At an initiation ceremony at Quinnipiac University on Wednesday, students majoring and minoring in Political Science – having achieved academic excellence in the sphere – were accepted to Pi Sigma Alpha, the only nationwide Political Science Honor Society. Guest speaker was Professor Tamar Hermann of Open University in Israel who presented an opinion poll summary about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict in Israel, and commented on its significance to the Israeli politics.

Here are the names of the other students accepted to the Honor Society: Gerrit T. Blauvelt, Francesca L. Capalbo, Megan E. Barnum, Zachary C. Dendas, Eve E. Efron, Alaina A. Caliendo, Michelle L. Cummins, Lorella L. Praeli, Anne K. Poulsen, Kathryn M. Goodleaf, Stephanie R. Tuorto, David L. Anstett, Corey F. Glynn, Justin P. Schneider, Derek J. Stanley, Christine M. Gamble, Allison M. Cunneen.

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Here is the second part of interpreting the Bill of Rights – arguably the universal rights to which a freedom-loving people would strive for. In this entry, the next two amendments will be discussed. The Third and Fourth Amendments are rather about real estate law and the right of privacy. Let’s take a look:

Third Amendment: No Soldier shall, in time of peace be quartered in any house, without the consent of the Owner, nor in time of war, but in a manner be prescribed by law.

As we already know, the Bill of Rights came into effect on December 15, 1971, 15 years after the passage of the Declaration of Independence from England: July 4, 1776. This amendment was written especially for that period of time – for the purpose of making it clear how to proceed, provided that England decides to attack again – and that’s one of the reasons why it is probably the least discussed of the ten amendments. It explains the soldiers’ and house owners’ rights and responsibilities both during wartime and in time of peace. If there is war going on on U.S. territory, it’s the federal law, if any, that determines whether or not – and how – a U.S. soldier can use someone’s house as a means of shelter. In time of peace, it is the owner of the house the one to determine it.

Fourth Amendment: The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.

This amendment provides the right of privacy of the individual in their home. Whatever they do there, no one – regardless of their job title – has the right to invade the individual’s property, unless there is probable cause supported by oath or affirmation and particularly describing the place to be searched. In other words, there must be some very consistent evidence that something illegal is going on in that property which, moreover, has to be supported by oath or affirmation in order for there to be reasonable search or seizure allowed. Besides, it has to be confirmed where to search. For example, if the oath or affirmation allows the local police officers to search a house’s yard only, then every search outside the yard’s boundaries is not allowed, and evidence detected from outside these boundaries cannot be used against the potential defendant in court.

Numerous are the cases regarding the Fourth Amendment’s privacy rights. In one of the most recent cases regarding the Fourth Amendment, the U.S. Supreme Court granted a certiorari to the Illinois Supreme Court with the U.S. Supreme Court’s opinion to be taken into consideration. In Illinois v. Caballes, the U.S. Supreme Court held that there is no issue of privacy when it comes to illegal acts such as the possession of contraband. The defendant had been arrested by an Illinois State Trooper for the possession of marijuana after having been stopped by the latter for speeding, not for searching for marijuana. The revelation came after the State Trooper had reported to a dispatcher, a colleague of his, to have stopped someone for speeding after which he went to the scene with a drug-detection dog. That dog sniffed the defendant’s trunk and warned on it.

When talking about New York politics, the name of former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani often pops up. He ran for President until the Florida primary after which he knew that he didn’t stand a chance (and money which was the main reason why he hadn’t campaigned in Iowa and New Hampshire) against John McCain, Mike Huckabee and Mitt Romney. However, despite the fact that he hasn’t held political office for the last eight years, he is still considered a possible candidate for President in 2012, for Governor in 2010, and now for U.S. Senate in 2010. What political position should he run for though is the question to which there have been tons of speculations.

The Quinnipiac University Poll did their last survey on New York State a month ago. As you can see, Mr. Giuliani is leading to Rick Lazio in the GOP primary (74%-9% with 14% being unsure), Governor David Paterson in the general election (54%-32% – who isn’t… ah, yes – Rick Lazio – 38%-38%) but the latter doesn’t matter much because he will most likely face New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo (who is leading in the primary to Mr. Paterson 61%-19% with 17% being unsure). To Mr. Cuomo, the former Mayor is losing (50%-40% with 8% being unsure).

