The information below is a compilation of information quoted from PBS and the New York Times.

	Civil War and famine Long-time dictator Siad Barre is forced out of Mogadishu in January, 1991. Conflict between the Somali National Movement (SNM), Aidid's party, and other factions causes clan infighting, leading to famine and lawlessness throughout portions of the country. An estimated 300,000 Somalis die of starvation during the year of civil war that followed Barre's ouster.
March 3	Ceasefire Warring faction leaders sign a ceasefire agreement, which includes provisions to allow a UN monitoring mission into Somalia to oversee arrangements for providing humanitarian assistance.
April 24	UN Military Observers to Somalia UN Security Council approves UN operation in Somalia, pursuant to the ceasefire agreement. In July, 50 unarmed UN military observers are deployed to Mogadishu to monitor the ceasefire.
August 15	Operation Provide Relief (United Nations Operation in Somalia -- UNOSOM I) UN humanitarian relief effort begins.
Dec. 4	US President George Bush launches Somalia intervention Deteriorating security prevents the UN mission from delivering food and supplies to the starving Somalis. Relief flights are looted upon landing, food convoys are hijacked and aid workers assaulted. The UN appeals to its members to provide military forces to assist the humanitarian operation. With only weeks left in his term as president, George Bush responds to the UN request, proposing that US combat troops lead an international UN force to secure the environment for relief operations. On December 5, the UN accepts his offer, and Bush orders 25,000 US troops into Somalia. On December 9th, the first US Marines land on the beach. Bush assures the American people and troops involved that this is not an open ended commitment; the objective is to quickly provide a secure environment so that food can get through to the starving Somalis, and then the operation will be turned over to the UN peacekeeping forces. He assures the public that he plans for the troops to be home by Clinton's inauguration in January. This US-led United Task Force (UNITAF) is dubbed "Operation Restore Hope."
January	Clinton takes over Clinton, like Bush, is anxious to scale down the American military presence in Somalia and let the United Nations take charge.
March 15 -28	Addis Ababa Accords The UN organized Conference on National Reconciliation in Somalia, held in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, results in a resolution among faction leaders, including Aidid, to end the violence.
May 4	UN takeover; "nation building" (UNOSOM II) In March, the UN authorizes UNOSOM II, a UN operation with expanded enforcement power, whose mandate stressed "the crucial importance of disarmament" of the Somali people. This UN-led mission was to take over from the US-led UNITAF. The expanded operation's new mission goes beyond simply providing humanitarian relief, calling for the UN to facilitate "nation building," to get Somalia back on its feet by restoring law and order, shoring up the infrastructure, and helping to set up processes for establishing a representative government. By the end of March, 28 different nations send contingents to Somalia in support of the new militarized operation. The US officially hands over the command to the UN on May 4. While Clinton supported this expansion of the UN's mandate, he simultaneously ordered the number of US troops in Somalia to be reduced and replaced by UN troops. By June, only 1,200 US combat soldiers remained in Somalia, with 3,000 support troops.
June 5	Massacre of Pakistani troops; the hunt for Aidid During an inspection of a Somali arms weapons storage site, 24 Pakistani soldiers are ambushed and massacred. The next day, the UN Security Council issues an emergency resolution calling for the apprehension of "those responsible" for the massacre. Though Aidid is not specifically named in the resolution, it is, in effect, a call to apprehend him. Twelve days later, Admiral Howe orders Aidid's arrest, offering a $25,000 reward for information leading to his apprehension.
June 8	Special Forces requested In the aftermath of the June 5 massacre, Admiral Howe first requests a counterterrorist hostage rescue force from Washington because they he they needed more extensive military capability to deal with the escalating violence. No such troops are forthcoming until Task Force Ranger is deployed in August.
June 12-16	Attacks on Aidid's strongholds US and UN troops begin attacking various targets in Mogadishu associated with Aidid, including a radio station and ammunition depots. The peacekeepers are now at war with Aidid. U.S. Attacks Somali Clan Chief To Support U.N. Peacekeepers By MICHAEL R. GORDON, New York Times June 12, 1993 American and allied forces delivered a punishing blow tonight against a Somali leader in Mogadishu who has been blamed for ordering the deadly ambush of United Nations peacekeepers last weekend, senior United States military officials said. American officials said the purpose of the air and ground attack in the Somali capital was to destroy the arms stores and radio station that constitute the power base of the leader, Gen. Mohammed Farah Aidid.
July 12	Abdi house attack In a major escalation, American Cobra helicopters attack a house in south Mogadishu where a group of clan leaders are meeting, destroying the building with TOW missiles and cannon fire and killing a number of Somalis. Four western journalists who had gone to investigate are beaten to death by an angry mob.
July 29	Last sighting of Aidid
August 8	Americans killed by land mines Four American military police are killed by a remote detonated land mine set off by Somalis. Two weeks later, six more US soldiers are wounded in a similar attack. This gets attention in America, and shortly thereafter, Task Force Ranger is deployed to Somalia.
August 26	US Special Forces arrive in Somalia US Army Task Force Ranger flies into Mogadishu -- 440 elite troops from Delta Force and the U.S. Rangers. Led by Major General William F. Garrison, their mission is to capture Aidid. They begin pursuing Aidid and his top lieutenants, with sporadic success.
September	Carter negotiating with Aidid In the midst of the manhunt, the Clinton administration opens a secret initiative to negotiate with Aidid. Former president Jimmy Carter, who had a previous relationship with Aidid, volunteers to act as intermediary. The US military commanders in Mogadishu are not informed about this new initiative.
September	Request for armored reinforcements denied In a decision that is later highly criticized, US Defense Secretary Les Aspin denies requests from General Montgomery for armored reinforcements, despite support for Montgomery's request from General Colin Powell. Aspin says that he did not want to create the appearance that the US was increasing forces in Somalia at a time when they were trying to reduce military presence. He later concedes,"Had I known at the time what I knew after the events of Sunday, [October 3]. I would have made a very different decision." In December, he is forced to resign. U.S. Vows to Stay in Somalia Force Depite an Attack By ERIC SCHMITT, New York Times September 26, 1993 The Clinton Administration said today that the deaths of three American soldiers whose helicopter was shot down in Mogadishu early this morning would not deter Washington from supporting the United Nations operation in Somalia. But the episode, which brought to 11 the number of American combat deaths there, provoked renewed calls from Congress for the immediate withdrawal of the 4,700 remaining United States troops there.
October 3-4	Firefight Task Force Ranger's assault on the Olympic Hotel in Mogadishu, in search of Aidid, results in a seventeen hour bloody battle in which 18 US soldiers are killed and 84 are wounded.
October 7	Clinton's response: withdraw troops President Clinton decides to cut his losses. He sends substantial combat troops as short term reinforcements, but declares that American troops are to be fully withdrawn from Somalia by March 31. The hunt for Aidid is abandoned, and US representatives are sent to resume negotiations with the warlord. Two weeks later, in a letter to President Clinton, General Garrison accepts full responsibility for what happened in the battle.
October 14-25	Durant released CWO Mike Durant, who had been taken captive by Aidid's men during the battle, is released along with a Nigerian prisoner on October 14th. 750 Rangers are to Leave Somalia, President Says By GWEN IFILL, New York Times October 20, 1993 President Clinton announced today that 750 Army Rangers would leave Somalia immediately, effectively ending the American role in the search for the clan leader who international officials have said is responsible for the deaths of scores of United Nations peacekeepers. Mr. Clinton said that the Rangers, who had been part of the United Nations effort to track down and arrest the Somali leader, Mohammed Farah Aidid, had completed their mission -- though they have not found General Aidid -- Details of U.S. Raid in Somalia: Success So Near, a Loss So Deep By MICHAEL R. GORDON WITH THOMAS L. FRIEDMAN, New York Times October 25, 1993 At the time, the Oct. 3 raid into south Mogadishu by Army Rangers seemed like just another security sweep to round up troublemakers. But judging from its early political impact, the firefight, in which 18 Americans were killed and 75 wounded, may well be one of those searing battlefield experiences whose memory shapes public opinion and sharply influences what the United States will and will not do in the world.
March 25	Remaining US forces leave Somalia Approximately 20,000 UN forces remain, composed primarily of Asian and African contingents.
Spring	Final UN withdrawal from Somalia
August 1	Aidid dies Aidid dies in hospital from bullet wounds received during an outbreak of fighting in Mogadishu. His son, Hussein Aidid, later returns to Mogadishu from the United States to succeed his father.

