This says it all

Investor's Business Daily printed a must-read editorial, 97 reasons why we can't trust the Democrats in wartime. It starts with Jimmy Carter and goes from there.

Everybody who is concerned with national defense going into this election should probably read this.

I Blame Hunter and Palmer

Is it any wonder Daniel Cabrera lost his bid for a no-hitter in the 9th inning tonight? On the Comcast broadcast, Jim Hunter and Jim Palmer could not shut up about the fact that Cabrera was pitching a no-hitter, flying in the face of baseball superstition. If I heard one more thing about Palmer's no-hitter in 1969, I was going to scream (because it just had to be about Palmer...). It really leant itself to the concept "turn down the TV sound."

I'm just glad that Cabrera got himself together and pitched a good game to end the year.

The Wrong Message

Apparently it's OK in Michigan to teach high schoolers that when the going gets tough, just quit:

Despite pleas from players and parents, the Oscoda Board of Education on Monday upheld the cancellation of the varsity football season after four games.

The school board in this northern Iosco County district sided with coaches who said the condition of the varsity team was ''dangerously unsafe'' to continue playing.

''When you go to a game on Friday night and see a team physically dominated, those are the indisputable facts,'' said Kyle Tobin, head coach of the team.

Tobin said Oscoda's team wasn't physically competitive, had too few players and faced a grueling schedule in the North East Michigan Conference against teams such as Bangor John Glenn High School and Ogemaw Heights High School.

Yet players such as quarterback Mike Gondek pleaded with the school board to reconsider the school's Sept. 19 decision to cancel the remaining varsity football games.

''All I ever wanted to do was play football,'' said Gondek, a senior. ''My teammates never felt so unsafe that we didn't want to be out there.''

The team went 0-4 this season, without scoring a point.

What an awful message this sends; if things get tight, don't go out and try your best. Just walk away. I am just amazed at how people could send such an awful message, though I shouldn't be given the fact that competition among children is something that is not being discouraged so nobody's feelings get hurt (never mind the fact that competition is part of everyday life).

At least this guy gets it:

But Lansing-area schools that have suffered through losing streaks say Oscoda Area High School's decision to throw in the towel sends the wrong message.

"The message you're telling the kids is that when it gets tough, you're giving up," said Eaton Rapids football coach Randy Taylor, whose team went 0-9 last season. "You're giving up on the kids."

And is that the message you want to send? That you have no faith in these kids who want to play football?

Are there mitigating circumstances? Sure; injuries, small rosters, etc. However what would have happened had anybody who ever faced a tough circumstance quit?

Education officials really need to consider the message we send these students. We cannot have them be given the impression that it is OK to quit. It may be the football field today, but it could be the classroom tomorrow.

Hoping for the Best

Here is a case I'm glad to see the Supreme Court take on:

The Supreme Court said yesterday that it will decide whether a teachers union can collect fees from nonunion members and spend their money on political activity without their prior permission....

In the union case, the court will decide whether the Washington Education Association (WEA) can spend money, collected from 3,000 nonunion teachers, on political activity without their prior consent. The teachers are required to pay fees to the union even if they don't belong to it because they are deemed to benefit from collective bargaining. Washington state's Supreme Court ruled that the requirement is unconstitutional because it puts too much burden on the union to check with every nonmember....

Stefan Gleason, vice president of the Fairfax-based National Right to Work Foundation, which is working on behalf of the teachers, said the case has big stakes because the state court's ruling could be seen to create a right to collect money even from nonunion teachers.

Long-time readers know that this is a pet peeve of mine dating back to 2004's SB 507, which gives the Board of Education authorization to enact a fee on non-union teachers who do not affiliate with TAAAC.

It is unfortunate that an issue like this has to go all of the way before the Supreme Court. The problem, as we have seen here in Maryland, is that legislatures do not understand that Americans have a basic freedom not only to associate with whomever they wish, but to not associate with whomever they wish. When teachers exercise their right to not associate with the teacher's union, they should not be punished for their decision by paying a fee because of the so called "benefits" they receive from the continued existence of the union. Hopefully, the Supreme Court will set a precedent in this case that people cannot be strongarmed into funding an organization they do not wish to be associated with.

Just Not Couth

There are now at least two candidates who were defeated in their recent primaries in our county party who have made de facto announcements that they will be running for these seats again in 2010, regardless of the outcome of the election. And I just cannot figure this out.