In a race for the U.S. Senate, there are still no results. The last time New York voters were asked about Senator Kirsten Gilibrand’s approval rating was three months ago. Senator Gillibrand was favored by 33% of the registered voters who took the survey, 19% disapproved of her job, and almost half of them (48%) were unsure. In other words, voters in the state generally don’t recognize her name so far, and I doubt that anything has changed for the last three months, all the more that her approval rating and name recognition had been somewhat the same, according to the Institute’s past results.

So what should Rudy Giuliani run for

This is the question of the day. Everything so far tells me that he is going to run for the U.S. Senate. Here are other arguments that supports this hypothesis:

• Rudy Giuliani has had a certain affinity toward this position so far. He already ran for the U.S. Senate in 2000 but was diagnosed with prostate cancer and withdrew.
• His name is still often mentioned for a potential run for the GOP nomination for the general election for President in 2012. If he is elected to the U.S. Senate, it will give him a boost for attacking the White House, making him politically active in the form of voting for legislations, and his leadership skills in pushing for certain legislations, and against other, will also have a positive impact on his name recognition in addition.
• He already held an executive position (Mayor), and provided that he is elected Governor – it may not make much of a difference in the way people know him. As a Senator, he will have more potential of showing people that he knows how to get things done regardless of what kind of power he has.
• As a Senator, he will be able to talk about not just issues in New York State but also nationwide and international ones. This is a weak argument though because Governors can do it too. However, unlike Governors, Senators can vote on such issues, are more often seeked by the mainstream media for commentary on them, and also participate on Committee hearings. The latter gives Senators more of an insider position than that of a Governor.

It appears that the best option for Rudy Giuliani so far is to run for the U.S. Senate. What do you think?

After so many busts so far, we have witnessed a new embarrassment to Iran’s image at the international scene. Unlike in previous cases when the Islamic leadership made up excuses, most of which were twice as lame as they could be legitimate (the laptop possession denial, the timely confession about the underground facility), this time it hasn’t made a minimum effort to conceal the essence behind another unsuccessful operation.

I am talking about the recent shipment of weapons on an Antiguan ship caught by the Israeli military. The huge arsenal was allegedly traveling to Lebanon which reportedly violates a UN arms embargo imposed on the country. The reaction of the Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki – calling the action “official piracy in the name of inspection” – speaks for itself. His statement must be interpreted as a revelation that Iran does officially the best it can to wipe Israel off the map of the world. He officially criticizes the Israeli operation instead of trying to think of another lie that would partially conceal Iran’s most recent shame in front of the world.

It doesn’t matter much whether the Islamic leadership is trying to fulfill President Ahmadinejad’s alleged dream through WMDs or through helping anti-Israeli militant groups, except for the intelligence agencies. What matters is how to put an end to the Iranian government’s ambitions – which are to acquire WMDs and to wipe Israel off the map.

I said it before and I will say it again. The Iranian people has gone through a lot of unfortunate circumstances. They have seen few good both from their corrupt governments – regardless of whether it was during the rule of a Shah or that of a Supreme Leader – and from the Western world which let Saddam Hussein violate international law by using biological weapon against them, and also of stripping a democratically elected Prime Minister of power because of an oil scandal – something that even U.S. President Barack Obama confessed. What we have seen recently (their protest against the election results) is their discontent toward Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and the Western world (including Israel).

With such circumstances, all that the Iranian people need to do, in my opinion, is change of their system from an Islamic one to a secular one with preventive policies against corruption which is among the main reasons for the outbreak of the Islamic Revolution in 1979. It is both to their good and to everybody else’s good, otherwise they risk having their country further isolated, and isolation in today’s world of advancing technology and globalization can only be unfortunate for them, especially after several decades when people will use different sources of energy from the black gold.

The first ten amendments of the U.S. Constitution are known as the Bill of Rights. It has been into effect since December 15, 1791, when it was ratified by three-fourths of the states. Here’s the first two amendments’ language accompanied by their meaning:

First Amendment: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

The First Amendment is famous for protecting the American people from anybody’s (including the government’s) intervention in the individual’s choices of religion, of opinion on anything, and of creating whatever kinds of entities with other individual(s), if the nature of these entities doesn’t involve hurting other people in a way (violating their piece, for example). It is also known as the one that provides the individual with their freedom of religion and of speech. It also provides the individual with the right to sue the government, if the latter acted in an unjust way to the former.