What follows is the transcript of a speech by Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars on March 14, 2005, and broadcast by C-Span.

Mr. Hamilton:

Good afternoon to all of you. Thank you very much for coming to the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. My pleasure to welcome you here for the director’s forum with Antonin Scalia, the Associate Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States. As an institution of advanced research, the Wilson Center seeks to enhance the public dialogue by bridging the worlds of scholarship and policy. Today, we are pleased to welcome a man whose work consistently informs and enlightens the dialogue on the critical issues that confront the country. Justice Scalia is one of the most prominent legal thinkers of our times. He was appointed to the Supreme Court in 1986 by President Reagan. Confirmed by a vote of ninety-eight to zero. On the court, he has become well known for his strict interpretation of the Constitution and his thoughtful and engaging opinions. Before his appointment, Justice Scalia enjoyed a distinguished career in private practice, academia and public service. He was first in his class at Georgetown University; went on to graduate from Harvard Law School. From 1961 to 1967 he worked for Jones, Day, Cockley, and Reavis in Cleveland. Justice Scalia entered public service in 1971 as General Counsel for the Office of Telecommunications Policy under President Nixon where he formulated policy for the growth of cable television. He was then Assistant Attorney General for the Office of Legal Counsel in the Ford Administration. He has remained in touch with academia, serving as a Professor of Law at the University of Virginia from 1967-1971 as well as the University of Chicago from 1977-1982. In 1982, President Reagan appointed him Judge of the United States Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia. His talk today is entitled Constitutional Interpretation. Justice Scalia, we welcome you to The Center.

Justice Scalia:

Thank you very much Mr. Hamilton. It’s a pizzazzy topic: Constitutional Interpretation. It is however an important one. I was vividly reminded how important it was last week when The Court came out with a controversial decision in the Roper Case. And I watched one television commentary on the case in which the host had one person defending the opinion on the ground that people should not be subjected to capital punishment for crimes they commit when they are younger than eighteen. And the other person attacked the opinion on the ground that a jury should be able to decide that a person, despite the fact he was under eighteen, given the crime, given the person involved, should be subjected to capital punishment. And it struck me how irrelevant it was, how much the point had been missed. The question wasn’t whether the call was right or wrong. The important question was who should make the call. And that is essentially what I am addressing today.

I am one of a small number of judges, small number of anybody: judges, professors, lawyers; who are known as originalists. Our manner of interpreting the Constitution is to begin with the text, and to give that text the meaning that it bore when it was adopted by the people. I’m not a strict constructionist, despite the introduction. I don’t like the term “strict construction”. I do not think the Constitution, or any text should be interpreted either strictly or sloppily; it should be interpreted reasonably. Many of my interpretations do not deserve the description “strict”. I do believe however, that you give the text the meaning it had when it was adopted.

This is such a minority position in modern academia and in modern legal circles that on occasion I’m asked when I’ve given a talk like this, question from the back of the room: “Justice Scalia, when did you first become an originalists?” As though it is some kind of weird affliction that seizes some people. “When did you first start eating human flesh?”

Although it is a minority view now, the reality is that not very long ago, originalism was orthodoxy. Everybody, at least purported to be an originalists. If you go back and read the commentaries on the Constitution by Joseph Story, he didn’t think the Constitution evolved or changed. He said it means and will always mean what it meant when it was adopted.

Or consider the opinions of John Marshall in the Federal Bank Case, where he says, we must not, we must always remember it is a constitution we are expounding. And since it’s a constitution, he says, you have to give its provisions expansive meaning so that they will accommodate events that you do not know of which will happen in the future.

Well, if it is a constitution that changes, you wouldn’t have to give it an expansive meaning. You can give it whatever meaning you want and when future necessity arises, you simply change the meaning. But anyway, that is no longer the orthodoxy.

Oh, one other example about how not just the judges and scholars believed in originalism, but even the American people. Consider the Nineteenth Amendment, which is the amendment that gave women the vote. It was adopted by the American people in 1920. Why did we adopt a constitutional amendment for that purpose? The Equal Protection Clause existed in 1920; it was adopted right after the Civil War. And you know that if that issue of the franchise for women came up today, we would not have to have a constitutional amendment. Someone would come to the Supreme Court and say, “Your Honors, in a democracy, what could be a greater denial of equal protection than denial of the franchise?” And the Court would say, “Yes! Even though it never meant it before, the Equal Protection Clause means that women have to have the vote.” But that’s not how the American people thought in 1920. In 1920, they looked at the Equal Protection Clause and said, “What does it mean?” Well, it clearly doesn’t mean that you can’t discriminate in the franchise. Not only on the basis of sex, but on the basis of property ownership, on the basis of literacy. None of that is unconstitutional. And therefore, since it wasn’t unconstitutional, and we wanted it to be, we did things the good-old-fashioned way and adopted an amendment.

Now, in asserting that originalism used to be orthodoxy, I do not mean to imply that judges did not distort the Constitution now and then, of course they did. We had willful judges then, and we will have willful judges until the end of time. But the difference is that prior to the last fifty years or so, prior to the advent of the “Living Constitution”, judges did their distortions the good-old-fashioned way, the honest way, they lied about it. They said the Constitution means such and such, when it never meant such and such.

It’s a big difference that you now no longer have to lie about it, because we are in the era of the evolving Constitution. And the judge can simply say, “Oh yes, the Constitution didn’t used to mean that, but it does now.” We are in the age in which not only judges, not only lawyers, but even school children have come to learn the Constitution changes. I have grammar school students come into the court now and then, and they recite very proudly what they have been taught: “The Constitution is a living document.” You know, it morphs.

Well, let me first tell you how we got to the “Living Constitution.” You don’t have to be a lawyer to understand it. The road is not that complicated. Initially, the Court began giving terms in the text of the Constitution a meaning they didn’t have when they were adopted. For example, the First Amendment, which forbids Congress to abridge the freedom of speech. What does the freedom of speech mean? Well, it clearly did not mean that Congress, or government could not impose any restrictions upon speech. Libel laws for example, were clearly Constitutional. Nobody thought the First Amendment was carte-blanche to libel someone. But in the famous case of New York Times v. Sullivan, the Supreme Court said, “But the First Amendment does prevent you from suing for libel if you are a public figure and if the libel was not malicious.” That is, the person, a member of the press or otherwise, thought that what the person said was true. Well, that had never been the law. I mean, it might be a good law. And some States could amend their libel law.

Could we stop the cameras? I thought I announced a couple of shots at the beginning was fine, but click, click, click. Thank you.

It’s one thing for States to amend it’s libel law and say, “We think that public figures shouldn’t be able to sue.” That’s fine. But the courts have said that the First Amendment, which never meant this before, now means that if you are a public figure, that you can’t sue for libel unless it’s intentional, malicious. So that’s one way to do it.

Another example is: the Constitution guarantees the right to be represented by counsel; that never meant the State had to pay for your counsel. But you can reinterpret it to mean that.

That was step one. Step two, I mean, that will only get you so far. There is no text in the Constitution that you could reinterpret to create a right to abortion, for example. So you need something else. The something else is called the doctrine of “Substantive Due Process”. Only lawyers can walk around talking about substantive process, in as much as it’s a contradiction in terms. If you referred to substantive process or procedural substance at a cocktail party, people would look at you funny. But, lawyers talk this way all the time.

