Published – Idaho State Journal, 03/25/12

On January 20, 2009, President-elect Barack Hussein Obama stood in front of the portico on the west side of the U.S. Capital and recited an oath administered by U.S. Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts. The promise Obama made was, "I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute the office of President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the Constitution of the United States."

Officers in our military take a similar oath, when they avow, "I, [name], do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office on which I am about to enter. So help me God."

Even local law enforcement and first responders take a similar oath to support the Constitution. At all levels, those to whom are entrusted our safety, security, and lawful tranquility, swear or aver that they will support the Constitution of the United States. For military personnel especially, this is considered a lifetime oath, not just for their term in active duty.

Those who take oaths to uphold the Constitution should be expected to keep them. Clearly from what we see emerging from Washington these days, many who take the oath perfunctorily and cavalierly, don’t feel a compulsion to keep it. This has lead to the emergence of an organization dedicated to keeping the oath.

The Oathkeepers (Oathkeepers.org) distinguish themselves from those who simply take the oath, and promise instead to actually “keep” it based on key provisions of the Constitution itself. They list ten things they will not do if so ordered, for any one would be anathema to the rights assured to all American citizens by our founding legal codex. The violation of any of these would constitute the most egregious, and totalitarian disembowelment of our fundamental liberties.

The Oathkeepers declare that they will not obey orders to: 1) disarm the American people; 2) conduct warrantless searches of the American people; 3) detain American citizens as “unlawful enemy combatants” or to subject them to military tribunal; 4) impose martial law or a “state of emergency” on a state; 5) invade and subjugate any state that asserts its sovereignty; 6) blockade American cities, thus turning them into giant concentration camps; 7) force American citizens into any form of detention camps under any pretext; 8) assist or support the use of any foreign troops on U.S. soil against the American people to “keep the peace” or to “maintain control;"9) confiscate the property of the American people, including food and other essential supplies; or 10) infringe on the right of the people to free speech, to peaceably assemble, and to petition their government for a redress of grievances.

As fundamental as those “guaranteed” rights are to all Americans, there really is nothing controversial to the basic tenets of the group. What should be controversial is that we have politicians who, as evidenced by their legislation and executive orders, are opening the door to abuse of the most basic rights of our republic. They take the oath, but obviously have no intention of keeping it. That’s what should be alarming, and controversial, to all of us.

Those rights that Oathkeepers vow to uphold are promised by the Constitution to all of us, regardless of race, creed, political affiliation, or ideology. These truly are fundamental, and are not reliant on narrow or limited constitutional interpretation, but are generally accepted rights and privileges for all Americans.

In light of that, there really should be no American citizen unwilling to take, and keep, the same oath to support our basic constitutional rights that our president, our military, and our first responders take. In fact, if our politicians kept their oaths, there would be no need for the Oathkeepers. National legislation, like the National Defense Authorization Act, and executive orders, like the National Defense Resources Preparedness order from just last week, have opened the door to abuses of those very rights.

Mike Chism, a Pocatello resident who serves as the Idaho Chapter President for the national Oathkeepers organization, said they’re giving all citizens an opportunity to take the oath. City Councilman Jim Johnston will administer it on Wednesday the 28^th at 6 p.m. in the Vision 12 Studio at City Hall. Said Chism, “Any American Citizen who wishes to either reaffirm their Oath, if they have once taken it, or any other Citizen who never has taken it, we’re offering that opportunity.”

AP award winning columnist Richard Larsen is President of Larsen Financial, a brokerage and financial planning firm in Pocatello, and is a graduate of Idaho State University with a BA in Political Science and History and former member of the Idaho State Journal Editorial Board. He can be reached at rlarsenen@cableone.net.

Published – Idaho State Journal, 03/18/12

In a discussion this past week, someone raised the question of whether President Obama will have to go negative in his campaign against whoever happens to be his opponent. There probably is not a limit to how negative he'll go in the campaign, as evidenced by the fact that his campaign released a TV ad this week attacking Sarah Palin, who as I recall, is not even on the ballot! His actual record doesn’t have much to offer to the thoughtful voter.