Freedom of speech is a broad term, and oftentimes it is a question of an individual’s perception to determine how far that freedom could go. In one case, the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002 (BCRA), sponsored by Senator John McCain (R – Arizona) and Senator Russell Feingold (D – Wisconsin) whose purpose was to reform federal campaign finance in a way that would limit the political campaign contributors’ influence in the future politicians’ decision making,  was questioned as to whether or not it was constitutional regading the First Amendment. In McConnell v. Federal Election Commission, the U.S. Supreme Court held that “forbidding national party committees and their agents to solicit, receive, direct, or spend any funds that are not subject to limitations, prohibitions and reporting requirements of the Federal Election Commission Act (FECA) does not violate the First Amendment” because it is more important to prevent the actual or apparent corruption of federal candidates and officeholders, and anything that could lead to actual or apparent corruption.

In this case, such funds are so called “soft money” (which were not regulated by FECA) which were used in “issue ads” which did not mention “magic phrases” such as “vote against [John McCain]” or “vote for [Barack Obama]“. Under the law, this “soft money” may not come from the national level of a political party or from an agent, officer of such level within the party or from an entity that is (in)directly controlled by that party’s structure (2 U.S.C. §441i).

 Second Amendment: A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.

Better known as the right to bear arms, the language of this amendment is so unusual that it is still questioned. Some people are still not clear about whom the word ‘militia’ is referred to, a concern that is addressed on the first ruling on the Second Amendment by the U.S. Supreme Court ever as you will see. 

Strict constructionists (conservatives) interpret the amendment as one that provides the American people (except for “mentally retarded people, criminals, murderers and other groups of that kind”, as I explained before) with the right to bear arms at most places, while judicial activists (liberals) claim that the U.S. Constitution is a living document, and – unlike more than 200 years ago when the Bill of Rights was written, and when Great Britain was still a threat to the existence of the American nation – nowadays, the conservative interpretation is not as functional as before, meaning that there is no such a desperate need to have the right to bear arms. 

In D.C. v. Heller, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled a 32-year old D.C. ban on handguns unconstitutional. The then majority of the highest court in the country was right in their ruling for the following reasons the ban included keeping firearms nonfunctional even at home, even when necessary for self-defense which technically makes the firearm completely useless.

In regards to the word ‘Militia’ the court interpreted it as “all males physically capable of acting in concert for the common defense”. It means that the Second Amendment provides the physically capable males, regardless of whether or not they are from the military (that’s what ‘common defense’ means here), with the right to bear arms for the purpose of defending the United States from an attack by an enemy. That enemy could be an individual, a foreign country, a militant group, and so on.

Immediately after the New York Yankees won the World Series against the Philadelphia Phillies, some of the comments about it that I have seen is that a salary cap should be imposed in MLB and other sports so that they don’t turn business-only which would lead to the end of these sports. Imagine that – with the current system, we will see the same favorites for the particular championships and the same losers every season. What a mockery to most of the fans at the expense of the few!

Frankly, as a Mets fan, I was not happy to see the Yankees win the World Series, and I understand the frustration to a certain extent. After all, money gives you wings (Red Bull too, but not as often as money does) and more money gives you better wings. However, the idea of equal chances to all teams remains nothing more than a… utopia.

The Yankees can undoubtedly afford to buy – and pay the salaries of – more baseball players than most of the MLB teams, and therefore will get the best players on the market. Wasn’t this the same organization that didn’t make it to the postseason a year ago though? Wasn’t this the same organization (with completely different players for the most part, of course) that hasn’t won World Series in eight years? It appears that it takes the richest club in a championship just one title in order for some fans to request salary caps. Last year, probably the same fans were laughing at the Yankees because of their inability to win a postseason bid with all the money and stars that they had available.

Salary cap is not going to solve the problem

In fact, it will create a problem. Players and coaches will be less ambitious in their work which will bring the sport into a stagnation. In other words, ten years from now its dynamics will not have changed, tactics will most likely stay the same, as a result of which, according to the economic law of diminishing utility, you will see older fans getting sick of seeing the same old production from their favorite club but with different team-mates, thus creating a recipee for disaster.

From sociology, we know that most young fans get excited about a sport because it is a family trait to watch it and root for a certain club and because their peers do it, and the latter is requisite of conversations. Comparatively few are the people who are interested in following a sports championship just for themselves, no matter how sad this sounds.

