A group of retired Marines is asking Connecticut's attorney general to allow the "Don't Tread on Me" Gadsden flag to fly over the state Capitol on July 4 after Capitol Police refused the request saying it doesn't fall within the state's flag flying parameters.
The group says the yellow banner, which sports a coiled rattlesnake and its trademark motto, is the original flag of the U.S. Marine Corps and clearly fits into the section of the policy which states that the Connecticut State Capitol can fly flags of recognized military organizations of the U.S.A.'
But Capitol Police have denied several requests to fly the flag -- which has become a favorite nationwide among the Tea Party movement and a popular alternative to the stars and stripes saying it is not the official Marines flag.
The Gadsden flag was a personal standard used by one admiral during the Revolutionary War,' Capitol Chief of Police Walter Lee told FoxNews.com. The Marine Corps never claimed that to be one of its organizational flags.'
Retired Marine Patrick Rubino says the Marines see it very differently.
I'd learned about in the Marine Corps. It's one of the first, if not the first Marine Corps flag,' Rubino told FoxNews.com. They even flew it over our bases in Afghanistan and Iraq while I was there.'
Having heard that the police had denied a previous request to have the flag displayed at the Capitol, Rubino wrote a letter to lawmakers to find out why.
I didn't get any response from that so I just went down there and submitted a request to have it flown on Memorial Day because my brother was coming home from the Army so I thought it would be a great thing,' he said. They denied it before I even filled out the form.'
The reason given for the rejection, Rubino said, was that the rules were going to be changed' so they were denying it preemptively.
And now I'm finding out they're not even changing the rule so that the flag would be denied, they're just denying it,' he said.
A follow up request from Rubino's mother, Katheryn Brown, to fly it on July 4 was also denied.
But the policy wasn't always so strictly interpreted.
The Society of Cincinnati, a historic group dedicated to preserving the ideals of the American Revolution has flown its flag over the Capitol every July 4 since at least 1968. It was denied this year amid the Gadsden flag flap.
Capitol Police even approved an earlier request to fly the Gadsden Flag over the Capitol in April, but reconsidered after lawmakers dubbed it a political symbol due to Tea Party connections to the request and said it didn't fit the state's requirements.
In hopes of settling the dispute, a group of former marines and supporters plan to gather at the state attorney general's office to issue a final decision on the issue,.
We're going to be going down on the 30th to put the paper work in,' retired Marine Tim McCall told FoxNews.com. The Capitol Police are the ones in charge of granting or denying the request, so the idea for the 30th is to go to AG Blumenthal's office and request that he issue a directive for the Capitol Police to comply with the law as written and stated just to get some resolution on the issue.'
McCall added that if it's not in the cards to have the flag on display July 4, he hopes the matter is at least resolved in time to see it fly on October 23 to commemorate the 1983 barracks bombing of the Marines in Beirut, Lebanon, where he served.
Historically, it's like when you look at a picture of George Washington; he was the first president of the United States so as a patriotic American you look to George Washington as kind of representation as the forefather of the country,' McCall said. The Gadsden flag is the original flag of the Marine Corps, so it's the forefather standard of the Marine Corps.'
Rubino says that's what the Connecticut government needs to keep in mind above anything else.
I know the flag has been adopted by another group, but what it is and who decides to use it are two different things,' he said. We know what it is and we know why we want it to be up there. ... It's a really important way to pay tribute to our history and that's a great message.'
President Barack Obama on Monday met with grass-roots leaders Monday afternoon to discuss immigration reform, the White House said.
Obama told those at the meeting that he wants to see a bipartisan process for immigration reform based on a proposal presented in the Senate that addresses the need to secure the border and demands accountability from both workers who are in the United States illegally and employers who take advantage of the system, the White House said.
True border security requires comprehensive immigration reform, Obama said. The president will give a speech soon on the importance of passing that reform, the White House said.
The president also reiterated his views against the recently passed immigration law in Arizona, which the Justice Department is reviewing.
"Today, we strongly requested for the president to assert his leadership and escalate his efforts to assure comprehensive immigration reform legislation is enacted in 2010," Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum and meeting attendee, said in a statement. "From our meeting, it is clear that the president is committed to comprehensive immigration reform and understands that congressional action is needed urgently."
Other topics discussed at the meeting included concerns that the grass-roots leaders had about reforms to current detention and deportation procedures, Noorani said.
Monday's meeting comes on the heels of a number of immigration movements that have been quietly percolating over the last 48 hours.
Sources outside the White House point to National Security Adviser for Homeland Security John Brennan's meeting with Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, which is scheduled to take place as early as Monday in Arizona.