Pat Corcoran has the right approach to this. On his website, he notes that he is not discouraged from running again, that he will wait to see who wins the upcoming general elections and consider his personal and professional life before making any pronouncements for 2010, and that in the meantime he will support his party and its nominees. This is the right attitude to take, regardless of whether Pat decides to run again or not.

Now is the time for those of us who are active in the party to ensure Republican victories in November. I'm not advocating obseqiousness, but if there is a candidate who you just cannot support publicly or cannot work for, stay on the sidelines and stay out of the way. Dividing the party at this critical juncture does not accomplish anything for anybody, including the two candidates in question. It's uncouth and unbecoming to the voters.

The statesmanlike thing to do would be to remain quiet during this period and take the loss in a dignified manner. Pronouncements of candidacies for races four years hence for offices that have no winners yet in this electoral cycle is just a cynical, jaded reaction to a defeat and frankly do not put the particular candidates hinting at these decisions into a favorable light.

DSCC Steele Attack Ad Update

Here's an intersting note from the Washington Times:

The DSCC ads had been scheduled to begin airing a month from now and run up to the Nov. 7 general election.

But last week, the DSCC moved up its $1 million ad purchase by one month and presumably will run ads against Mr. Steele for six weeks instead of two weeks.

Looks like they really are quaking in their collective boots...

Who Knew?

Can somebody explain why Elias actually keeps track of records like this one?

When Dusty Baker called for Jae-Kuk Ryu to pitch the ninth inning of the Cubs' 14-6 win over the Brewers, it marked Chicago's 522nd pitching change of the season, a new major league record. The previous mark was set by Felipe Alou's Giants in 2004.

Loco

Can we officially say that Mel Gibson is slightly off-base?

At a film festival in Texas, Gibson, 50, drew parallels between the collapsing Mayan civilisation depicted in the movie and the current situation in the US.

"The precursors to a civilisation that's going under are the same, time and time again," Gibson said after the work-in-progress screening at the weekend. "What's human sacrifice if not sending guys off to Iraq for no reason?

"I don't mean to be a doomsday guy, but the Mayan calendar does end in 2012, boys and girls. Have fun!"

Being against the war is one thing. Drawing paralells to the U.S. and the Mayans through the end of the 13th b'ak'tun in December 2012 while promoting a movie....that's a little different.

Just When You Think You've Seen Everything...

...this happens:

A maverick Anne Arundel County state senator who was defeated in the Democratic primary after breaking ranks with party leaders on several high-profile issues has switched political parties, apparently with an eye on seeking re-election as a Republican in November.

Sen. John A. Giannetti Jr., 42, a lawyer elected in 2002 as a Democrat, said Tuesday night that he has become a Republican and had the paperwork to prove it. He was carrying it with him at a Republican fundraising dinner in Baltimore.

Wow. I'm not even sure what to say....

That Was Quick

The Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee sure didn't wait long to start attacking Michael Steele. I saw their first ad today and it is hysterical. Not because of its accuracies, but because the DSCC actually had the hubris to use footage from Michael Steele's "puppy" commercial in it. Only the Democrats would actually crate an attack ad by using footage from an ad denouncing attack ads.

To the Steele campaign's credit, they already have a new ad denouncing the DSCC ad.

Can you imagine what the Cardin and DSCC internals are telling them right now? If this supposedly impenetrable Democratic Senate seat requires attack ads against Steele six weeks before the election, then the internals must be breaking all against Cardin. Neither the Cardin campaign nor the DSCC has launched any new positive material since the primary. First thing out of the chute and the Democrats are already attacking the Lt. Governor (very reminiscent of Bill Clinton's bizarro ranting against Chris Wallace on Sunday). The Democratic team could be in for a long, LONG ride the next 42 days and nights.

I don't want to be too optimistic that the SurveyUSA poll of last week was completely accurate, but maybe the Democratic internals are telling them the same thing..

Don't Worry About the Offense

Yeah, the Ravens won 15-14 yesterday. And yes, the offense looked rather less than pedestrian for the first two-and-a-half quarters. But don't worry about the actual offense....