What substantive due process is, is quite simple, the Constitution has a Due Process Clause, which says that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. Now, what does this guarantee? Does it guarantee life, liberty or property? No indeed! All three can be taken away. You can be fined, you can be incarcerated, you can even be executed, but not without due process of law. It’s a procedural guarantee. But the Court said, and this goes way back, in the 1920s at least, in fact the first case to do it was Dred Scott. But it became more popular in the 1920s. The Court said: there are some liberties that are so important, that no process will suffice to take them away. Hence, substantive due process.

Now, what liberties are they? The Court will tell you. Be patient. When the doctrine of substantive due process was initially announced, it was limited in this way: the Court said it embraces only those liberties that are fundamental to a democratic society and rooted in the traditions of the American people.

Then we come to step three. Step three: that limitation is eliminated. Within the last twenty years, we have found to be covered by Due Process the right to abortion, which was so little rooted in the traditions of the American people that it was criminal for two hundred years; the right to homosexual sodomy, which was so little rooted in the traditions of the American people that it was criminal for two hundred years.

So it is literally true, and I don’t think this is an exaggeration, that the Court has essentially liberated itself from the text of the Constitution, from the text, and even from the traditions of the American people. It is up to the Court to say what is covered by substantive due process. What are the arguments usually made in favor of the Living Constitution? As the name of it suggests, it is a very attractive philosophy, and it’s hard to talk people out of it: the notion that the Constitution grows. The major argument is the Constitution is a living organism, it has to grow with the society that it governs or it will become brittle and snap.

This is the equivalent of, an anthropomorphism equivalent to what you hear from your stock broker, when he tells you that the stock market is resting for an assault on the eleven-hundred level. The stock market panting at some base camp. The stock market is not a mountain climber and the Constitution is not a living organism for Pete’s sake, it’s a legal document, and like all legal documents, it says some things, and it doesn’t say other things.

And if you think that the aficionados of the Living Constitution want to bring you flexibility, think again. My Constitution is a very flexible Constitution. You think the death penalty is a good idea: persuade your fellow citizens and adopt it. You think it’s a bad idea: persuade them the other way and eliminate it. You want a right to abortion: create it the way most rights are created in a democratic society. Persuade your fellow citizens it’s a good idea, and enact it. You want the opposite, persuade them the other way. That’s flexibility. But to read either result into the Constitution is not to produce flexibility, it is to produce what a constitution is designed to produce: rigidity.

Abortion, for example, is offstage, it is off the democratic stage, it is no use debating it, it is unconstitutional. I mean prohibiting it is unconstitutional. I mean it’s no use debating it anymore. Now and forever, coast to coast, I guess until we amend the constitution, which is a difficult thing. So, for whatever reason you might like the Living Constitution, don’t like it because it provides flexibility. That’s not the name of the game.

Some people also seem to like it because they think it’s a good liberal thing. That somehow this is a conservative/liberal battle. And conservatives like the old-fashioned originalist Constitution and liberals ought to like the Living Constitution. That’s not true either. The dividing line between those who believe in the Living Constitution and those who don’t is not the dividing line between conservatives and liberals.

Conservatives are willing to grow the Constitution to cover their favorite causes just as liberals are. And the best example of that is two cases we announced some years ago on the same day, the same morning. One case was Romer v. Colorado, in which the people of Colorado had enacted an amendment to the State Constitution by plebiscite, which said that neither the State, nor any subdivision of the State would add to the protected status’s against which private individuals cannot discriminate. The usual ones are: race, religion, age, sex, disability and so forth. Would not add sexual preference. Somebody thought that was a terrible idea, and since it was a terrible idea, it must be unconstitutional. Brought a lawsuit, it came to the Supreme Court. And the Supreme Court said, “Yes, it is unconstitutional.” On the basis of… I don’t know. The Sexual Preference Clause of the Bill of Rights, presumably. And the liberals loved it; and the conservatives gnashed their teeth.

The very next case we announced is a case called BMW v. Bush. Not the Bush you think; this is another Bush. Mr. Bush had bought a BMW, which is a car supposedly, advertised at least as having a superb finish, baked seven times in ovens deep in the Alps, by dwarfs. And his BMW apparently had gotten scratched on the way over. They did not send it back to the Alps, they took a can of spray-paint and fixed it. And he found out about this and was furious, and he brought a lawsuit. He got his compensatory damages, a couple of hundred dollars, the difference between a car with a better paint job and a worse paint job. Plus, two million dollars against BMW for punitive damages for being a bad actor, which is absurd of course, so it must be unconstitutional. BMW appealed to my court, and my court said, “Yes, it’s unconstitutional.” In violation of, I assume, the Excessive Damages Clause of the Bill of Rights. And if excessive punitive damages are unconstitutional, why aren’t excessive compensatory damages unconstitutional? So you have a federal question when ever you get a judgment in a civil case. Well, that one the conservatives liked, because conservatives don’t like punitive damages, and the liberals gnashed their teeth.

I dissented in both cases. Because, I say, “A pox on both their houses.” It has nothing to do with what your policy preferences are; it has to do with what you think the Constitution is.

Some people are in favor of the Living Constitution, because they think it always leads to greater freedom. There’s just nothing to loose. The evolving Constitution will always provide greater and greater freedom, more and more rights. Why would you think that? It’s a two way street. And indeed, under the aegis of the Living Constitution, some freedoms have been taken away.

