen the video, but if the video doesn’t say something about defeating Palin, it might be difficult to have “the electoral portion of the communication being unmistakable, unambiguous, and suggestive of only one meaning”.

jim m on September 22, 2008 at 5:09 PM

Let it go jimmy.
You are advocating a position that is indefensible. The proximity alone, the relationship as a campaign producer of material for the opposition, the obvious attempt at destroying a candidates image, and more…you tire me out with your foolish posts. You know what the attempt was, and so will any reasonable mind…but not a mind that is made up to defend.
bye-bye, let me know when you get your law degree…