Worry about the six or seven sacks of Charlie Frye the defense missed yesterday. Sure, Frye went down seven times, but the defense could have really put the game away if they could have kept Frye wrapped up (and maybe Rolle and McAlister wouldn't have looked so bad in the process).

The Sun does not learn

I hate to sound like a broken record, but once again the Sun commissioned a poll by Potomac, Inc. that was once again inclusive of a weekend:

The telephone survey conducted Sept. 15 to Sept. 18 has a margin of error of 3.5 percentage points.

If you have read what I have had to say on this in the past, you'll know why the Sun screwed this poll up as well.

Quick: Somebody find $66 million

Buried in a Sun article about the potential the Tribune Company trying to get out of partnerships or sell assets:

The Sun properties, owned by one partnership, are assessed at about $66 million. They include The Sun's headquarters in the 500 block of N. Calvert St.; an office building-parking garage next door, and the Sun Park printing facility on Cromwell Street in Port Covington.

Somebody needs to find $66 million in a hurry; maybe we can right some of these wrongs!

Democrats Against the Ropes

Lt. Governor Steele unveiled his "Steele Democrats" yesterday. How did the Democratic establishment/intelligentsia respond? Let's just say "not well". First, political "observer" Donald Norris from UMBC:

Donald F. Norris, a professor of public policy at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, said that while such cross-party coalitions are a routine campaign gimmick, Steele's new signs are "underhanded" and a "dirty trick."

"Oh ho, we're a blue state, aren't we?" Norris said. "This is an obvious attempt on the part of a candidate who is behind in the polls to confuse the voters about which party he actually represents. To me, it's a form of dirty politics."

Not only does Norris show disdain for the Steele campaign, but also an abject rejection of the voter's ability to figure out which candidate is in which party.

Next, a DSCC spokesman bloviates:

Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee spokesman Phil Singer said that Steele's ties to the national GOP are indisputable and that signs alone will not mask his allegiances.

"Michael Steele is trying to hide the fact that his campaign is funded and directed by George Bush and the Republican party," Singer said in an e-mail statement. "When Steele returns the money he's gotten from the national Republicans and unequivocally rejects the President's support, he can try to portray himself as an independent."

And of course Terry Lierman had something to say too:

"Steele's new logo is the biggest election fraud perpetrated on the voters of Maryland in this campaign to date - and proves that Steele thinks his only chance is political identity theft," Lierman said in a statement. "But 'Steeling' a logo or party name won't work; Maryland's voters are smart enough to know that the former Maryland Republican Party Chairman - who was on the executive committee of the Republican National Committee and who was recruited to run by George Bush himself - will just be another Bush Republican vote in the U.S. Senate."

Lierman's statement was so hyperbolic that I was amazed David Paulsen didn't give it himself. At least he called it the biggest fraud to date, because I don't think we need to remind anybody about 1994.

Finally, Ronald Walters, political science prof from the University of Maryland, throws this at the wall:

Ronald Walters, a professor in government and politics at the University of Maryland, College Park, said Steele's new signs are an attempt to avoid a discussion of the issues. Noting that Steele's conservative policy views are not in sync with the beliefs of the majority of Maryland voters, he said that Steele is better off selling an image that might have broad appeal.

"He wants to stay away from any discussion of the issues because that would be to his detriment," Walters said. "He wants to run instead on his personality."

Hey...isn't O'Malley using the same strategy? Heck, so is Cardin isn't he?

This is is sheer lunacy from the Democratic Party. They are proving once and for all that Michael Steele has Ben Cardin against the ropes and, like the 1998 attacks against Ellen Sauerbrey and the 2002 gubernatorial debate, they are acting out of desperation. How else can you explain comments like these that insult the intelligence of the voters and, quite frankly, make the quoted not sound particularly smart?

We Don't Know Anything

Becuase everytime we turn around, nature is full of surprises:

Almost every day, the great antennas of NASA's Deep Space Network turn to a blank patch of sky in the constellation Ophiuchus. Pointing at nothing, or so it seems, they invariably pick up a signal, faint but full of intelligence. The source is beyond Neptune, beyond Pluto, on the verge of the stars themselves.

It's Voyager 1. The spacecraft left Earth in 1977 on a mission to visit Jupiter and Saturn. Almost 30 years later, with the gas giants long ago seen and done, Voyager 1 is still going and encountering some strange things.

"We've entered a totally new region of space," says Ed Stone, Voyager project scientist and the former director of JPL. "And the spacecraft is beaming back surprising new information."

Click on the link to learn all sorts of things about the heliosheath, the heliopause, nanoteslas and all sorts of neat stuff.

How About This!

Thankfully, Nancy Pelosi said all of the right things today:

One of President George W. Bush's fiercest political opponents at home took his side on Thursday, calling Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez a "thug" for his remark that Bush is like the devil.

"Hugo Chavez fancies himself a modern day Simon Bolivar but all he is an everyday thug," House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi said at a news conference, referring to Chavez' comments in a U.N. General Assembly speech on Wednesday.

"Hugo Chavez abused the privilege that he had, speaking at the United Nations," said Pelosi, a frequent Bush critic. "He demeaned himself and he demeaned Venezuela."

Charlie Rangel too (H/T RedState):

'You do not come into my country, my congressional district, and you do not condemn my president. If there is any criticism of President Bush, it should be restricted to Americans, whether they voted for him or not. I just want to make it abundantly clear to Hugo Chavez or any other president, do not come to the United States and think because we have problems with our president that any foreigner can come to our country and not think that Americans do not feel offended when you offend our Chief of State'

Incidentally, Chavez is one of many heads of state the U.N. gave a stage too this week, joining such other proud examples of dictatorial strongmen Heads of State as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Abdelaziz Bouteflika, Raul Castro, Alexander Lukashenko, Evo Morales, and Robert Mugabe. Nothing screams "freedom and democracy" like that crew. At least Ahmadinejad managed to get thousands out to protest his attendance due to his insane ramblings about Israel.

Is This Becoming a Trend?

Because this week, it's Minnesota (Hattip: Wizbang)

Democrat Amy Klobuchar's U.S. Senate campaign has fired its chief spokeswoman, revealing Wednesday that she viewed an unreleased TV ad for Republican candidate Mark Kennedy that may have been illegally obtained.

In a prepared statement, Klobuchar campaign manager Ben Goldfarb said that communications director Tara McGuinness was contacted last Saturday by a local blogger who sent her a link to the ad. Goldfarb said the campaign had turned the matter over to the Minneapolis office of the FBI.

"The blogger indicated to Ms. McGuinness that he had gained access to the advertisement by use of passwords," Goldfarb said in the statement. "Exercising poor judgment, Ms. McGuinness opened the link, watched the advertisement and asked others on our campaign to watch it."

At a hastily called press conference late Wednesday, Noah Kunin, who maintains the liberal blog www.blanked-out.com, revealed that he uncovered the ad. He said he was at the Web site of Kennedy media consultant Scott Howell, looking for previously aired examples of his work.

Kunin said he typed the word "Allen" into a field at the site, seeking the ads of Howell client U.S. Sen. George Allen, which led to several more links that ultimately brought up the Kennedy ad.

There are so many strange and goofy things associated with this story. And unlike the Cardin blogger flap, there is clearly potentially criminal activity involved.

The best part; they watched in Saturday, and waited five days to tell somebody about it...

Go Figure

Why does this not surprise me? (Emphasis mine)

No big surprise that the campaign aide to Rep. Ben Cardin, who is challenging Lt. Gov. Michael Steele for the open Maryland Senate seat, who published racist and anti-Semitic remarks on a blog, was steered to Cardin through MoveOn.org and the Democrat National Committee, says a state Democratic operative.

Cardin's senior staff on Sunday mulled putting out a story that the woman, who joined the campaign about a month ago, was believed to be a Republican plant. But after reviewing notes of the woman's hiring, they discovered that she was a Democrat Party operative. The staffer has been fired.

Doing the People's Business, Baltimore Style

Obviously, all of the problems with crime, education, drugs, and poverty have been tackled by the Baltimore City Council, since Robert Curran now wants to tackle political signs:

Baltimore's City Council banned pizza menus from vestibules. It condoned tearing down advertisements promoting cheap houses and work-from-home jobs. Now the council is faced with a dose of its own medicine - a bill that would regulate political yard signs.

Responding to an increase in larger-than-ever political signs that have proliferated in some neighborhoods during this year's gubernatorial campaign, Councilman Robert W. Curran introduced a bill yesterday to ban political signs larger than 16 square feet in residential neighborhoods.

"Not only are they unappreciated ... they're unsightly," Curran said yesterday. "We've never seen 4-by-8 signs in the neighborhoods before."

I just can't see the point in taking time and energy to pass this. Frankly, this seems more like an restriction of the right of free expression of people to support candidates of their choosing, and an overreaction planted by the O'Malley campaign thanks to the large 4x8 Ehrlich sign across the street from the Mayor's home.

Amazingly, this is my 500th post.

Head for the Minibar

If you didn't already feel bad enough at Parris Glendening's $55 million election machine boondoggle, this won't help:

after giving a presentation to some computer science colleagues last week, Prof. Ed Felten was approached by Chris Tengi, a member of the department's technical staff, who pointed out that the key that opens the AccuVote-TS voting machine is very similar to a key that he has at home. Tengi's key opened the voting machine, and upon further investigation, the Princeton posse discovered that both keys are actually a common office furniture type used for hotel minibars, electronic equipment and jukeboxes. Furthermore, said keys can easily be bought on eBay or from various online retailers. So, all you need to hack Diebold's crackerjack security is to spend a little cash on these keys, bring 'em to your next local election along with a cheap-o flash drive, and you can easily open the lock that houses that Diebold memory card while you're in the voting booth -- good times, hey?

Yeah, good times.

One Bad Apple

There is one bad apple in every bunch, and now we know who the bad apple is in the newly elected Republican Central Committee.

Tom Remdond was the leading vote getter in the Republican Central Committee race in District 31. This was troubling, not just because I lost, but because Redmond served on the County Council as a Democrat from 1994-1998 (my first political letter to the editor was a letter to the Gazette criticizing his support of the proposed NASCAR track in May, 1998). But he had since switched parties back, supported various Republican candidates, so that was that as far as I was concerned. As many of you know, his property along Route 100 has many large political signs for Republican candidates on his fence.

Needless to say, I was not particularly happy to see this: a Ron Bateman sign stuck with all of these other Republican signs. Tom Redmond, a newly elected member of the Republican Central Committee is openly supporting a Democratic candidate Four Days after the Primary.

I look at it this way; if anybody wants to vote for a candidate from another party, that is their personal decision that they can undertake in private. But a Republican Central Committee member cannot be serious about supporting the party, and supporting the party's candidates if they are openly promoting and supporting candidates from the other side. Is Redmond showing his true colors? Is his George Johnson sign on backorder?

I know that I have been critical of other Republicans in the past, and that has angered some people. But the primary election is now over. We as Republican leaders are supporting the Republican ticket because that is how we advance our Republican agenda and this is how we build our Republican Party. Redmond's behavior in doing this is unacceptable and a slap in the face to not only our Republican nominee for Sheriff, John Moran, but a slap in the face to the 2,955 Republicans who voted for Redmond on Tuesday.

If this angers you as much as it does me, contact Tom Redmond and urge him to take the Bateman sign down or resign from the Republican Central Committee immediately.

Because you won't read it in the Sun

Looks like there was a staffer with some, shall we say, interesting insights into the Cardin campaign who was recently canned because of some of the things she said on her blog. From WBAL Radio:

A blog has apparently led to the firing of a staffer in the Ben Cardin for Senate campaign.

According to the Washington Times Insider Politics blog, a person labeling herself the 'Persuasionatrix' wrote that she was on the staff of a high profile, contested Senate campaign and was based in Baltimore.

Persuasionatrix wrote that staffers should pose holding Oreo brand cookies under the caption 'devouring the competition.'

They got the story from Wizbang:

Just days after Rep. Ben Cardin won the Democratic nomination for U.S. Senate in Maryland, we've found the secret blog of a female Cardin staffer who has quite a bit to say about race, gender, and creepy old Jewish guys... It's not quite Washingtonienne, but Cardin's mystery staffer, known as Persuasionatrix, is dishing some anonymous dirt that's sure to leave a black eye on the campaign...

Wizbang has posted the full blog here.

Religious insensitivities? Racial insensitivities? This is absolute red meat for Sun reporters who devoured the Steffen/MD4Bush story right? Oh, that's right; Ben Cardin is a Democrat so it will probably never, ever see the light of day in the Daily Disappointment.

EDIT: The Sun actually posted the story this afternoon, so presumably it will run in Sunday's paper.