Recently, last term, we reversed a fifteen year-old decision of the Court, which had held that the Confrontation Clause, which couldn’t be clearer, it says, “In all criminal prosecutions, the accused shall enjoy the right to be confronted with the witness against him. But, a Living Constitution Court held that all that was necessary to comply with the Confrontation Clause was that the hearsay evidence which is introduced, hearsay evidence means you can’t cross examine the person who said it because he’s not in the court, the hearsay evidence has to bear indicium of reliability. I’m happy to say that we reversed it last term, with the votes of the two originalists on the court. And the opinion said that the only indicium of reliability that the Confrontation Clause acknowledges is confrontation. You bring the witness in to testify and to be cross examined. That’s just one example, there are others, of eliminating liberties.

So, I think another example is the right to jury trial. In a series of cases, the Court had seemingly acknowledged that you didn’t have to have trial by jury of the facts that increase your sentence. You can make the increased sentence a sentencing factor. You get thirty years for burglary, but if the burglary is committed with a gun, as a sentencing factor, the judge can give you another ten years, and the judge will decide whether you used a gun. And he will decide it, not beyond a reasonable doubt, but whether it’s more likely than not. Well, we held recently, I’m happy to say, that this violates the right to a trial by jury.

The Living Constitution would not have produced that result; The Living Constitution, like the legislatures that enacted these laws would have allowed sentencing factors to be determined by the judge. Because all the Living Constitution assures you is that what will happen is what the majority want to happen. And that’s not the purpose of Constitutional guarantees.

Well, I’ve talked about some of the false virtues of the Living Constitution, let me tell you what I consider its principal vices are. Surely the greatest, you should always begin with principal, its greatest vice is its illegitimacy. The only reason federal courts sit in judgment of the constitutionality of federal legislation is not because they are explicitly authorized to do so in the Constitution, some modern constitutions give the constitutional court explicit authority to review German legislation or French legislation for its constitutionality. Our Constitution doesn’t say anything like that. But John Marshall says in Marbury v. Madison: look, this is lawyers work. What you have here is an apparent conflict between the Constitution and the statute. And all the time, lawyers and judges have to reconcile these conflicts; they try to read the two to comport with each other. If they can’t, it’s judges work to decide which ones prevail. When there are two statutes, the more recent one prevails. It implicitly repeals the older one. But when the Constitution is at issue, the Constitution prevails because it is a superstatute. I mean, that’s what Marshall says, its judges work.

If you believe however, that the Constitution is not a legal text, like the texts involved when judges reconcile or decide which of two statutes prevail, if you think the Constitution is some exhortation to give effect to the most fundamental values of the society as those values change from year to year. If you think that it is meant to reflect, as some of the Supreme Court cases say, particularly those involving the Eighth Amendment, if you think it is simply meant to reflect the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society, if that is what you think it is, then why in the world would you have it interpreted by nine lawyers? What do I know about the evolving standards of decency of American society? I’m afraid to ask.

If that is what you think the Constitution is, the Marbury v. Madison is wrong. It shouldn’t be up to the judges, it should be up to the legislature. We should have a system like the English. Whatever the legislature thinks is constitutional is constitutional. They know the evolving standards of American society, I don’t. So in principle, it’s incompatible with the legal regime that America has established.

Secondly, and this is the killer argument, I mean, it’s the best debaters argument. They say in politics, you can’t beat somebody with nobody, it’s the same thing with principles of legal interpretation. If you don’t believe in originalism, then you need some other principle of interpretation. Being a non-originalist is not enough. You see, I have my rules that confine me. I know what I’m looking for. When I find it, the original meaning of the Constitution, I am handcuffed. If I believe that the First Amendment meant when it was adopted that you are entitled to burn the American flag, I have to come out that way, even though I don’t like to come out that way. When I find that the original meaning of the jury trial guarantee is that any additional time you spend in prison which depends upon a fact, must depend upon a fact found by a jury, once I find that’s what the jury trial guarantee means, I am handcuffed. Though I’m a law and order type, I can not do all the mean conservative things I would like to do to this society. You got me.

Now, if you’re not going to control your judges that way, what other criterion are you going to place before them? What is the criterion that governs the living constitutional judge? What can you possibly use, besides original meaning? Think about that. Natural law? We all agree on that, don’t we? The philosophy of John Rawls? That’s easy. There really is nothing else. You either tell your judges, “Look, this is a law, like all laws, give it the meaning it had when it was adopted.” Or, you tell your judges, “Govern us. You tell us whether people under eighteen, who committed their crimes when they were under eighteen, should be executed. You tell us whether there ought to be an unlimited right to abortion or a partial right to abortion. You make these decisions for us.”

I have put this question, you know I speak at law schools with some frequency just to make trouble, and I put this question to the faculty all the time, or incite the students to ask their living constitutional professors. “OK professor, you are not an originalist, what is your criterion?” There is none other.

And finally, this is what I will conclude with, although it is not on a happy note, the worse thing about the Living Constitution is that it will destroy the Constitution. You heard in the introduction that I was confirmed, close to nineteen years ago now, by a vote of ninety-eight to nothing. The two missing were Barry Goldwater and Jake Garn, so make it a hundred. I was known at that time to be, in my political and social views, fairly conservative. But still, I was known to be a good lawyer, an honest man, somebody who could read a text and give it its fair meaning, had judicial impartiality and so forth. And so I was unanimously confirmed.

Today, barely twenty years later, it is difficult to get someone confirmed to the Court of Appeals. What has happened? The American people have figured out what is going on. If we are selecting lawyers, if we are selecting people to read a text and give it the fair meaning it had when it was adopted, yes, the most important thing to do is to get a good lawyer. If on the other hand, we’re picking people to draw out of their own conscience and experience, a new constitution, with all sorts of new values to govern our society, then we should not look principally for good lawyers. We should look principally for people who agree with us, the majority, as to whether there ought to be this right, that right, and the other right. We want to pick people that would write the new constitution that we would want.

And that is why you hear in the discourse on this subject, people talking about moderate, we want moderate judges. What is a moderate interpretation of the text? Half way between what it really means and what you’d like it to mean? There is no such thing as a moderate interpretation of the text. Would you ask a lawyer, “Draw me a moderate contract?” The only way the word has any meaning is if you are looking for someone to write a law, to write a constitution, rather than to interpret one. The moderate judge is the one who will devise the new constitution that most people would approve of. So for example, we had a suicide case some terms ago, and the Court refused to hold that there is a constitutional right to assisted suicide. We said, “We’re not yet ready to say that. Stay tuned, in a few years, the time may come, but we’re not yet ready.” And that was a moderate decision, because I think most people would not want a… If we had gone, looked into that and created a national right to assisted suicide that would have been an immoderate and extremist decision.

I think the very terminology suggests where we have arrived: at the point of selecting people to write a constitution, rather than people to give us the fair meaning of one that has been democratically adopted. And when that happens, when the Senate interrogates nominees to the Supreme Court, or to the lower courts, you know, “Judge so and so, do you think there is a right to this in the Constitution? You don’t?! Well my constituents’ think there ought to be, and I’m not going to appoint to the court someone who is not going to find that.” When we are in that mode, you realize, we have rendered the Constitution useless, because the Constitution will mean what the majority wants it to mean. The senators are representing the majority. And they will be selecting justices who will devise a constitution that the majority wants.

And that of course, deprives the Constitution of its principal utility. The Bill of Rights is devised to protect you and me against, who do you think? The majority. My most important function on the Supreme Court is to tell the majority to take a walk. And the notion that the justices ought to be selected because of the positions that they will take that are favored by the majority is a recipe for destruction of what we have had for two-hundred years.

To come back to the beginning, this is new. Fifty years old or so, the Living Constitution stuff. We have not yet seen what the end of the road is. I think we are beginning to see. And what it is should really be troublesome to Americans who care about a Constitution that can provide protections against majoritarian rule. Thank you.

In the September 26, 2005 article "Madam President, Madam President" at Villagevoice.com, Kristen Lombardi writes, "Imagine this: You see a woman, tall and elegant, with a power-flip hairdo and ruby lips, take an oath of office. You hear her aides call out the words, "Madam President."

Could it be the predominantly liberal media and Hollywoodians have started their presidential push for Hillary in 2008? Afterall, they almost helped Senator John Kerry and his "tall and elegant" wife "with a power-flip hairdo and ruby lips" get into the White House in 2004, but fell a little short in the home stretch when they began counterfeiting documents and running false stories about President Bush on CBS 60 Minutes and other shows. Fortunately, the media coup attempt was revealed to Americans prior the election.

So this time around, ABC television will be a little more subtle than CBS. They will attempt to influence America's choice for "Commander-in-Chief" using a television show that depicts Gina Davis at the helm of the United States of America. In the show, Ms. Davis sports dark hair instead of a dirty blonde Hillary hairdo. Afterall, a dirty blonde "do" would be too much like Hillary, and perhaps appear a little too coincidental.

And as Lombardi writes in her article, "It's timely, too, what with speculation about Senator Hillary Clinton making a White House bid in 2008. Polls show 39 percent of Democrats favor Clinton as the party's next pick, compared with 21 percent for John Kerry." Poor Senator Kerry. He received a "Dear John" letter from America in 2004, and it looks as if he will get another from his own party in 2008.

Ms. Lombardi also quoted Bob Kunst of Hillarynow.com as saying, "Hillary must have friends at ABC.....This is just too much of a coincidence."

Yes, it is almost an unbelievable coincidence, especially given the fact that one of the show's main writers, Steve Cohen, was Hillary's deputy communications director in the 1990s while she was the First Lady of the United States. What a surprise!

So as we head toward the 2008 election, keep your eyes and ears on the media and Hollywood as they prime their mass media pipelines and intensify their efforts to influence the presidential elections with the hopes of making Hillary Clinton the next "Commander-in-Chief."

If you watch ABC, NBC, CBS, and CNN you no doubt have the impression that Mrs. Sheehan is the only one who lost a son during the war in Iraq. The media tends to ignore the over 1,900 other American families who lost loved ones in Iraq. Why doesn't the press provide continuous coverage of the other families who lost their husbands, wives, sons, and daughters in Iraq? The answer should be obvious. The mainstream media elite are also against the war, and they need an icon for their anti-war movement, so they can create a situation similar to what our nation experienced during Vietnam. I suppose they figure that if they did it back then, they can do it again.

But what are the stakes this time?

Is it wise to pull our troops out before Iraq is stable and fully capable of defending its new-found fragile democracy against the murderous thugs of Sadam's former Baathist regime, and the anti-democratic elements in Syria, Iran, and other nearby Arab nations?

What happens if Al Qaeda gets a strong grip on Iraq?