Besides, from the perspective of the same economic law, if one and the same teams win the title (regardless of the kind of sport), fewer people will follow it. We watch something that we find interesting. If we watch a season the champion of which is known very much ahead of time, we usually lose interest in watching it.

Why no salary cap is good for the sport

Coaches and players will be more ambitious in their work. They have families to feed, and like us they want to sign contracts for higher salaries. From macroeconomic perspective, with the more money that they receive from their clubs, they are going to spend more money for each additional dollar that they receive in their new contract. Part of this spending might go to your pocket, no matter whether you are a businessman or an business agent.

Poor clubs will benefit from the transfers that they make with clubs like the Yankees. In this situation, their priority should be to develop players who are good enough to replace the ones already transferred. It sounds easier than it is to be done but life is not easy anyway. Thus these poor clubs can have the potential to be equally competitive stronger clubs. Of course, the strongest oppositions will look unattainable to beat because they will have developed the players that they bought earlier but something that looks unattainable doesn’t mean that it is impossible to attain.

The same poor clubs will potentially be stimulated to rewrite the economic and marketing books by creating new strategies of being competitive. Not everything in this world is unearthed – for a long time people haven’t been aware of what rights and liberties are because the Church had too much of an impact on their lives and personalities.

Also, as a Mets fan, I would be a lot more delighted to see the Mets win the World Series in these circumstances than see them win them because richer clubs couldn’t stimulate their teams to perform better. With a salary cap, there is a possibility of 30 Yankees imitations – some of them good enough, others as weak as before because of poor judgments – competing for the title.

For the last couple of months I have been doing a weekly roundup of what is happening with the political life in Connecticut at state level.

In case you are interested to check it out but haven’t seen the new links that I put on the right side of this blog, you can click here. I hope that you like it, and I hope that I have been of help to you in knowing more about the most interesting political news in the State of Connecticut.

I have been thinking of expanding my blog with a new category and here it is – The Law. The Law will be a category where I will write about laws of any kind.

They could be international, federal, state, foreign, even court decisions, court procedures, bills, and so on. If you have any requests for me to interpret laws, and do a certain research on them, you can let me know about it on my Facebook page, my Twitter page or through my email. I hope I will be of help to you.

A disturbing news for the Democratic Party, and the Republican Party to a certain extent, has appeared on Yahoo! Finance. Raj Rajaratnam, a Wall Street billionaire, originally from Sri Lanka and with dual citizenship, whose net worth is valued at $1.3 billion, was arrested, together with six hedge funds managers for allegedly conducting insider trading schemes which generated illegal profits of $25 billion.

The news concerns not just finance but politics as well. According to the Federal Election Commission (FEC), Raj Rajaratnam contributed to political campaigns for federal office, and most of these contributions went to the Democratic Party and the Democratic candidates. Here’s what the political contributions data show regarding not just Raj Rajaratnam but also everybody else involved, thanks to Associated Press writers, and some analysis from my part:

• Raj Rajaratnam: $4,200 to Hillary Clinton’s Senatorial Democratic primary campaign and $26,700 to the Senatorial Campaign Committee of the party, $4,600 to Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign during the Democratic primaries, $2,000 to Rohit Khanna for his Congressional Democratic primary campaign for the 12th District in New York (Mr. Khanna was appointed by President Obama to serve as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Domestic Operations), $2,000 to Maria Cantwell for the general election for Senator in Washington, $2,000 to Charles Schumer’s Senatorial campaign ($1,000 for the primary and other $1,000 for the general election), $5,000 to a Volunteer PAC. $2,300 were were disbursed from Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign during the general election. $30,800 to the Obama Victory Fund known as Barack Obama’s Principal Campaign Committee, another $4,600 ($2,300+2,300 at the same day, one for the primaries and one for the general elections, as filed with the FEC) to Barack Obama, $12,100 ($2,100+$10,000) to New Jersey Democratic Victory which is a fundraising project for Senator Robert Menendez (D – New Jersey), other $2,100 given personally to Senator Menendez (that is, not through the fundraiser) on the same day when the $12,100 were donated to the project, additional $10,000 that went through the New Jersey Democratic State Committee (again on the same day), and $26,200 to the Democratic National Committee (this time from a different address in New York City, as you can see). Raj Rajaratnam is also alleged to have sponsored the Tamil Tigers, a terrorist group in Sri Lanka. These numbers plus the allegation and other related facts are a big red light for the Obama Administration and the Democratic Party. In times of a crisis in the right, the GOP will be sure to use them against the current majority at the federal level, and why not at the state level. The people in New Jersey are getting mad at the Democratic Party there, especially when it comes to their property taxes and the corruption scandals in the Garden State, and it won’t be surprising if the state experiences a reallignment after less than three weeks.
• Rajiv Goel had personally no campaign contributions whatsoever according to the FEC. His name doesn’t appear on their data at all.
• Anil Kumar: the media say that he is a director at McKinsey & Co. Inc. but FEC data show several people with the name Anil Kumar and none of them holds such a position. Click here to see it for yourself.
• Robert W. Moffat, Jr. has not personally made any contributions. There are several people named Robert Moffat but none of them appears to be the resident of Ridgefield, Connecticut, nor is it there a person with this name who works for IBM.
• Danielle Chiesi: $5,000 to the National Republican Congressional Committee plus $200 twice beforehand to the same grantee. This may somewhat make some Republicans more unwilling to make a big deal out of the inside trading scandal but not as much as required. Twelve years are a long period of time, not to mention the comparatively insignificant amount of money given to the GOP. Of course, if we take inflation into consideration, the worth of $5,000 back then is more than it is today but this message particularly is too abstract to be given to the people. Don’t get me wrong, I think that people are smart enough for the most part but this exact issue is very much hidden into the background, that is, the whole picture.
• Mark Kurland: $500 to Bear Stearns PAC 12 years ago. Bear Stearns PAC has given money both to Republicans and Democrats for the last two years.

How this will affect the American left is still too early to predict, and I am sure that there are a lot of details that we as outsiders are not aware of, which are very likely to change the analyses to a whole lot different direction. Other scenario can be that everybody will keep quiet on it which, to me, is unlikely but is hypothetically possible. What is for sure though is that the Democratic Party must pay attention to the entire situation and prepare a good and reasonable answer which exists for sure, at least because there are too many contributors to political parties and candidates for office in order to keep track on everybody’s reputation, not to mention that contributors would be more willing to give money to candidates for office that are more likely to win an election. Besides, this is allegedly an inside trading scheme which can have tons of interpretations. As one who considers himself a Democrat, I hope and believe that there is absolutely no place for fears here.

Breaking news today inform people all over the world about a concealed nuclear facility in Iran. This time the Iranian leadership was kind enough to be the first to let the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) know about the underground facility. Is that so, though?

Unfortunately not. The fact that it was first said by the Iranian government doesn’t mean that there were no circumstances from outside Iran other than international regulations that made it do so.  Arguably the most consistent circumstance is called collection of intelligence. If it wasn’t for the intelligence, I strongly doubt that the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic of Iran Ayatollah Ali Khamenei – the person most tightly involved with the nuclear program, not to be confused with the powerfully weak President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad – would instruct his puppet to tell the world about the underground nuclear facility for no reason other than being aware of the western intelligence agencies’ awareness of what is going on northeast of Qom.

Furthermore, the Iranian government’s communication with the IAEA has always caused lack of confidence toward Tehran. Its late and often lame responses to the agency’s questions posed as a result of its and intelligence agencies’ revelations about the Islamic republic’s nuclear program have created such a discredit on it by the international community that even presumably naive people as well as political doves – as President Obama is estimated to possess the latter characteristic – have used a harsher language in their reactions to Iran’s letter to the IAEA.

Besides, if it was absolutely true that the facility was being built for peaceful purposes, questions such as why the Iranian government lets the international community know about it today and not on the day it actually started the construction remain unanswered. After all, the construction of the facility was allegedly started in mid-2006.

The near future

Without insider’s information, it is next to impossible to predict what sanctions will be imposed, especially not until the Geneva talks between Iran, Germany and the five permanent members of the UN Secirity Council that will be held in less than two weeks. Fortunately, sanctions are more likely than ever as all the five leaders of the permanent members of the UN Secirity Council expressed concerns and criticized Iran for constructing the nuclear facility, and to end up without imposing any sanctions against the Iranian government will be the most surprising outcome of the whole story. They just have to make sure to impose sanctions that will not hurt the Iranian people because we already know what the reaction to such sanctions lead to – xenophobia.