The Sketch Effect

An artist sketches a young subject. During the session, the artist engages in conversation with the subject, observes the subject’s mannerisms, and develops a sense of the subject’s personality and characteristics. The finished work not only encompasses the physical exactness of the subject, but includes the artist’s incorporation of the subject’s characteristics as well.

The original sketch is passed along to another artist to be duplicated. The second artist renders his sketch based upon the first sketch, but, without the use of the original characteristics of the original subject, the artist then incorporates his depiction of what he believes the subject’s personality should be into the sketch. This process is repeated until the tenth artist completes the sketch.

When the original sketch is compared to the tenth sketch, the similarities are abstract and transcendent, and the tenth sketch has taken on the aura of a caricature of the original subject. Yet when the tenth artist is asked to sketch the original subject under the same circumstances as the first artist, without knowledge of who the subject is, the sketch completed by the tenth artist of the original subject has only a vague similarity to the tenth artist’s first sketch.

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It’s that time again, time for the perennial assault on the Electoral College and its compulsory dismantling.

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Posted to Constitutional Law | Comments (15) | Email This Post | Tags: America's Constitution, Electoral College

Since the Supreme Court ruling reversing the 1990 case Austin v. Michigan Chamber of Commerce, and the unconstitutional provisions of the 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign-finance law, are of a First Amendment disposition, prefacing this and all related articles with the First Amendment would be prudent:

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Perhaps somewhere along the line I acquired an egregious misunderstanding of the premeditated and calculated limited powers granted to the Congress and the Executive Branch by the United States Constitution.It has always been my understanding, and also the understanding of a few antediluvian and currently extraneous thinkers like Thomas Jefferson, George Washington, John Adams, James Madison, Ben Franklin, et al., that according to Article I Section VII of the United States Constitution, the two legislative bodies, the House of Representatives and the Senate, were granted the exclusive power to write, have an open and honest debate, then call for a vote on a bill. Then they send it to the president, and if he chooses to sign the bill, it becomes law. The cardinal power of the Legislative Branch of the United States Federal Government is to make laws.

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Posted to Constitutional Law,Politics | Comments (1) | Email This Post | Tags: Cadillac Insurance Plans, Labor Union Writing Legislation

My interest was piqued by the title of the article, Why the Stupak Amendment to the Healthcare Reform Bill is Unconstitutional, by Marci Hamilton. Assuming the title was surely a play on words, as the title is nonsensical in nature, and even within the confines of the mildly learned, the Stupak Amendment was the only component of the health care reform bill that could remotely be construed as constitutional, I settled in for an au courant display of constitutional prowess. The author, Professor Marci A. Hamilton, according to her profile, holds the Paul R. Verkuil Chair in Public Law at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, Yeshiva University, where she is the founding Director of the Intellectual Property Law Program. She has been a visiting scholar at Princeton Theological Seminary, the Center of Theological Inquiry, and Emory University School of Law.

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Posted to Constitutional Law | Comments (1) | Email This Post | Tags: Marcia Hamilton, Stupak Amendment

The health care reform bill that passed the House of Representatives, as well as the language in the Senate’s health care reform bill, have generated an unhealthy and contentious debate regarding the limited versus unlimited powers of the federal government. This is a debate about the soul of the United States. The heart and soul of the Constitution and this country’s founding principles are threefold: 1) individual rights and liberty, 2) free market ideas and national free trade, and 3) an expressly limited federal government. Barack Obama and the Democratic Party have shepherded Congress’ blatant usurping of the Constitution by violating all three of the above founding principles, which would be unprecedented, if not for FDR’s monarchical reign.

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Posted to Constitutional Law,Politics | Comments (2) | Email This Post | Tags: Commerce Clause, Health Care Reform

U.S. President Barack Obama and various world leaders have decided to delay the legally binding climate treaty until at least 2010, with a concessionary tone that alluded to the possibility of delaying beyond 2010.

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Posted to Constitutional Law,Politics | Comments (2) | Email This Post | Tags: Copenhagen Climate Treaty

There are two distinct methods the Democrats have used to write unconstitutional laws. The first is through malice. This method has been employed since FDR by the continuous chipping away with the uncontested usurping of the document by a political sect that harbors a stalwart disdain and insolent disposition regarding the Constitution, its limited constraints on the federal government, and by proxy, the Founding Fathers. Currently Barack Obama and his acolytes in Congress have elevated this method to FDR wholesale levels.

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Posted to Constitutional Law,Politics | Comments (2) | Email This Post | Tags: Commerce Clause, Congress, Steny Hoyer

The Constitution of these United States holds different meanings for different people:

Conservatives/Federalists believe that this federated group of states, governed by a representative government with the Constitution as the foundation and the rule of law as the bedrock that keeps this country from spiraling into the abyss that has historically plagued other forms of government.

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Posted to Constitutional Law,Economics | Comments (1) | Email This Post | Tags: 14th Amendment, Second Amendment, Sonia Sotomayor, Supreme Court

I am perplexed over the Supreme Court’s decision in the case of Redding v. Safford United School District. The court ruled that the 4th Amendment rights of one Savana Redding were violated by the school’s performing a strip search of Savana for prescription drugs. I am perplexed on two levels: first, the ruling in favor of Savana Redding, and second, the strip search by the school.

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Posted to Constitutional Law | Comments (3) | Email This Post | Tags: Redding v. Safford, Supreme Court