RUTHFULLY YOURS

Chief Judge Beryl A. Howell, appointed by President Obama to the District Court for the District of Columbia, left out “so help me God” while administering the Oath of Allegiance at a naturalization ceremony Wednesday.

Howell asked the new U.S. citizens to raise their right hand and “repeat the ‘Oath of Allegiance’ after me.”

According to U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, the oath goes: “I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will bear arms on behalf of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform noncombatant service in the Armed Forces of the United States when required by the law; that I will perform work of national importance under civilian direction when required by the law; and that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God.”

When presiding over the ceremony at the National Archives in Washington, Howell omitted “so help me God” at the end of the oath. She then congratulated the new U.S. citizens and said they may be seated.

Title 8 of the Code of Federal Regulations provides for a religious exemption, stating in part, “When a petitioner or applicant for naturalization, by reason of religious training and belief (or individual interpretation thereof), or for other reasons of good conscience, cannot take the oath prescribed in paragraph (a) of this section with the words ‘on oath’ and ‘so help me God’ included, the words ‘and solemnly affirm’ shall be substituted for the words ‘on oath,’ the words ‘so help me God’ shall be deleted, and the oath shall be taken in such modified form.”

Judge Howell did not mention the phrase “and solemnly affirmed” while administering the oath Wednesday. U.S. Code does not outline the specific rules for the official or judge presiding over a mass public naturalization ceremony when one or more new citizens requests a religious exemption. CONTINUE AT SITE

The Children of Abraham of the Southern Tier, an interfaith organization in Johnson City, has taken offense at the 9/11 memorial raised in the nearby Town of Owego, New York. This association of misguided multiculturalists and Muslim moderates allege that identifying the perpetrators of the worst individual act of aggression on American soil would encourage Muslim hatred, never once excoriating the very act that resulted in the death and injury to more than 3,000 American victims and 453 responders and boundless grief for their families and for all Americans.

Did the moderates ever attempt to apologize for the horrific crime that forced people to jump to their death rather than be burned alive? Did they express their sorrow for the victims and heroic rescue workers, or atone in a way to benefit the families that suffered such tragic loss? Do they even acknowledge that Islamic terrorists continue their march of evil, putting America and Europe on high alert for 9/11, or that this was part of Islam’s perpetual holy war against every living being on the planet. No. And the city manager’s overtures were also snubbed.

The Muslim residents of Johnson City may be moderates who never take up a lethal weapon for Allah, but they are engaging in a subtle act of civilizational or settlement jihad. Such people are comparatively discreet in Western society, going about their lives inconspicuously, but effecting regime changes in gradual increments. By their refusal to acknowledge the obvious links between Islam and 9/11, they shield those who spew hatred against America, Israel and democracy; they empower the academics and students who vilify Israel and Jewish students on campus, and they facilitate the crossing of borders for hijra (conquest by increased population). Under the guise of injured sensibilities, they insist on the removal of anything that may identify those who pursue our destruction and conquest with Islam, hoping to erase the ugly truth that fourteen centuries of barbarism continues unabated in every country where Islam is found.

They would have us believe that a tiny minority is to blame, but a recent Pew Research poll shows that 51 percent of American Muslims choose to be governed by sharia; 30% believe it is legitimate to use violence against those who insult Muhammed, the Koran, or Islam; 25 percent believe violence against Americans can be justified as part of the global jihad; and nearly 20% believe the use of violence in the US is justified in order to make sharia the law of the land. When presented with a choice when sharia conflicts with the US Constitution and Bill of Rights, 33% say sharia should be supreme. That’s some minority! Politically, 48% are Democrats, 19 percent Independents, and 19 percent Republicans.

“[A] basic American legal principle [is]: American courts apply American law, rather than one rule for Muslims, one rule for Christians, one rule for Jews, and so on.” — Eugene Volokh, First Amendment law professor at UCLA.

Allowing Islamic shariah law to substitute for state law regarding inheritance and related matters would undercut the values of equal protection of the laws and equality before the law, and in many instances, would violate American law.

The Minnesota Court of Appeals has rejected an argument that would essentially have required a lower court to divide the proceeds of a wrongful-death suit under shariah (Islamic law) rules governing inheritance. The decision was based on technical grounds, leaving open the question of whether a state court would apply shariah in the future.

Nadir Ibrahim Ombabi, a 57-year-old taxi driver, was killed October 29, 2012, in a car accident outside Minneapolis. Ombabi was a native of Sudan, where he was a family doctor, and was working on becoming certified as a medical doctor in the U.S. when he died. He was active in Minnesota’s Sudanese community.