If we pull out of Iraq, will the bad terrorists go away and leave us alone?

Or will our children have to fight an even larger, stronger, and much more dangerous terrorist force in the future?

Think about these questions. The answers are not that difficult to figure out.

And while you are pondering those questions, ask yourself this question. If getting our troops out of Iraq is so important to Mrs. Sheehan, the media, and other liberals, why not bring all of our troops home?

What troops you ask? Ah, have you forgotten them?

I am talking about the troops still in Germany, Japan, Korea, and Bosnia as a result of the exit strategies of a few Presidents, who happen to have been Democrats. As a matter of fact, when President Bill Clinton sent our troops to Bosnia on December 3rd, 1995, he said he would have them home by Christmas? Well, that was about 10 years ago, and our troops are still there. In all honesty, I guess he didn't actually specify a particular year, decade, or century when they would be pulled out of Bosnia. By the way, I don't hear anyone referring to them as occupiers.

And what about Presidents Woodrow Wilson and Franklin D. Roosevelt? What were their exit strategies for World War I and II? When did they plan to get our troops out of Germany and Japan? After 116,708 Americans were killed and 204,002 were wounded during the 19 months of combat in WWI, or after another 407,316 Americans were killed and 670,846 were wounded in the 44 months we fought in WWII.

And have our troops ever been completely removed from Germany and Japan? I think not. We have maintained a military presence in both of those nations since the end of World War II, over 60 years ago. But no one calls either of them empire builders?

I would like to know when President Harry S. Truman had planned to bring all of our troops home from the Korean War? It has been over 40 years and our troops are still there. We lost 33,651 American lives, another 103,284 were wounded, and an unknown number of U.S. Servicemen and women who were never accounted for, nor reported by the Truman administration during the 37 months of the Korean War. And no one calls him an imperialist.

I want Senator Kennedy, Senator Clinton, Senator Kerry, Congressman Wrangell, and all of the other doubting Democrats to explain the exit strategies for these wars!

I don't recall hearing any democrats calling those troops terrorists, and the enemy forces freedom fighters. And I didn't hear any liberals slandering Presidents Roosevelt, Wilson, or Truman by referring to them as imperialists, fascists, or Nazis.

But anyway, getting back to the brief history lesson on Democrat exit strategies, let's try to figure out what President John F. Kennedy's or President Lyndon B. Johnson's exit strategy was for Vietnam?

Only 58,168 Americans were killed and 153,303 wounded during 90 months of combat in Viet Nam, and we lost that war because of left wing protesters who, after Nixon was elected, crawled out of their communes and protested just long enough and loud enough to make Nixon pull out of Vietnam.

I seems that the war in Vietnam was the only major war with a real exit strategy in the 20th century. And by golly, that was a totally Democrat-driven all hands abandon ship drill led by the very same people who demand an exit strategy for Iraq today. Isn't that quite a coincidence? Once more it is Senator Kennedy, Senator Kerry, Senator Clinton, and Jane Fonda, only this time they have a combined cast of old and new Democrat stars and muscians to aid them in defeating America in her fight to free Iraq and the world of terrorism. Not to mention all of the leftist let's-make-love-not-war college professors and students who wouldn't fight the enemy in the 1960s, but did attack, fight, and even spit on American troops who returned from Vietnam!

And today, some of those very same cowards are principals, chancelors, and leaders in our education system who want to ban military R.O.T.C. units, and recruiters from college campuses. They are the very people responsible for teaching our children to hate America first, and that terrorists are freedom fighters.

They don't teach our children about the atrocities committed after we left Vietnam? And there won't be any leaders in the Democrat Party talking about what happened after we left the "QUAGMIRE" in Vietnam either. And the reason they don't talk about it is simple. Almost one million innocent Vietnamese men, women, and children were slaughtered at the hands of the murderous regime that took control after we jumped ship in Vietnam.

Now, wasn't that a brilliant exit strategy? Please Teddy, Johnny, Janey, and Hilly, can we do that again? Only this time, can we leave the innocent Iraqi men, women, and children at the mercy of the good Baathists, Saddam loyalists, and friendly Al Qaeda freedom fighters! It will be just like Vietnam all over again. Doesn't that sound like fun?

And while we're at it, we can leave the terrorists with an oil rich breeding ground from which they can generate billions and billions of dollars and create unimaginable fun toys of terror, including neat nuclear and chemical capabilities.

Now, for those Americans who want to cut and run from Iraq, you had better pull your heads out of your....but anyway, you better give this situation some very, very serious consideration.

It's time to stop the stupidity, end the insanity, and get together as a nation to defeat the forces of terrorism in Iraq and elsewhere. And when we win this war, that will be our exit strategy. That will be our legacy for our children, the children of Iraq, and the children of the world.

Then and only then, can we all rest peacefully, at least until the next threat to freedom rises.

Oh my gosh! Call the Sierra Club! Call Green Peace! All environmental activists and global warming wingnuts need to report to the planet Mars right away! There must be humans with SUVs who are polluting Mars so much that it is experiencing man-made global warming just like Earth. And even worse, the goverments on Mars and Earth conspired to coverup the global warming facts from the environmental extremists on Earth.

A number of credible news and scientific sources reported on the Martian environmental woes almost two years ago. The information was somehow overlooked by environmental activists on Earth. A recap of the major reports are listed below.

