Yesterday, Gov. Bobby Jindal (R-LA) signed two laws targeting undocumented workers, including one that is closely modeled on an Arizona law recently upheld by the Supreme Court:

No person, either for himself or on behalf of another, shall employ, hire, recruit, or refer, for private or public employment within the state, an alien who is not entitled to lawfully reside or work in the United States. [...] For a third or subsequent violation, the appropriate local governing authority or licensing agency shall immediately suspend the violator’s permit or license to do business in the state for not less than thirty days nor more than six months and a fine shall be assessed that shall be not more than one thousand two thousand five hundred dollars for each alien employed, hired, recruited, or referred in violation of this Section.

Although the Court’s very recent decision in Chamber of Commerce v. Whiting permits Louisana to strip away business licenses from companies that hire undocumented workers, the state’s attempt to fine employers unambiguously violates federal law. Under a doctrine known as “preemption,” Congress may invalidate state laws which conflict with a federal policy, and federal immigration law preempts “any State or local law imposing civil or criminal sanctions (other than through licensing and similar laws) upon those who employ…unauthorized aliens.”

Although Whiting held that the express exemption for “licensing and similar laws” allows states to enact a law which strips business licenses from companies that employ undocumented workers, the exemption only applies to licensing laws and not to general fines for business that employ immigrants. Any attempt to fine businesses in order to regulate their employment of undocumented workers is a clear violation of federal law.

In an interview touting his self-parodying bill to privatize airport security, Rep. Ron Paul (R-TX) made the remarkable claim that the 9/11 attacks occurred as a result of the government prohibiting firearms on airplanes:

PAUL: The responsibility [to ensure airport security] should be on the airlines. Just as it’s on—the responsibility—of the owners of chemical plants of the owners of armored cars. They take charge of that, and they do a very, very good job. And the government was in charge of security before 9/11 and they did a lousy job. They prohibited guns from being on the airplane, and they said nobody should resist, and so we set the stage for 9/11.

Watch it:

Later in the same interview, Paul took his ultra-libertarian attitude even further, suggesting that the free market should allow customers to decide how much security they want — even if that means permitting racial profiling:

QUESTION: If you privatize airport screening and security, how does profiling fit into that?

PAUL: Well they’re allowed to. Because a private company has an obligation. If you don’t like the airline, and they do too much profiling, then don’t fly on that airline.

There are obviously many things wrong with Paul’s claim that the rights of minorities should depend on what corporate executives decide to give them, but Paul’s overarching claim that the free market should be allowed to decide how much security we have in airports exposes the utter ridiculousness of his libertarian philosophy. Among other things, impatient travelers and al Qaeda members will both opt into an airline with minimal security, and the people in the World Trade Center will have no say in whether those passengers should have been required to undergo more rigorous screening.

Last night, Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) became the first presidential candidate to sign a maximalist socially conservative pledge that, among other things, calls for “all forms of pornography” to be banned. In other words, yesterday marks the day when Bachmann added the First Amendment to the long list of constitutional provisions she despises.

The right to express yourself — whether erotically or otherwise — is one of the most fundamental rights enshrined in our Constitution. As the Supreme Court explained nearly 40 years ago, only the most “patently offensive” erotic expression that is utterly lacking in any “serious literary, artistic, political, or scientific value” can be banned without violating the First Amendment.

Moreover, there is very real danger in allowing Bachmann to ban a certain kind of expression simply because it bothers her. Des Moines school officials were bothered by opposition to the Vietnam war, so they banned the most quiet and unintrusive protest of one of America’s greatest mistakes. The Wilson Administration was bothered by opposition to World War I, so it banned that opposition as well. Postal Inspector Anthony Comstock waged war on art and literature that he found bothersome, combing through American’s mail to root out literature anyone might find the least bit titillating. It is virtually impossible to draw principled lined between art and mere vulgarity, and so our Constitution does not leave this choice up to the whims of government officials.

Bachmann, however, clearly believes the entire Constitution should be read according to her most uninformed whims. Bachmann suggested Census forms are unconstitutional. She supports stripping federal judges of their power to hear marriage equality cases in order to prevent the Constitution’s guarantee of equal protection of the law from being extended to gay people. Bachmann even invited two radical tenthers who believe that everything from Social Security to the federal highway system to the 17th Amendment to the Constitution are unconstitutional to lecture her fellow lawmakers on what the Constitution requires. (Yes, you read that right, one of Bachmann’s constitutional role models believes that part of the Constitution is unconstitutional.)

In the end, it is difficult to read Bachmann’s agenda as anything less than a mission to replace the entire Constitution with her own selfish desires. If Bachmann thinks Social Security should be repealed or that the Census should use different forms, then she should introduce legislation that will do so and try to get it passed, but Bachmann is simply wrong to pretend that the Constitution says whatever she wants it to say.

A 28-year old Washington state construction worker Ikenna Njoku bought a home a year ago, considered by many to be an essential part of the American Dream. “I was really excited. For the first time, I actually got to buy a lawn mower, mow my lawn and everything,” he told a local news station.

By purchasing a home, Njoku qualified for a first time home buyer rebate on his tax return. The IRS directly deposited his rebate into his Chase Bank account. Chase had previously closed Njoku’s account due to overdrawn checks, so it first deducted $600 to recoup its expenses and then mailed a $8,463.21 check to him.

But when he showed up at Chase Bank to cash his check, the teller refused to believe that it was legitimate. He returned later and found the police waiting for him. He was immediately arrested. Within a day, the bank realized it had made a mistake, but because the local detective was off work, Njoku was unable to get out of jail for three days.

By then, he had been fired from his job and his car had been towed. He ended up having to sell the car because he couldn’t afford to get it out of the pound. And after all this, Chase still hasn’t apologized in the year since these events occured. His lawyer his requested damages from the bank, but has yet to get any sort of agreement out of it. Local news station KING 5 filed a video report about Njoku’s case. Watch it:

KING 5 reached out to Chase Bank for a response to Njoku’s predicament. It received a 2-sentence reply from Chase Media Relation’s Darcy Donoahoe-Wilmot: “We received the letter and are reviewing the situation. We’ll be reaching out to the customer.” “It’s one thing to make a mistake,” responded Chase Luna, Njoku’s attorney. “It’s one thing to make multiple errors of judgment like Chase has made and then, once you realize that your error has caused such harm to somebody else, to just ignore it for a year. I think he deserved better. I think all their customers do.”