Ombabi left behind a wife, mother, brother, and sisters. He married Nariman Sirag Elsayed Khalil in Sudan, under Islamic law. Reportedly, she was still living in Africa when Ombabi died, and he would “often send back money to help his family.” His brother was living in California and a sister in Canada.

Ombabi’s next of kin brought a wrongful-death claim, which was settled for $183,000. Minnesota law requires the proceeds of a wrongful-death suit to be given to “the surviving spouse and next of kin, proportionate to the pecuniary loss severally suffered by the death.”

Next of kin are basically everyone who qualifies as a potential heir under the state’s intestacy law. States have laws governing how to distribute property when a person dies without leaving a will. In Minnesota, if the decedent has no children (as seems true of Ombabi), or if all of his children are also children of his widow, the widow inherits the entire estate. If, and only if, the decedent leaves neither spouse nor children, the estate passes to his parents. If he leaves no parents either, it goes to his brothers and/or sisters.

The district court found “no credible evidence to prove Mr. Ombabi’s mother, brother, or sisters experienced a pecuniary loss, or more importantly what that pecuniary loss is, because of Mr. Ombabi’s passing.” It ordered that all of the proceeds (less expenses) be given to Ombabi’s widow, Khalil.

Ombabi’s brother objected that the court should have divided the proceeds under Islamic law, giving the widow only 25%, Ombabi’s mother’s estate 16.7%, and the balance distributed among Ombabi’s siblings, with the brother receiving twice as much as each sister. He based this on the claim that “the law of all parties (the decedent, his widow and decedent’s next of kin) is the Islamic Law and they are all Muslims and follow the specifics of the religion.”

The court rejected that argument, on the grounds that it was unsupported by legal authority or argument, and that it was unclear whether it had been raised in the lower court. As a general rule, new issues may not be raised for the first time on appeal.

The court did not prohibit application of shariah to wrongful death suits or other cases. It only held that it found no legal or factual support that would justify applying it to Ombabi’s case.

Democrats are running for office claiming that the U.S. needs to spend hundreds of billions on infrastructure. If you want to know why they’re not serious, look no further than the Obama Administration’s order halting construction on a sliver of an oil pipeline in North Dakota even after the U.S. won in court.

On Friday federal Judge James Boasberg allowed construction to proceed on the 1,100 Dakota Access pipeline, which aims to deliver a half million barrels of crude a day from the Bakken shale to Pakota, Illinois, for delivery to East Coast and Gulf refineries. Shipping oil via pipeline is less expensive and safer than by rail with fewer carbon emissions.

The Dakota Access would be a boon for the northern Plains, which has suffered more from the rout in oil prices than other regions with better access to markets. The pipeline would make Bakken crude more economical by reducing the shipping cost and supply glut at the source. It was on course to be finished by the end of this year.

But green groups have locked arms with some Native American tribes to block pipeline work around Lake Oahe—a water source for the Standing Rock Sioux—that was permitted this summer by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Nearly half of the clearing and grading for the pipeline is complete including 90% in North Dakota. As Judge Boasberg noted, the pipeline “needs almost no federal permitting of any kind because 99% of its route traverses private land.”

Under the National Historic Preservation Act, federal agencies must follow certain procedures prior to permitting projects that could affect places of cultural or religious significance to Indian tribes. But the law applies only to activities that are subject to federal jurisdiction, not those undertaken on private land.

The company Dakota Access went above and beyond the law’s requirements to mitigate its environmental impact. This meant devising the route to avoid sites on the National Register of Historic Places as well as those identified as potentially eligible for listing. Archaeologists conducted cultural surveys including visual reconnaissance and “shove-test probes” to examine historic sites. The pipeline was modified 140 times in North Dakota alone to avoid potential cultural resources. Around Lake Oahe, the pipeline will run adjacent to the Northern Border Gas Pipeline that was completed in 1982, which reduces the likelihood that construction would harm intact tribal features.

The Army Corps of Engineers bent over backward to consult the Standing Rock Sioux, only to be ignored or rejected. The tribe ignored agency letters requesting comment and belatedly cancelled meetings. “When the Corps timely arrived for the meeting,” the judge noted, “Tribal Chairman David Archambault told them that the conclave had started earlier than planned and had already ended.”

After the Corps issued an environmental assessment of “no significant impact” in July, the Standing Rock sued the Corps for violating the National Historic Preservation Act’s consultation requirements and sought to force a halt to construction around Lake Oahe. CONTINUE AT SITE