I don’t care for polls, but when objectively conducted, they constitute the most viable vehicle to quantify public sentiment, which is crucial when it comes to measuring the efficacy and effectiveness of the president’s accomplishments and policies. So while I personally disdain relying on polls, such studies, targeted at key Obama efforts for the first three years, may provide insight as to whether the president will be running on, or from, his record.

Of greatest concern to Americans should be the national debt. It is, as Hillary Clinton has said, an issue of “national security.” Obama owns this. $5 trillion of our debt, and three years of $1.5 trillion deficit spending are creations of Obama and his facilitating congress. Such fiduciary ineptitude would disqualify him for mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, let alone our national president. He may dismiss it as inconsequential, but he cannot run from it.

Looking at his three signature legislative accomplishments, Obamacare is favored by just 42%, of Americans. But perhaps more importantly, “72 percent of Americans believe that the law's individual mandate to purchase health insurance is unconstitutional, including 56 percent of Democrats,” according to Rasmussen from two weeks ago. And perhaps more significantly, “65% of doctors believe healthcare will deteriorate in the next five years” because of it.

The “Stimulus” was not viewed positively just a year after its passage. “Sixty-eight percent of Americans said they think the $787 billion American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) was a "waste," compared to just 29 percent who think the money was well-spent,” according to an ABC Washington Post poll.

The last legislative “accomplishment” is actually seen as a positive for congress, the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory overhaul. But if people understood that it defined “too big to fail,” virtually assuring future bailouts of big banks and financial institutions, they wouldn’t be too keen on that landmark legislation either, since only 9% view the big banks and the recent bailouts positively. Only a slight majority, 51%, views the auto bailouts unfavorably.

He can’t very well run on his record for helping gas prices, for as we saw this week, as they have skyrocketed, his approval ratings took a 10% hit…in one month. Currently 61% feel he’s handling gas prices poorly.

Perception on the jobs situation has improved, but can any of his policies be traced to amelioration of that malaise? Here there seems to be a real disconnect with voters, since his approval rating improves when unemployment drops, but when pressed for what he’s done to improve job creation, those polled by Gallup recently could not identify anything specifically that he’s done for the non-farm payrolls to increase. And in a CBS poll recently only 38% of respondents thought the president had a plan for creating jobs.

Couple that with a Zogby poll a few months ago where “just one third of the public feels President Obama deserves re-election while five times more Americans think Obama has done a worse job fixing the economy than Jimmy Carter, the modern era's Herbert Hoover.” Overall, 6 in 10 Americans disapprove of Obama’s handling of the economy according to the latest ABC Washington Post poll.

When we look at the raw polling data on the specific areas where Obama has expended most of his effort, we’re hard pressed to find anything substantive from a public sentiment standpoint that he can hang his hat on. Rather, we find mostly wide public disapprobation over what he has actually done, rather than what he claims to have accomplished.

So will he run on his record? It’s unlikely. If his record was a scorecard, it would be filled with “D”s and “F”s. Voters bought his “hope” and “change” mantra without any record to run on four years ago. Will there be a similar logical disconnect this year, with a record? Hopefully voters will be more logical, and less emotional and gullible, this time around. Only with copious spin and misrepresentation can his “record” appear viable to reasonable voters.  After all, elections provide our opportunity to hire, or fire, our leaders based on actual performance; as opposed to how well they can tell us they did.

Based on his own words from 2009, his administration should be a “one-term proposition.” If he’s not part of the solution, he’s part of the problem and clearly should go.

AP award winning columnist Richard Larsen is President of Larsen Financial, a brokerage and financial planning firm in Pocatello, and is a graduate of Idaho State University with a BA in Political Science and History and former member of the Idaho State Journal Editorial Board. He can be reached at rlarsenen@cableone.net.

Published – Idaho State Journal, 03/11/12

The Constitution is the foundational codex for our legal and governmental system. Built into its relatively succinct 4,500 words is an elaborate system of checks and balances designed to prevent any one of the three branches of government from gaining supremacy over the others. The powers of the government are enumerated for each branch, and what powers are not enumerated, “are reserved to the states respectively, or to the people.”

The Constitution has clearly become increasingly inconsequential to the ruling class in Washington over the past several decades as the limitations to the federal government by that document are progressively disregarded for political expediency. The Constitution should be respected as an inviolable founding document. This, in essence, is the message of Ron Paul, with which I totally concur.

However, there’s an aspect of Paul’s interpretation that begs further examination as it relates to foreign affairs. Paul would have us believe that isolationism, a policy of retraction and seclusion of one’s country from others, is a constitutional requisite. Most of his speeches about our national defense and security sound like they could’ve been written by the issues committee at Code Pink. Even his official website addressing foreign policy utilizes nearly the entire allotted space explaining “blowback,” the notion that we created the justification for Islamic extremist’s Jihad against us by “having boots” in Saudi Arabia, where the holy sites of Mecca and Medina are located.

While our presence on the peninsula may have provided an excuse for the fundamentalist jihad against western culture and democracy, it certainly wasn’t the cause for it. For that we must look at least as far back as the 1940s and the influence of the prolific Islamic author Sayyid Qutb, who later became the figurative head of the Muslim Brotherhood. Qutb was writing scathing and vitriolic letters about American decadence written from his university dorm room in Greely, CO, later published in Egypt.

We could go back even further to find the roots of Islamic extremism in the 18^th century and the influential teachings of the fundamentalist reformer and theologian Muhammad Ibn Abd al-Wahhab, for whom Wahhabism is named. Although denied by Islamic apologists, Wahhabism, or Salafism, seems to be the common thread running through most of the anti-American, anti-western civilization extremist groups like Al Qaida and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Aside from the “blowback” issue, Paul’s “constitutional” basis for foreign policy correctly cites Congress’ role in declaring war. He maintains that although the president serves as the Commander in Chief of the military, that the exercise of that role should be ultimately controlled and directed by Congress. And that’s fundamentally true, but it doesn’t equate to isolationism.

Article II Section 2 of the Constitution clearly specifies that the president and the executive branch take the lead on foreign relations negotiating treaties and appointing ambassadors with Senate ratification. Article I Section 8 enumerates the authority of Congress, including Section 8.11, the power to declare war.

This seems to be the tenet most focused on by Paul, that only Congress can declare war. Congress has only passed a “Declaration of War” five times in our history. But they have authorized war by resolution or by funding at least 19 times. The Supreme Court logically ruled in 2003 that congressional action supporting bellicose activity is the equivalent of declaring war.

Ron Paul supporters point to the Founding Fathers who spoke in their personal writings against "entangling alliances.” Clearly they were opposed to war. After all, who isn't? Ideally, there would never be cause for conflict. But reality seldom converges with the ideal, so they built into our founding document the ability to declare war, without proscribing under what conditions it may be done. 

The Founding Fathers’ actions speak perhaps even louder than their words. Exercising diplomacy, Thomas Jefferson negotiated his way out of hostilities with Morocco over piracy of American commercial ships. Unable to do the same with Algeria, Jefferson sought, and obtained, Senate approval for the First Barbary War against those 18th century terrorists. No “War Declaration” was passed, yet congress gave him funding and authorized the use of force for the protection of American interests. John Adams and George Washington concurred with the action.

Although some claim Paul’s isolationism is the policy of the Founders and the Constitution, there is ample evidence to the contrary. Facing the reality of exogenous threats, the Founders opted for reality in dealing with those threats rather than adhering to the ideal. One can claim a preference for isolationism, a foreign policy perhaps best characterized by an ostrich, but such a preference is not based on even a literal interpretation of the Constitution.

So while it may sound good to say, "Ron Paul's foreign policy is the founding father's policy," in reality, it clearly is not.

AP award winning columnist Richard Larsen is President of Larsen Financial, a brokerage and financial planning firm in Pocatello, and is a graduate of Idaho State University with a BA in Political Science and History and former member of the Idaho State Journal Editorial Board. He can be reached at rlarsenen@cableone.net.

Published – Idaho State Journal, 03/04/12

Political parties were warned against by George Washington, yet their formation, evolution, and in some cases, transformation, was inevitable. People who think similarly usually group together for common causes, which in a very loose historical sense, explains the emergence, and sometimes disappearance of parties throughout our nation’s history.

Whether we like it or not, our nation has developed into a fundamentally two-party system. Democrats trace their formation back to Thomas Jefferson, who interestingly, was an anti-federalist opposed to a strong centralized federal government, while the modern Republican party claims Abraham Lincoln as it’s founder, based primarily on an anti-slavery platform.

The most fundamental task filled by political parties is recruiting and selecting candidates for public office. That’s why we have primary elections, to narrow the field of candidates so a winner of the general election can receive a majority vote.

Since primaries are used by the parties to select their candidates, Idaho voters have always had to specify which ballot they wanted to vote on. Last year, however, the legislature passed HB 351 creating “closed” primaries, where voters must declare a party affiliation by registering as a member of one of four possible parties, Constitution, Democrat, Libertarian or Republican. While it was controversial at the time, frankly, it makes sense. Open primaries, without consideration for party affiliation, is tantamount to allowing Protestant ministers vote for the Catholic Pope.

Starting this year, one must register by party affiliation to participate in a party’s caucus or primary. This can be done at the County Election Office, or by printing, filling out, and mailing in the form found at http://www.idahovotes.gov/VoterReg/affiliation_form.pdf. For the Republican Presidential Caucus on Tuesday, anyone can participate by registering before the caucus begins.

With the state-funded primary in May, Idahoans have rarely had a say in the selection of presidential candidates, as earlier state primaries, and caucuses, have usually determined party candidates long before Idahoans voted.

That’s why the changes made by the Idaho Republican Party for this year’s presidential campaign are so significant. The primary date has not been changed from May, which is still important for selecting state and local candidates for the respective parties. But Idaho Republicans have opted to conduct caucuses around the state on “Super Tuesday,” March 6, when over 400 of the requisite 1144 delegates to secure the nomination are up for grabs from 10 states.

The change to a caucus seems to be permanent, as the Idaho Legislature has passed a bill (H 391) that removes the presidential primary line from the state-funded primary ballot, clearly indicating both major parties prefer to determine their national convention delegates by early caucuses.

For Idaho Republicans, this caucus is historic. A Republican challenger to the incumbent president has not yet been determined, which means perhaps for the first time ever, Idaho will have a say in the selection of a major party nominee, much like Idaho Democrats had a say with their 2008 “Super Tuesday” Caucuses. This has resulted in more presidential candidate visits than Idaho is accustomed to.

At stake is Idaho’s 32 delegates to the national convention. And with the way the national party determines delegates for each state, Idaho actually ends up sending more to the national convention than early voting states like Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada.  And this year, Idaho has more than Arizona and South Carolina. Although ranked 39^th in population, Idaho is #30 in delegate count to the national convention.

Each of Idaho's 44 counties will hold its own caucus on Tuesday. Bannock County Republicans will meet in the ISU Student Union Ballroom with registration starting at 5:00 p.m. and the caucus beginning at 7:00 p.m. Bingham county locations are the Blackfoot High School old gymnasium, Snake River High School, Shelley High School gymnasium?and the Aberdeen American Legion Hall.

Every participant votes by secret ballot in successive rounds. The candidate with the lowest vote tally in each round is eliminated until one candidate receives over 50% of the votes. The results of each County Caucus will be accumulated and the winning candidate will be awarded all of Idaho's 32 delegates.

As I have pondered the possibilities with these caucuses, there’s another benefit to them that may not be quantifiable, but perhaps even more important. And that’s the social component. Getting together with others in a dynamic setting, discussing the future of the country and what is needed to get it on the right track, meeting and interacting with others of roughly similar core values, can’t help but have a synergistic affect on the participants. The level of enthusiasm will likely be elevated, which hopefully will increase commitments for awareness, increased knowledge, involvement, and visibility.

Democrats seem to be much more outspoken and visible. Learning from their counterparts, perhaps those whom Nixon referred to as the “silent majority,” can learn how to be a vocal majority instead.

