One of the direct results of this rising leviathan is most often realized by small-business owners and entrepreneurs who gripe about licensing requirements or heavy-handed regulations that drive them into the red. So when you hear that officials in Multnomah County have shut down an enterprise for operating without a license, you might just sigh and say, there they go again.

“I believe there are more instances of the abridgement of freedom of the people by gradual and silent encroachments of those in power than by violent and sudden usurpations."

UPDATE: Apparently this story is far from over. The crew over at Reason's Hit and Run blog note that the "Lemonade Revolt" has now begun.

Some video clips need no additional commentary... and this falls within that category.

Watch as Democrat and one-time Obama supporter Pat Caddell discusses the coming November tidal wave, the growing fraction within the democratic party, healthcare and more...

Hat tip: Flopping Aces

We were pondering the recent news that the U.S. Postal Service reported a $3.5 billion loss in its most recent quarter. According to the postal service, the quarterly loss was the fourteenth in the last sixteen quarters.

All of which further illustrates the point that there isn't one thing (outside of war) that government does better than the private sector....


Which brings us to the latest article by John Stossel in which he appropriately notes that free enterprise does everything better. Why? Because if private companies don't do things efficiently, they lose money and die. Unlike government, they cannot compel payment through the power to tax. In fact, Stossel continues, even when a private company operates a public facility under contract to government, it must perform. If it doesn't, it will be "fired"—its contract won't be renewed. Government is never fired.

View this article.

A federal judge has overturned California's same-sex marriage ban Wednesday in a landmark case that could eventually land before the U.S. Supreme Court to decide if gays have a constitutional right to marry in America.

The AP notes that despite the favorable ruling for same-sex couples, gay marriage will not be allowed to resume. That's because the judge said he wants to decide whether his order should be suspended while the proponents pursue their appeal in the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The judge ordered both sides to submit written arguments by Aug. 6 on the issue.

And so the Prop 8 debate will continue.

Two years ago we wrote an article entitled Prop 8 and the Undermining of a Democracy. In that article we detailed how Proposition 8, while dealing with marriage, is also about the fundamental question of where ultimate constitutional authority rests. In light of today's ruling, we felt it was appropriate to revisit part of that post:

Let’s think big picture people. Yes Prop 8 is in part about marriage, but it is certainly also about the fundamental question of where ultimate constitutional authority rests. Our system of government has always been a system of winners and losers. Each election victory also means an election defeat -- yet by attempting to overturn that system we wrest control from the general populace and place power in the hands of a select few. And such action has severe consequences.

If the consolidation of power is allowed in such a way as to undermine the representative nature of our government, substituting the will of a few judges on the substance of the law for the will of the people or the representatives elected by the people -- then elections mean nothing, then laws are no longer being made by the representatives of the people, they are being forged by an oligarchy answering to no one except their own whims, their own will, their own judgment. That then is a threat to our system of constitutional self-government.

Alan Keyes rightly noted that 'if a handful of individuals responding to the clamorings of a small minority can substitute their judgment of right conduct for the judgment of the representatives of the people, can impose their dictates as laws, even upon those who are, according to the Constitution, the right fount and source of law, then our republic is dead, and our freedom is gone.'

In the case of the California state Supreme Court the will of four judges was imposed on the almost 34 million people who live in the state. Proposition 8 was more than just a marriage defense amendment, it was a direct and legitimate response to the litigiousness of America – and a movement to ensure our representative form of democracy.

It is not the business of the government of the United States or any of the several states to impose the will of a few on the many without the consent of the many. If the people of California want to define marriage as a union between only a man and a woman, that is their right and no group or organization has the right to force that issue through the court system.

To trod down that road, is to shed our freedoms along the way.

EXIT NOTE: For your convenience we have rounded up some of the early takes from various think tanks you might find worthy of note. You can find them here, here, here and here.

Ah the wonder of liberal economic policies, harming the poor, the middle class and washing away profits from business.

The latest USAToday/Gallup poll shows President Obama’s job approval rating at 41 percent, a historic low. The down-tick is driven in large measure by decreased support for the president’s handling of the war in Iraq, and especially the war in Afghanistan:

Public support for President Obama’s Afghanistan war policy has plummeted amid a rising U.S. death toll and the unauthorized release of classified military documents, a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll shows.

Support for Obama’s management of the war fell to 36%, down from 48% in a February poll. Now, a record 43% also say it was a mistake to go to war there after the terrorist attacks in 2001.

The decline in support contributed to the lowest approval ratings of Obama’s presidency. Amid a lengthy recession, more Americans support his handling of the economy (39%) than the war.

Even Obama’s handling of the war in Iraq received record-low approval, despite a drawdown of 90,000 troops and the planned, on-schedule end of U.S. combat operations there this month.

More here.

From our "Polls of Hope and Change" files we bring you the latest numbers from Gallup. After a two-week surge by Democrats, Republicans have regained their lead on Gallup’s generic congressional ballot. According to Gallup, registered voters now favor the GOP by a five-point margin, 48 percent to 43 percent.

Gallup points out in its analysis that the five-point edge is “not statistically significant,” but it does represent a “return to the prevailing 2010 pattern, seen since mid-March, whereby Republicans were tied or held a slight advantage over Democrats in most Gallup Daily tracking weekly averages.”

Republicans’ resurgence this past week could simply represent a return to the prior norm, but may also have been spurred by the Afghanistan war documents leak, the federal judge’s ruling that blocked the implementation of certain aspects of the Arizona immigration law, and perhaps ethics investigations into two powerful senior Democratic members of the House, Charlie Rangel and Maxine Waters.

If Republicans can keep up these numbers among registered voters, Gallup predicts that there could be “major seat gains” for the party in November. President Obama’s approval rating, it adds, remains flat at 45 percent.

It was only early 2009 that legislators, who had mismanaged state finances into a $42 billion deficit, voted to impose California's highest-ever tax increase, ostensibly to balance the budget. A few months later, last May, they asked voters to extend those two-year historic tax increases for two additional years. Voters, of course, soundly rejected the idea.

The message sent by the voters was clear: Enough is enough. It's time for Government - Democrats and Republicans alike - to live within their means. Tax hikes never solve budget deficits, now is time to reform the system and make it work for the people - not against them.

Apparently those on the left either didn't get the memo, or just flat out ignored it.

Now true to form, California's Democratic leaders are ready to do what they do best: increase your taxes. Bloomberg reports that Democratic leadership plans to unveil a budget proposal to erase a $19.1 billion deficit as early as next week that will likely include a hike in the personal income-tax rate.

As we've said time and again, taxes are a poor substitute for doing the heavy lifting of re-thinking, reorganizing, and re-prioritizing government. But the Democrats have made it clear that is work they refuse to do.

Addressing the Golden State's debt requires "bold leadership." California's families can't simply choose to stop budgeting and spend without consequences. Sacramento shouldn't be able to either.

Remember: By the way, the next time someone complains about budget cuts or says we need higher taxes, show them these charts.

House Democratic leaders are launching an eleventh-hour bid to get on offense on jobs and the economy before they face voters in the November midterms. Their plan: When it comes to the economy, spending, and deficit, find religion... fast.

After running reckless and wild with their spending, bringing the United States closer to the economic crisis being felt across Europe, it would seem some on the left have suddenly "found religion" on deficit spending... Cavuto addresses the point: