H.R. 505 - Native Madness

[Tigermike 3,055]

Native Madness

By Senator Lamar Alexander

“Becoming an American has always meant giving up allegiance to your previous country and pledging allegiance to your new country, the United States of America.”

Wednesday the House of Representatives passed H.R. 505, the Native Hawaiian Reorganization Act, a bill that would create a new, race-based government within the borders of the United States.

This legislation may seem insignificant, but embedded in this bill is an assault on the original national motto of this country which is inscribed on the wall above the desk of the President of the Senate and on every quarter, dime, nickel and penny: E Pluribus Unum, one from many.

H.R. 505 would, for the first time in American history, create a new, separate sovereign government within our country based on race, putting us on the path to becoming the United Nations instead of the United States. This bill will set a precedent for the breakup of our country along racial lines, and it ought to be soundly defeated.

I’m sorry to report that this legislation is also advancing in the Senate, where it is known as S. 310. It was passed by the Indian Affairs Committee in May. While it was considered and rejected by the Senate last year, it was a close call and the outcome this time around is far from certain. 56 Senators – just four short of the requisite 60 – voted in favor of considering this bill in June of 2006.

This bill would undermine our history of being a nation based not on race, but upon common values of liberty, equal opportunity, and democracy.

And you don’t have to take my word for it. The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights has publicly opposed this legislation. Here’s what they said about the same bill when it was offered before: “The Commission recommends against passage of the Native Hawaiian Government Reorganization Act of 2005, (S. 147) as reported out of committee on May 16, 2005, or any other legislation that would discriminate on the basis of race or national origin and further subdivide the American people into discrete subgroups accorded varying degrees of privilege.”

The question the bill poses is thus one that is fundamental to the very existence of our nation. It creates a new government based upon race. Our constitution guarantees just the opposite: equal opportunity without regard to race.

Hawaiians are Americans. They became United States citizens in 1900. They have saluted the American flag, paid American taxes, fought in American wars. In 1959, ninety-four percent of Hawaiians reaffirmed that commitment to become Americans by voting to become a state. Like citizens of every other state, Hawaiians vote in national elections.

Becoming an American has always meant giving up allegiance to your previous country and pledging allegiance to your new country, the United States of America.

This goes back to Valley Forge when George Washington himself signed and then administered this oath to his officers: “I . . . renounce, refuse, and abjure any allegiance or obedience to [King George III]; and I do swear that I will to the utmost of my power, support, maintain and defend the said United States. . . .”

America is different because, under our constitution, becoming an American can have nothing to do with ancestry. That is because America is an idea, not a race. Ours is a nation based not upon race, not upon ethnicity, not upon national origin, but upon our shared values, enshrined in our founding documents, the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, upon our history as a nation, and upon our shared language, English. An American can technically become a citizen of Japan, but would never be considered “Japanese.” But if a Japanese person wants to become a citizen of the United States, he or she must become an American.

That’s who we are as Americans, and when we forget that, we run the risk of undermining our greatest strength. Some say that diversity is our greatest strength. And it is a great strength, but hardly our greatest. Jerusalem is diverse. The Balkans are diverse. Iraq is diverse. Our greatest strength is that we have taken all that magnificent diversity and forged it into one nation.

Instead of supporting a bill to create this new Native Hawaiian government (which, by the way, will be eligible for the transfer of billions of dollars in assets and land), we should consider legislation that unites us all as Americans. Our nation must remain “one nation, under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all” – not many nations, divided by race, with special privileges for some.

http://www.redstate.com/blogs/erick/2007/o.../native_madness

[TitanTiger 20,511]

Don't we already do this for Native American Indian tribes?

[Tigermike 3,055]

Not to this extent I don't think. Maybe channoc can provide a little info.

[Tigermike 3,055]

A little more info on pending legislation.

New & notable legislation

The House passed the Free Flow of Information Act, which offers for the first time federal protections—in certain circumstances—for journalists who are under pressure to reveal sources. The bill’s sponsors include Reps. Mike Pence (R-IN), John Conyers (D-MI) and Rick Boucher (D-VA), an odd team to be sure. The protections do not extend to criminal investigations or prosecutions of classified-information leaks. The President threatened a veto, but the bill passed 398-21, well beyond being veto-proof.

Sen. Hillary Clinton introduced the Quality Child Care for America Act this week to redistribute more wealth—it is her favorite pastime, after all. The bill would give $200 million to provide benefits and training for professional child-care providers.

Longtime homosexual-rights advocate and openly homosexual Demo Rep. Barney Frank (MA) is confident that he has the votes to pass a marked-up version of a new employment non-discrimination bill that offers further protections to homosexuals. The original version of Frank’s bill contained a provision that would prohibit employers from discriminating against employees if they displayed mannerisms and characteristics not traditionally associated with their gender. This ridiculous and unenforceable provision was stripped from the bill to gain wider support, and the homosexual “community,” predictably, cried foul.

Several House Democrats are withdrawing support of the resolution condemning Turkey for the genocide of 1.5 million Armenians, a Christian minority under Ottoman rule, during World War I. That leaves significantly less than a majority in the House that still fancy themselves the Official World Historians of the Republic. Most Republicans, including the White House, vehemently opposed the resolution because of the needless damage it does to our relations with our Turkish allies. Turkey had threatened to evict us from Incirlik Air Base, a critical supply point for operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. (But the dims on this board don't want to talk about this bill.)

Turkey, meanwhile, has authorized military operations against Kurdish separatists in northern Iraq, despite appeals for restraint from the U.S. and other nations.