Published – Idaho State Journal, 02/26/12

I recall vividly an experience growing up on a farm years ago when I claimed credit for doing something one of my brothers did. It was a task assigned to me, which I failed to carry out. But my brother completed it before I could. My father, in his wisdom, upon learning of my unearned credit, sardonically asked me, “Don’t you know how dishonest that is?”

I did know it was dishonest, but that experience piqued my attention to claims of credit unearned. And now that presidential politics are into full swing, the claims of unearned credit are being self-proclaimed nearly every day.

A visit to the official presidential reelection campaign website reads like a bad fiction novel. Improvements in various sectors of the economy and our collective financial viability as a country are claimed as “accomplishments” of the president.

Obama claiming credit for an economic rebound is like an old girlfriend of mine in high school who claimed credit for every time our Snake River High School football team won. She claimed that whenever she went to a game, we won. Just “showing up” caused the win. Correlation is not to be mistaken for causation.

Certainly if he’s to be given credit for an improving economy, we should be able to identify and quantify, to at least some extent, what he has done to ameliorate our moribund economy. Any policy of his, any legislative accomplishments, any executive orders that he has issued or implemented should provide the evidence to validate his claims.

His three most significant legislative exploits provide no evidence of causation for improving the economy. Obamacare certainly doesn’t stimulate the economy, for it is laden with new taxes and fees imposed on individuals and employers to be implemented over the next few years. And actually when those new taxes hit, the adverse impact on the economy will be considerable. For as Christina Romer, former chair of Obama’s Council of Economic Advisors, revealed last year, "Tax changes have very large effects: an exogenous tax increase of 1 percent of GDP lowers real GDP by roughly 2 to 3 percent."

How about the FinReg, Dodd-Frank financial regulatory reform? As with Obamacare, there is nothing stimulative in it either. It only solidifies the crony capitalistic relationship between Wall Street, the major banks, and Washington by assuring further government intervention with institutions deemed “too big to fail.” The costs of implementation at the private sector level will likely result in higher fees, charges, and interest rates for financial institutions to recoup the implementation costs. That’s definitely not stimulative!

The claims for improving the economy must be in the president’s “stimulus” package. According to the Wall Street Journal, over half of the $850 billion ($1.1 trillion, including interest) “stimulus” bill could be more correctly classified as discretionary spending. The Congressional Budget Office “scoring” of the stimulus package indicated that only 12 cents of every dollar would have a stimulative affect on the economy within the first 18 months. The scoring process clearly indicated the impotence of the “Stimulus” for creating positive economic activity.

Then there must be some evidence in his executive orders then, a total of 111 that he’s issued to date. Of those, most deal with regulation, government agencies, commissions, and appointments. Perusing all the executive orders I didn’t see one that was designed to augment the economy, improve job prospects for out of work Americans, or stimulate economic growth.

In three years at the helm, in real world economics, there is only one thing that I can recall that he did that had any potential to stimulate the economy, and that was extension of the payroll tax holiday. And for the average American that is fortunate enough to have a job, that amounts to $40 per month.

Even his unprecedented increase in government spending cannot be considered as stimulative. There are some academic die-hards, many of whom are currently serving in the administration, who still adhere to that aspect of Keynesian economic theory. And it’s hard to understand why, unless it’s just “bitter clinging” to an archaic ideology, for it’s failed every time it’s been attempted, by any administration, including FDR’s.

The great Nobel Laureate for economics, Milton Friedman, declared a couple of years ago, “unbridled government spending is the single greatest deterrent to faster economic growth in the United States today.” He’s probably rolling over in his grave as he observes the unparalleled spending spree the federal government is engaging in.

Sorry, Mr. President, you have no grounds to claim credit for the modicum of improvement we’ve seen since the recession officially ended. Any improvement is in spite of your policies, not because of them. Just “showing up” does not a win make.  And as my father taught me years ago, claiming credit where none is warranted, is dishonest.

AP award winning columnist Richard Larsen is President of Larsen Financial, a brokerage and financial planning firm in Pocatello, and is a graduate of Idaho State University with a BA in Political Science and History and former member of the Idaho State Journal Editorial Board. He can be reached at rlarsenen@cableone.net.