† Living In These Mad, Mad, Madoff Times: Cristian Alfredo Urquijo, 39, who has been unable to find a job for more than a year, was arrested for robbing 12 banks in the metro Phoenix area from September 2010 through July, Reuters reports:

 

"It's pretty simple. It's black and white. I don't have a job, I had to work, and I rob to survive," he said, adding "desperation is a great motivator." …

 

Urquijo got up courage to carry out the robberies by drinking beer beforehand, telling officers: "I had to drink a lot to have the bravery."

 

If convicted on all 16-counts of bank robbery, armed bank robbery and use of a firearm to commit a violent crime, he could be sentenced to as much as 35 years in prison and fined $250,000.

 

† Is Obama Already A Lame Duck?: It's doom for President Barack Hussein Obama, writes John Podhoretz, without a trace of gloom:

 

Unless something extraordinarily dramatic comes along to change the course of the US economy and the sentiments of the American people in the next six months, Barack Obama is finished.

 

That conclusion is inescapable from the history of US presidential politics since 1945.

 

Obama is now below 40 percent in job approval in the Gallup poll. Yes, as the political scientist Larry Sabato points out, almost every president since FDR has fallen to that level. But of those seven presidents, five (Harry Truman, Lyndon Johnson, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter and George H.W. Bush) went on either to lose the next election or to not run again. …

 

History says that five of seven presidents whose poll numbers hit the 30s either lost or dropped out. The two who won were able to run on economic numbers that left the public optimistic about the future.

 

† The Right To Bear Arms Belongs To Us All: Part II: Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX), who is known to jog around Austin with "a concealed .380 Ruger loaded with deadly hollow-point bullets, fully equipped with a laser-sight for precise killing," just in case he runs into a coyote while on his run. Chris Moody of Yahoo! News blog The Ticket wonders whether a President Perry could “continue to pack heat on his morning run” even though D.C. law bans carrying firearms. After consulting several Constitutional scholars, his answer: “You're damn right he could”:   

 

[I]f the president really wanted to run around Lafayette Park with a revolver strapped to his leg, the legal barriers would be easily surmountable. …

 

He could probably just sign an executive order authorizing himself to carry guns wherever he likes."

 

If, however, the president didn't want to pursue his right to carry through an executive order, he could also take the argument to the federal courts.

 

The president would have to "persuade the court that carrying the gun was part of his official duties," said Eric M. Freedman, professor of constitutional law at Hofstra University. …

 

The president could also request to be deputized in the District, which would allow him to carry a firearm via the same channels that members of law enforcement in the District use.

 

Or he could avoid the legal hassle altogether by jogging in VA “a state with loose gun laws, where the president could run freely with the wind blowing through his holsters.”

 

[Hat Tip: Law.com’s Legal Blog Watch]

 

† Render Unto Caesar (second item): Center for Immigration Studies deconstructs objections to a new anti-illegal immigration law enacted in AL by religious leaders interviewed for a New York Times article (natch, ministers who have no problem with the law “seem to be relegated to the shadows, as though their perspective bears less weight, and is less representative of the Christian experience”):

 

Religious leaders who are opponents of the new law claim that it impedes them from exercising their ministry, criminalizing acts of mercy towards these vulnerable members of the flock. Bishops from the Methodist, Episcopalian, and Roman Catholic traditions have asserted that being a Good Samaritan (i.e. one who reaches out to the downtrodden stranger) is now a crime. However, as the article says, "framers of this law say this is broadly exaggerated. The provisions, they say, clearly pertain to human traffickers or employers actively seeking to skirt the law." …

 

Actions that entail reckless disregard of immigration law are unlawful. The law seems to allow for a legitimate distinction between punctual assistance and systematic assistance. Helping "on the spot" someone who appears on the church doorstep (with food or clothing or money) is not the same thing as developing an entire program that necessitates a deliberate lack of cooperation with the legal system. The latter indeed disregards, disregards the common good of the community, which implies an open collaboration under law. The only way to consider "deliberate lack of cooperation with the legal system" to be legitimate is to consider the persons benefiting from the actions to in fact be members of the community. In other words, it means, as regards immigrants, erasing the distinction between legal and illegal.

 

As the very traditions of these bishops, however, have always stated, national sovereignty must be respected by the Christian community. For the Christian community, the distinction between legal immigrant and illegal alien is a real one. In a Christian perspective, all are members of God’s family. But the political, human reality remains. …

 

Like the state must respect the church, so the church must respect the state.

 

As The Stiletto previously explained, members of the clergy who are determined to defy the law justify their actions with a bogus – and theologically unsound – argument:

 

The Apostle Paul also instructed the faithful that they have a duty to obey the laws of earthly governments. From Romans 13:1 and 13:2: "Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from G-d, and those that exist have been instituted by G-d. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what G-d has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment."

 

There is no conflict here. Evangelical Christians and illegal immigrants alike must obey the law. Breaking or circumventing the laws of a duly elected government makes you a bad Christian.

 

† Restorative Capital Punishment: As the nation’s longest serving governor (11 years) Rick Perry has “overseen more executions than any governor in modern history: 234 and counting … more than the combined total in next two states — Oklahoma and Virginia — since the death penalty was restored 35 years ago,” The Washington Post reports:

 

“If you don’t support the death penalty and citizens packing a pistol, don’t come to Texas,” he wrote in his book lauding states’ rights, “Fed Up!”

 

It is a bipartisan tradition. The annual rate of executions was actually higher when George W. Bush was the state’s governor, and Democratic Gov. Ann Richards oversaw 50 executions during her four-year term without ever granting clemency.

 

“In the big picture, it is hard to see how Perry is much different from Bush or Richards,” said Jordan Steiker, co-director of the University of Texas Law School’s Capital Punishment Center. …

 

Decisions to seek the death penalty are made by local prosecutors. Unlike in some states, the governor does not sign death warrants or set execution dates. The state constitution forbids the governor from calling a moratorium on executions and allows clemency only when the Board of Pardons and Paroles recommends it. Which is rarely. …

 

“In many states, executions are blocked because the state courts, the federal courts or both are intensely hostile to capital punishment and look for any excuse to overturn convictions,” said Kent Scheidegger, legal director of the pro-death penalty Criminal Justice Legal Foundation in California.

 

“So the short answer to why Texas has the most executions is (1) size, and (2) not being obstructed by hostile courts.”

 

To sum up: The WaPo suggests that Perry has blood on his hands even though his record on executions is in line with that of his predecessors; only the Board of Pardons and Paroles can stop an execution; and no conviction or execution has been successfully challenged in court.

 

† Is Armenian Genocide Denial Good For The Jews?: To maintain good relations with the Turks, the official state policy of Israel was to deny that the Armenian Genocide occurred. Unfortunately, the Faustian pact fell apart when Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan began Islamicizing the country, allying itself with Iran and other enemies of Israel and – this is rich – calling Israel’s actions to protect its citizens against terrorism a genocidal campaign against Palestinians. To anyone who continues to maintain the fantasy that Turkey is a secular Muslim state, an October 2009 U.S. diplomatic cable released by WikiLeaks should be a bracing smack of reality upside the head. The Washington Times reports:

 

The confidential … cable cites the musings of Gabby Levy, Israel’s ambassador to Turkey, on why Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had turned on Turkey’s longtime ally.

 

“Levy dismissed political calculation as a motivator for Erdogan’s hostility, arguing the prime minister’s party had not gained a single point in the polls from his bashing of Israel.” …

“Instead, Levy attributed Erdogan’s harshness to deep-seated emotion: ‘He’s a fundamentalist. He hates us religiously’ and his hatred is spreading,” according to the cable.

 

† Updates To Previous Posts (Every Bubble Bursts Eventually): Things are getting pretty blue for President Barack Hussein Obama in the blue states – and not in a good way. First, an increasing number of NYers are giving him a Bronx cheer. Now, it appears that permanent residents of Martha’s Vineyard are blowing him a raspberry over the faltering economy which has put a dent in the tourism on which their livelihoods depend, The Boston Globe reports:

 

When President Obama took his first trip to Martha’s Vineyard after taking office, the excitement among locals here was palpable, from the signs of support strung across shop windows and front porches to a full-page newspaper ad taken out by 125 Vineyard grandmothers in support of his health care plan.

 

This week, with the jobless rate stuck above 9 percent and the president’s nationwide approval rating at its lowest level, the Vineyard’s broad allegiance shows cracks, leaving some islanders with a more textured, even tormented feeling about the president. …

 

At the core of islanders’ misgivings is the shaky local economy. Although the Vineyard is sometimes depicted as a playground for the rich and famous, the numbers tell another side of the story.

 

Empty storefronts dot main streets in Vineyard Haven, Edgartown, and elsewhere. According to the island’s Chamber of Commerce, at least one member of nearly every Vineyard household is dependent on summer business, which softened during the recession and still has not recovered.