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano also has recently introduced a number of border security initiatives.
Posted by: Flapper Scourge of the Algonquins4926 ||
06/29/2010 21:10 Comments ||
Top||
#2
the need to secure the border
Won't happen
demands accountability from both workers who are in the United States illegally...
Also won't happen. At best, it'll a rudimentary process toward citizenship. More likely, it'll be de facto asylum.
... and employers who take advantage of the system
This has an extremely good chance of all the three of taking place. However,
I suspect who does the 'take advantage' will be subject to interpretation.
#3
CHINESE MIL FORUM > [DavidDuke.com]AMERICA GOING BANKRUPT STATE BY STATE?
Artic = warns that the US HASN'T SEEN THE WRST YET OF THE [Bammer]"OBAMA DEPRESSION"; US + AMERS TO GO ON A "CAT FOOD DIET"???
* SAME > CALIFORNIA CITIES START SHUTTING DOWN POLICE FORCES TO CLOSE BUDGET GAPS [trying $$$-saing consolidation andor outsourcing of PUBLIC SAFETY DEPTS = POLICE-FIRE-EMT, etc.]
VARIOUS NET > opine that Hispanic-majority MAYWOOD, CA is now all but a de facto "OPEN/
SANCTUARY CITY" FOR ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS since it ordered the shutdown of most or all of its normal or vital Govt services???
H/T Weaselzippers
All earmarks in the proposed Homeland Security spending bill for 2011 went to Democrats -- save one. Rep. Joseph Cao (La.) was the only House Republican to win a Homeland Security earmark: $800,000 for Federal Emergency Management Administration state and local programs and an emergency operations center in New Orleans. Every other earmark was sponsored by a Democrat.
The remaining $69.15 million in earmarked funds in the Homeland Security bill were for Democrats, a point Republicans were quick to note.
"This is a clear sign that House Republicans' principled stand for an earmark moratorium and real reform is having an immediate effect," said Michael Steel, spokesman for House Minority Leader John Boehner (R-Ohio). "At a time when Washington Democrats' out-of-control spending is scaring the hell out of the American people, and they refuse to even pass a budget for the first time in modern history, the contrast on the issue of spending and jobs could not be more clear."
Cao's earmark does cut against the one-year earmark moratorium that Boehner and other GOP leaders have called for. While most of House GOP members are complying with the temporary ban, Cao, Rep. Don Young (R-Alaska) and Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas) haven't committed to it.
The $43.9 billion Homeland Security spending proposal was reported out of a House Appropriations subcommittee last week. It's the first of a dozen spending bills for fiscal year 2011 to advance in Congress.
Earmarks are provisions that lawmakers insert in spending bills in order to steer federal money to specific projects.
The Homeland Security spending measure approved last year had $264 million in earmarks. It's too early to say whether earmarked spending will be lower in the 2011 bill, as senators -- who tend to be more prolific earmarkers -- have yet to take up the measure.
House members, however, appear to be on the path to lower earmark totals. Last year's House Homeland Security spending bill included a total of 146 earmarks requested solely by lawmakers worth $108 million, according to Taxpayers for Common Sense, a non-partisan group. The total for the House bill for 2011 has 73 congressional earmarks worth $57.1 million. (Those numbers don't include earmarks requested by both the Obama administration and lawmakers.)
"Total earmarking is down and not only did Democrats not fill the vacuum left by the Republican earmark moratorium, but they actually cut their own totals as well," said Steve Ellis, vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense.
In the House proposal for 2011, the largest earmarks went to Democrats: $12.9 million for a National Emergency Response and Rescue Training Center at Texas A&M University requested by Rep. Chet Edwards (Texas) and the White House; $4.75 million for the North Carolina Collaboratory for Bio-Preparedness at the University of North Carolina requested by North Carolina Reps. Bob Etheridge, Brad Miller and David Price; and $3 million for State and local cybersecurity training at the University of Texas requested by Rep. Ciro Rodriguez (Texas).
Earmarks have come under greater scrutiny from both parties. House Democrats have installed a permanent ban on earmarks that go to for-profit entities. Most of those earmarks have been attached to Defense spending bills and have gone to military contractors.
The growing momentum against earmarks is due in part to rising concerns about government spending and the $1.5 trillion deficit expected this year. But earmarked spending for 2010 spending bills accounted for just $10 billion of the $3.5 trillion federal budget.
Earmark watchers said the total number of earmarks was higher -- $15.9 billion, according to the Taxpayers for Common Sense, and $16.5 billion according to the Citizens Against Government Waste. Their totals include both the earmarks disclosed in official legislative reports and money steered toward specific projects by federal agencies at the request of lawmakers.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