Housekeeping

As you'll notice, I finally got a chance today to update the index pages in order to reflect Tuesday's carnage results.

Four White Dudes

I guess O'Malley, Cardin, Gansler and Franchot proves the Democratic Party commitment to diversity, I suppose.

Somehow, the Democrats managed to nominate the most left-wing candidate in the AG and Comptroller's race. Gansler thinks he's an environmental ombudsman; Franchot thinks the Comptroller's office is the one who ensures abortion clinics stay open.

Once again, the Republican ticket in Maryland leads the way in diversity

Disgraceful

The conduct of this election was absolutely disgraceful yesterday. Of course, I shouldn't actually say yesterday since as of right now only 86.4% of the precincts in Anne Arundel County are actually reporting over thirteen hours after the polling places closed.

We paid millions for a system so that campaign poll watchers (and I was one of them) could wait for individual printouts from every machine and try to add numbers on the fly to figure out what was going on. How can we have machines that don't print one tally?

On top of that, we have paid millions of dollars for machines that we can't actually know the results by the next morning. How come the results have not been updated online for almost seven hours?

As much as I usually don't agree with him, Kweisi Mfume is right about one thing: what happened yesterday in regarding to voting should have never happened.

Food for thought

A friend of ours told me this, and I think it is very important to consider as we go to the polls on Tuesday, in light of many of the things that have happened recently:

A righteous man cannot choose when he is righteous.

Thanks

Thanks go out to all of those kind people who have honked and given the thumbs up as we have been sign waving. That's part of the reason for the lack of blogging activity, as we get ready to support me and our other candidates on Tuesday. If you see us around in the next few days as we waive and campaign, please be kind!

Just Saying...

• Watching the PA Senate debate on Meet the Press this morning, Bob Casey may be the worst "major" candidate for U.S. Senate I have seen in quite a while.
  
  
• Is it just me, or is Tim Russert a poor choice to serve as a moderator between D's and R's? He usually asks good questions in one-on-ones, but he seemed to ease up on Casey at times while pressing and pressing Santorum on the same question over an over again, particularly on Iraq.
  
  
• I agree with Pejman Yousefzadeh; I don't buy this either.
  
  
• Why should voters vote for John Sarbanes? If there is a lot of work still to be done, as his ads say, why wasn't his father on the ball for the last forty years? If John is trying to be a chip off of the old block, and by including his father in his commercials he is trying to do just that, why should voters think junior will do any better?
  
  
• I don't care what Allan Lichtman says about his actions being spontaneous, it just has given him too much publicity for it not to be a pre-planned media event.
  
  
• Licthman, Rales, and Rasmussen's participation in the debate would have been a boon for Republican candidates. Both Cardin and Mfume would have had to shift more to the left on television in order to out-Democrat the other Democrats.
  
  
• Can we say enough with the illegally placed campaign signs? More and more candidates are putting our more and more illegal signs in state highway right of ways.
  
  
• Why are the Ravens carrying only two quarterbacks? We have gone down this road before. Maybe, just maybe, the Ravens will resign either Olson or St. Pierre, releasing them only for the purpose of not guaranteeing the entire year of their contract.
  
  
• Maryland is going to have to do better in ACC play than they did yesterday against I-AA Middle Tennessee.
  
  
• No matter how badly Hayden Penn pitched today, you have to keep him pitching the last month of the season.
  
  

California to Constitution: Drop Dead

That's the message given by California General Assembly, which recently passed a bill that would require California to award its electoral votes to the winner of the nationwide popular vote, not the winner of the popular vote in California. This is part of a Natitonal Popular Vote scheme put forth by some in an effort to get states to pass such legislation in order to elect the President directly. The scheme is basically a way to undermine the Constitution change the way we elect our President without actually amending the Constitution.

What's truly sad is that by doing it in this manner, the California legislature has taken the basic premise of one man, one vote away from the people of California. California voters no longer will have any control over how their electoral votes are cast, instead that decision being turned over to the country as a whole. Furthermore, if the proponents of abolishing the Electoral College really want to do this in a legitimate manner, not in a sneaky, underhanded, subversive way, try to pass a Constitutional Amendment. It certainly wouldn't be the first time such an amendment would be introduced in Congress. Clearly, the organizers of this effort have some sort of agenda they are pushing in order to try and subvert our political process in this manner.