 

† Updates To Previous Posts (sixth item, Life Imitates “A Law Abiding Citizen”): CA pioneered the concept of victims’ rights and codified it into law in 1982 – the first of roughly 30 states to do so – but a Supreme Court ruling mandating the release of inmates to relieve prison overcrowding has made parole hearings of convicted killers who would have otherwise never been set free fraught with anguish for victims and their families, The New York Times reports:

 

Gov. Jerry Brown has thus far upheld 207 of the parole board’s 253 decisions to release convicted killers. Already this year, more release dates granted to killers have been allowed to stand than in any year since governors got the power to reverse them.

 

As a result, these hearings have taken on a new urgency for victims’ family members – many of whom have seen themselves as the last line of defense between a killer and freedom – because inmates are now more likely than ever to be paroled.

 

For some family members, attending the hearings is cathartic, offering a voice to those who feel powerless in the wake of crimes that have upended their lives. …

 

Parole commissioners and victims’ rights advocates say that victim statements can have a major influence. They put a human face on a murder victim, who is often referred to only as “the deceased” during a parole hearing, and make it that much more difficult for the board to grant release.

 

Some victims who survived murder attempts show their scars – missing limbs or disfiguring burns – while relatives detail the emotional trauma they have endured.

 

“You need to be there so the board understands what this has done to your life,” said Nina Salarno Ashford, a lawyer with Crime Victims United, a group that helps represent some victims at parole hearings.

 

Ms. Salarno Ashford said the increase in parole grants upheld under Governor Brown makes it all the more important for victims to attend hearings.

 

After Salarno Ashford’s sister Catina was murdered in 1979, she and her mother, Harriet Salarno, founded Crime Victims United. The group had unsuccessfully fought the release of felons to relieve prison overcrowding.

 

† Updates To Previous Posts (eighth item, Multiculturalism: Jihad By Other Means): MI – the state with the largest Muslim population in the U.S. – is considering legislation similar to "American Laws for American Courts," which has been taken up by nearly half the states in the union. Though the bill, introduced in June by state Rep. Dave Agema (R-Grandville) hasn’t made it out of committee, the Council of American-Islamic Relations, the American Civil Liberties Union and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People have already lined up to denounce it and to threaten lawsuits. The Washington Times reports:

 

Backers of the law say they are reacting to court decisions that have cited either international law or faith-based statutes such as Shariah to help decide cases, instead of relying solely on the Constitution or federal and state laws. …

 

A study by the Center for Security Policy in Washington, D.C., looked at 50 appellate cases from 23 states and found that Shariah law had been applied or formally recognized in court decisions.

 

Those cases, said Christopher Holton, a vice president at the center, represent the tip of the iceberg in what he describes as a growing conflict in state courts, where many decisions are never publicized.

 

"There is no question – Shariah principles are finding their way into our courts for years now. It's inherently discriminatory for women – most of these involved family law. When you get a ruling in a child custody case from Saudi Arabia, Iran, Pakistan or Egypt and it's family law, it's all Shariah," he said.

 

Mr. Holton argued that American Muslim activist groups and others have employed scare tactics and have mischaracterized the statute against foreign law. "It's designed to protect constitutional liberties, not designed to go after anyone's religious practices." …

 

Mr. Holton and other supporters of the laws, however, argue that state legislatures have a proper role in defining what policy should be when foreign laws are introduced into state courts. No explicit public policy exists in most state legislatures, he said.

 

† Updates To Previous Posts (fourth item, Living In These Mad, Mad, Madoff Times): A poll of Americans ages 18 to 29 by Generation Opportunity found that three-quarters of them expect to delay a major life change or purchase because economic stagnation has diminished their prospects. The intractable rate of unemployment has hit twentysomethings particularly hard. “Career plans are being altered, marriages put off and dreams shelved,” Los Angeles Times reports:

 

"There's a generation here being formed under the crucible of unemployment, debt and lack of economic chances," said Conway, who was chief of staff at the Labor Department during the George W. Bush administration. "They're just seeking an opportunity to get in the game." …

The economy has been in sorry shape for so long that it has covered a significant portion of young people's lives. The recession officially ran from December 2007 to June 2009, but with slow growth and high joblessness since then, it doesn't feel much like it ended. …

Since mid-2008, unemployment in the 16-to-24 age group has been 13% and higher, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Last month, it stood at 17.4%. …

The job situation could haunt young people for years, said Andrew Sum, director of the Center for Labor Market Studies at Northeastern University in Boston.

More than half of earnings growth over a lifetime happens in the first decade of a career, meaning that early unemployment can depress future wages for life, he said.

But older workers are staying longer in their jobs, forcing twentysomethings to fill up retail, fast-food and other part-time spaces that traditionally give teens their first paycheck. Without work experience, young job seekers will need to scramble for options, he said.