On December 10, 2003, WorldNetDaily.com reported that despite no "... pollutants of human habitation, Mars appears to be undergoing global warming, with new data suggesting the planet is possibly emerging from an ice age." ¹

Also according to the WorldNetDaily article:

"Odyssey is giving us indications of recent global climate change on Mars," Jeffrey Plaut, project scientist for the mission at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, is quoted as saying.₁

Another article, from Science.com on December 8, 2003 reported that Mars is emerging from an Ice Age. Science.com also reported:"There appears to be too much frozen water at low-latitude regions -- away from the frigid poles -- given the current climate of Mars. The situation is not in equilibrium, said William Feldman of the Los Alamos National Laboratory. One explanation could be that Mars is just coming out of an ice age, Feldman said. In some low-latitude areas, the ice has already dissipated. In others, that process is slower and hasn't reached an equilibrium yet. Those areas are like the patches of snow you sometimes see persisting in protected spots long after the last snowfall of the winter."²

NewScientist.com reports also reported "Mars is undergoing global warming that could profoundly change the planet's climate in a few thousand years, new data suggests."²

"High-resolution images taken by NASA's Mars Global Surveyor show that the permanent south polar "ice" cap shrank significantly between two successive Martian summers - a period roughly corresponding to two Earth years. If the trend continues at the same rate and the polar cap is entirely frozen carbon dioxide, "the whole cap would be evaporated in a few thousand years," Mike Caplinger of Malin Space Science Systems told New Scientist.²


1. WorldNetDaily (2003). Global warming on Mars – without SUVs! Planet experiencing increased temperatures despite lack of humankind. Retrieved October 10, 2003, from http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=36049.

2. Hect, Jeff (2001). Mars could be undergoing major global warming. Retrieved September 20, 2005, from http://www.newscientist.com/.

The U.S. continues to lag behind other nations in math and science, but no one wants to accept responsibility. The parents blame the teachers, the teachers blame the parents, and the students, well they blame anything and everything.

Could it be the U.S. has become a "blame somebody else" society? Afterall, we see it in politics, at work, and at school. While the blame has continuously shifted directions, students academic performance has not. As shown in the table below, U.S. students are still lagging behind in their math skills. The table below compares the math abilities of U.S. 15 year olds with 15 year olds in other nations.



According to an Education Week report,"U.S. 15-year-olds scored, on average, significantly lower than their counterparts in most OECD nations in both math literacy and problem-solving on the 2003 administration of the Program for International Student Assessment, known as PISA."

American business leaders are also concerned about the performance of U.S. students. I think Bill Gates, the Chairman of Microsoft Corporation, adequately summed up the situation in the following statement:

"When I compare our high schools to what I see when I'm travelling aborad, I am terrified for our workforce of tomorrow."

So what is the excuse for the nation's teenage math failure? Most often, the biggest excuse for any academic failure is money. However, that is probably the worst excuse. Why? Because the country has in the past, and in the present, continued to pump more, and more, and then more money into the schools. Private industry has even become a partner in the education process, and added even more money to the equation.

However, more money hasn't solved the problem, and there doesn't seem to be any relevant mathematical theory to support a correlation between the amount of money spent on education, and the academic performance of the children. So, scratch money off of the list.

There are however, three common factors to academic achievement. They are teachers, parents, and students. And believe it or not, but the state and federal government are certainly not the answer. Because if you examine any bureacracy in the U.S., you will find they are not quite an example of effectiveness and efficiency, no matter how much money we put into them.

So in the end, it's a matter of Americans accepting reponsibility, expecting accountability, and working together to make the children of today the greatest American success story of tomorrow.

The 9th Circut (or circus) Court strikes again! The San Francisco "mainstream" Federal Judge Lawrence Karlton, appointed by President Jimmy Carter in 1979, ruled the Pledge of Allegiance was unconstitutional because it contained the words "under God."

When asked to comment on his judicial appointee's ruling, former President Carter replied, "DOH!"

I don't want to say I told you so, but as I wrote in my article "Mainstream: in the Liberal Sense" on Tuesday, September 13, 2005, "Since 2000, the ACLU has filed over 100 lawsuits to remove Christianity and God from the public square in America. When the ACLU cannot change the will of the people, they will change the laws of the land."

I would like to add that the ACLU is not alone in the efforts to eradicate God from every facet of American life. The United States 9th Circuit Court is an active advocate of the ACLU agenda.

The following CBS News article confirms what I have been saying for years.

FEDERAL JUDGE PULLS PLUG ON PLEDGE

SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 14, 2005

(CBS/AP) A federal judge [Lawrence Karlton] in San Francisco has declared it unconstitutional to recite the Pledge of Allegiance in public schools.

The judge, ruling in the second attempt by Sacramento atheist Michael Newdow to have the pledge removed from classrooms, found that the pledge's reference to one nation "under God" violates school children's right to be "free from a coercive requirement to affirm God." Read the full story.

The following story was reported by ABC News.

Two Heavy Trucks, Helicopter Were Involved in Lawmaker's Trip at Height of Crisis

by Jake Tapper
ABC News

Sept. 13, 3005 — Amid the chaos and confusion that engulfed New Orleans after Hurricane Katrina struck, a congressman used National Guard troops to check on his property and rescue his personal belongings — even while New Orleans residents were trying to get rescued from rooftops, ABC News has learned. Read full story.