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by Free Market Duck

House Speaker Pelosi violates U.S. Constitution and Logan Act, commits felony by impersonating Sec of State Condoleezza Rice on trip to Middle East
(Apr 6, 2007)

Riyadh, Saudi Arabia – According to Robert Turner, Acting Assistant Sec of State for Legislative Affairs, 1984-85, and former Chair of the ABA Standing Committee on Law and National Security, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s unauthorized trip to the Middle East violates The Logan Act, which makes it a felony and provides for a prison sentence of up to three years for any American, “without authority of the United States,” to communicate with a foreign government in an effort to influence that government’s behavior on any “disputes or controversies with the United States.”

   Enacted in 1799 after George Logan of Pennsylvania dashed off on his own to assure the French that the U.S. wanted peace on the high seas, Rep Roger Griswold of Connecticut, the author of the Logan Act, said the objective was “to punish a crime which goes to the destruction of the executive power of the government, … which arises from an interference of individual citizens in the negotiations of our executive with foreign governments.”  Rep Isaac Parker of Massachusetts further elaborated, “the people of the United States have given to the executive department the power to negotiate with foreign governments, and to carry on all foreign relations, and that it is therefore an usurpation of that power for an individual to undertake to correspond with any foreign power on any dispute between the two governments, or for any state government, or any other department of the general government, to do it.”  Thomas Jefferson’s future Sec of the Treasury added, “it would be extremely improper for a member of this House to enter into any correspondence with the French Republic…As we are not at war with France, an offence of this kind would not be high treason, yet it would be as criminal an act, as if we were at war…”

   As Mr. Turner states today in the WSJ, “Indeed, the offense is greater when the usurpation of the president’s constitutional authority is done by a member of the legislature – all the more so by a Speaker of the House – because it violates not just statutory law but constitutes a usurpation of the powers of a separate branch and a breach of the oath of office Ms. Pelosi took to support the Constitution.”

   Historically, the Supreme Court has ruled, in Marbury vs. Madison, that the executive branch’s Dept of State is an example of “important political powers,” that, “being entrusted to the executive, the decision of the executive is conclusive.”  In the Curtiss-Wright case, the Supreme Court held, “Into the field of negotiation the Senate cannot intrude, and Congress itself is powerless to invade it.”

   House Speaker Pelosi and her Congressional groupies specifically engaged in discussions with Syrian President Assad and other heads of state in Saudi Arabia and Israel regarding Israel’s and the United States’ readiness to negotiate peace.  In fact, Pelosi got her messages mixed up and angered Israeli PM Ehud Olmert who retracted her interpretation of his talks with her as she mistakenly told Syrian Dictator Assad that Israel was “ready to engage in negotiations for peace” if Syria stopped assisting terrorist groups and cutting ties to Palestinian militants.  Olmert backed away from Pelosi’s statements, saying there were other conditions she omitted.

   While fact-finding trips to inspect or review conditions in foreign nations by individuals in Congress are deemed OK, as long as one does not posture as a negotiator for the U.S. executive department, House Speaker Pelosi and tight bud House Foreign Affairs Chairman Tom Lantos declared, “We have an alternative Democratic foreign policy.  I view my job as beginning with restoring overseas credibility and respect for the United States.”

   Straight from the horse’s mouth and a clear violation of the Logan Act.

   As Mr. Turner continued in his WSJ article, “The opposition to the trip from the White House, and the character of the regime she has chosen to approach make her behavior particularly inappropriate.”  Granny “Pelosi’s trip was not authorized, and Syria is one of the world’s leading sponsors of international terrorism.  The U.S. is in the midst of two wars authorized by Congress.  For Ms. Pelosi to flaunt the Constitution in these circumstances is not only shortsighted, it may well be a felony, as the Logan Act has been part of our criminal law for more than two centuries.”

   Unfortunately, as we see it, Prez Bush has brought the Pelosi mess upon himself, which doesn’t excuse her actions but it does account for it.  So here’s how it stands:  (1) the GOP correctly kicked Saddam Hussein’s butt, forced him to ship his WMDs which we KNOW he had – read the Dulfar Report -- to Syria, and freed the Iraqis (self-defense for America); (2) President Bush and the GOP then botched it up royally by trying to build Iraq into a socialist democracy – the tyranny of the religious majority -- with fake paper money and nationalized Everything from water to oil to you-name-it; (3) the American people voted in the Democrats (i.e., voted against the corrupt GOP politicians) to stop the GOP’s outrageous deficit spending and get out of nation-building in Iraq; and then (4) Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi gets drunk with power, thinks she’s a cross between Gandhi, Maria Theresa, General George Patton, Jesus Christ and Muhammad, and goes bezonkers on an unauthorized, unconstitutional, felonious “peace negotiation” trip to the Middle East in which she botches up communications between Israel, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and the U.S.

   So what do we do now?

   It’s bad enough that President George Bush doesn’t know how to exit correctly from Iraq and take out the true terrorists who are financing and supplying the War in Iraq, the Iranian Mullahs, especially when opportunity knocks as it did for the last two weeks after Iran grabbed off 15 British sailors.  That’s now a moot point since the hostages were released yesterday after serving their purpose for the Iranian Mullahs.  But House Squeaker Nancy Pelosi, drunk with power, has violated her oath to uphold the U.S. Constitution, violated the Logan Act, and set back U.S. credibility throughout the Middle East and the world.  Islamo Terrorists are no doubt laughing their butts off as Pelosi sat down in the exalted gilded chair in Saudi Arabia’s un-elected legislature in which it is illegal for Saudi women to participate and said, “Ooh, it’s a nice view from here.  This chair is very comfortable.”

   And FM Duck says, “OK, girl friends, time to ENFORCE the Logan Act.  Three years in the slammer for House Speaker Nancy Pelosi for impersonating Sec of State Condoleezza Rice.” – FM Duck

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